{Out Where The Water Is - Andrew Pope Cody x F!Reader}
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Andrew did not say no when you suggested the beach.
That was how you knew he was nervous.
If he had hated the idea outright, he would have said so. Bluntly. Immediately. Probably while giving you three reasons why it was impractical and one reason why Andie would try to eat something dangerous within five minutes of arrival.
Instead, he went quiet.
You were in the kitchen, one hip leaned against the counter while Andie stood at the open cupboard under the sink, attempting to remove every clean cloth you owned from the basket. She had already made a pile on the floor and was very proud of herself.
Andrew stood near the fridge with his coffee untouched in his hand.
His eyes flicked to you.
Then to Andie.
Then to the window, where the morning sun made the kitchen look warmer than it was.
"The beach?" he asked.
"Just for the morning."
He looked back at you. "Is it busy?"
"Probably a bit."
"How busy?"
"Andrew, it's a beach, not a hostage exchange."
His mouth twitched, but the tension stayed in his shoulders.
You softened.
"We don't have to stay long."
Andie pulled a cloth free, turned, and held it out to him.
"Da."
Andrew took it automatically.
"Thank you."
She went back for another.
He watched her for a second, something shifting in his face.
"No," he said.
You paused.
"No beach?"
"No." He set his coffee down. "She should see the water."
There it was.
Not I want to go.
Not yet.
She should.
That was Andrew all over. He could still make himself brave faster for Andie than for himself.
You crossed the kitchen and touched his wrist.
"Then we'll go slow."
His eyes dropped to your hand.
He still did that sometimes.
Not as much as the first week home, when every casual touch seemed to catch him off guard. But enough that you noticed. Enough that your heart always gave a small, sad twist before it warmed again.
He turned his hand and linked his fingers with yours.
"Okay."
Andie arrived with another cloth.
She pushed it against his leg.
"Da."
Andrew looked down.
Then at the six cloths already on the floor.
"You packing?"
Andie grinned.
You smiled.
"She heard beach day and immediately entered logistics mode."
"She's not wearing shoes," Andrew said.
"She will be."
Andie looked at him.
"No."
Andrew looked at you.
"You sure?"
"She knows."
"Already?"
"She's fourteen months old. She knows anything involving shoes is an attack on her freedom."
Andie slapped the cloth against the floor.
"No."
Andrew sighed.
"Good start."
Getting ready for the beach took forty-seven minutes.
This was, according to you, a record.
According to Andrew, it was a warning from God.
Andie treated sunscreen like a personal betrayal.
You sat on the living room floor with her between your knees, trying to rub lotion onto one arm while she twisted dramatically away from you.
"No."
"Yes."
"No."
"Sunburn is also no."
"No."
Andrew crouched in front of her, holding the tiny sunhat.
"You need sunscreen."
Andie glared at him.
"No."
"The sun doesn't care that you're angry."
She stared.
"No."
You looked at Andrew over her head.
"She has strong legal arguments."
"She has one argument."
"She says it with conviction."
Andrew tried to put the hat on her.
Andie took it off immediately and threw it at his chest.
He caught it.
Then stared at her.
"That was rude."
Andie laughed.
You pressed your lips together.
Andrew looked at you. "Don't."
"I didn't say anything."
"You have a face."
"I have many faces."
"She gets this from you."
"She gets her throwing arm from your family."
He looked down at Andie, who was now attempting to crawl over your leg to freedom with one sunscreen-slick arm and a sock halfway off.
"Probably."
By the time she was finally dressed, she had sunscreen in her hair, one shoe on, one shoe missing, and a look of deep resentment aimed at the entire adult population.
You were sweating.
Andrew had lost a button again.
No one knew how.
Andie held the sunhat in one hand like a trophy.
Andrew checked the beach bag for the third time.
"Towels?"
"Yes."
"Water?"
"Yes."
"Snacks?"
"Yes."
"Extra clothes?"
"Yes."
"Her cup?"
"Yellow one."
"The blue one too?"
"In case she emotionally matures during the drive."
He glanced at you.
"She won't."
"No."
He looked in the bag again.
You stepped close and placed both hands on his chest.
"Baby."
His eyes came to yours.
"I packed the bag."
"I know."
"You checked the bag."
"I know."
"The bag is ready."
His jaw shifted.
"I don't want to forget something."
"You won't."
"I might."
"Then we'll survive without it."
His expression said that seemed unlikely.
You smiled and reached up, brushing your thumb along his jaw.
"It's just the beach."
His eyes softened.
"No," he said quietly. "It's not."
Your chest tightened.
For a moment, neither of you moved.
Behind you, Andie yelled, "Da!" and hit the coffee table with her sunhat.
Andrew exhaled.
You leaned up and kissed him quickly.
"Okay," you whispered. "Then it's not just the beach. But we're still only staying as long as we want."
He nodded.
Andie threw the hat again.
It landed on his foot.
He looked down.
"She's going to be a problem."
"She is already a problem."
Andie clapped.
"Da!"
Andrew picked up the hat.
"Yeah," he said. "I know."
The beach was too much at first.
You saw it hit him the second you got out of the car.
The sky.
The noise.
The wind coming in off the water.
Children shouting somewhere near the shoreline. Dogs barking. Gulls screaming like they had urgent legal complaints. Cars pulling in and out of the car park. Waves breaking again and again and again, a sound with no walls around it.
Andrew stood beside the car with the beach bag in one hand and Andie on his other hip.
He went still.
Not frozen exactly.
Contained.
His eyes moved too quickly across the open stretch of sand.
Left.
Right.
Waterline.
People.
Exit.
You closed the car door and came around to his side.
Andie was already pointing.
"Wa."
Your heart softened.
"Yeah, baby. Water."
Andrew's gaze dropped to her.
That helped.
You could see it.
The way his body came back by a fraction because Andie was not afraid of the sky. She was not counting exits. She was not scanning faces. She was reaching toward the water with one sticky hand and all the trust in the world that someone would carry her there.
You touched Andrew's back.
"Too much?"
He did not answer right away.
Then, honest enough to hurt, he said, "No."
A beat.
"Yes."
You nodded.
"We can go."
His hand tightened on the beach bag.
"No."
"Andrew."
"No." He looked toward the water. "Just give me a second."
So you did.
You stood beside him in the car park, your hand at his back, Andie on his hip, the ocean spread huge and bright ahead of you.
No locked door.
No guard.
No time limit.
Just open space.
Andrew breathed in.
Once.
Twice.
Andie patted his cheek.
"Da."
He looked down at her.
His face softened.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "I see it."
She pointed harder.
"Wa."
"I know."
You smiled.
"She wants to go."
"She's impatient."
"She is your daughter."
"She gets impatience from you."
"She gets brooding from you."
"She called the sea water after one glance. She's a genius."
"She tried to put a sandal on her hand this morning."
"Versatile genius."
Andrew huffed softly.
Not quite a laugh.
Enough.
You threaded your fingers through his free hand and started toward the sand.
Andie hated the beach.
For twelve seconds.
Andrew set her down carefully near your blanket, one hand hovering behind her back like she might topple into the earth's core.
Her bare feet touched the sand.
She froze.
Her face went blank.
Then offended.
Deeply, personally offended.
She lifted one foot.
Looked at it.
Looked at Andrew.
"No."
You laughed before you could stop yourself.
Andrew crouched beside her.
"Yeah," he said solemnly. "I agree."
Andie lifted the other foot and nearly lost her balance.
Andrew caught her instantly.
She grabbed his shoulder.
"No."
"That's sand."
"No."
"I know."
You lowered the beach bag onto the blanket and knelt beside them.
"It feels weird at first."
Andie stared at the ground like it had betrayed her.
Then she bent at the waist and poked the sand with one finger.
Andrew watched closely.
"Careful."
She poked again.
Then brought her finger toward her mouth.
Andrew caught her wrist gently.
"No eating sand."
Andie frowned.
"No."
"Correct. No."
You pressed your lips together.
He looked up at you.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"She almost ate sand."
"She's at the beach. She was always going to try."
"That's not comforting."
"Welcome to the beach."
Andie poked the sand again.
This time she did not eat it.
Progress.
Then she sat down abruptly and began patting both hands into it.
Andrew looked horrified.
"She's sitting in it."
"That is also part of the beach."
"She hated it five seconds ago."
"She contains multitudes."
Andie grabbed a fistful of sand and dropped it on her own knee.
"Da!"
Andrew nodded, very serious.
"Good work."
You sat back on your heels and watched them.
Andrew crouched in the sand in front of his daughter, sleeves rolled, shoulders still too tight but softening by the second as he narrated the world to her.
It pulled at something deep in you.
All those prison phone calls.
All those recordings.
All those visits where he had spoken to her through glass, through wires, through time limits.
And now here he was.
In open air.
Telling his daughter not to eat sand.
You laughed quietly.
He glanced up.
"What?"
"I love you."
His face changed.
The beach moved around you. Wind. Water. Strangers. Gulls.
Andrew looked at you like the words had reached him anyway.
"I love you too."
Andie threw sand on his shoe.
He looked down.
"Rude."
You smiled.
"Your daughter is making memories."
"She's making a mess."
"That too."
The water was a negotiation.
You had expected Andie to run straight for it.
You were wrong.
The second the waves became more than a shiny idea in the distance, she decided caution was her new religion.
Andrew carried her down to the edge of the wet sand with you walking beside them. Andie was on his hip, one arm looped around his neck, sunhat finally on her head because the wind had apparently made it acceptable.
The water rushed forward in a thin sheet.
Andie gasped.
Her whole body pulled back against Andrew.
He stopped immediately.
"Too close?"
She pointed at the wave.
"Wa."
"Yes," you said. "That's water."
The wave slid back.
Another came in.
Andie shrieked.
Not quite fear.
Not quite delight.
Something wild and in-between.
Then she grabbed Andrew's shirt with both hands.
"Dada!"
Andrew's arm tightened around her instantly.
"I've got you."
You looked at them.
The words hit differently every time.
He had said them through labour.
Through phone calls.
Through the first morning home.
Through banana politics and bumped foreheads and bad naps.
But here, with the ocean pulling at the shore and Andie clinging to him, they sounded like a promise he could finally keep with his whole body.
"She knows who to grab," you said softly.
Andrew looked at you.
His eyes were wet.
From wind, maybe.
Maybe not.
"She does."
The waves came again.
Andie pressed her face against his neck.
Andrew turned slightly, shielding her from the spray.
"It's loud, huh?" he murmured to her.
Andie peeked at the water.
"Wa."
"Yeah. Loud."
She looked at him.
He shifted her higher.
"That's okay," he said, voice low enough that you almost missed it under the surf. "Loud things can still be safe."
Your throat tightened.
Andrew did not look at you when he said it.
You did not make him.
Some things were easier spoken to a toddler first.
Andie considered the water.
Another wave rushed in.
This time, she did not hide.
She watched it with suspicious interest.
Andrew crouched, keeping her on his knee, one arm around her waist. He let the water come close enough to touch the edge of his shoe, but not her feet yet.
Andie stared.
Then she pointed.
"No."
Andrew nodded. "That's fair."
You laughed.
"Maybe next time."
He looked at you.
"Next time," he repeated.
The words sat there for a second.
Next time.
A thing you could say now without a prison calendar attached.
A thing that meant weekend mornings and weather and toddler moods, not approvals and guards and counts.
You stepped closer and leaned into his side.
His free hand found your waist automatically.
It had become one of your favourite things since he came home.
The way he reached for you without asking himself whether he was allowed.
The way his hand settled at your back in the kitchen, on your hip in the hallway, against your knee in the car, like touch was a language he was relearning and still afraid to waste.
You rested your head briefly against his shoulder.
Andie pointed again at the water.
"Wa."
"Yes," Andrew said. "Water."
A gull screamed behind you.
Andie's head snapped around.
"Duck!"
You lost it.
A laugh burst out of you so suddenly Andie startled.
Andrew looked toward the gull.
Then at his daughter.
"No," he said seriously. "That one's worse."
You laughed harder.
Andie pointed at the gull, delighted.
"Duck!"
"Bad duck," Andrew said.
You bent forward, one hand over your mouth.
"Andrew."
"What? It's true."
"It is not a duck."
"It's bad."
Andie waved at the gull.
"Bad duck!"
Your mouth fell open.
Andrew froze.
Then looked at you with something like pride.
You stared back.
"No."
"She said it."
"No."
"She's right."
"You taught our daughter to call seagulls bad ducks."
"She learned fast."
Andie pointed at another gull.
"Bad duck!"
Andrew nodded.
"Yes."
You were crying from laughing now.
"Excellent parenting."
"She's observant."
"She's going to call every bird a bad duck."
"Some birds deserve it."
Andie clapped.
"Bad duck!"
Andrew's mouth twitched.
Then he laughed.
Really laughed.
Not the quiet, careful one from the first day home.
Not the broken little laugh that came through tears.
A real laugh, rough and surprised and carried off by the wind.
You stopped laughing just to hear it.
He saw your face.
His smile faded into something softer.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"You do that."
"Do what?"
"Look at me like I did something."
"You laughed."
He looked away toward the water.
"Yeah."
"I like it."
His hand tightened at your waist.
The gull screamed again.
Andie yelled, "Bad duck!"
Andrew laughed again.
This time, he did not hide it.
They built a sandcastle badly.
Technically, you built it.
Andrew guarded the bucket.
Andie destroyed the lower walls with one determined hand while shouting, "No," every time anyone tried to redirect her.
"This is not a castle," Andrew said after the third collapse.
"It is abstract."
"It's a pile."
"It is a fortified pile."
Andie patted wet sand onto his knee.
"Da."
"Yes," you said. "Dada is part of the pile now."
Andrew looked down at the sand on his jeans.
Then at Andie.
She smiled sweetly.
He sighed.
"She gets away with too much."
"You are part of the problem."
"I know."
After the sandcastle came snacks.
Andie ate three pieces of banana without objection, which you and Andrew both treated with the wary respect of witnessing a natural phenomenon.
Then she became furious at a cracker.
Normal service resumed.
Andrew sat on the blanket with her between his knees, wiping sand from her fingers before she could shove them into the snack cup. You sat beside him, legs stretched out, one shoulder touching his.
He kept glancing around.
Less sharply now.
Still aware.
Still Andrew.
But not trapped inside the watching.
When Andie finished her snack, she pushed herself to standing with one hand on his thigh.
"Careful," he murmured.
She stepped away.
Only two steps.
Maybe three.
Not far.
Toward a shell half-buried in the sand.
Andrew's entire body went still.
You saw the moment happen.
The old instinct rose first.
The flash of fear.
The calculation.
The need to hold her close because the world was too open and too much and she was too small.
Then something else.
Something new.
Andie moved away.
Andrew moved too.
He followed her.
Not because he had to ask permission.
Not because a guard nodded.
Not because a visit had rules about how far he could stand from the chair.
He just got up and followed his daughter across the sand.
For a second, you watched him understand it.
If she moved away, he could move too.
No glass.
No counter.
No voice over a phone saying I'm here while his body was somewhere else.
He was here.
He could go after her.
Andie crouched toward the shell, lost her balance, and sat heavily in the sand.
Andrew was there immediately, crouched in front of her.
"You okay?"
Andie held up the shell.
"Da."
He took it carefully.
"That's a shell."
She pointed at it.
"Duck?"
"No."
You laughed from the blanket.
Andrew looked back at you, deadpan.
"Not every object is a duck."
"You taught her bad duck."
"I taught her one thing."
"You opened a door."
Andie grabbed the shell back and tried to eat it.
Andrew caught her hand.
"No."
She yelled.
He scooped her up before she could escalate fully.
She kicked once, then settled against him, shell forgotten, outrage brief and bright as weather.
Andrew stood there with her on his hip, both of them looking at the water.
You reached for your phone.
"Stay there."
He turned. "What?"
"Photo."
His face immediately changed.
"No."
"Yes."
"I look weird."
"You have not seen the photo yet."
"I know."
"You look like her dad."
That stopped him.
The wind lifted his hair slightly. Andie's sunhat was crooked. His shirt had sand on it. His jeans were damp at one knee. Andie was on his hip, one arm around his neck, the other pointing toward the ocean.
He looked down at her.
Then back at you.
"Okay."
You took the photo before he could change his mind.
Then another.
Then one where Andie twisted around and patted his cheek.
Then one where a gull flew behind him and Andie yelled, "Bad duck!" and Andrew looked like he was trying not to laugh.
That one, you knew immediately, was going on the fridge.
You walked over and showed him.
He frowned at the screen.
"I look strange."
"You look free."
He went very still.
You almost regretted saying it.
Not because it was wrong.
Because it was too true.
Andrew stared at the photo.
At himself standing under open sky with his daughter in his arms.
At the ocean behind him.
At no wall in sight.
His mouth parted slightly.
No sound came out.
You touched his wrist.
"Sorry."
He shook his head.
"No."
"You okay?"
He looked out at the water.
Then at Andie, who was now trying to remove her sunhat with one hand.
"I don't know."
You nodded.
"That's okay."
"It looks..." He glanced at the photo again. "Like someone else."
Your chest tightened.
"Maybe it is."
His eyes came to yours.
"Maybe you get to be someone else here," you said softly. "Not all the way. Not instead of who you were. Just... more."
Andie pulled the hat off and dropped it.
"No," she announced.
Andrew bent to pick it up.
Your moment of deep emotional intimacy, apparently, had ended at hat refusal.
He put the hat back on her.
She took it off again.
He looked at you.
"She's doing it on purpose."
"She is absolutely doing it on purpose."
Andie grinned.
"Bad duck!"
Andrew stared at her.
"That doesn't apply."
You laughed.
By the time you left, Andie was sandy in places that defied logic.
Her hair had gone wild from wind and sunscreen.
Her shoes were in the beach bag because she had rejected them after twenty minutes and no one had the strength to argue.
She had called four seagulls bad ducks, one child's bucket Dada, and the actual ocean no.
Andrew carried her back to the car.
She was tired enough to lay her head against his shoulder, thumb near her mouth, eyes heavy.
He walked slowly.
Not because he was delaying.
Because he could.
You watched from beside him, holding the beach bag, your bare feet still dusty with sand.
"You okay?" you asked.
He glanced over.
"Yeah."
"Too much?"
He looked toward the water one last time.
The beach stretched wide behind you.
Open.
Bright.
Loud.
"Yes."
Your heart softened.
"But good?" you asked.
His hand spread over Andie's back.
"Good."
At the car, Andie objected briefly to the car seat on principle.
Then fell asleep before you had even pulled out of the car park.
You drove home because Andrew had gone quiet again, not in a bad way, but in the way he did when the world had given him too much to carry at once.
He sat in the back beside Andie.
You glanced at him in the mirror.
He was watching her sleep.
Her little feet were sandy.
One hand curled loose beside her cheek.
Her sunhat had slid sideways.
Andrew reached out and gently fixed it.
She did not wake.
"You can take it off," you said softly.
"She likes it now."
"She hated it all morning."
"She changed her mind."
"You are very generous with her inconsistencies."
"She's one."
"She's almost fifteen months."
"She's one."
You smiled.
He kept his fingers near her hand.
Not quite touching.
Then Andie shifted in her sleep and her little fist closed around his finger.
Andrew froze.
You watched his face in the mirror.
Every part of him softened.
There.
That was the whole day, really.
Not the water.
Not the sand.
Not the gulls or the photos or the bad ducks.
That tiny hand finding him even in sleep.
"You know," you said quietly, "I think she had a good day."
Andrew looked down at their hands.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
He swallowed.
"I did too."
You smiled at the road.
"Good."
He leaned his head back against the seat but kept his finger in Andie's grip.
The car smelled like salt, sunscreen, snacks, and warm toddler.
Behind you, Andrew watched the streets pass through the window like he was still learning the shape of freedom.
Not dramatic freedom.
Not the kind people made speeches about.
This kind.
His daughter asleep beside him with sand on her feet.
His wife driving them home.
A beach bag full of wet towels in the boot.
A photo on your phone where he looked like her dad under open sky.
For two years, Andrew had loved you both inside rooms with locked doors.
Through phones.
Through glass.
Through recordings reviewed by strangers before they were allowed to become bedtime.
That afternoon, Andie fell asleep smelling like salt and sunscreen, her hand wrapped around his finger, and Andrew finally understood that home was not only the house.
Just wanted to pop in and say I’m working through a little bit of writer’s block right now. nothing has fully grabbed me lately in that obsessive, can’t-stop-thinking-about-it way, so I’ve been playing around with a few different ideas and seeing what feels right.
I never want to force something just to post, because I know my writing is always better when I’m actually excited and passionate about it. So I’m giving myself a little room to experiment, bounce between drafts, and let something click.
I’ll post again when I find the idea that makes my brain go feral again. Thank you for being patient with me.
The first time Andrew said, "I've got her," everyone stopped moving.
Not dramatically.
No plates shattered. No music stopped. No baby screamed on cue.
But the kitchen went still in the way it did now whenever something new and fragile stepped into the room.
You were standing by the counter with your bag open, trying to remember whether you had put your keys in it or if Andie had hidden them somewhere deeply cursed, like the laundry basket or inside one of Craig's boots.
Craig was leaning against the fridge, arms crossed, watching you make a mental list of things you had already written down on an actual list.
Deran sat at the table with Andie on his lap, letting her pull every napkin from the holder because he had apparently decided discipline was a theory best explored by other people.
And Andrew stood near the sink, one hand curled around his half-finished coffee, eyes on you.
You looked at him.
"What?"
"I said I've got her."
Craig straightened slightly.
Deran's hand paused over the napkin holder.
Andie, unaware of the adult weight in the room, held up a napkin with great pride.
"Da."
Andrew looked at her.
Then back at you.
"You need to go."
"I don't need to go."
"You have an appointment."
"It's just the pharmacy and the grocery shop."
"And the thing at the bank," Craig said.
You pointed at him. "Unhelpful."
"And you haven't been out of the house alone since he got home," Deran added.
You turned to him slowly.
He lifted his eyebrows.
"What? I observe things."
"You observe things in the most annoying way possible."
Andie slapped a napkin against his chest.
Deran looked down at her. "See? She agrees with me."
"She does not."
"She respects honesty."
"She's eating the napkin."
Deran gently removed the corner from Andie's mouth. "No eating paper, criminal."
Andie yelled.
Andrew set his mug down.
"I've got her," he said again.
Softer this time.
Not a challenge.
Not pride.
A statement he was making himself stand inside.
You looked at him properly then.
He had been home nine days.
Nine days of learning the house by touch and sound. Nine days of sleeping badly beside you and pretending you did not notice. Nine days of Andrew waking at every noise, then relaxing when he realized the noise was only Andie dropping a toy, the kettle clicking off, Craig at the back door, Deran swearing softly because he had stepped on a block.
Nine days of bedtime attempts.
Nine days of morning chaos.
Nine days of Andie saying Dada at him so often that sometimes he had to turn away because the word still hit him too hard.
But he had not been alone with her yet.
Not fully.
Not without you in the house, or Craig in the kitchen, or Deran pretending not to hover.
He saw you realize it.
His jaw tightened.
You stepped closer.
"Andrew."
"I can do it."
"I know."
His eyes searched yours.
"No." You softened. "I know."
That seemed to knock some of the fight out of him.
Behind you, Craig cleared his throat.
"I can stay."
Andrew's eyes flicked to him.
Craig immediately held up both hands. "Not because you need me. Just—"
"No," Andrew said.
The word was not harsh.
But it landed.
Craig stopped.
Deran looked between them, then down at Andie, who was now trying to shove a whole napkin into the gap between his wristwatch and skin.
Andrew looked at Craig.
"I need to do it."
The kitchen went quiet again.
This time, no one pretended not to understand.
Craig nodded once.
"Yeah."
Deran's mouth tightened slightly, but he said nothing.
You swallowed past the lump in your throat.
"Are you sure?"
Andrew looked at you.
"No."
Your lips parted.
Then he added, "But I've got her."
That was what made you almost cry.
Not the confidence.
The honesty.
You crossed the kitchen and reached for his hand.
He gave it to you immediately now. That had become one of the small changes since he came home. In the beginning, he had still hesitated before touching. Like some part of him expected permission to be revoked. Now, if you reached, he reached back.
You squeezed his fingers.
"I won't be long."
"You can be as long as you need."
"Don't be heroic."
"I'm not."
"You are frequently heroic in stupid ways."
His mouth twitched.
"I'll call if I need."
"Promise?"
"I promise."
Deran made a low sound.
You glanced over.
"What?"
"Nothing. It's just funny watching you give him a toddler command briefing."
"I have not started the briefing."
Craig looked alarmed. "You haven't?"
"No."
Andrew's attention sharpened.
You turned fully toward him.
"Snacks are in the left cabinet. Not the top shelf, the middle one. The top shelf has crackers she thinks she wants but will throw because they are apparently offensive after noon."
Andrew nodded seriously.
"Water cup is on the drying rack. Use the yellow one, not the blue one, because she hates blue in the morning but also sometimes in the afternoon if she has decided to make that everyone's problem."
"Yellow cup."
"No whole grapes."
"I know."
"Nothing smaller than the end of your thumb unless it is meant to dissolve."
"I know."
"She can have banana but she may become angry at it."
Andrew frowned. "Why?"
"No one knows."
Craig nodded. "The banana thing is real."
"She will ask for the rabbit book and then reject the rabbit book."
Andrew's expression darkened. "That book is a problem."
"You recorded it."
"For her."
"She loves it."
"She has questionable taste."
Andie looked up from Deran's lap.
"Da."
Andrew softened instantly.
"Not you," he told her.
You smiled and kept going.
"The wooden duck stays on the high shelf."
"Always."
"She will point at it and yell."
"I know."
"You cannot give it to her."
"I won't."
"Even if she says please."
"She can't say please."
"She has a look."
Andrew paused.
You nodded gravely.
"She does."
"I won't give her the duck."
"Good. If she falls, check her pupils, check for vomiting, check if she settles, and call me if you're worried."
His face changed slightly.
You hated that you had said it.
But also, it was true.
"Okay," he said.
"Not every fall is an emergency."
"I know."
"You say that like you know, but you once asked if hiccups were neurological."
Deran choked on a laugh.
Andrew shot him a look.
Deran held up Andie's hand and waved it. "She said it, not me."
You stepped closer to Andrew again, lowering your voice.
"She's tougher than she looks."
"I know."
"And she trusts you."
His eyes came to yours.
That landed.
"She does," you said.
He swallowed.
Craig pushed away from the fridge. "We'll go."
Deran blinked. "We will?"
Craig gave him a look.
Deran stood with a sigh and handed Andie to you.
She immediately reached for Andrew.
"Da."
Andrew took her.
No hesitation.
Maybe that was why you finally believed you could leave.
Andie settled against his chest and began inspecting the collar of his shirt like it was her job.
You touched her hair.
"I'll be back soon, okay?"
Andie did not care.
She had found a button.
You leaned in and kissed her cheek.
She accepted this with regal indifference.
Then you looked at Andrew.
He was already watching you.
You rose on your toes and kissed him.
Soft.
Brief.
Not because you wanted it brief.
Because if you let it become anything else, you were going to stay.
Andrew's hand touched your waist for one second.
"Go," he said quietly.
You smiled against his mouth.
"Bossy."
"You need to practice too."
That hurt more than you expected.
Because he was right.
You had spent fourteen months being the first answer. Before that, you had spent the pregnancy learning how to carry things alone while keeping him close through calls and visits and letters.
Leaving Andie, even with him, even with her father, felt like stepping off a curb you knew was there but still distrusted.
You nodded.
"I love you."
"I love you."
You touched Andie's back.
"I love you."
Andie tugged Andrew's button.
"Da."
"I'm choosing to take that personally."
Andrew's mouth softened.
You picked up your bag.
At the door, you turned back.
Andrew stood in the middle of the kitchen with Andie on his hip.
His daughter.
Your daughter.
Their daughter.
She was leaning against him like she had never once questioned whether he could hold her.
He looked terrified.
He also looked like he would rather die than put her down.
"You've got her," you said.
He nodded once.
"I've got her."
Then you left.
For twenty-three seconds after the door closed, nothing happened.
Andrew stood in the kitchen with Andie on his hip, listening to your car start outside.
Andie looked at the door.
Then at him.
Then back at the door.
"Mama?"
His chest tightened.
"Mama's coming back."
Andie stared at him.
He crouched slightly so he could see her face better.
"She went to the shop. And the pharmacy. And the bank."
Andie blinked.
"Boring stuff," he clarified.
She looked at the door again.
"Mama."
"She's coming back."
He did not know if he was telling her or himself.
Andie considered this.
Then held out the button she had yanked loose from his shirt.
Andrew stared at it.
"How did you get that off?"
She smiled.
He looked down at his shirt.
One button missing.
Nine days home, and his daughter had already begun dismantling him physically.
"Okay," he said.
Andie shoved the button toward her mouth.
"No."
He caught her wrist before she could eat it.
Gently.
Quickly.
His heart slammed into his ribs.
Andie frowned.
"No."
"That's my line."
"No."
"You can't eat buttons."
Andie yelled.
Andrew placed the button on the counter, well out of reach.
She lunged for it.
He shifted her away.
She yelled louder.
"Okay," he said, already sweating. "Good start."
He carried her into the living room.
The room looked different without you in it.
Not empty.
Just bigger.
The toys were scattered across the rug. The approved player sat in its basket. Books lay in a crooked pile near the sofa. A soft duck toy had been abandoned under the coffee table like it had given up on life.
Andie pointed.
"Down."
He set her down.
She immediately crawled toward the coffee table, pulled herself up, and reached for your mug.
Andrew moved fast.
"No."
Andie looked at him.
Then at the mug.
Then at him again.
"No," she said.
"Exactly."
She smiled and reached again.
He moved the mug to the mantel.
Andie's face collapsed into betrayal.
"No!"
"You can't have coffee."
"Da!"
"I'm Dada, yes. Still no coffee."
She dropped dramatically onto her bottom.
Andrew crouched.
"Are you hurt?"
She cried harder.
He reached for her.
She turned away.
He froze.
Not wanting him.
That was fine.
That was normal.
Toddlers did that.
He knew that.
Probably.
"Andie."
She crawled toward the toy basket, still sobbing, and grabbed the rabbit book.
Andrew sat back on his heels.
His chest hurt.
He told himself not to be stupid.
She wanted the book. Not him. That was not rejection. That was a child being angry about coffee.
He could handle this.
Andie crawled back to him and shoved the rabbit book into his lap.
Oh.
He stared at it.
Then at her.
"You want this?"
She sniffed.
"Da."
He picked up the book.
"I thought you were mad."
She patted his knee impatiently.
"Okay."
He sat on the floor and opened the rabbit book.
He hated the rabbit book.
The rabbit had poor judgment, repetitive phrasing, and no respect for reasonable consequences.
Andie loved it.
So he read.
His voice was awkward at first.
Too careful.
Too aware of the empty house around him.
But Andie settled between his knees, one hand on his leg, thumb in her mouth, listening.
By page three, she had forgiven him.
By page five, she was trying to turn the pages herself.
By page six, she had thrown the book and crawled toward the sofa.
Andrew stared after her.
"We weren't done."
Andie pulled herself to standing against the cushion.
"No."
"That's not how stories work."
She slapped the sofa.
"No."
He closed the book.
"Fine."
She turned, grinned at him, and tried to climb.
"No."
He moved toward her.
She lifted one foot like a tiny mountain climber.
"No climbing."
She looked over her shoulder at him.
"Da."
"No."
Her face lit up at the challenge.
Andrew understood, very suddenly, why you were tired all the time.
The next hour was a campaign.
Andie tried to climb the sofa four times.
She succeeded once.
Andrew aged six years.
She found one of your hair ties under the rug and attempted to eat it.
He removed it from her hand.
She screamed as if he had stolen her future.
She demanded banana.
He gave her banana.
She became enraged by the banana.
He stared at the fruit in his hand.
"You asked for this."
Andie pointed at it.
"No!"
"It's banana."
"No!"
"It didn't do anything."
She smacked the highchair tray.
He cut it smaller.
Wrong.
He offered a different piece.
Also wrong.
He considered calling you.
Did not.
This was not an emergency.
This was banana politics.
He could survive banana politics.
He gave her toast.
She accepted the toast with suspicion, ate half of it, then fed the other half to the soft duck.
"Duck doesn't eat toast," Andrew told her.
Andie pushed the toast harder into the duck's face.
"Okay."
She demanded the yellow cup.
Then rejected the yellow cup.
He tried the blue cup.
She looked at him like he had insulted the family.
He returned to yellow.
She drank.
He sat across from her, elbows on the table, watching like she was a puzzle with teeth.
"You have a lot of rules," he said.
Andie smiled around the cup.
"Da."
"I'm starting to understand your mother better."
She threw the cup.
He caught it.
Barely.
Andie laughed.
A bright, delighted, wicked little laugh.
Andrew froze.
Then laughed too.
He couldn't help it.
She laughed harder because he did.
For a few seconds, the kitchen was full of it.
Her laughter.
His.
No phone.
No recording.
No wall.
Andrew leaned back in the chair and let the sound move through him.
It still hurt sometimes, joy.
Not because it was bad.
Because it went places grief had carved out first.
Andie banged her hand on the tray.
"Da!"
"Yeah," he said softly. "I'm here."
She grinned.
He cleaned her up after snack with moderate success and one yoghurt smear on his sleeve.
Then he put her on the floor, turned for exactly one second to rinse the cloth, and heard a thump.
Not loud.
Not terrible.
But enough.
Andie's breath caught before the cry.
Andrew turned so fast his hip hit the counter.
She was sitting on the kitchen floor, one hand on the cabinet, lower lip trembling, eyes wide with shock.
Then she wailed.
Andrew crossed the room in two steps and dropped to his knees.
"Andie."
She reached for him.
Both arms.
No hesitation.
"Dada!"
He picked her up.
Immediately.
She sobbed into his neck, little hands clutching his shirt.
His heart slammed so hard he felt sick.
"What happened?" he whispered, already checking her head with shaking fingers. "Where? Where did you hit?"
She cried harder.
He held her close and forced himself to breathe.
Check.
You had told him what to check.
He pulled back enough to see her face.
No blood.
No vomiting.
Pupils equal, as far as he could tell. She was crying, which meant breathing. She was angry, which meant conscious. A small pink mark bloomed near her forehead, close to the hairline.
The cabinet, probably.
Nothing sharp.
Not a bad fall.
Still, his hands shook.
"Andie," he said, voice low. "Look at me."
She sobbed.
"Baby girl. Look at me."
She looked.
Furious.
Betrayed.
Fine.
He nearly collapsed with relief.
"You're okay," he whispered.
She cried into his neck again.
He pressed one hand to the back of her head and the other across her back.
"I've got you."
She clutched him harder.
The words hit him after he said them.
I've got you.
Not through a phone.
Not from the other side of glass.
Not as a promise he could only half keep.
Here.
In the kitchen.
With his daughter crying into his shirt because she had bumped her head and reached for him.
For him.
His eyes burned.
He grabbed a clean cloth, wet it with cold water, and held it gently near the pink mark.
Andie objected loudly.
"I know."
"No!"
"I know."
"No!"
"You're right. It's rude."
She sobbed.
He carried her into the living room and sat on the sofa, holding her against his chest. She cried for another minute. Maybe two. Time stretched strangely when she was hurt.
Then the sobs softened.
Her little body sank into him.
Her fists loosened in his shirt.
She hiccupped once.
Then rested her cheek against his chest.
Andrew stared over her head.
The house was quiet now.
Too quiet.
He could hear his own breathing.
Her breathing.
The hum of the fridge in the kitchen.
He waited for panic to tell him what he had done wrong.
It came, but weaker than he expected.
Because Andie was calming.
Because he had checked her.
Because she was still in his arms.
Because she had reached for him when she hurt.
He looked down at her.
Her lashes were wet.
Her cheeks blotchy.
One hand still gripped the fabric over his heart.
"You scared me," he said.
She sniffed.
"Da."
"Yeah."
He kissed the top of her head before he could overthink it.
She did not pull away.
In fact, she tucked closer.
Andrew closed his eyes.
"Oh," he whispered.
He sat back slowly, letting her settle across his chest.
He meant to hold her for a minute.
Just until she calmed fully.
Just until he was sure she was okay.
Just until his heart stopped trying to claw its way out of him.
Andie fell asleep.
Of course she did.
One second she was sniffling.
The next, her breath evened out against his shirt, her little body heavy and warm across him.
Andrew did not move.
Not even when his arm started to go numb.
Not when his neck ached.
Not when the house creaked.
Not when his phone buzzed on the coffee table with a message from you that said:
Everything okay?
He stared at it.
Then carefully, using one hand, he typed:
She bumped her head. Small. I checked. She's okay. Sleeping on me.
Three dots appeared immediately.
Then:
Are YOU okay?
Andrew looked down at Andie asleep on his chest.
Her forehead had a faint pink mark.
Her mouth was slightly open.
One tear had dried on her cheek.
She was safe.
With him.
He wrote:
No. But I've got her.
Your reply came seconds later.
I know you do.
He stared at the words until they blurred.
Then he set the phone down and held his daughter while she slept.
You came home forty minutes later with grocery bags in one hand, pharmacy bag in the other, and your heart already halfway up your throat.
Andrew's message had been calm.
Too calm.
You trusted him.
You did.
But Andie had bumped her head and you were her mother, which meant trust and terror could apparently share a body.
You opened the front door quietly.
The house was still.
No crying.
No toddler yelling.
No Andrew reading the rabbit book like he was being personally punished by literature.
You set the bags down softly in the hallway and stepped into the living room.
Then stopped.
Andrew was on the sofa.
Andie was asleep on his chest.
One of his arms curved around her back. His other hand rested carefully near the faint mark on her forehead, not touching it, just guarding the space around it.
His head was tipped back against the sofa cushion, eyes open, staring at the ceiling.
Not asleep.
Not even close.
But still.
You softened so quickly it hurt.
"Hey," you whispered.
His eyes moved to you.
The relief in them almost knocked you down.
"She fell."
"I know."
"I told you."
"I know."
"She hit the cabinet. I think. I didn't see the exact second. I turned around and—"
"Andrew."
His mouth shut.
You came closer and crouched beside the sofa.
Andie slept through it, warm and limp against him.
You brushed your fingers lightly over her hair, then looked at the mark.
Small.
Pink.
Already fading.
Your body loosened by a fraction.
"She's okay."
"I checked her pupils."
"I know."
"No vomiting."
"Good."
"She cried right away."
"Good."
"She settled."
"I can see that."
His jaw worked.
"She reached for me."
Your throat tightened.
There it was.
The real thing.
Not the fall.
The reaching.
You looked at him.
"She was hurt," he said.
His voice dropped.
"And she reached for me."
You rested a hand on his knee.
"Of course she did."
"No." He shook his head slightly. "No, you don't—"
"I do."
His eyes were wet now.
"She was crying and she reached for me."
You moved your hand from his knee to his cheek.
His eyes closed at the touch.
"You're her dad."
He breathed out unevenly.
"She knows that."
"I know."
"Do you?"
His eyes opened.
You held his gaze.
"She didn't reach for you because I wasn't here," you said softly. "She reached for you because you were."
His face shifted.
"She cried because she was hurt," you continued. "She stopped because you were there."
Andrew looked down at Andie.
Her tiny hand had gone slack on his shirt.
"You did not fail because she fell."
His throat moved.
"You were the person she cried into."
That one landed.
You saw it.
He looked back at you, wrecked in the quietest way.
"I thought being alone with her would feel like a test."
You stroked your thumb along his cheek.
"Did it?"
He looked down at Andie again.
At the small weight of her.
At her trust.
At the way she had fallen asleep on him without asking whether he knew enough.
"No," he said.
His voice was rough.
"It felt like she already knew I could do it."
Your eyes filled.
"She did."
He huffed softly, but it broke halfway through.
You leaned forward and kissed him.
Carefully, because Andie was between you.
Softly, because he needed that.
He kissed you back with one hand still on your daughter's back.
When you pulled away, his forehead rested briefly against yours.
"I didn't call you."
"I know."
"I almost did."
"That would have been okay too."
"I wanted to handle it."
"You did."
His eyes closed.
You kissed his brow.
Then Andie stirred.
Both of you froze.
She made a tiny grumbling sound, shifted her face against his chest, and stayed asleep.
Andrew did not breathe for three seconds.
You smiled.
"She's fine."
"She should nap in the cot."
"Probably."
"She's sleeping."
"She is."
"On me."
You looked at him.
His face was soft now.
Still shaken.
But soft.
"Yes."
He looked down at her again.
"I don't want to move."
"Then don't."
"Routine?"
"Can survive one sofa nap."
"Are you sure?"
You laughed quietly.
"I am the household routine dictator. I grant permission."
His mouth twitched.
You stood and sat beside him carefully, tucking yourself into the corner of the sofa so your shoulder touched his.
Andrew leaned into you.
Only slightly.
Enough.
You rested your head against his arm and looked down at Andie.
The grocery bags could wait.
The pharmacy bag could wait.
The world could wait.
For a while, the three of you stayed there.
Andie asleep across Andrew's chest.
His hand on her back.
Your hand over his.
No glass.
No countdown.
No one else in the room.
Just them.
Just you.
Home.
"She ate a button," Andrew said suddenly.
You lifted your head.
"What?"
"She didn't eat it."
"Andrew."
"She took it off my shirt."
You looked down.
Sure enough, one button was missing.
Your mouth fell open.
"She removed your button?"
"Yes."
"How?"
"I don't know."
You stared at him.
Then at Andie.
Then back at him.
"She's becoming too powerful."
"I know."
You started laughing.
Quiet at first.
Then harder, though you tried to muffle it against his shoulder so you didn't wake her.
Andrew smiled.
A real one.
Small.
Tired.
A little stunned by the shape of the afternoon.
"She yelled at banana," he said.
You wheezed silently.
"I know."
"She asked for it."
"They do that."
"It was the banana she wanted."
"Yes."
"And then she hated it."
"Yes."
"Why?"
You wiped your eyes.
"Parenthood."
He looked down at Andie.
Then at you.
"I get it less now."
You laughed again.
"That's also parenthood."
He nodded slowly.
"Okay."
Andie sighed in her sleep.
Andrew's hand spread over her back.
You watched him watching her.
"What?" he asked.
You shook your head.
"Nothing."
"You have a face."
"I have many faces."
"That's my line."
"I steal from the best."
He looked back down.
You let the quiet settle.
Then you said, softly, "I'm proud of you."
He went still.
"Don't."
"I am."
"I watched our daughter fall."
"And helped her."
"I panicked."
"And helped her."
"I didn't know what to do."
"You remembered."
His jaw tightened.
"You're allowed to be scared and still be good at it," you said.
Andrew looked at you then.
Like that was a sentence he might need to hear more than once.
So you said it again.
"You're allowed to be scared and still be good at it."
His eyes went wet.
He looked away.
You did not make him look back.
You just held his hand.
Eventually, he whispered, "I love her so much it feels wrong."
Your chest ached.
"Wrong how?"
"Too much."
You smiled sadly.
"That's not wrong."
"It feels like there should be somewhere for it to go."
You looked at Andie asleep on him.
"There," you said.
He followed your gaze.
"She can't hold all that."
"She doesn't have to. She just has to feel safe in it."
Andrew was quiet.
Then he nodded once.
Barely.
Enough.
Outside, a car passed.
The afternoon light shifted across the living room floor.
Andie slept on.
Andrew had spent two years being watched like he was dangerous.
But his daughter slept on his chest like he was safety itself.
And for that afternoon, with the groceries still in the hallway and one missing button on his shirt, Andrew Cody finally let himself believe she might be right.
{Learning the House - Andrew Pope Cody x F!Reader}
Sorry for not posting for a few days, I have just been doing a lot of planning for this series moving forward. This is not ending anytime soon.
Andrew woke before the house did.
For a few seconds, he did not move.
He did not know where he was.
That had happened twice in the night already. Once when a car passed outside and threw a pale stripe of headlights across the ceiling. Once when the pipes clicked somewhere in the walls and his body jolted awake before his mind could understand that the sound was not a door, not a lock, not someone coming to count him.
Now the room was dim and blue with early morning.
Quiet.
Not prison quiet.
Not the kind of quiet that waited with teeth.
House quiet.
A radiator ticking softly. A bird somewhere outside. Your breathing beside him, slow and warm, your face half-buried in the pillow, one hand tucked under your cheek. His shirt was twisted around your body, worn soft from years of belonging to both of you. One of your bare legs was tangled with his beneath the sheets.
Andrew stared at the ceiling.
Then at you.
Then at the ceiling again.
Home.
The word still felt too large to fit inside his chest.
He had said it last night.
In the hallway, with Andie in his arms.
In the nursery, after the duck book.
In this bed, after the lights went off and the house settled around the three of you like it had been waiting to exhale.
But saying it and surviving the first night inside it were different.
He turned his head carefully toward you.
You were asleep.
Really asleep.
Not the shallow kind of sleep from prison visiting-room nights, when you had called him too late and tried to pretend your voice wasn't fraying. Not the exhausted newborn sleep where you could wake at the smallest sound of Andie's breath changing through the monitor. This was deep, heavy, unguarded sleep.
He had missed watching you sleep.
That was a strange thing to miss.
Maybe a creepy thing, if he said it wrong.
But he had.
He had missed the proof of you resting. The ordinary miracle of your body trusting a room enough to let go.
His hand rested lightly at your waist.
It had been there when he woke.
He did not remember putting it there.
For two years, his hands had learned rules.
Hands visible.
Hands to yourself.
Hands behind your back.
Hands off the glass.
Hands returning his daughter before a guard could tell him to.
Last night, his hands had learned something else again.
Your skin.
Your hair.
The soft give of your waist beneath his palm.
The way you had said his name in the dark like you were returning it to him.
It had been nearly two years since he had been allowed to want you without a guard outside the door. Without a phone line thinning your voice. Without a clock deciding when his hands had to let go.
So the night had not been rushed.
It had been careful.
Almost disbelieving.
Andrew had kissed you like he was still waiting for someone to knock on the door and tell him time was up.
No one had.
He had stopped twice to ask if you were sure.
Then a third time, because his body could believe in touch faster than his mind could believe in permission.
You had taken his face in both hands, eyes wet and steady in the dark.
"Yes," you had whispered. "I'm sure."
His forehead had dropped against yours.
"You can say no."
"I know."
"You can tell me to stop."
"I know."
"You don't have to—"
"Andrew."
He had gone still.
You had brushed your thumb under his eye.
"I want my husband," you had said, so softly it nearly broke him. "I want you. And you're home. And no one is coming to take this away."
That was when he had finally understood.
Not all at once.
Not perfectly.
But enough.
Enough to kiss you again.
Enough to let his hand settle at your hip.
Enough to follow your body's familiar map slowly, carefully, like someone returning to a place he had been afraid he would never be allowed to enter again.
After, you had cried.
So had he.
Neither of you had made a thing of it.
You had lain tangled together under the sheets, his face pressed to your hair, your hand over his heart, both of you breathing like you had run a very long way and only just realized you had stopped.
At some point, you had fallen asleep against him.
Andrew had stayed awake longer.
Not because he wanted to.
Because no one told him when to sleep anymore.
Because the door was not locked.
Because the room smelled like you and laundry detergent and home.
Because his daughter was sleeping down the hall.
Because his wife was in his arms.
Because he had spent two years surviving the idea of this and now that he had it, his body did not know how to believe it quietly.
You shifted in your sleep.
His hand tightened at your waist before he could stop it.
You made a soft sound and settled again.
Andrew let out a slow breath.
Then, down the hall, Andie screamed.
"Mama!"
Your eyes opened immediately.
Not fully.
Just enough for your body to start moving before your brain arrived.
Andrew felt it happen.
The automatic shift.
The half-asleep reach toward the edge of the bed.
The reflex of fourteen months of being the first answer to every cry.
His hand held you gently in place.
"I've got her," he whispered.
You blinked.
Turned your head.
For a second, you looked at him like you had forgotten he could say that from the same bed.
Then your face softened.
"You sure?"
No.
He was not sure about anything.
His daughter was calling from the green room. His daughter, who knew his voice and his photo and his arms in special visits, but not this. Not morning. Not him opening her curtains and lifting her from the cot and knowing whether she liked to be held immediately or given a second to complain.
He knew prison schedules.
He knew visiting-room rules.
He knew the approved book list.
He knew the exact sound of the automated call connecting.
He did not know breakfast.
He did not know where the wipes were without thinking.
He did not know whether Andie's morning cry meant hungry, wet, angry, lonely, or simply offended by being awake.
But she was calling.
And for the first time, he was there to answer.
"Yeah," he said. "I've got her."
You searched his face.
Then you nodded and sank back into the pillow like your whole body had been waiting fourteen months to be told it could.
"If she has the duck pyjamas on, check the left leg," you mumbled.
Andrew paused with one foot on the floor.
"What?"
"She gets it twisted."
"The duck pyjamas?"
"Mhm."
"Why just the left leg?"
"No one knows."
Your eyes were already closing.
Andrew stared at you.
Then Andie shouted again.
"Mama!"
He stood.
The floor was cold under his feet.
That surprised him too.
Everything did.
The door being open.
The hallway dim and soft.
The framed picture on the landing wall of you heavily pregnant in the green nursery, his shirt stretched over your stomach. The photo of him holding Andie at her first birthday, yellow frosting over his heart.
He passed them slowly.
Too slowly, probably.
Andie made an outraged sound from the nursery.
Right.
Daughter first.
Existential crisis later.
He pushed the nursery door open.
The green room was pale with morning.
Andie stood in her cot, both hands wrapped around the rail, hair wild, cheeks pink, one foot somehow bare despite the sleep sack you had zipped her into last night.
Andrew stopped in the doorway.
She stopped yelling.
For one second, they stared at each other.
Her brow furrowed.
His frown.
Always his frown.
Then her face changed.
Not the huge birthday grin.
Not yet.
Something smaller.
Sleepy recognition.
Confusion and delight trying to exist at the same time.
"Dada?"
Andrew's chest gave out.
Not visibly.
He stayed standing.
Barely.
"Hey, baby girl."
Andie bounced once, gripping the cot rail.
"Da."
"Yeah." He stepped closer. "I'm here."
She looked past him toward the hallway.
"Mama?"
"She's sleeping."
Andie frowned.
Andrew nodded. "I know. Weird."
She stared at him like she agreed.
He lowered the cot rail. Slowly. Carefully. It took him a second to figure out the latch, and Andie waited with the impatience of someone who had never respected a learning curve.
"Hold on," he murmured.
"No," Andie said.
He looked at her.
"That's fair."
The latch gave.
He lifted her out.
Awkwardly at first.
She was heavier than she had been yesterday.
Which made no sense.
And also made perfect sense.
Every time he held her, she felt bigger than the last time. More person. More herself. Less imagined. More impossible to put down.
Andie came against his chest warm and squirmy, her sleep sack bunching between them, one hand going immediately to his neck.
She patted him twice.
Then grabbed his shirt.
"Dada."
Andrew closed his eyes for half a second.
"Yeah."
She leaned back to look at him.
Her hair stuck out in three directions.
There was a crease on one cheek from the sheet.
One sock was gone. The other was half off.
He had never seen anything better in his life.
"You lose a sock?" he asked.
Andie pointed vaguely at nothing.
"Da."
"You blaming me?"
She patted his cheek.
"Okay."
He looked around the nursery.
Wipes on the dresser.
Nappies in the basket.
Sleep sack zipper.
Duck pyjamas.
Left leg twisted.
Of course.
He sat carefully in the rocking chair with her on his lap and tried to fix the sleep sack.
Andie immediately attempted to escape.
"No."
"I'm helping."
"No."
"You got your leg wrong."
"No."
"You're very sure."
She shoved one hand against his chest.
Andrew looked at her solemnly.
"You know, your mom warned me about this."
At the word mom, Andie looked toward the door.
"Mama."
"She's sleeping," Andrew said.
Then, because the words felt strange and good in his mouth, he added, "I've got you."
Andie considered this.
Then yawned directly in his face.
He huffed a quiet laugh.
"Rude."
She smiled.
The sock fell off.
Andrew stared at her bare foot.
"How?"
By the time you came downstairs forty minutes later, the kitchen looked like a crime scene committed by breakfast foods.
Andie was in the highchair wearing only one sock, a clean jumper, and an expression of triumph.
There were banana pieces on the tray.
Banana pieces on the floor.
Banana pieces in her hair.
Toast strips of wildly uneven sizes lay on a plate beside the highchair, some too large, some too small, all clearly cut by a man who had approached toddler breakfast like a tactical operation with incomplete intelligence.
Andrew stood at the counter, holding a tub of yoghurt and reading the back of it with deep suspicion.
You stopped in the doorway.
No one noticed you at first.
Andie slapped the tray.
"Da!"
Andrew looked up immediately. "You have banana."
She slapped harder.
"No."
"You do."
"No."
"Okay."
He looked back at the yoghurt.
You bit your lip.
He had changed clothes. His hair was still messy from sleep. There was a smear of banana on his sleeve. He looked exhausted, overwhelmed, and so intensely focused on the nutritional composition of Greek yoghurt that you nearly started crying.
Again.
Apparently that was still who you were.
"Is she allowed this?" he asked without looking up.
You leaned against the doorway.
"Good morning to you too."
His head snapped up.
His face changed the second he saw you.
Softer.
Wary, too, because he was still Andrew.
His eyes moved over you quickly.
Your face.
Your body.
His T-shirt on you.
The bare legs.
The sleep in your eyes.
The evidence of the night before in the way you stood a little lazily, a little tenderly, like your body had remembered happiness and was still adjusting.
His gaze caught there for half a second.
Your cheeks warmed.
"Good morning," he said, voice lower.
You smiled.
"Hi."
The kitchen went quiet.
Not because there was nothing to say.
Because there was too much.
Andie solved it by throwing banana on the floor.
Andrew looked down.
Then at her.
"Why?"
Andie laughed.
You pushed away from the doorway and crossed the kitchen, stepping around the banana.
"She throws food."
"I see that."
"She does it when she's done, bored, happy, angry, or experimenting with gravity."
"That's all the time."
"Yes."
He looked mildly horrified.
You kissed Andie's sticky hair.
"Morning, chaos goblin."
"Mama."
Your heart melted.
Then you stepped toward Andrew.
His hand came to your waist before you even reached him.
Like it belonged there.
Like he had spent two years not touching you and was now trying, quietly, to make up for every missed second.
You slid your hand over his chest.
"Did you make breakfast?"
"I attempted breakfast."
"You did very well."
He looked at the floor.
"There's banana everywhere."
"That's normal."
"The toast is wrong."
"There is no wrong toast."
His eyebrows lifted.
You looked at the plate.
"Okay, some of those are structurally questionable."
"I didn't know what size."
"It's fine."
"She ate some."
"Great."
"She threw more."
"Also normal."
"She tried to feed me one."
"That means she loves you."
"She put it in my ear."
"She loves you aggressively."
Andrew looked down at you.
His mouth twitched.
You reached up and brushed a bit of banana from his sleeve.
He watched your fingers like the touch had weight.
"Did you sleep?" you asked softly.
"A little."
"Bad?"
"Different."
You nodded.
"Yeah."
"You?"
You smiled.
"Better than I expected."
His eyes searched yours.
You let him.
Then Andie shouted.
"Dada!"
Andrew turned instantly.
You laughed.
"You're being summoned."
He picked up the yoghurt.
"Is she allowed this?"
"Yes."
"How much?"
"A spoonful or two."
"What if she wants more?"
"She will."
"What if she throws it?"
"She will."
"Why are we giving it to her?"
"Parenthood."
Andrew stared at you.
You kissed his cheek.
"Welcome home."
He learned the house in fragments.
Not the layout.
He knew the layout.
He had built it in his head from every photo, every phone call, every casual mention you had made without realizing he had stored it away like evidence.
He knew the kitchen drawer stuck if you pulled too quickly.
He knew the living room rug had a corner that curled no matter what you did.
He knew the baby gate was crooked because Craig had installed it and refused to admit it.
He knew the nursery chair creaked.
He knew the wooden duck was on the high shelf.
But living inside the house was different.
He learned that Andie liked to hide spoons under the sofa.
That the washing machine made a clunk on the second spin cycle that sounded alarming but apparently was "just what it did."
That the kettle clicked before it boiled.
That you drank half cups of coffee all morning because Andie interrupted every attempt at finishing one.
That your hands moved constantly.
Wiping the tray.
Catching the cup before it tipped.
Moving a choking hazard.
Picking up socks.
Putting down laundry.
Lifting Andie.
Setting Andie down.
Lifting Andie again because she had changed her mind loudly.
You did not seem to notice the choreography.
Andrew did.
He noticed everything.
You wiped yoghurt from Andie's chin with your thumb while reaching for your mug with the other hand. You put toast in the bin, rinsed a bowl, caught Andie's cup mid-fall, and answered a babbled complaint with, "I know, terrible service," without even looking up.
Andrew stood by the sink and watched.
Not uselessly.
He had tried to help.
He was helping.
But he kept being one second behind the rhythm.
You knew what every noise meant.
He was still learning the language.
Andie grunted and pointed.
You handed her the blue cup.
She pushed it away.
You handed her the yellow one.
She accepted it.
Andrew stared.
"How did you know?"
You looked over. "Know what?"
"The cup."
"She hates blue in the morning."
He blinked.
"What?"
"I don't know why."
He looked at Andie.
She drank from the yellow cup like this was obvious.
Andrew turned back to you.
"She has cup rules?"
"She has many rules."
"She's fourteen months."
"She's very advanced in tyranny."
He huffed softly.
Then went quiet.
You noticed because you noticed him too.
"Andrew?"
He looked at you.
There was something in his face you did not quite like.
Not guilt, exactly.
Something close.
Awe with bruised edges.
"You did all this," he said.
You frowned faintly.
"Made breakfast?"
"No."
His voice was low.
"You did all this."
Your expression shifted.
You glanced around the kitchen as if the answer might be hidden under the banana on the floor.
"I mean, badly some days."
"No."
"Andrew—"
"No." He stepped closer. "Look at me."
You did.
His eyes were wet.
Not crying.
Almost.
"You did this," he said. "Every day."
Your throat tightened.
You looked down.
He caught your hand.
Not hard.
Enough.
"Don't shrug it off."
"I wasn't."
"You were."
"I don't know what to say."
"You don't have to say anything."
His thumb moved over your knuckles.
Andie babbled in the highchair, unaware that the room had shifted around her.
Andrew looked at you like he was seeing the year in your body. Not just the photos you had sent him. Not just the stories. But the invisible weight of it. The nights. The appointments. The colic. The teething. The lonely mornings. The birthdays. The joy you had carried to him carefully so it did not become only grief.
"I knew," he said. "But I didn't know."
Your eyes filled.
"I didn't do it perfectly."
"I don't care."
"I cried a lot."
"I know."
"I messed up all the time."
"You kept her alive."
You laughed wetly. "That is the baseline."
"You loved her."
Your face crumpled.
"You kept me in it."
That one broke you.
You covered your mouth with your free hand.
Andrew's grip tightened.
"You kept me in it," he said again. "When it would've been easier not to."
You shook your head.
"It wouldn't have been easier."
"No?"
"No." You looked at him through tears. "It would have hurt more."
He absorbed that.
Slowly.
Painfully.
Then Andie smashed both hands into the yoghurt on her tray.
You both turned.
She lifted her hands, delighted.
"No," she said, very proudly.
Andrew stared.
You laughed through tears.
"And there she is."
He looked at you.
Then at Andie.
Then back at you.
"What do we do?"
"Wipe her hands."
He grabbed a cloth immediately.
Andie shrieked like he had insulted her ancestors.
Andrew froze.
You smiled.
"Welcome to the resistance."
By noon, Andrew looked like he had survived something.
To be fair, he had.
Andie had shown him every toy in the living room by handing it to him, taking it back, and shouting "No" when he tried to place it in the basket.
She had crawled halfway into the cupboard under the television.
She had tried to eat a crayon.
She had demanded to be picked up, then immediately demanded to be put down, then cried because she had been put down.
She had called the coffee table Dada.
Andrew had accepted this with more grace than expected.
Now she stood beside the sofa, one hand on the cushion, rubbing her eyes with the other.
You were folding laundry on the floor, because somehow all roads led back to laundry.
Andrew sat beside you, legs stretched out, watching Andie with deep concern.
"She's tired."
"Yes."
"She's rubbing her eyes."
"Yes."
"She keeps falling over."
"Yes."
"Should she nap?"
"Yes."
You did not move.
Andrew looked at you.
"You're enjoying this."
"A little."
"Why?"
"Because for fourteen months, I was the only person having this argument with reality."
He looked at Andie.
She tried to sit down, missed slightly, and landed on her bottom with a soft thump.
Then she looked offended.
"Da!"
Andrew immediately started to move.
You put a hand on his arm.
"She's fine."
"She fell."
"She sat dramatically."
Andie glared at the rug.
Andrew looked torn.
You smiled.
"She's fine."
Andie crawled toward him.
His face changed.
Not much.
Enough.
She reached his knee, pulled herself up on his leg, and lifted both arms.
"Dada. Up."
The room went still.
Your hands froze around a tiny shirt.
Andrew looked at Andie.
Then at you.
As if he needed permission.
As if she had not already given it.
Your eyes filled before you could stop them.
"She asked you," you whispered.
His throat moved.
Andie bounced impatiently.
"Up."
Andrew picked her up.
She came willingly, tired and warm, her little body folding against his chest with the boneless trust of a toddler who had made her choice and expected the world to comply.
Andrew's arms closed around her.
Careful.
Always careful.
But sure now.
Andie tucked her face into his neck.
Your heart broke open so quietly you almost missed it.
Andrew did not move.
He looked down at the top of her head.
Then at you.
His eyes were wet.
"She asked me."
"She did."
"For up."
"Yes."
His hand spread over her back.
"She wants me."
Your smile trembled.
"Yes, baby. She wants you."
Andie made a sleepy humming sound against him.
You pressed your lips together.
Andrew closed his eyes.
For a second, the living room held only that.
A father being chosen for something ordinary.
Not a first word.
Not a birthday.
Not a special visit approved by a committee.
Just up.
A tired toddler wanting arms.
His arms.
Andrew swallowed hard.
"What do I do?"
You laughed softly.
"You hold her."
"And?"
"That's mostly it."
"She sleeps like this?"
"Sometimes."
"What if she doesn't?"
"Then she doesn't."
He looked down at her.
"What if I mess up nap?"
"Then she'll be tired and mean until bedtime."
"That sounds bad."
"It is."
His eyes lifted.
You smiled. "But survivable."
Andie yawned against his neck.
Andrew's whole face softened.
"Nap," he murmured.
"Yes."
"You'll show me?"
"Of course."
Nap time was not peaceful.
Andrew had imagined it would be.
That was his first mistake.
Andie was half asleep on his shoulder until the second he carried her into the nursery, at which point she lifted her head and remembered she had opinions.
"No."
Andrew paused in the doorway.
You stood behind him, trying very hard not to laugh.
"She says that a lot."
"I noticed."
"No," Andie repeated, with more conviction.
Andrew looked at her. "You're tired."
"No."
"You rubbed your eyes."
"No."
"You asked for up."
"No."
"You're arguing with facts."
"She does that."
"Like you."
You pressed a hand to your chest. "Me?"
He glanced at you.
"Do not start something you can't finish, Cody."
His mouth twitched.
That small tease felt like sunlight through a window.
He carried Andie to the changing table.
She immediately tried to roll.
Andrew put both hands out, panicked.
You stepped closer.
"Hand on her tummy. There. Not too hard. Just enough."
He followed your instruction exactly.
Andie grabbed the clean nappy and threw it.
Andrew stared as it sailed across the room.
You nodded. "Classic."
"She weaponizes supplies?"
"Constantly."
He retrieved the nappy.
She laughed.
He looked at you.
"She thinks this is funny."
"It is a bit funny."
"It's not."
"It is when it isn't you."
He gave you a look.
You smiled sweetly.
Eventually, through teamwork, negotiation, and one emotional rendition of the duck book from memory, Andie was changed, sleepy, and furious about it.
Andrew sat in the rocking chair with her and opened the actual duck book.
She pushed it away.
"No."
He looked at you.
You whispered, "Moon."
He switched books.
Andie accepted this with the regal air of someone granting mercy.
Andrew began reading.
His voice was low and careful.
The same voice from every recording.
But there was tension in it now.
Not fear of the book.
Fear of failing the ritual.
You leaned against the wall and listened.
Andie squirmed.
Andrew kept reading.
She reached for the book.
He let her touch the page.
She tried to turn three pages at once.
He looked alarmed.
"She skipped."
"She does that."
"But the story—"
"She is fourteen months old."
"She'll miss the middle."
"She does not respect narrative structure yet."
Andrew looked personally wounded.
You bit back a laugh.
He kept going.
By the last page, Andie's head had settled against his chest.
Her eyes were heavy.
Andrew looked at you like he needed help.
You mouthed, cot.
He nodded.
Very slowly, he stood.
The chair creaked.
Andie's eyes opened.
Both of you froze.
She stared at him.
He stared back.
You did not breathe.
Then she closed her eyes again.
Andrew looked like he had just survived a bomb.
He lowered her into the cot with the careful precision of a man handling glass.
Too slow.
You could tell immediately.
Babies sensed hesitation like sharks sensed blood.
Andie's eyes opened.
"No."
Andrew froze.
You winced.
She stood up in the cot.
"No."
Andrew turned to you with panic in his eyes.
You stepped beside him and touched his arm.
"It's okay."
"She's up."
"I see."
"She was asleep."
"She tricked you."
Andie held out both arms.
"Dada."
Andrew nearly collapsed emotionally.
"No," you whispered before he could reach.
His eyes snapped to yours.
"She asked."
"I know."
"She wants—"
"She wants not to nap."
His face twisted.
"She said Dada."
"Yeah. She's very good."
"This feels wrong."
"It does."
"She's crying."
"She is complaining."
Andie's lower lip trembled.
Andrew looked like you had asked him to abandon her in the wilderness.
You softened.
"We're not leaving her alone to scream," you said quietly. "We're just giving her a chance to settle."
He swallowed.
"She'll think I left."
Your heart cracked.
There it was.
Not about nap.
Not really.
You reached for his hand.
"No," you said. "She won't."
Andie grumbled in the cot.
Not crying.
Not really.
Just deeply dissatisfied.
"You're right here," you said.
Andrew looked at the cot.
"She can see you. She can hear you. You're not disappearing."
His jaw worked.
You squeezed his hand.
"Sit beside the cot. Talk to her."
He nodded once.
Then sat on the rug beside the cot, back against the wall, his fingers resting through the bars.
Andie immediately grabbed one.
"Da."
"I'm here," he said.
His voice shook.
You stood in the doorway, hand over your mouth.
"I'm here," he repeated.
Andie held his finger.
Then sat down.
Then lay down badly, her legs folded under her at a strange angle.
Andrew looked at you in alarm.
You nodded.
"She's okay."
"She looks broken."
"She sleeps like a folded chair sometimes."
"That's not okay."
"It is baby okay."
He looked unconvinced.
But he stayed.
He talked quietly.
Not reading now.
Just telling her nonsense.
That the moon book had better pacing than the rabbit book. That the duck was on the shelf and still not for eating. That Craig's baby gate was crooked but respectable. That her mother was probably laughing at him silently in the hallway.
You were.
Andie's grip on his finger loosened.
Her breathing evened.
Andrew stopped talking.
Then started again, quieter.
"Dada's here."
Your eyes filled.
Andie slept.
Finally.
Andrew sat there for another five minutes because he was afraid to move.
Then another three because he wanted to.
When he eventually came downstairs, he looked exhausted.
You were in the kitchen making coffee.
He stepped into the doorway.
"She's asleep."
You turned.
He looked like a man returning from a war that involved board books and emotional manipulation.
You tried not to smile.
Failed.
"Congratulations."
"She's dangerous."
"She is."
"She says Dada and I lose judgment."
"I noticed."
"That's bad."
"It's manageable."
He crossed the kitchen and leaned both hands on the counter.
You set a mug beside him.
He stared at it.
"What?"
"Coffee."
"For me?"
"Yes."
He looked at the mug like it was a kindness he did not know how to hold.
You stepped between his arms, leaning back against the counter.
His hands came to your waist automatically.
There.
Again.
The touch.
The no glass.
The no countdown.
You slid your hands up his chest.
"How was your first nap time?"
"Bad."
You laughed.
"I thought coming home would feel like the end of something," he said.
Your smile softened.
You looked up at him.
"And?"
His eyes searched yours.
"Feels harder."
You nodded.
"Yeah."
"I wanted it."
"I know."
"I still want it."
"I know."
"But it's..." He looked toward the ceiling, where Andie slept above you. "It's a lot."
"It is."
"I don't know the rules."
"There are no rules."
"That's the problem."
You smiled sadly.
"Beginnings usually are harder than endings."
He looked back at you.
"Is that what this is?"
"A beginning?"
He nodded.
You slid one hand to the side of his neck.
"I think so."
His forehead lowered to yours.
He breathed you in.
You felt some of the tension leave his body.
Not all.
Enough.
"I missed you," he said.
"I was right here."
"No." His thumb moved over your waist. "Like this."
Your throat tightened.
"Me too."
He kissed you.
Slow.
Not desperate like yesterday.
Not stolen like the contact room.
A kitchen kiss.
A home kiss.
Coffee cooling beside you, banana on the floor, your daughter sleeping upstairs because he had helped her get there.
You smiled against his mouth.
He pulled back slightly.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"You're smiling."
"I'm happy."
He went still.
The words seemed to land somewhere he had not expected.
Then his face softened.
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
He swallowed.
"Good."
You touched his cheek.
"You're allowed to be too."
"I know."
"Do you?"
He was quiet.
Then, "I'm trying it out."
You laughed softly.
"How does it feel?"
He looked around the kitchen.
At the highchair.
The abandoned cloth.
The crooked baby gate visible through the doorway.
Your hands on him.
His mug beside yours.
Then he looked back at you.
"Scary."
You smiled.
"Yeah."
"But good."
You kissed him again.
"Good."
The baby monitor crackled.
Both of you froze.
A rustle.
A tiny grunt.
Then, clear as anything through the speaker:
"Dada!"
Andrew lifted his head.
His eyes went wide.
You grinned.
"You're on."
"She just went down."
"She knows what she wants."
"She needs sleep."
"She needs Dada, apparently."
The monitor crackled again.
"Da!"
Andrew stared at it like the device had personally challenged him.
Then he looked at you.
You nodded toward the stairs.
"Go on."
He was already moving.
At the bottom of the stairs, he paused and looked back.
You stood in the kitchen, coffee in hand, hair messy, wearing his shirt, smiling like your heart was too full for your body.
"What?" you asked.
Andrew shook his head.
"Nothing."
But it was not nothing.
It was the house.
It was you.
It was his daughter calling him from upstairs.
It was the fact that nobody else had to answer first.
For more than a year, Andrew's voice had lived in the house by recording, by phone, by memory.
Now it moved through the walls on its own, answering their daughter when she called.
He went upstairs.
You stayed in the kitchen and listened.
The nursery door creaked softly.
Andie babbled.
Andrew's voice came low and warm through the ceiling.
summary: One glitchy tablet, one HR email, and suddenly you’re married to your attending, Jack Abbot. HR thinks it was intentional and has already started merging your records. Claim it was a mistake, and your residency could be delayed. With only three months left until you're an attending, Jack agrees to play along. Pretending to be married might save your career—but can your heart survive the side effects?
tags: accidental marriage, slow burn romance, HR involvement, nosy coworkers, reader is a PGY-4 resident, jack is not a widow in this fic, possible medical/legal inaccuracies, mutual pining, fluff
word count: 4.4k
a/n: thank you all for still being here! we're nearly at the end :(( but it's been so much fun!! i appreciate you lots and LOVE reading your comments <33 i hope you enjoy! <33
i'm not keeping a tag list for this series!
Diagnosis: Married | Masterlist
The Pitt | Masterlist
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You wake to the sensation of soft kisses brushed against your skin—your forehead, your cheek, and your chin. It's the best sleep you've had in months, muscles warm and at ease. The feeling grows with each kiss as you're reminded of the fact that last night was real.
Jack loves you.
It wasn't just a vivid dream; the tender kisses he places on your skin confirm that. You're tempted to pretend to stay asleep just to enjoy more of this, but you instinctively scrunch your nose as his lips land on it, his scruff tickling you gently.
"Morning," he murmurs warmly, his voice husky with sleep, as he breathes against your cheek. You can feel his smile before your eyes fully open as he presses another soft kiss to your face.
Jack rests on one elbow, his hair tousled, with the soft morning light catching the strands that are more white than grey. God, he's handsome.
Yesterday, you might have convinced yourself that this look of adoration he’s giving you is just a figment of your imagination, but today, you know it’s real. He’s actually gazing at you like this, as if nothing else matters—not your messy morning hair nor yesterday’s mascara remnants around your eyes. He simply looks like he’s glad you’re here with him.
"Morning," you grin back, stifling a yawn into your hand.
His smile broadens. "Hi."
You chuckle softly. "Hi."
He keeps staring at you with a smile on his face. His other hand finds your waist, and your cheeks flush in response as he drags you closer. Although his touch isn’t new, the familiarity feels different now—seeing as you now know the intent behind it means what you want it to.
"What?" you ask, a bit self-conscious, rubbing your eyes in hopes of wiping away the stubborn mascara stains.
"Nothing," he shrugs, yet the grin on his face suggests otherwise.
"Jack." You pout at him and watch as his gaze drops down to your lips.
"I just..." he laughs lightly and shakes his head. "I can’t believe this is real."
You know exactly how he feels, and you hope he's able to see it in your eyes. If he doesn't, then you hope he feels it as your hand brushes through his wild strands. His eyes flutter shut under your touch, and when he opens them again, you’re convinced he does.
You both lock eyes for a moment before he leans forward. At the last moment, you turn your head, and his kiss lands on your cheek instead. He makes a comically disgruntled noise.
"I haven't brushed my teeth yet," you lament, though unable to suppress your laughter at his pouty face.
"I don't care," Jack says, placing a kiss against your jaw.
"Jack," you giggle louder. "I’m serious. My breath stinks."
"I've wanted to do this for months," he says, pressing another kiss to your cheek. "A little morning breath won’t stop me. Honestly, you could have rotten teeth, and I’d still kiss you."
"Ew," you grimace, but he just laughs and plants another kiss at the corner of your mouth.
You debate it for a second, then your cringe morphs into a grin as you lean in, stealing a quick kiss from his lips.
When you pull back, Jack stares at you with wide eyes. You can see when realisation hits him; his eyes darken, and he leans in quickly, giving you no chance to dodge him again. His mouth meets yours, soft yet persistent, each kiss lingering a bit longer than the last. He swallows your giggles with his lips, but he can't help but laugh, too.
Eventually, he presses his forehead against yours, and you stay there for a little while, wrapped up in each other, letting the reality of last night fully settle. The room is quiet except for your breathing, and for the first time since yesterday, the silence feels comfortable.
"I missed waking up next to you," Jack confesses, his voice low in your ear.
You press a kiss to his cheek before resting your head against his shoulder. "Me too."
You breathe in, nose buried deep in the crook of his throat, and his arms tighten around you when he realises what you're doing—breathing in the scent that's purely him. You've never been able to do this freely, and it feels surreal to be able to be this close with no excuses needed.
The moment's broken when your alarm rings softly. Jack shifts to turn it off while still holding you close, and makes no move to let you go or get up.
"We need to get up," you say after a minute, trying to pull back.
"Says who?" he answers cheekily, pulling you in even closer.
"Check-out, for one," you reply, pushing gently against his chest. "And I’d like to shower before we have to sit in an enclosed space for two hours."
"What if I like the way you smell?" he says, and usually, your stomach would be fluttering at a sentence like that, but you know him too well—
"—Fritos are my favourite chips," he continues. His chest bounces a bit as you playfully swat him.
"Rude," you grin, and this time he allows you to slip out of his grasp. "And you’re a liar. I know your favourite isn’t Fritos."
"Says who?" he repeats with a grin as he watches you sit up. You move to the edge of the bed, and he sits up to be able to see you better.
"Says the several bags of Doritos in your cabinets," you counter with a raised eyebrow. You move to slide off the bed, but he catches your arm, pulling you back over to him.
"Ja-ack," you laugh as you land against his chest.
"Those are for Robby," Jack says, and before you can argue, his mouth captures yours again. He keeps you there for another five minutes before your alarm blares again.
"Fine," he concedes when you pull back again. "Just leave me all alone here."
You shuffle forward, but pause at the doorway to the bathroom, meeting his eyes with a mischievous smile. "You could always join me."
Jack freezes, and you can see him process the offer—the way his eyes darken and the slight swallow as his gaze trails over you.
"Or not," you shrug, stifling a grin as you turn away.
He's got his crutches in his hands before your sentence finishes.
The checkout line is ridiculously long, and under normal circumstances, you’d complain about it—after all, how hard can it be to hand over a keycard and walk out? But with Jack’s arm wrapped around your waist and soft kisses peppered onto your hairline, you just can’t find the energy to care.
Even as Jack offers to give you his car keys, so you can wait in the car, you shake your head. You want to stay close to him despite the line barely moving. The lobby is crowded, and it really makes no sense for both of you to be standing here. Still, after spending weeks keeping your distance, torturing yourself, the thought of being apart now feels absurd.
Jack doesn’t push the issue; he simply nods and pulls you closer again. You're plastered to his side for the ten minutes it takes before you finally reach the desk.
"Hey," a warm voice greets you just as Jack hands over the keycard. Jeremy stands off to the side, a bag slung over his shoulder, sunglasses pushed up into his hair.
"Hi," you respond with a smile, stepping out of the queue to approach him.
He returns your smile. "I’m glad I caught you—you left before I could tell you how nice it was to see you again yesterday."
"Oh, sorry about that," you start, embarrassment flaring at the reminder of your jealous outburst. "I had—"
"We had some stuff to do," Jack interjects, slipping an arm around your waist again. He gives Jeremy a tight smile.
"Oh, don't worry about it," Jeremy responds. "Warren was asking about you, but honestly, I’m not sure she even remembers anything now." He leans in a little closer, lowering his voice to a whisper. "I had to extend her hotel room for her—she got pretty wasted after you left. The ushers had to escort her to her room after she threw up in the plants in the hallway."
"What? Really?" Laughter bubbles out of you. "Well, that's very professional."
Jack squeezes your waist admonishingly but still huffs an amused breath.
Jeremy grins. "Anyway, it was great to see you again. You’ve really done well for yourself, Sleepy." He nods at you, then glances at Jack, offering him a nod as well.
"You too," you say, and you mean it. Jeremy was a great guy in med school, even if he wasn't the best at relationships back then, but you're sure he's grown up more. You certainly have.
You're more certain of what you want, more certain of what you deserve, and somehow, that has landed you with Jack.
"Maybe we'll see you around," you finish. Presby isn't that far from PTMC after all.
"Yeah, I hope so," Jeremy replies, pulling his sunglasses down. He smiles at you one last time before he walks off. "Get home safe."
Jack grumbles something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like 'yeah, I hope so' as he steers you towards the exit. He keeps a neutral face until you're outside, where it turns sullen. A laugh escapes you the moment you’re near the car, and away from prying eyes.
Jack narrows his eyes at you as he pops open the trunk. "What’s so funny?"
Another laugh leaves you. "You're just a silly, jealous man."
"I'm not silly," he replies immediately as he places your bags inside the trunk before shutting it again.
"That's the part you focus on?"
"I'm not jealous," he insists, crossing his arms.
You tilt your head, raising an eyebrow.
"I'm not."
"Hey," you say, stepping closer. His arms drop the moment you gently press down on them. You curl your fingers into the front of his t-shirt. "You have nothing to be jealous of."
Jack huffs, staring at your hands.
"Jack."
His eyes lift to yours.
"I love you." The words still feel new in your mouth, but no less right.
His eyes search yours, still checking after everything revealed yesterday that you mean it. The tight line of his mouth softens when he finds a satisfying answer.
You draw him in closer. "Okay?"
"Okay." His hand slides to your cheek and you meet him halfway, your lips pressing together in a tender kiss.
A smile tugs at the corner of his mouth when he pulls back. "Let's go home."
Coming home feels strange.
Not in a bad way, but it feels different than it did when you left. The air has shifted inside, the furniture moved without being an inch out of place, and the smell is different, and yet everything is exactly the same.
Jack's sweater still hangs over the back of the dining room chair. Your blanket is still draped across the couch, unfolded in that way Jack always grumbles over, but never does anything about.
Everything feels new and somehow the exact same. The only different thing is you and Jack. There's finally nothing unspoken between you, with all cards on the table. No uncertainty, no wondering, no pretending.
There's still the question of what this means for you, but it doesn't feel pressing. It's just there in the background, waiting until the moment feels right. There's no rush to speak.
You're free to enjoy this moment for what it is. The pleasantness from the drive, where Jack spent the entire trip with his hand firmly planted on your thigh, carries into the house.
The bags get unpacked together, clothes thrown into the washer by four hands rather than two. You follow Jack to the bedroom when he puts the bags away; he follows you into the bathroom when you put your toiletries back. You make lunch together, hips nudging, shoulders brushing—a task that normally takes ten stretches into thirty because neither of you can stop talking and laughing.
He keeps looking at you like he still can't believe it's real. You can keep leaning in close to prove to him that it is.
The day settles eventually as you both curl up on the couch with books. The laundry tumbles quietly in the background as warm sunlight spills in through the living room windows.
You're leaning against his chest, reading, but more focused on the hand that's trailing slowly up and down your arm. Every so often, you glance at him out of the corner of your eye, catching the scruff on his jaw that's slightly longer than usual, the way he scrunches his nose at passages in his book, and how his face is relaxed in a way you haven't seen before.
As if sensing you, he glances over at you. His mouth immediately curves into a smile when he catches you swiftly looking away. He huffs a little cute sound, squeezing your shoulder.
You grin into your book, nudging his leg with your hand. You try to refocus on the pages, but it doesn't take long before you're blinking heavily. Without even really thinking about it, you slide down until your head is resting on his lap instead.
Jack's hand follows soundly, petting your head softly and lulling you to sleep.
By evening, neither of you has spent more than a few minutes apart.
Dinner comes and goes. The dishes get washed. The laundry gets folded. Around you, the house gradually darkens, shadows stretching across familiar rooms. You try to stay awake as long as possible, hoping to drag your sleeping schedule back toward something resembling normal before your next shift. By the seventh yawn in under a minute, Jack gives you a look.
"Okay," he says with an amused huff. "Time for bed."
You grumble half-heartedly but still let him steer you toward the bedroom. Blearily, you grab at clothes in the closet. Jack doesn't comment on the fact that you grab one of his shirts, just glances at it with a pleased smile before he heads into the bathroom.
When he's done, you brush past him in just his shirt and underwear that he can't see, biting back a smile at when he swallows harshly. You don't fight the grin once you're alone in the bathroom, letting the giddy feeling take over.
Your phone vibrates against the counter, just as you've put your toothbrush into your mouth.
>> Hello??? Are you alive?!
It's Olivia. Fuck. She's already texted you three times earlier today, and you'd ignored her, unsure of what to say that won't reveal everything immediately.
<< Yes
>> That's it??
<< Yes, I'm fine <3
You add the heart, toothbrush hanging loosely from your mouth as you try to act normal.
>> Uh huh. How did it go?
You can picture her narrowed eyes when you read it. Your thumbs hover over the screen for a minute, thinking of what to say.
<< It was fine. Nothing worth mentioning.
You can see her typing, deleting, then typing again several times.
>> And what about Jack?
<< He's fine, too.
You pause before adding:
<< We're fine. Things are okay again.
>> What does that mean??
You take too long to answer her, but her following text shows that it doesn't really matter anyway—she knows you too well.
>> oh😏
When you reemerge, you've decided to keep this to yourself until the morning. No need to reveal to Jack that the plan has failed immediately. This can still be just yours tonight.
He sits against the headboard, prosthetic off, and duvet covering his lap. He looks nervous. "Are you gonna—?" He gestures vaguely toward the empty side of the bed before clearing his throat. "I mean..."
The uncertainty in his voice surprises you. You'd just spent the entire day together, and he's unsure if you want to share the bed. It's kinda cute.
"Yeah," you say softly. "If that's okay?"
His answer comes fast. "Of course it's okay." He pauses. "I just didn't know if—" he shrugs, trailing off.
You climb into bed, into the arm that was waiting for you. You both sink down until your head settles against his chest, listening to the familiar rhythm of his heartbeat.
You guess this is as good a moment as any other to finally have the conversation.
"I...uh—" you start. "I have the divorce papers printed on my desk."
Jack goes very still.
"I also still have that apartment viewing on Thursday." You stare at a loose thread on his shirt. "I know we've done this in a weird order. Getting married, moving in together, and then confessing."
You force out a laugh. "If you want to do this properly, we can."
The room goes quiet. Jack's arm tightens around you. "Properly?"
"You know." You shrug. "Dating. Separate places. Normal people stuff."
For a moment, he doesn't say anything; then, he says: "Do you want that?"
The question catches you off guard. You hesitate but answer truthfully. "No."
Jack lets out a breath. Just a small exhale that sounds suspiciously like relief. "Oh."
You lift your head. "Oh?"
Jack's mouth twitches. "I don't either." He rubs the back of his neck. "But I don't want you staying because you think you have to."
Your chest squeezes. "Jack."
"You've spent months trying to make decisions based on what you thought I wanted." His fingers trace idle patterns against your arm. "I'd rather know what you want."
You stare at him for a second. "I want to stay. I want to stay here."
His eyes soften immediately. "Okay."
"Okay?"
"Okay." A smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. "We don't have to rush to figure things out. I like having you here. We can't figure the rest out later."
"Yeah?"
"Mm," he hums, his grip tightening around you. "I slept like shit when you weren't here. I'd prefer not to do that again."
You huff a breath. "Me too."
Even though the apartment had been nicer than the others you'd looked at, you really didn't want to move. You're happy he feels the same as you do. Maybe it doesn't matter if you do this in an order that doesn't make the most sense—as long as it makes sense to you, that's all that matters.
The room quiets again until Jack speaks again. "Can I ask you something?"
Your chest tightens, but you still nod.
"Why Lily?"
You knew he was going to ask eventually, but it doesn't make it any less embarrassing. You sigh into his chest. "That day—" you don't have to specify which, he already knows. "The way you ran inside looking terrified—"
You swallow. "And how you yelled at me after..." The memory of it still stings now, even after his countless apologies. "It was the difference in how you treated me and her."
"I'm sorry," he says again.
"I know."
"No." His voice is quiet. "I need you to understand what happened."
You lift your head enough to look at him.
"I got there seconds after—" His jaw tightens. "I barely managed to pull you away. I was already petrified when I heard the code being called. I could only imagine you—" he stops, breathing heavily. "...I can't explain what that felt like."
He continues, "When I realised it wasn't you, I was relieved. And then I felt guilty for being relieved because someone had still gotten hurt, but all I could think about was how happy I was that it wasn't you."
The confession lands heavily between you.
"I was scared out of my mind. Angry at the patient. Relieved that you weren't hurt. Guilty that I was relieved. All at once. And I took it out on you. I'm sorry."
You squeeze his hand.
His eyes find yours. "It was never about Lily."
You believe him. Now, you do. But back then? Back then, you'd been drowning in uncertainty.
You shrug helplessly, revealing more of how you felt. "After that, I started noticing every little thing. The way you talked to her. The way she made you laugh."
"You make me laugh," he says firmly.
You roll your eyes at him, a slight smile tugging on your lips. "I think I was trying to make peace with losing you. If I wasn't the one for you, then she could be. She could be better for you. Kinder than me. Easier than me."
Jack's face falls. "Sweetheart..."
Your mouth twitches sadly, looking down at his shirt again.
"You genuinely thought that?"
You nod.
His hand comes up to cradle your cheek, lifting your gaze back to his. "Do you have any idea how much time I spent wishing you'd look at me the way I looked at you?" His thumb brushes across your skin. "It was always you."
You close your eyes, leaning into his touch. You sigh. "We wasted so much time."
"Yeah."
Moments stolen by fear and assumptions and bad timing. You think about every dinner that could have been a date. Every movie night spent pretending not to notice how close he sat. Every almost-confession. Every chance that slipped away.
But now, everything's finally out in the open. The conversation drifts after that. You talk about everything. The first dinner. The first kiss. The kiss cam. The bar. Every misunderstanding. Every moment one of you had walked away convinced the other didn't feel the same.
Sometimes you laugh until your stomach hurts. Sometimes you bury your face in a pillow because neither of you can believe how oblivious you've been. Sometimes there's silence while you mourn all the things that could have been.
By the time the conversation finally slows, pale morning light is spilling through the curtains. Your eyes burn with exhaustion, but your chest feels lighter than it has in months.
You don't know what happens next.
You don't know what being married and newly confessed and hopelessly in love is supposed to look like. But for the first time, that uncertainty doesn't scare you. You'll figure it out together.
Beside you, Jack shifts closer beneath the blankets until there's barely any space left between you.
His lips brush your hair. "I love you."
You smile immediately. The confession still feels unreal. "I love you too."
The smile you feel against your forehead is warm and content. And wrapped in his arms, with the future still unwritten and endless possibilities stretching ahead of you, sleep finally finds you both.
The next evening finds you faster than you'd like.
As you step in through the door to the hospital, side by side, it reminds you of the first time you walked in carrying a secret on your shoulders—only this time, your shoulders are light, and your stomach is fluttering with happy jitters.
Somehow, you manage to make your way to the lockers without meeting anyone. With your bags dropped, you sneak a brief kiss against the door before you reenter the Pitt. Jack's hand brushes yours, your pinky catching his for a second, before you take a step apart.
You try to bite back the smile that threatens to break through. If you want this work, you need to stop acting like a lovestruck teenager. It's incredibly hard, though.
Robby stands at the hub, tablet in hand and a frown on his face.
"Rough day?" Jack says, clapping his back. He leans against the counter as you trail closer.
"Yeah... Good luck." Robby rubs his face, dropping the tablet on the counter. When his eyes open, they narrow in on the space between you and Jack—or rather the lack of it.
You shift to the side, trying to act nonchalant, but Robby's a hound. His eyes follow the movement immediately, nose twitching as he tries to sniff out everything you're trying to keep quiet.
"How was the conference?"
"Fine," Jack replies, glancing up at the board. He taps his fingers rhythmically on the counter.
"It was?" Robby raises an eyebrow, staring at him. Jack nods at him, shifting his gaze away quickly. Robby watches him for a moment, then turns to you.
"Mm," you nod, offering a tight smile. "The usual."
Robby stays silent, shifting his gaze from Jack to you, and then he grins widely. He chuckles, "If you so."
"Yeah," Jack nods with an awkward smile.
"Well, that's good." Robby keeps grinning as he pats the counter twice. "I'll see you later." He salutes you, still smiling, then walks off without any further questions.
You stare at his disappearing figure with a sense of dread. With a hand around Jack's wrist, you pull him into a quiet corner, hissing: "He knows."
Jack frowns. "How could he? We were acting normal."
You stare at him. "Normal? If you call 'you not looking at him at all' normal, then yes. Very normal."
"I did look at him."
"For two seconds. Normally, you don't look away at all," you counter.
Jack crosses his arms. "Well...You gave it away to Olivia."
"I didn't—I told her nothing."
"Exactly!" Jack points out. "That's not normal for you."
You stare at him with pinched eyebrows and then sigh. "...Yeah, okay. Maybe I did."
Jack sighs, too. "I guess I did, too." He shrugs, a smile tugging at his lips as he leans closer. "But to be fair, I think we forgot that they've spent months dealing with our sorry asses. Of course, they know. They knew we were in love before we did."
"—Abbot, there you are! Stop hiding in corners with your missus—trauma incoming," Lena interrupts with a wink. She doesn't even look back as she disappears down the hallway.
Jack squeezes your hand briefly on the way out, sending you a soft smile. "See you on the other side."
You watch him disappear around the corner before you head after him. The familiar knot of anxiety never comes. For weeks, every shift had felt like walking a tightrope. Every glance from Jack had meant something, and every action had been dissected. Now, the uncertainty is gone.
The Pitt is still loud. Still chaotic. The same as it always was. It's you who is different.
Across the department, Jack glances back. Just for a second, but long enough to catch your eye. Long enough to smile, and then he's gone into a trauma room.
And for the first time in a very long time, you're looking forward to the shift ahead.
summary: the pitt notices the growing tension between you and dr. jack abbot, even after you're moved to the day shift temporarily - spurring forth a secret bet you're both unaware of. jack is there when you get injured at work, and he shows you just how helpful his hands can be.
warnings: 18+ MDNI, porn with a lotta plot (we work for our porn in this household), undefined age gap, hint at power imbalance (they're both consenting adults), sloooow burn, swearing, jealousy, mutual pining, jack is a yearner, so much tension it's dizzying, santos is a menace, lots of dialogue, reader has had knee surgery, reader gets injured, mentions of jack's prosthetic, swat jack, pet names (pretty girl, sweetheart, baby), detailed explicit smut, reader is desperate (aren't we all for that old man), dirty talk, teasing, praise kink, nipple play, fingering, oral (f!recieving), squirting, jack comes untouched, thigh grinding, unprotected pnv (reader is on birth control), service dom!jack, aftercare, dual pov, no use of y/n, not beta read, partly proofread, smut is not proofread (whatever i wrote is between me and the demon that possessed me)
word count: 16.7k (last 6k is straight up smut)
authors note: part 2 is finally here 😭 i have been going back and forth on this for weeks; i cannot just go full smut so apologies for the additional plot to part 1 (i'm not sorry, i love the pitt shenanigans 🙂↕️). i finally listened to yes, chef - shawn...the man that you are. i live for praise so don't be shy 🫦
song inspo: ooo - amber mark
divider credits: red line divider by @/omi-resources, medical divider by @/sisterlucifergraphics
part one masterlist
Have you ever thought about the things we could do?
Wakin' up next day smellin' like my perfume
I'll turn you on, I know you want those
Late night views, just us two, me on you
Jack Abbot knew what he was doing was wrong.
Well, maybe not wrong per se—but it wasn't typical attending behaviour. He knew for a fact he wouldn't guide Crus to an empty patient room if he caught him with a slight limp, knew he wouldn't touch Ellis' bare leg let alone fucking massage it.
The first time it happened he convinced himself that no, it was typical attending behaviour—he was concerned that your pain would affect your ability to treat patients. And yeah, there was a sliver of understanding as well—he knew how hard it was to ignore the physical ache, how once it reached a point it became an obsessive loop of pain, pain, pain.
Having an excuse to touch you, to get close to you—that was just a bonus, it wasn't the sole reason he was helping you. At least that's what he kept on telling himself, to convince himself that the professional boundaries were still there.
The second time he dragged you into an empty patient room, he was able to admit to himself that it wasn't typical attending behaviour. And while helping to relieve your pain wasn't wrong, the thoughts he had with your leg on his lap definitely were.
The thoughts he carried home with him after every shift with you, they were wrong. But, fuck, did they feel so right. Touching himself remembering how your skin felt under his hands, replaying your small pained whimpers and the look of relief on your face —he knew that was wrong. Moaning your name out as he came over his fist and stomach, he knew that was wrong. But no one would ever know—you would never know.
"So," he started, his fingers pressing into the spots on your calf he knew were the worst. "Any more first date horror stories?"
He didn't know why he was asking. He didn't want to know about you going out with other men. But it was on the long list of things about you that kept him up as he tried to sleep—the incessant thoughts about you spending your time with a man that was undeserving. Endless thoughts about another man's hands tending to your knee, hands that were allowed to drift higher and pull sounds from you he could only dream about hearing.
You placed your hands behind you on the patient bed, leaning back on them. "No, I've learned my lesson. Think I might get started early on that whole single, crazy cat lady thing."
His breathy laugh brushed across your bare shin. "Oh, yeah? How's that going?"
You pretended to think for a second with a hum. "I went to an animal shelter the other day, there was a cute three legged cat that I wanted to adopt."
He felt his chest crack open with something warm at the thought of you with a little amputee cat.
"Why didn't you?" His hazel eyes were tender when they met yours.
"Just…don't know if it's the right time. They're much less work than dogs, but it's still a pet—something that would rely on me." You shrugged, looking up at the ceiling because his eyes were too intense. A small wince left you as he worked on a tight knot.
"You're a very reliable person, I'm sure you could manage just fine. Plus, it's a three legged cat—those guys are adorable." He finished with a half smile.
You looked at him again, a small smile gracing your lips. "It sounds like you really want me to adopt this cat."
Jack was ready to go to every animal shelter in Pittsburgh to find that cat himself, if it guaranteed you wouldn't waste any more time on a man that wasn't him.
He finished off the massage with a soft pat to your shin. "If it means that you won't date any more assholes, then yeah, I want you to adopt the damn cat."
You were aware of the eyes on you and Dr. Abbot since he began helping with your knee. It was obvious when Ellis' and Shen's eyes trailed after you both as Abbot steered you towards South seventeen the second time he noticed your pained wince and limp. And it was especially obvious when Nurse Vivi came into what she thought was an empty room, intending to prep it for a patient from chairs.
"Oh! I'm sorry, doctors." She shot you a peculiar smile, her eyes flicking down to your exposed leg. "You okay?"
Dr. Abbot stood up and approached the door that Vivi was half standing in. "Yep. Just an old injury flare up." He said casually, like he did this for every one of his staff. He gave you a single nod before walking back into the ED.
The few hours until the end of your shift after that incident were full of raised eyebrows from Lena and Bridget—mainly directed at Dr. Abbot—and curious side-eyes from Ellis.
Lena approached you in the staff locker room as you grabbed your bag, Ellis doing the same at her locker next to yours.
"Hey, sweetie," she gave you a warm smile. "You know you can tell me if anything, if anyone, is making you uncomfortable, right?"
You felt heat rush up your neck—you understood what she was insinuating immediately. "Yes, of course!"
She tilted her head to the side, a look of suspicion pulling at her features.
You sighed, "it's nothing, really. I have an old sports injury that's been acting up, and Dr. Abbot has been helping when it slows me down."
Lena nodded slightly with a small smile. "He's a good man."
You didn't need the reminder. It was something that had you spiralling while trying to sleep more often than not lately.
"Let us know when it acts up again, okay? An ex once told me I have the hands of a masseuse." She ended with a wink before exiting, throwing a wave at you two over her shoulder.
The fourth and last time Dr. Abbot sat on a stool in front of you, it felt like you were under a microscope. You caught the double takes nurses did as they walked past the open curtain, and the small smirk on Ellis' lips had you wanting to shrink in on yourself.
You couldn't even enjoy the feel of his hands on your skin.
You couldn't enjoy the way his scrub sleeves were pulled taut around his biceps, the fabric straining against his thick muscles. You couldn't enjoy how every tendon in his arm tensed and moved while he massaged your calf, a sight that normally left you speechless—that left you with an ache you could only satiate with your hand between your thighs, imagining it was his instead.
Then there was the way Dr. Abbot looked at you in those brief moments you were alone—like he was memorising every detail about you. It made you want to crawl out of your skin. He was so goddamn attentive, catching every micro-flash of pain your face betrayed. And despite the sinking feeling that what you were doing was wrong, his hands on your skin felt so right—they left you feeling dizzy and flustered every time.
His voice was always softer, the rough edge of his professional doctor side falling away. He spoke to you almost as if you were a friend, and made it seem like this was something he often did with friends.
It was in that soft voice of his that he opened up about his own pain with his amputated leg—telling you the small things he did to help alleviate the pain, recommending you the cream he used, reminding you to take a small break whenever the chaos quietened enough.
"Can't have my best resident suffering," he mumbled, his eyes flicking to your mouth when one of your pained whimpers slipped free.
You chuckled through the tightness in your chest from his praise. "Don't let Ellis or Crus hear you say that—they might swap to the day shift in retaliation."
He let out a scoff. "Nah, they're too weird for the day shift," he gave you one of his signature winks. "Besides, I think Ellis would end up in a fist fight with Robby if she had to spend a full twelve hour shift with him. God knows how many times I've been close to punching him."
You threw your head back with a loud laugh, your body shaking from the intensity. You gave him a teasing smile after you caught your breath. "Isn't he one of your closest friends?"
Jack couldn't stop the full blown grin on his face, the sound of your laughter filling his body with a warmth he hadn't felt in a long time.
"And? You telling me you haven't wanted to cause your friends physical harm when they were being dicks?"
Another giggle slipped out of you. "Yeah, you've got me there. Santos has a photo of a bruise I gave her when we went out a few weeks ago." You held up a finger as his eyes shot up to yours, his eyebrows raised in surprise and his mouth parting to no doubt give you shit. "Before you say anything, she totally deserved it."
He shook his head with a small laugh, squinting his eyes at you. "I'm sure she did."
He finished massaging your leg, rolling your scrub pant down over your knee. He flashed you a small smirk before giving your calf a light pinch.
"I always knew you had a fiery side."
Fuck.
At the end of your next shift was when you realised how serious it really was. You were standing in the ambulance bay before morning rounds, catching a breath of fresh air when Dana joined you outside.
"I can already feel this is gonna be a long one," she huffed, pulling out a cigarette and lighter.
She lit the cigarette and took a long drag before looking at you with a glint in her eye. "You nightcrawlers are great at leaving a mess behind."
"Hey, that's not on me. I clean up after my weirdos." You crossed your arms over your chest and leaned against the exterior wall.
"You ever think about coming back to us, kid?" She flicked the butt of her cigarette, bringing it to her lips for another puff. "Step back into the light, you need the sunshine." She patted your cheek lightly.
You rolled your eyes fondly. "Always the mama bear, Dana. I get plenty of light, seeing as how my shift finishes when the sun comes up."
She let out a soft chuckle. "Touché."
She cleared her throat softly before taking a step closer and laying a hand on your arm. Her voice dropped low, soft. "Nurses, they like to talk. And you have been a hot topic lately, missy."
You tensed immediately, a nervous laugh slipping past your lips. "What—what are you talking about? Has my…work been called into question?"
She rubbed your arm with a squeeze. "No, no, nothing like that. People are just worried, maybe a little intrigued. Is there anything I should know, doll?"
"Is this about Dr. Abbot?"
She gave you a brief nod and you sighed, your head dropping forward. The exhaustion from the twelve hour shift was bordering on unbearable and all you wanted was to crawl into bed.
"I swear, nothing is happening. I would never do that, would never jeopardise my career like that. He just happened to notice my knee injury a few weeks back and has been helping when it hurts. I told Lena all this…" you trailed off, your voice dropping to a mumble.
She finished her cigarette, pressing the butt against the wall before chucking it in the bin next to her. She turned back to you, a look of understanding on her face and a glimmer in her eye.
"Okay, I just wanted to hear it from you." She pulled you into a side hug, squeezing tight. "I'll tell the rumour mill to pipe down, don't want you running off before you become an attending."
You both walked back into the ED, only one of you aware of the conversation that was happening on the hospital's rooftop.
The brisk morning air was biting on the roof, tingling Robby's cheeks as he pushed the door open and let it swing shut with a loud thud behind him.
Jack was leaning against the roof's railing, both arms braced against the cold metal with tension lining his shoulders. He didn't bother turning—there was only one person who knew to find him on the roof at this hour.
"What are you doing, brother?" Came Robby's gruff voice, partially swallowed by the early morning sounds from the city around them.
"Engaging in quiet contemplation. You?"
"Not what I'm talking about." Robby stopped beside his friend, resting his side against the railing with his hands in his pockets.
Jack shot him a side glance, "I have many talents; mind reading isn't one of them."
Robby raised his eyebrows, giving Jack a pointed look. "I'm talking about your resident."
"Crus? I've left him in charge for ten minutes tops, he can't have caused that much damage."
"Don't play dumb. It's not a good look on you."
"You're wrong, everything is a good look on me." Jack shot his friend a half smirk, the tension in his shoulders betraying his nonchalant behaviour.
Robby let out a frustrated scoff, growing tired of Jack's obvious deflecting. He straightened his posture and crossed his arms over his chest, showing his friend that he was serious.
"You know what's not a good look? Dragging your resident into empty patient rooms and massaging her fucking leg." Robby said, a sharp bite to his words.
Jack winced, dropping his head forward slightly. He didn't think word would get to Robby that fast.
"I'm just trying to help her." Jack grumbled, feeling like a child caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "It's not a big deal."
Robby let out a loud incredulous laugh. "Tell her to go see a goddamn physio, Jack!"
Jack sighed and shook his head, growing frustrated at this conversation. Tell you to waste money seeing a physio? When he was more than willing to help, to provide the relief you need?
"I want to help her."
For a second, everything around them froze. The wind came to a halt, the sounds of early morning traffic dissipated. All that was distinguishable was the sincerity in Jack's voice, the conviction behind his words. And that's when Robby knew that this—whatever it was, whatever Jack was feeling—ran deeper than what Lena had insinuated to him and Dana the day before.
Robby shook his head with a small, disbelieving laugh. "You're fucking screwed, my friend."
Jack twisted his wedding ring around his finger, trying to ground himself. He didn't want to accept his feelings for you, didn't want to unlock the door that was clearly labelled 'DANGER' in bright red letters.
"I'm moving her to the day shift."
Jack's reaction was instant.
He pushed off from the railing, crossing his arms over his chest and levelling a cold glare at Robby.
"No. She's my best resident." His tone was sharp, his annoyance bleeding through.
"It's just for a week, while Whitaker is visiting his family." Robby sighed as Jack stood strong, his shoulders moving in a shrug that said 'why should I care'. "You know we need all the help we can get on the day shift—you nightcrawlers can survive without her."
Jack didn't believe that for a second. He needed you on the night shift with him—needed it like he needed air to breathe. The thought struck him deep in his chest, a cold realisation seeping into his bones.
Robby clapped him harshly on the back, throwing an arm over his shoulders as he pivoted them to walk to the rooftop door.
"You could be more grateful—I'm saving your sorry ass from a gruelling trip to HR."
When Robby told you they needed you back on the day shift to cover for Whitaker you were hesitant at first. Not that you had much say in the matter, but the timing of it felt suspicious—Dana had just questioned you about the Abbot situation, and not even thirty minutes later Robby was pulling you aside for a chat about your schedule.
It didn't help that multiple pairs of eyes were not so subtly watching your conversation with your chief attending. You tried your best to not let your surprise show, offering Robby a small smile and a "no problem". One pair of eyes was harder to ignore than the others—eyes that you fantasised about more often than not, eyes that you had to pinch yourself from getting lost in.
Eyes that followed you as you said goodbye to your colleagues, engaging in excited conversation with Mohan and McKay who were ecstatic to have you back on the day shift. Eyes that didn't care that their obvious staring had drawn unwanted attention.
Ellis was finishing up her notes on a patient, tablet in hand as she prepared to pass them off to Santos. She was watching her night shift attending with a small smirk on her face—his forlorn puppy dog expression making her disturbingly pleased. Santos let out a snicker beside Ellis, her own eyes clocking Dr. Abbot's yearning disposition.
Ellis turned to Santos, both sporting matching smirks on their faces with a mischievous gleam in their eyes.
"Want to start a new bet?"
Jack was furious with Robby.
Actually, he was angry with a lot of people lately. He was quicker to snap, his patience wearing thin—on track to lose his title of being the 'fun dad' of the PTMC Emergency Department.
Robby had told him that you were only going to be back on the day shift for one week, just to cover while Whitaker was away. It had been three weeks since Whitaker had returned to the Pitt, and you were still on the day shift.
The night shift had been surviving without you, though barely hanging on by a thread. The main issue they were having? Abbot's perpetual foul mood.
The only time the night shift ever saw a flicker of something warm cross their attending's face was during shift change. It had them all raising their eyebrows, looking at each other knowingly, and digging into their wallets.
"Thirty bucks on Abbot making a move after a paramedic hits on her." Shen murmured to the group gathered at the Hub during shift change, him and Ellis keeping watch in case you or Dr. Abbot appeared. He had witnessed a paramedic hit on you once before, right in front of Abbot. He thought he heard a bone in Abbot's hand fracture from how tightly clenched his fists were.
"Nah," Princess breathed out. "I'm putting twenty on them being together for at least a month."
Perlah hummed next to her. "You thinking they got together after that bad date?"
Dana peered at the group huddled at the counter over the top of her glasses. "Have you seen how he's pining after her? There's no way they're together."
Ellis let out a little whistle, the signal for one of you nearby. The group split off in different directions, Shen slipping a handful of cash into Ellis' hand as they passed each other.
Robby hummed from his spot next to Dana, eyebrows raised as he read over a chart. "You know you shouldn't be entertaining them…"
Dana scoffed, her eyes tracking you as you stepped into Central nine. "You're one to talk—I heard you bet fifty on him confessing after she gets hurt."
"I bet twenty," Dana gave Robby a knowing look, raising her eyebrows at him. "What? I know my friend and I know his white knight complex."
"Yeah," Dana murmured quietly, "that's going to catch up to him one day." She gathered a stack of papers on the counter, stamping them down on the surface to straighten them. Her eyes flicked back up to Robby. "You really think he's going to do somethin' before she becomes an attending?"
Robby sighed, dragging a hand down the side of his face—his beard audibly scratching against his palm. "He stopped wearing his wedding ring a couple weeks ago. I think he's been holding himself back longer than he'd ever care to admit."
The first week you were on the day shift, Jack found himself walking into the ED twenty minutes earlier than he usually did. By the third week, he was standing at the Hub over an hour before shift change. He quickly found out his early arrivals were both a blessing and a curse.
A blessing because it was an extra hour he got to see you; to hear you laugh at something Princess said, to admire you as you cared for your patients, to be by your side the second you let out a wince.
A curse because Santos was hell bent on torturing him. He knew she was doing it on purpose—she had a whole twelve hour shift to talk to you, to gossip about your personal lives, yet it seemed that whenever he was near you two all she wanted to talk about was your dating life.
"I know you're still pissed about Mark," Santos started, slinging an arm around your shoulder as you checked the board at the Hub. "But—hear me out—there's a pedes attending at Presby I want to set you up with."
Jack slowed down on the other side of the Hub, pulling up a random chart on a discarded tablet to act busy while his ears strained to hear the rest of your conversation with Santos. A pedes attending? Really?
You let out a disbelieving laugh. "You're joking, right? I am not going out with anyone you suggest ever again."
Santos groaned, throwing her head back dramatically. "How many times do I need to apologise? I'm sorry, okay—I promise Ben is the real deal, he won't make you pay for anything."
You shrugged her arm off your shoulder, turning to face her with your arms crossed. "Wow, that's a real high bar you got there, Trin. I feel spoiled," you drawled sarcastically.
She held her hands up in defence. "Fine, don't believe me. You're the one who's going to be sorry you let a catch slip through your fingers."
Her eyes glanced over to the other side of the Hub, catching the way Abbot was standing still with rigid shoulders and a frown pulling at his face. She couldn't stop the small smirk twitching her lips—he was definitely listening.
"Garcia can vouch for him, they did their residency together." She watched, delighted, as your arms loosened, your mouth moving side to side like you were considering it. "And," she dragged out, "he's exactly your type."
You rolled your eyes, but the small bite to your bottom lip gave away your interest. "What, emotionally unavailable?"
You watched as Santos eyes lit up, a slow smirk taking over her face as she subtly nodded towards where Dr. Abbot was standing.
"Old."
A rush of heat crawled up your neck and you elbowed her in the ribs. "Shut up," you hissed with wide eyes.
"You two done gossiping over there?" Dr. Abbot's voice barked out. "I'm sure your patients would love to know they bled out because you were busy planning a date."
You whipped your head to the side, your shocked eyes meeting his cold glare. His hands were gripping the counter's edge, his eyebrows raised as he gave you a pointed look.
You scrambled under his attention. "Sorry, Dr. Abbot, won't happen again." You shot Santos a sharp look before turning on your heels and hurrying towards the North nurses station.
Santos jutted her hip out and crossed her arms over her chest, levelling her superior with a knowing look across the Hub.
"What's the matter? You jealous, Abbot?"
He straightened up, clasping his hands behind his back. Everything about his posture screamed composed—except for the muscle that flexed his jaw.
"Get back to work."
Trinity turned back to the board with a hum, satisfaction thrumming through her veins. She was definitely going to win the bet.
The torture didn't stop there. No, that would have been too easy. Instead, Jack had to hear more about your dating life—this time at the end of a punishing twelve hour shift.
You were walking through the ambulance bay doors with Santos on your right and Mohan on your left. The three of you were fresh-faced in the early morning hours, each of you holding a cup of coffee in your hands. Jack's eyes were drawn to you instantly, catching the way the fluorescent lights brightened your eyes and highlighted the sleepy smile stretching your lips.
He was too busy getting lost in the mere sight of you to notice the sly look Santos threw his way.
"What is it that you like about older guys?" Trinity asked, nudging you with her elbow. Mohan let out a chuckle from your other side, suddenly finding her coffee very fascinating.
You shot Santos a bewildered look, your brows furrowing and mouth parting slightly. Before you could express your confusion, she continued.
"Is it the knee thing?"
"What?" You asked, a puzzled laugh lacing your words. "What are you talking about?"
"Do you bond with them over your upcoming knee replacements?" Santos asked with a cocky grin.
"Oh, shut up," you shove her shoulder lightly. "It's way too early for me to deal with your abuse."
The three of you reached the Hub, exchanging soft smiles and greetings with the night shift nurses. Your eyes flickered to Dr. Abbot briefly, his broad frame hard to ignore. He met your eyes for a second, giving you a small nod before turning to Lena.
"But seriously, I'm curious," Santos said, resting her elbows on the counter and cocking her head to the side. She didn't bother lowering her voice, gaining the attention of your colleagues scattered around the Hub—which, unbeknownst to you, was her full intention.
You narrowed your eyes at the mischievous smile on her face, a sense of dread tightening your throat. That look never meant anything good for you.
"How do you fuck your geriatric boyfriends when you've both got bad knees?"
A chorus of sounds echoed around the Hub.
Mateo snickered loudly behind his hand.
Samira let out a shocked gasp beside you.
Lena muttered, "oh dear."
Robby let out a long exhale, his mouth trembling in effort to not bark out a laugh.
"What the fuck, Trinity!" You exclaimed, slapping her arm harshly. Your response earned a few chuckles to sound out around you, causing the embarrassment you were feeling to clog your throat. Your wide eyes found Dr. Abbot's, his blank expression giving nothing away.
You quickly brushed past your amused coworkers, shoulder checking Santos on your way to the lockers. For a brief second, mortified tears blurred your vision. It was one thing for her to talk about setting you up on dates while working, but to make a joke about your sex life—in front of the unattainable attending she knew you had a crush on—was a step too far.
Jack watched as you bolted through the ED, a mix of emotions storming within him. He was irate with Santos, jealous about whoever these 'boyfriends' were, and concerned about you. He caught the flicker of hurt that crossed your face at Santos' question, the panic in your eyes when you looked at him.
And, he couldn't ignore the desire pooling low in his gut. Because it was something he had thought about—what position would feel best for you, what would guarantee you the most pleasure without hurting your knee. And he knew that if he ever was lucky enough to have you writhing under him, he wouldn't give a fuck about his leg.
Whilst Santos' jabbing was uncouth, it did confirm one important thing for him—you liked older men. Enough to want to fuck them.
That fact had his cock twitching in his scrub pants.
"You hear that, brother?" Robby murmured quietly, standing closer to Jack than he was a second before. "You might have a chance." Robby chuckled and gave Jack a pat on the shoulder before turning to the staff gathered at the Hub.
"Alright," he exclaimed, clapping his hands together once, "day shift, gather round."
The PTMC Emergency Department was a high stress, fast paced environment. You had seen multiple of your fellow coworkers take a tumble, faint from exhaustion, or be injured due to a patient's aggression. Every time it happened, Dana sternly directed them to the staff break room without fail. You had made it to your fourth year of residency without being dragged there once. That's not to say you didn't get injured, you just hid your pain better than others—one of the pros of living with chronic pain for so long (or a con, depending on who you asked). You were just two months away from becoming an attending, and you were determined to keep the record for the least amount of injuries endured during your time at PTMC—even if it was a record that you were the only one keeping track of.
Stupid Ogilvie and his lack of spatial awareness.
You let out a hiss as Dana pressed an ice pack against your knee. You were sitting at the small round table in the break room with your injured leg resting on one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs.
"Oh, hush, you big sook," Dana said with a small teasing smile. The faint line between her eyebrows gave away her concern, though.
A small rush of air left your nose—something that might've been a laugh if you weren't preoccupied with the unbearable throbbing in your knee.
Dana brushed a stray hair back from your forehead, fixing you with a pointed stare. "I need to get back out there or else the whole place is going to fall apart." She poked your forehead gently, "you need to stay put, missy. Understood?"
You nodded with a small pout. "Yes, understood. No more life saving today," you grumbled out.
"Good. If you need anything…you're Ogilvie's patient now," she said over her shoulder, throwing you a wink before closing the door behind her.
"I never want to see his face again," you mumbled petulantly to the empty break room.
With nothing else to do but sit, you grabbed the tablet off the table and started to catch up on charting—or what you could catch up on without a hospital computer. Twenty minutes later you were groaning with your head in your hands, your good leg on the ground bouncing impatiently. Ten minutes of doing nothing and you were already bored shitless. You could hear the symphony of a busy ED calling to you through the closed door—voices shouting over one another, an urgent page being called over the speaker system, a child with a healthy set of lungs screaming.
Back in the ED, Jack was ripping off his blood soaked gloves in Trauma two. He had just finished performing a clamshell thoracotomy on his buddy Officer Riveria, who had been shot in the chest from crossfire during an armed bank robbery. Jack walked the short path towards Central, tearing off his SWAT vest and dumping it on a chair in the Hub—barely paying any attention to Dana who scoffed at his appearance.
He could feel his t-shirt clinging to his skin uncomfortably, sweat soaking through to his SWAT uniform leaving visible patches—which he couldn't care less about in that moment. He had been in the ED for half an hour already, and he had yet to hear your voice. It was unsettling.
Even during the most adrenaline inducing, hectic shifts he could still make out your voice above the noise. And last time he looked at the schedule, you were meant to be working the day shift.
"Hello to you, too," Dana mumbled, raising her eyebrows at Abbot's swivelling head.
"Hi," he glanced at her briefly before looking at the board, trying to see if you were assigned to any patients. "Where is she?"
Dana chuckled, shaking her head. Of course he noticed you weren't on the floor. "Who?"
Jack responded with your name quickly, just as McKay stopped next to him at the Hub—letting Dana know a patient was ready for discharge.
"Oh," McKay snorted, "Ogilvie knocked her down with a gurney earlier."
"What?" Jack seethed, levelling a glare at Dana—why wasn't that the first thing she said to him?
"Take it easy, soldier." Dana gave him a sharp look. "She's in the break room, she's fi—"
Jack didn't wait to hear the rest of her sentence, darting through the ED in a rush to get to you. He flung the door open to the break room with force, making you look up at him with startled eyes.
"Dr. Abbot? What are you doing here?"
He ignored your question, making his way to you in two long strides and squatting down next to your injured leg. You watched as his nostrils flared and his jaw clenched tightly, an irritated huff leaving him. Your eyes wandered from his face to his shoulders, your eyebrows scrunching at his camo sleeves—was he wearing fucking SWAT gear?
"What are you wearing—"
"I'm going to fucking kill Robby," he seethed.
"Robby? What did he do?" You asked, your head swirling with more questions.
Dr. Abbot lifted the ice pack off your knee gently, drawing in a sharp breath at your red, swollen joint. His eyes snapped up to yours, a battle of concern and anger warring in the hazel depths.
"This wouldn't have happened if you were with me."
Jack realised his slip a second too late, watching your eyes widen in surprise at his words.
"If you were on the night shift," he mumbled quickly, his eyes darting back down to your injured leg.
A calloused finger pressed softly to the bottom of your knee, just below the swelling. A pained wince left you at the barely there touch.
"Fuck, sweetheart." Abbot whispered, his brows pulling together in worry. "This doesn't look good."
"I'm fine," you breathed out quickly, your heartbeat picking up at him calling you sweetheart again. "It's fine, it was an accident."
"It's not fine," he said sternly. "You're hurt."
"I've dealt with worse."
He let out a deep sigh, shaking his head at your stubbornness. He stood back up—his leg twinging briefly in complaint. He took a few steps back, leaning against the kitchenette and crossing his arms over his chest.
"Alright—if you say you're fine, stand up."
You met his raised eyebrows with a deadpan stare—your bruised pride fighting against the desire to submit to him, to let him take care of you.
You sucked in a breath, lifting your injured leg off the chair and placing it on the floor hesitantly. The pull of gravity had your knee aching in an instant, the swollen joint throbbing incessantly. You tried to keep your face blank as you braced both hands on the table, using it to support yourself as you rose to your feet. You put all your weight on your good leg, and Dr. Abbot clocked it immediately—his eyes glued to your legs as you tried to stand nonchalantly.
"Take a step."
That stupid stubbornness flared hot despite the agony you were in, not wanting someone—especially the attending you thought about obsessively—to take care of you. Well, the problem was how badly you wanted him to take care of you, and you refused to let that show—to be the damsel in distress.
You took a small step forward on your injured leg and crumbled in a second, trying to bite back a pained whimper and failing. Abbot was there before you could catch yourself on the table, one strong arm wrapping around your waist and a steady hand supporting your upper back.
"Yeah, that's what I thought," he mumbled low, his body so close to yours that you could feel his voice rumble through you.
Jack stood still, relishing the feeling of you in his arms. Your breath was warm against his neck, your curves soft beneath his hands, and he could feel you leaning into him. It was fucked up—you were injured, biting down your pain to try not be an inconvenience, and he wanted more. He wanted so much more.
Keeping his arm around your waist, he grabbed your bag hanging off the chair and hiked it up his shoulder. He grabbed his phone out of his pocket, drawing your attention to the gun on his hip—
What the fuck, since when was that there?
"What's your address?"
Your eyes snapped up to his face, your mind trying to process the sight of him in sweaty SWAT gear with a fucking handgun strapped to his hip. "Huh?"
He didn't look at you, thumb tapping on his phone. "I'm getting you an uber home. Give me your address."
"N-no, thank you, but I—"
He levelled you with a hard look, his eyes unrelenting. "This is not a discussion. Your address, now."
A thrill shot up your spine, his bossiness doing concerning things to your mind and body. You gave in, mumbling out your address—your body still actively aware of his thick arm wrapped around your waist, his warmth radiating through your clothes.
Jack grabbed your arm, slinging it over his shoulder and bringing you closer to his body—your perfume and something uniquely you cutting through the antiseptic and settling in his chest. His body screamed at him to turn his head, to bury his nose in your hair and inhale your scent like it was oxygen. His hand on your waist gripped tighter.
"What are you—" you started, shocked by his sudden closeness. The lines and freckles on his face were even more deadly this close.
"It's either this or I carry you. Your choice."
You slowly limped your way towards the door, consciously leaning as little weight on Dr. Abbot as possible—worrying about the strain you were putting on his prosthetic leg. Pain shot through your knee with every step you took.
"That's not gonna do, sweetheart."
He pulled you closer to him, essentially lifting you with every step. It took the weight off your leg, and had your breath stuttering at his strength.
Heat flushed throughout your body as you neared the Hub, your head dropping to ignore the curious and teasing stares from your coworkers.
"Hey, prince charming!" Dana's voice called over the rush of the ED. "This isn't your dumping ground!" Both your heads turned to see her holding his SWAT vest, shaking it with a pointed look before swinging her arm back and throwing it.
The hand steadying your arm on his shoulder lifted, catching the vest with ease. He handed it to you without a word, your free hand clasping around the slightly damp fabric.
It felt like it took hours to get to the ambulance bay, all the eyes on you two making you feel like an animal on display at the zoo. As you reached the doors, you faintly heard Javadi's voice behind you.
"Why didn't he grab a wheelchair?"
The uber was already waiting and Dr. Abbot helped you in the backseat before rounding the boot and getting in the other side. The door slammed shut, leaving you enclosed in the small space with your devastatingly attractive attending and crush.
"What are you doing?"
He grabbed your bag off his shoulder and the vest from your hand, putting them on the floor in front of him. His fingers clasped around your injured leg gently, lifting it and resting it on his lap.
"Making sure you get home safe."
The twenty minute drive to your apartment was quiet, the soft music droning from the car's speakers the only noise filling the uber. Dr. Abbot's hands rested on your leg the whole time, his thumbs rubbing absentminded patterns on your scrub covered shin.
Your brain stopped functioning approximately two minutes after the car pulled away from PTMC, when the first slow circle of his thumbs started. Instead of feeling the throbbing pain of your knee, you felt a throb grow north of it—slow strokes of fire coursing up your leg and gathering at the apex of your thighs. It was embarrassing, how desperately your body reacted to him and he wasn't even touching your skin.
You stared out the window the whole ride, despite how badly all the cells in your body ached to look at him—to map the lines of his face, to catch the way the sunlight coming through the window highlighted his stubbled jaw and changed the colour of his eyes. God, his eyes. You wanted to get lost in them, to watch them shift from honey amber to sunlit green—you wanted to know what colour they shifted to when dark with hunger, when dilated pupils eclipsed the sunburst irises.
Jack tried to keep his gaze locked on the seat in front of him, distracting himself with counting every individual stitch in the fabric. This was the fifth time he had placed your leg in his lap, but it felt different than the times previous. Maybe it was the protective anger curdling his gut—he had already drafted three carefully worded texts to Robby in his head—or the dangerous pull in his chest telling him that you were right where you belonged, next to him. All he knew was that the aching need to take care of you was now etched into his bones. Sitting next to you in the uber on the way to your place had nothing to do with him worrying about you as your attending—he was just a man needing to look after the woman he cared about deeply.
He couldn't stop his eyes finding the side of your face even if he tried—he was a moth to a radiant flame. He stored more details away in the overflowing file cabinet with your name on it; how the sunlight made your hair glow, how your lashes fluttered as you fought off fatigue, how despite the exhaustion and pain shadowing your face you still looked beautiful—ethereal. He wanted to worship at your altar.
Once the uber parked outside your building, he was quick to lower your leg—hands oh so gentle, again—and grab the bag and vest off the floor. He was out of the car before you could blink, opening your door and helping you out of the car with the strong hands you fantasised about daily. He offered the driver a quick thank you and it struck you deep in the chest—such a simple, kind act that you had watched men fail to do time and time again.
Your arm was back over his broad shoulders, one of his securely wrapped around your waist. It only hit you then how badly your body had missed the warmth of his pressed against you. And then something more frightening—exhilarating—hit you: Dr. Jack Abbot was going to be in your apartment.
Your step faltered, your heartbeat picking up in terror—or anticipation, only god knows.
"Thank you for your help—for the uber—but you should go—"
"No."
"Your shift is in a few hours, you should rest."
He let out a frustrated huff through his nose, turning his head to shoot you a hard look—his fingers on your waist tightening.
"Quit being stubborn and let me help you."
You opened your mouth to protest more, to say he's helped you enough, but the words died on your tongue before they had formed. You were sore and exhausted—that was the excuse you told yourself for letting your attending guide you into the building.
Your place was exactly how you left it—half a dozen medical textbooks littering your coffee table, your laptop still open on the dining table with sticky notes of varying colours covering the surface, a few dirty dishes stacked next to the sink. Your basket of clean underwear sitting on the couch waiting for you to put away. Because, of course the day Dr. Jack Abbot helps you home is your lingerie wash day.
Heat rushed up your neck as he helped you limp towards the couch, dumping his SWAT vest on the coffee table before grabbing the basket and putting it on the floor out of the way. You watched, intrigued, as red dusted along his neck and cheeks, his eyes looking everywhere but you.
His hand lingered on your waist as you sat down, before he cleared his throat and helped you get situated—placing a throw pillow under your injured knee and another behind your back. He started to take off your shoes, and it hit you at a dizzying speed how natural and domestic this all felt.
How nice it felt to have him in your home, taking care of you with no fuss. You can't remember the last time someone treated you with such care—the few times you asked your exes for help with your knee pain they made you feel like a burden.
Having Abbot treat you so gently, so delicately, only made the butterflies storming in your stomach increase tenfold. You were starting to feel sick, overcome with dangerous emotions at the hands of your attending.
You dropped your eyes to your hands fidgeting in your lap. "Thank you again, Dr. Abbot. For—"
"Jack."
You looked up at him to find him already staring down at you. Your hands started to shake.
"What?"
His voice was soft, low. "When it's just you and me, it's Jack."
You heart decided to find a home in your throat. "Oh…well, I appreciate your help," you smiled up at him softly, "Jack."
In that moment, Jack knew he was done for. He had noticed you only ever called him by his doctor title or last name, and now he knew why. His name sounded like it was made to slip from your tongue, like everyone else before you had said it wrong. He had to be careful—if you said his name with that little smile again, he was sure he would drop to his knees before you.
He stepped away from the couch, needing to do something else to distract his brain from the fantasy of you gasping out his name as he tasted you. He grabbed his vest and walked towards the kitchen—the open plan layout allowing him to keep an eye on you still.
You watched as he removed his gun from its holster, checking the safety was on before pulling the clip out, disarming it—the act alone sending a shiver racing up your spine. He didn't need to do that, but you figured he did it for your peace of mind—to ensure you felt safe in your own home. It had no right being that hot.
Your eyes landed on the gun and vest now sitting on your kitchen counter before you ran them over his sweaty uniform again, unconsciously biting your lip.
"So, you moonlight as a…SWAT medic?"
He started to look through your kitchen cabinets, pulling out a water glass. "My therapist said I needed a hobby."
"And all the men's shed's in Pittsburgh were at full capacity?"
He filled the glass with water, the side of his mouth quirking with a smirk. "Didn't meet the age requirement. I'll try again next year."
He brought the glass of water over to you, an amused glint in his eye.
"That where you scout for your dates? The men's shed?"
Your cheeks grew warm. "I am going to kill Santos," you muttered.
Your phone vibrated in your pocket and you pulled it out to see multiple texts from Santos. Speak of the devil.
Trin: (412) 858-5725
Trin: Ben's phone number
Trin: If your knight in sweaty swat gear doesn't make a move
You put your phone away quickly, grabbing the glass from the coffee table and taking a deep gulp to try soothe your nerves.
"Where do you keep your pain meds?"
Jack was still standing next to the couch, looking down at you with his hands in his pockets.
"There's a box under the bathroom sink," you told him. "First door on the left."
Jack returned less than a minute later, carrying your overflowing plastic container of pain medication—an eyebrow raised in surprise.
"Should I be concerned you're going to start a meth lab with these?"
"Medical textbooks are ridiculously expensive."
He chuckled in response, putting the container on the kitchen counter and grabbing a handful of pills for you. You accepted them with a small thank you, watching as he sat on the small armchair diagonal to you.
He nodded towards the textbooks splayed out on your coffee table. "How's the studying going?"
An involuntary sigh slipped out of you. "It's going fine, I guess." His furrowed eyebrows prompted you to elaborate more. "I'm—being on the day shift, I'm struggling to find the time to study." You watched his jaw clench and you quickly backpedalled. "I mean, that's not an excuse—I'm not trying to blame being on the day shift! It's my own poor time management, Samira seems to be doing fine. I just think the night shift suited me more…I miss you—it. I miss the night shift."
Your face was a furnace by the time you finally shut your mouth, refusing to look at Jack and instead glaring at the textbooks on the table like they had caused you grave pain.
"We miss you too."
Jack was struggling to control his breathing, feeling angry at Robby for keeping you off the night shift for the past month. Angry at himself for not pushing harder to keep you with him. It was obvious the day shift was not what was best for your well-being; here you were in front of him injured—by a day shift intern—, exhausted from the long shifts, and barely finding the time to study for your attending boards. He would bet his good leg that the only thing in your pantry was packets of ramen.
He took the lull in conversation to look around your apartment properly, a faint smile curving his lips as he spotted the decorations and trinkets that were very you. Something fond gripped his chest at the photos on your bookshelf. There was one of you and Santos on a night out—tipsy smiles and arms slung over shoulders—another of you and Ellis in your scrubs pulling the finger at the camera, and one on a higher shelf that had his heart tumbling.
It was of the night shift, everyone crammed into a small diner booth after a particularly rough shift. You two were sat next to each other, his head leaning back on the booth seat as he slept and your head turned to him with a soft smile on your face. He remembered the day it was taken—everyone called him grandpa for a week afterwards for falling asleep—but he didn't remember you looking at him like that. Like he hung the moon and the stars.
He cleared his throat, trying to get rid of the emotion clogging it. He opened his mouth and said the first thing he thought of. "No cat?"
You lifted your head, looking at him quizzically. "I've never had a cat."
"What about the one we talked about?"
"Oh, that cat." You shrugged, "someone else adopted the little guy before I could."
"That sucks." And because his jealously won out over his logical mind when he was near you, he continued. "Does that mean you're still dating assholes?"
You laughed nervously, crossing your arms over your chest. "Do we have to talk about my sorry excuse of a dating life?"
Jack stayed quiet, not sure how to downplay his interest in your dating life—in you.
You sighed. "No, I'm not dating assholes—I'm not dating anyone at the moment, despite Trin's persistence."
Jack let out a gruff hum, feeling both pleased that you're not wasting your time dating and annoyed at the reminder of Santos' terrible matchmaking. "So I've noticed."
You winced. "Sorry, I'll tell her to stop talking about it at work. Not that she listens to anything I say, but it's unprofessional."
Jack dragged a hand along his scruff, tempted to tell you that it was the jealously souring his gut that bothered him, not the unprofessionalism.
"How's your knee?"
You shifted your injured knee on the pillow, relieved when you only felt a dull ache instead of sharp throbbing. "Stiff, but the meds are kicking in at least."
"Did you get that cream I recommended?"
You started to get up from the couch, lifting your leg and clenching your teeth when the pain came back."Yeah, but I can go get it. You've done more than enough, you should—"
Jack was by the couch in less than a second, putting a gentle but firm hand on your shoulder to keep you seated. "If you tell me to go one more time, I swear to god."
You looked up at him, your breath catching at his broad frame towering over you.
"I don't want you to think I'm a burden." Your voice was smaller than you would've liked, a crack lacing through.
Jack's heart fractured at your words, his walls starting to crash down. "You're not a burden to me. I want to help you."
The sincerity in his voice made yours shake. "Why?"
He took a deep breath. "For reasons I shouldn't say out loud."
Your heart stumbled before picking up, feeling like it was going to beat out of your chest.
"Jack…"
"Don't. Don't say my name like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you have no clue what you do to me."
But, you didn't know what you did to him. This was the first time you were aware he might've shared a fraction of the feelings you had for him.
"Let me take care of you and then I'll go, okay?"
You gulped, now feeling unsure of where you stood with your older attending. You gave him a small nod.
"Okay."
He stepped back, looking both satisfied and torn at your response. "Good."
"The cream, it's in my bedroom—but I'll go get it."
"No, you can't even walk by yourself. Stay there, I'll get it." He raised an eyebrow at the panicked look on your face. "Unless, you don't want me in your bedroom. You hiding dead bodies in there or something?"
That got a small laugh out of you, and he felt his shoulders relax the slightest—some of the tension from his almost confession dissipating.
Jack Abbot in your bedroom was a thought you had way too frequently, but that wasn't what had you stubbornly trying to stop him from getting the pain relief cream. It was because you knew the cream was in your nightstand—the same one your small collection of vibrators were in.
You were an adult. Owning a vibrator or two was normal. Jack was also an adult, you're sure he's seen sex toy's before. So, you sucked in a breath and put your big girl pants on.
"No, it's fine. I just—the cream's in the top drawer of the nightstand on the left."
Jack found your bedroom easily in your small apartment, your perfume and scent hitting him hard as soon as he pushed the door open wider. He stood still for a second, breathing in a deep lungful and feeling himself get even more addicted—if that was possible. He beelined for the nightstand, opening it and finding the cream he had recommended to you what felt like a lifetime ago. His hand faltered, his gaze finding the toys next to the cream—sticking out like a sore thumb. Your hesitation about him coming into your room suddenly made complete sense.
His cock twitched in his pants at the sight of them alone, and his traitorous mind didn't take long to supply him with the fantasy of you using the toys on yourself—laid out on your bed in front of him, listening to his commands as he told you how to fuck yourself.
He adjusted himself in his pants, shaking his head to try rid himself of the thoughts before walking back into your lounge.
You watched as Jack came back with the cream in hand, nerves tightening your throat at the deep red covering his neck and cheeks. He definitely saw the vibrators.
He didn't say a word, just waved the cream at you and sat on the other end of the couch—moving the pillow under your leg aside so he could move closer and rest your leg in his lap. Despite this not being the first time he's helped with your knee, it felt entirely different. Maybe it was his half confession lingering in the air, or the fact that you've been wound tightly for so long. Either way, the first touch of his fingers on your bare skin as he rolled your scrub pant over your knee had your core clenching desperately, embarrassingly.
The late afternoon sun streamed through your sheer curtains softly, painting your apartment in a dreamy haze that softened the edges of your mind. Neither of you spoke, the soft sounds of your breathing filling the room. His touch was featherlight on your knee, gently prodding to assess your pain—his intense gaze never leaving your face.
The first slide of the cream on your inflamed joint offered a small reprieve, a small sigh leaving your lips.
"This okay?"
You nodded, staring down at his hands on your leg—noticing the absence of his wedding ring. They drifted higher, rubbing the cream into the tight thigh muscles above your knee. A gasp slipped from you as his fingers pressed deeper, rolling a knot that had formed due to the tension from your injury.
Your eyes flicked up from watching his hands, finding his glued to your parted lips. They stayed there for a second longer before meeting yours and your breath caught in your throat. You could see where the amber bled into green, the faint blue ring on the edge of his irises. You watched his pupils dilate, his eyes darkening like a storm rolling through a forest.
Your eyes dropped to his lips, the soft light highlighting the stubble framing his face and making the cupids bow on his top lip stand out—looking incredibly enticing and kissable.
You both leaned in slowly, the thread between you pulling tighter. His breath brushed against your lips and the tension you'd been harbouring for months—years, even—snapped. You closed the distance, pressing your lips to his in what you wanted to be a tender kiss but was anything but—your desperation bleeding out of you.
He breathed in through his nose sharply, his hands on your thigh tightening before he returned your kiss slowly. One of your hands bunched the fabric of his SWAT top, the other sliding up the back of his neck and finding its place in his silver curls. You pulled him closer, kissing him with more urgency.
A moan rumbled in Jack's throat at the feeling of your hand tugging his hair, and he brought a hand up to cup your jaw—losing himself in the press of your soft lips against yours. His hand on your thigh gripped tight and pulled you closer, briefly forgetting that you were in pain.
He sucked your bottom lip between his, nibbling on the plump flesh and drawing a soft whimper out of you—your hips trying to rock despite the awkward position of you half pulled onto his lap.
The sound had Jack's cock jumping eagerly, still half hard from thinking about you fucking yourself with your toys. His hand on your jaw slipped to grasp the back of your neck, tilting your head back. His tongue ran along your bottom lip and you opened for him without hesitation. The first caress of your tongue's against each other drew matching, low moans from both your chests.
You felt your core grow wetter and you needed more, your hand fisting his top travelling down to slide under his layers of clothes and touching his solid, yet soft, abdomen.
The feeling of your hand touching his skin had reality crashing down on Jack, making him pull away from your lips with visible effort. Your mouth chased after his with a small whine, the hand in his curls trying to yank him back to you.
"We shouldn't," he panted, his breath hot against your lips.
"Please," you whispered, not caring how desperate you sounded.
He dropped his forehead to your collarbone, a shaky moan leaving him at how needy you sounded and the intoxicating scent of you wrapping around him.
"You're injured, I'm your attending, this is—"
You grabbed his hand clutching your thigh, dragging it up until his fingers grazed your scrub covered core. All logic and reasoning faded from his mind as he felt the heat radiating through your clothes. He was shocked for a brief moment, that your aching need for him matched his own for you.
"Touch me, please. Make me feel good."
Jack thought he had died and gone to heaven—those sweet words whispered into his ear sounding even better than he had dreamed.
"Fuck," he breathed into your scrub top, his hand moving and cupping your core. A gasp shot out of you and you ground your hips against his hand.
His head lifted and he peppered light kisses on the side of your neck—his stubble scratching your skin lightly. You pushed his head harder into your neck, desperate for him to take more. He let out a chuckle at your eagerness.
"You always this needy?"
His teeth sinking into your neck stole any response you may have had, a moan leaving your lips instead. His kisses grew in confidence, his mouth leaving trails of spit across your skin as he relished in the sounds he was pulling from you. His hand on your core moved, his palm pressing harder against your clothed clit—your hips rocking faster in response.
You pulled his head from your neck, his dark eyes meeting yours before he lunged for your mouth, his kisses turning punishing—teeth clashing, tongues fighting for dominance, stubble scratching and burning your skin.
The warmth in your core transformed into a raging fire—you had never been this turned on by a kiss before. You could feel slick oozing from your cunt, your underwear sticking to your core where his hand was moving against you. You were sure you were leaking through your scrubs, and you might've been embarrassed if it weren't for the lust lighting up your body.
Jack pulled back, his hand stilling against you causing you to let out a displeased whine. He looked down at his hand, an expression of awe on his face as he saw his palm with a light sheen of wetness and the dark patch on your pants.
"You're wet." He said, like it was a miracle.
You nodded, both hands gripping his jaw to pull his lips back to yours. He turned his head, still looking at his hand in amazement. It had been a long time since he last touched a woman, but he didn't remember them getting this wet from some kissing and light groping.
Your lips found his neck, lavishing the wrinkled and freckled skin with the same attention he gave you. You bit along his jaw gently, soothing the bites with a wet glide of your tongue. His chest vibrated with a deep groan and you doubled your efforts, sucking on a spot below his ear. The sounds he was making made you even more wet, small whines getting stuck in your throat as your need for him ricocheted.
"Fucking hell, sweetheart." He groaned, his dick starting to leak from your mouth on his neck and the little sounds you let out. "You're gonna make me come in my pants if you keep doing that."
His words stroked the fire in you higher, your nerves singing with pleasure at the fact you were unravelling him just as he was you.
He pulled you away from him and stood up, watching as your hazy eyes blinked up at him unfocused, a small frown pulling your kiss swollen lips down.
He hooked an arm around your back and the other under your thighs, lifting you off the couch.
"Jack, your leg—"
"Is fine. Let me do this."
He ignored the strain on his amputated leg, carrying you the short distance to your bedroom. He laid you down on your bed gently, taking extra care to not jostle your knee.
You sat up on your elbows, biting your lip as he stood at the edge of your bed—not moving, just staring down at you with his mouth slightly agape.
"You have no idea how long I've thought about this. How long I've spent wanting you."
Your chest stuttered at his admission, heat licking up your spine at the raw want in his voice.
He leaned down, placing his hands either side of your head and kissing you slowly, tenderly. Your hands settled in his curls, your lips responding in kind—your chest aching with something far more dangerous than need.
He trailed kisses down your jaw and neck, nuzzling his nose into the junction where your neck met your shoulder and inhaling deeply. An almost pained groan tore from his throat and it made you arch up into him in need.
His hands gripped your hips and lifted you further up the bed, your head resting on your pillow. His thumbs rubbed on the sliver of bare skin your bunched scrub top exposed, his questioning eyes meeting yours. You lifted your arms up before he could ask, and he pulled the fabric over your head—throwing it somewhere behind him.
His eyes dropped to your chest and he licked his lips, his hand slipping behind your back to undo your bra clasp. He pulled your bra straps down your shoulders slowly, like he was unwrapping a delicate present.
"Jack," you breathed out, impatience lacing your tone.
He dropped his head, kissing along the swell of your breasts.
"Didn't know my name could sound so sweet until you said it." He mumbled into your skin.
He finally pulled your bra away, throwing it in the same direction as your top. He sucked in a sharp breath at your exposed breasts, his eyes closing briefly as he gathered himself.
"You're beautiful."
Then he latched onto one of your nipples, sucking lightly and pulling a gasp from you. A large hand cupped your other breast, his thumb rubbing circles around your nipple—the dual simulation making fire sprint down your abdomen to your core. Your hips rocked underneath him, and he chuckled at your desperation—the sound vibrating through your body.
Your hands found the hem of his SWAT top and pulled, wanting to see the thick muscle he hid underneath scrubs. His touch left you for a second as he pulled his top off, exposing the black t-shirt underneath. And you swear you'd never seen a simple t-shirt look so hot before. It was tight around his bulging biceps, his muscular abdomen pressing through the fabric. You only had a second to ogle before he was stripping it off as well, leaving you with a sight you had only dreamed about.
The only word in your head at that moment to describe Jack Abbot was thick. You knew he was big, but seeing it without clothes felt surreal. You ran your hands over his bare chest, marvelling at the muscles jumping beneath your touch. His skin was dusted in freckles, a patch of light hair covering his chest that was soft under your fingers. His shoulders were broad and your jaw ached to cover the sturdy flesh with bites.
You gripped his shoulders and pulled him down, your lips meeting in a desperate kiss that had you both moaning. Your hands travelled down his shoulders to his back, pulling his bare chest down to meet yours. The feeling of his pecks against your breasts had you sucking his bottom lip with need.
You slid a hand down his bulky abdomen, revelling in his body jerking under your hand. You dipped a finger in the waistband of his camo pants, pulling slightly before moving your hand down and cupping his hard cock through the fabric. The feel of him had your core clenching—he was big, bigger than you had ever taken. It sent a thrill coursing through you and you gripped him harder.
"Shit," he hissed, grasping your hand and pulling it away from him. "Not today, sweetheart. It's all about you now, okay?"
He kissed down your chest, lavishing at your breasts again and you let out an impatient whine, pushing his head down to where you needed him most.
"Stop teasing."
You could feel his lips curve into a smirk against your skin. "But you sound so pretty."
He sucked harshly on your nipple, pulling it between his teeth and biting down. Your hips shot off the bed with a gasp, your knee throbbing from the sudden jolt but you didn't care. He repeated his ministrations on your neglected nipple before—finally— his kisses travelled down your stomach and stopped at the waistband of your scrub pants.
His lips sucked light marks along your lower stomach and hips, his fingers toying with your waistband and dipping under before tracing the marks his mouth left.
"Jack, please." You whined, your need echoing in your quiet room.
"You sound so good begging, baby."
He pulled away, hooking his fingers around your pants and underwear—slowly pulling them down your legs like he had all the time in the world. A groan rumbled out of him at the sight of your slick clinging to your underwear, a line keeping them connected to you until they reached your knees. He doesn't think he's seen anything hotter.
He was careful pulling your pants down over your injured knee, pressing a light kiss to your inflamed skin before your pants were finally off of you. He grabbed a spare pillow near your head, propping it under your knee and adjusting you so you were comfortably spread open with no weight bearing down on your knee. He kept his eyes on your face the whole time, checking for any hint of discomfort.
"You tell me if it starts to hurt, okay?"
You nodded in response.
"Words. I need words, sweetheart."
"Yes, I'll tell you, Jack. Just touch me already, please."
His eyes left your face, travelling down your heaving body and ending at your core. Your need was glistening all over your mound and a moan vibrated through him at the sight. He brought a hand to your core, his fingers lightly trailing down your wet slit making your hips jump off the bed. His other hand pressed flat against your lower stomach, his weight holding your hips down.
"You're fucking soaked. This all for me?"
You nodded quickly, your breaths coming quick—pent up from months of wanting and his merciless teasing.
"Yeah? I get you this wet?"
"Yes, Jack—only you. Been wet since I saw the SWAT uniform." The confession slipped from you, need obliterating your filter.
His face morphed into a shit-eating grin. "That right, pretty girl? I'll make sure to wear it more often."
He pulled away from you and you groaned in annoyance.
"What the fuck, Jack!"
He chuckled at your impatience, a cocky smirk plastered across his face. He sat on the edge of your bed, quickly pulling the leg of his pants up to take off his prosthetic leg and leaning it against your bed. He turned back to you, lowering himself between your legs—the feeling of his breath against your core making your thighs twitch.
"Just getting comfortable. No more teasing, promise."
And then he was licking a long strip up your dripping slit, his dark eyes holding your gaze captive. You threw your head back, a sigh of relief leaving you. One of his hands gripped the thigh of your injured leg, keeping you steady as the other pressed down on your lower stomach again. He licked torturous and slow, his eyes closing as he made out with your lower lips.
"Taste so fucking good, better than I imagined." He moaned into your core, eliciting a gasp from you.
Your hands found his soft curls, gripping tight as he feasted on you. You tried rocking your hips to chase the friction but his strong hand kept you still, making you whine pathetically.
His tongue found your clit, alternating between flicking it and drawing circles around it. Fire built up in your core quickly, gasps of his name and please falling from your lips.
Jack's cock was painfully hard, precum leaking and dampening his pants as he listened to the sweet noises you let out because of him. He knew this was going to be ingrained in his brain forever—you panting beneath him, all desperate and needy, his taste buds overloaded with your delectable nectar. You were better than any drug and he was irrevocably hooked.
His tongue dipped down to your entrance, circling it twice before plunging inside your walls. Your core clenched down at the intrusion and he moaned into your core—delicious vibrations spreading up to your clit.
"Yes," you gasped, hips trying to chase the pleasure his mouth was unleashing. His tongue started to thrust in and out of you and a hand left his hair to grip his hand on your stomach. "Please, feels so good."
Obscene slick sounds filled your room, your core drenched from your arousal and Jack's spit. His tongue went back to your clit, the hand on your thigh moving up and tracing light fingers around your entrance. Jack watched in hunger and fascination as your core clenched in anticipation.
"You want my fingers? Be a good girl and tell me how bad you need them."
Your whole body lit up at him calling you a good girl. You opened your eyes to see him already staring at you, his gaze heavy and hungry.
"Yes—fuck, please—Jack I need them so badly. Want you to fuck me with them, please."
You didn't need to beg for long, one of his fingers dipping into you and curling against your walls. A moan slipped out at you, your walls clamping down on the single digit.
"Fuck, you're tight." He moaned into your clit, sucking it into his mouth harshly. You let out a wanton moan, your hips pushing against his hand holding you down. Another finger slipped inside you and he pushed them deeper, thrusting them against the spongy spot that no other man cared to find. You mewled, embarrassingly needy as a familiar tension built in your core.
"Oh my god, right there," you moaned out and his fingers picked up their speed, curling to stroke against that spot over and over. A third finger joined in and your eyes shot open at the stretch. His mouth doubled down on your clit, sucking harshly and nibbling gently.
"You gonna come for me?"
Incoherent babbling spilled from you—his name, please, and fuck being the only words your brain seemed capable of forming.
Jack was grinding his hips on your bed, feeling like a teenager ready to bust from the first moan that you let slip free. His cock was pulsing in his pants, so close to coming already.
"Yeah, that's a good girl. Come on my fingers."
The hand on your stomach pressed harder and the tension in your core shifted, still familiar but also different—tight and overwhelming. One last sharp suck to your clit had you soaring off the edge, your whole body tensing and head throwing back as pleasure rushed through you like a roaring fire. You came with a loud cry of his name, your ears ringing and white spotting your vision. You felt wetness gushing from your cunt, warm and sticky—amplifying and drawing out your release until it bordered on painful.
Jack groaned against your core as you gripped his fingers tight, sucking them in deeper as you squirted over his face, his hand, your bedsheets. Your fingers in his hair pulled as you panted and heaved beneath him. He pulled his mouth off your clit, moaning out your name as he spilled in his pants—your release making him come untouched. He continued moving his fingers inside you, drawing out your orgasm with his eyes focused on where release was squirting out of you with every thrust of his fingers.
"Good girl. You did so good."
Your fingers in his hair trembled, yanking softly as you tried to squirm away from his touch. "It's too much, Jack." You whined and he finally relented, drawing his fingers out of you with a loud, sinful pop. Your half open eyes met his, watching through a hazy fog as he lifted his soaked fingers to his mouth and sucked them clean—a deep groan tearing through him and you almost moaned at the sight.
He kissed up your body slowly, sucking and biting on a nipple and drawing a yelp out of you—your overstimulated body shaking underneath him.
"That was fucking incredible," he whispered into your neck, sounding starstruck. "You're incredible."
You giggled softly, his stubble tickling your neck. "That was all you." One of your hands brushed along the broad expanse of his shoulders, the other toying with the curls at the top of his neck. "I've never done that before," you admitted in a small and dazed voice.
He continued to nibble on your neck. "What, hook up with your boss or squirt?"
You slapped his shoulder lightly. "Both."
"Pleasure was all mine, sweetheart."
He removed his head from your neck, soft eyes gazing into yours before he leaned in and kissed you sweetly. His arms wrapped around your back, pulling your chest to his as he kissed you deeply—pouring everything he couldn't say yet into the kiss.
He pulled back, his eyes roaming around your face trying to memorialise this moment in his brain. He caught sight of the clock on your nightstand, a frustrated groan vibrating his chest as he saw he had to be at work in just over an hour. He dropped his forehead to yours for a few seconds, before pushing himself off of you with pained effort.
"I gotta go get ready for work. I—uh, need to clean myself up."
You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion before looking down, finally spotting the dark wet patch on his camo pants.
"Oh."
He put his prosthetic leg back on, standing and looking back at you still naked on your bed—spread out and glistening in your own release. He quickly walked to your bathroom, grabbing a clean towel from the cupboard and wetting it in the sink. He returned to your room, hit with the overwhelming smell of you—your perfume, your natural scent, your release. It had him debating calling in sick to lay tangled in the sheets with you, making you feel good until you passed out.
He cleaned you up gently, the soft press of the damp towel on your sensitive cunt making you twitch and flinch away.
"Easy, baby. Almost done."
He pressed a kiss to your forehead once he was done, a thumb brushing across your cheek.
"Okay, now I really have to go or Robby will send out a search party."
You bit your lip, your come down leaving you feeling exposed and vulnerable. "What…what does this mean?"
Jack didn't want to leave you alone, the uncertainty in your eyes making his chest ache. "We'll talk about it properly later, yeah? Just rest now—I'll order you some food."
He grabbed you some pyjamas out of your dresser, leaving them folded next to you on the bed. He left you with instructions on how to look after your knee—despite your insistence that you had been living with the pain for over a decade and you were a doctor as well, you knew how to take care of your injury.
After your front door clicked softly behind him you stared up at the ceiling for what felt like hours, your mind still not comprehending that you had hooked up with Jack Abbot—and he had made you come harder than you ever have in your life. So much was still left unsaid, but there wasn't a cold ache in your heart like you expected at the uncertainty. You trusted Jack, and you trusted that he wouldn't leave you spiralling for too long.
Just after seven pm your phone lit up with a text from Robby.
Robby: You're back on the night shift once your knee is better. Rest up.
A smile took over your face, a sigh of relief leaving you. You knew Jack was responsible for the shift change, and it had warmth spreading through your body from your chest.
Not even twenty minutes later, your screen flashed with texts from Trinity.
Trin: DID YOU AND ABBOT FUCK
Trin: Don't even try to lie to me
You: We didn't fuck
Trin: Then why is he smiling like he won the lottery
Your lips stretched into a grin.
You: Maybe he did?
Trin: Tell me what happened right now
Trin: I'm gonna be pissed if Robby won the bet
You: What bet, Trinity?
Trin: Shit gotta go! Someone's dying
You: Someone is always dying. Did you guys make a bet about Jack and I?
Trin: SMS ERROR: The phone number you are trying to reach is no longer in service.
Trin: …did you just call him Jack?!?!?!?
You were drafting a profanity filled response to her when a text from Jack came through.
Abbot: Dinner is 10 minutes away. Hope Vietnamese is all good.
Abbot: Ice your knee afterwards.
You didn't see Jack for seven days after that. He text you throughout the week, checking in and assuring you that you would talk but not over the phone—that you deserved more than that. The swelling in your knee eased by day three, and by day six it barely hurt anymore. You were under strict orders to not even think about the hospital, and you only left your apartment to go for walks around your neighbourhood—you didn't even go to the grocery store, there was no need to when Jack arranged groceries to be delivered to your front door.
He called you a couple times after a long shift, just wanting to listen to your voice as he struggled to sleep. He sat on the phone while you studied for your boards, giving his input when you started to ramble and spiral about a topic you thought you didn't understand—to which he reminded you that you were one of the most capable residents he'd seen walk through the PTMC doors. His confidence in you helped with the spiralling, and only made your need for him build to dizzying heights.
Neither of you brought up what happened at yours, both silently agreeing that it was a face to face conversation. It didn't stop you from thinking about it every night though, about him. You didn't ask him to come over before or after his shifts, not wanting to come on too strong despite how badly you wanted to see him again.
It was on day seven of not seeing him that you said fuck it. You were basically climbing the walls by that point, growing restless from doing nothing but sitting and studying and dreaming about all the ways Jack could fuck senseless. You knew it was his first scheduled day off in two weeks and while you should've let him rest, the demon he had unlocked inside of you didn't care.
You made it to mid afternoon before you sent him a text.
You: Hey, you busy?
Jack: No. What's up?
You: Think you could come over so we can have that talk?
Jack: I'll be there in 30.
True to his word, Jack knocked on your door twenty-eight minutes later with a takeout bag in his hand.
"Hey, I got us some sandwiches from the new deli on—"
You didn't give him time to finish, yanking on his sweatshirt's collar and dragging his lips down to yours. A shocked noise sounded in the back of his throat before he responded in earnest, his free hand wrapping around you waist and pulling you into his body. He staggered into your apartment, blindly closing the door behind him as you kissed him with a bruising intensity.
He pulled back to catch his breath, his chest rising and falling rapidly. You moved your mouth to his neck, sucking and nipping his neck as the desperation you'd been feeling for the past week clawed at your chest and core. You slipped your hands under the hem of his sweatshirt, relishing in the heat of his bare skin beneath it.
"Slow down, sweetheart." He chuckled, his hand moving from your waist to grip your jaw and pull you back. You let out a small whine, your brows furrowing in annoyance. "Did you ask me to come 'round for a booty call?"
You huffed. "No—I mean yes, but I wanted to talk too." You stepped back from him, feeling a drop of embarrassment for how you pounced on him. You took the takeout bag from his hand, offering him a soft smile. "Thank you for getting food."
"Of course."
He followed you as you made your way to the kitchen, putting the food on the counter and turning back to him with a sheepish expression.
"Thank you for everything this past week. The groceries, the late night—for you—study sessions. It…means a lot."
He stepped forward, resting his hands on your hips before pulling you into a hug—his strong arms wrapping around your back making you melt into his embrace. Your arms wrapped around his shoulders and you nuzzled into his neck with a soft, content hum.
"Anything for you, sweetheart." He mumbled into your hair. Your heart soared in your chest.
He felt the tension from the last week dissipate from his body now that you were back in his arms. He hadn't realised just how stressed he was until that moment.
He pulled back slightly, keeping an arm wrapped around your back as a hand cupped your jaw. He leaned in, kissing you softly before resting his forehead against yours.
"Hi."
You giggled in response. "Hi."
"I haven't stopped thinking about you, about this."
Your hands gripped his curls, pulling him down for another bruising kiss. His hands slid down your back before resting on your ass, giving it a light squeeze and making you sigh into his mouth. You traced your tongue along his lips and he opened willingly, his moan ringing throughout the kitchen as he tasted you again. You pushed your hips flush to his, grinding against the hard length you could feel growing in his pants.
You whimpered into his mouth. "Please, I need you."
He pulled his mouth back from yours an inch, his hands still groping and squeezing your ass. "Thought we were gonna talk?"
"After."
He laughed, the wrinkles on his face deepening. "You're a little minx, you know that?"
"Only for you."
He raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?" He pressed a kiss to your cheek, another to your jaw, a line down your throat. "I heard you've got a thing for old men."
You sighed, tilting your head back to give him better access. "Thought I did, but I think it's just a thing for you."
He groaned against your throat. "You can't just that, baby."
"Why not?"
Jack's mouth moved to your ear, catching your lobe between his teeth and tugging. "Makes me want to skip the talking." He whispered low into your ear, your body wracking with shivers.
"Jack Abbot, you're a goddamn tease."
He pulled back fully, hazel eyes swirling with desire locking onto yours. "If we do this, it changes everything. I'm not—you're it for me. I'm not letting go of you."
"Fine by me."
He smiled, shaking his head lightly before diving back down to kiss you. He walked you backwards through your apartment, leading you to your bedroom like he had done it a thousand times before.
"How's the knee?" He mumbled against your mouth, pushing you back against your bedroom door once he closed it.
"Better. Swelling's gone, minimal pain."
He pulled back, squinting his eyes at you. "And you wouldn't be lying to me?"
"Never."
His mouth quirked up, an appraising look in his eyes. "Good girl."
A whimper slipped out of you and his eyes lit up.
"You like that? You like when I call you a good girl?"
You nodded, one of your hands gripping his shoulder and the other slipping into his curls. He gave you a peck on the lips before moving down to kiss your neck, mouthing at the spot below your ear that had you unleashing sighs and soft moans. One of his thick thighs slotted between your legs, pressing against your core and making you dizzy.
His hands grasped your hips, dragging you back and forth on his strong thigh. Your hips followed his lead, sparks shooting throughout your body from your clit. You could feel the wetness starting to leak out of you, making the friction even more delicious. Breathy pants and sighs slipped from your lips, your hips rocking faster as your body lit up under his touch. His fingers pressed harder into your hips, grunts tickling the skin of your neck as he got achingly hard from you getting yourself off on his thigh.
"Yeah, like that, pretty girl."
He latched his mouth onto your pulse point, sucking hard and making your head drop with a thud against the door.
"Jack," you breathed out. "Please."
"Tell me what you need."
Your hand on his shoulder trailed down the front of his sweatshirt, landing on his hard bulge and squeezing. His broken moan sounded in the quiet room.
"You. Fuck me, please."
"You need it that bad, huh?"
You nodded eagerly, giving him another squeeze before his hand gripped your wrist and pulled it away.
"Shit—yeah, okay. I'll give you what you need."
He spun you around, walking you towards the bed and pulling your top off. He let out a groan as he saw you were braless, your already hard nipples ready for him to feast on. He pushed you down to sit on the bed, pulling his sweatshirt over his head. Your hands grasped the waistband of his pants, trembling with anticipation as you worked the button open and zipper down. His hands found yours, pulling them away from him and you huffed in annoyance.
He moved his hands to the waistband of your leggings and pulling them down slowly. You fought back the frustrated groan working it's way up your throat—you didn't need his slow hands, you wanted him to fuck you dumb.
He ran a finger down your underwear, a damp spot already formed. He pressed down on it, earning a soft moan from you and his cock twitched in his pants. His finger moved faster, more slick soaking your underwear and he became addicted to the sight—addicted to the way your hips moved forward eagerly. He gripped both hands around the fabric and pulled them down your legs, much to your relief.
"No foreplay. Trust me, I'm already wet enough." Your desperate voice sounded out, your hands making their way back to his pants. He let you pull his pants and boxer briefs down to his knees, your wide eyes latching onto his cock as it sprung free against his stomach.
You were right. He was really well hung; thick and long, curving slightly to the left. You felt your mouth watering, wanting nothing more than to choke and drool on his length. Maybe next time.
"Did you pop a viagra before you came over?" You teased, your lips curving into a smirk as your eyes met his.
He squinted at you, giving your thigh a light smack. "Watch it, sweetheart."
Your nerves sang from his smack, and you felt the strong urge to roll over onto all fours and ask him to slap you again—though you knew he would just flip you back over because of your knee.
He toed his shoes off before pulling his pants off all the way, giving you a good look at his stupidly big thighs and his prosthetic leg. Your breath caught at him standing fully naked before you—he was beautiful; his freckles, wrinkles, and scars telling you a story of a long life that you hoped you would continue to be a part of.
"Don't need a little blue pill when I've got you. Just need to think of you and I'm already half hard."
"That was strangely sweet."
He leaned down, capturing your lips in a searing kiss. One of your hands found his cock, using the precum leaking from the tip as lube to slowly drag your hand up and down his length. He groaned into your mouth, his hips jerking forward into your touch.
He pushed at your shoulders, encouraging you to lay back on the bed with your legs dangling off the edge. He grabbed a pillow, slotting it under your hips so they were tilted up.
"I'm gonna take the leg off, okay?"
"Whatever is comfortable for you, I really don't mind."
He took his prosthetic off, the process quick and like second nature. He rested his amputated leg on the bed beside your thigh. "There might be a bit of adjusting, but we just need to communicate. That okay with you?" You nodded your agreement.
He leaned over you, one hand next to your head as the other came up to squeeze your breast and roll your nipple between his fingers. He kissed you passionately, his tongue slipping into your mouth and stubble scratching your skin. You moaned into his mouth, grabbing his cock and tugging it slowly, teasingly.
His kisses grew sloppy as your pace picked up before he pulled back, resting his head on your collarbone.
"You got a condom?" His warm breath elicited goosebumps across your skin.
"I'm on the pill. And clean."
His cock jumped in your hand at your insinuation and he stood back up to get a good look at you. His sweet girl laid out on her bed before him, telling him he could fuck her raw. Yeah, he was pretty sure he had died and gone to heaven—or hell, either worked.
"You sure?"
"Please," you breathed out, dark and lidded eyes gazing up at him desperately.
"Fuck, don't know how I got so lucky."
He brought his cock to your soaked core, dragging it back and forth with ease—the tip catching on your clit making you gasp. He repeated the motions until you were writhing under him, pretty mouth falling open and moaning out his name.
"Tell me you want this. Tell me you want me." He rasped out, his control thinning by the second.
"God, I want this so badly. I want you—I have for so long, please." You whined, snapping his restraint.
He grabbed your legs, resting your ankles on his shoulders in the butterfly position. He gripped your hips before he brought his tip to your entrance, captivated by your tight hole clenching at the slight press of him. He pushed in slowly, a guttural moan leaving him as your walls gripped tightly.
"Shit—fuck, you're tight."
You let out a whine, your cunt stretching to accommodate his girth. Your chest heaved with heavy pants, your core lighting up with pleasure and only half his length was in you. Your hands found his forearms, your fingers digging in as he pressed into you more. A wail left you once he was fully in, your walls clenching impossibly tight. You both stayed still for a few seconds, both your staggered breaths filling the room. You squeezed around him and he let out a pained groan.
"That's—you feel so fucking good."
"Move, please." You begged.
He pulled his hips back, leaving just the tip in before he thrust back in harshly.
"Fuck!" You yelled, his cock hitting against your sweet spot perfectly. He picked up the pace, his hips alternating between slow, dragging thrusts and harsh, quick thrusts—his eyes watching your face carefully, learning what made you whimper and your eyes roll back. His grip on your hips tightened, tilting them up as he delivered a harsh thrust that had a cry leaving your lips.
"You like that? Does that feel good?" You nodded mindlessly, pressure building in your core as your room filled with the sounds of your pleasure and skin slapping against skin.
"Don't stop, Jack—oh, god—"
He groaned out as you squeezed even tighter around him, his release nearing embarrassingly fast. Your nails dug into his skin, a hiss leaving him at the burning sensation. He moved a hand from your hip to your core, rubbing tight circles on your clit. Your back arched as a loud moan escaped your chest, echoing throughout your room and probably being heard by the neighbours.
He kept his pace on your clit as his thrusts sped up, the effort making his face shine with a sheen of sweat.
"That's a good girl. You close, sweetheart?"
You mewled at his praise, nodding your head and uh-huhing as the fire licked higher. Your stomach clenched as your orgasm built, and you could feel Jack's nearing—his thrusts starting to lose rhythm.
"Come inside me. Please, Jack." Your eyes shining with tears met his as you begged, and he almost blew his load right then.
"Tell me you're mine," he gritted out through clenched teeth.
"I'm yours—only yours," you gasped out.
"Fuck, I'm gonna come. Shit, sweetheart—oh fuck." Jack moaned out, and the sound combined with the dual simulation on your cunt had you coming with a sharp cry—warmth spreading out from your core, your body feeling weightless and mind going fuzzy with pleasure.
You clenched down on his cock as you came, your slick walls keeping him locked deep and he rutted two times before coming—spilling in you with a long groan.
He brought your legs down from his shoulders and collapsed on top of you, peppering your chest with kisses as his cock softened inside you.
"That was…" He started.
"Yeah," you laughed softly, your arms wrapping around his shoulders and holding him to your chest. "Pretty good for an old man," you couldn't help but tease him, earning another smack to your hip.
"Smartass."
After showering and eating you found yourself back in bed with Jack, lying next to him with your head on his bicep, one leg slung over his hip and a finger lazily tracing his chest—mapping his freckles like constellations. His free hand was running a path up and down your thigh and hip, goosebumps erupting from his touch.
You turned your head slightly to look at his face. "Did you know there was a bet about us?"
He turned to give you a bewildered look, before realisation slowly dawned on him.
"Well, that explains Robby pestering me with questions all week. Kept asking if I was getting laid, apparently the smile on my face was concerning."
You laughed softly, your heart glowing at the fact he was caught smiling at work because of you. "What did you tell him?"
Summary: Jack Abbot is going to propose to you. That part is easy. The harder part is honoring your very serious, definitely-binding request that your best friend be consulted on any future ring purchase or proposal plan. Which is how Jack ends up in a coffee shop with John Shen, four ring photos, one proposal plan, a folder labeled Proposal Committee: Preliminary Review, and a cinnamon latte that may or may not become evidence in a future homicide investigation. But when the ring finally arrives six weeks later, Jack realizes the plan was never really about the candles, the takeout, or the timing. It was always about knowing you.
Warnings: fluff, proposal, engagement, emotional intimacy, established relationship, Shen being Shen, best friend/work husband chaos, brief lingerie mention, Jack being deeply in love, crying, happy tears, mild language
Author's Note:
The clause saga continues, and this one is pure proposal chaos with a deeply emotional center. Jack is trying so hard to be normal. Shen is taking his advisory role with terrifying seriousness. The reader is, of course, two steps away from figuring everything out at any given moment. This is for everyone who wanted Jack to honor the best friend clause, survive the proposal committee, and still get his perfect kitchen proposal. I hope you love it.
Xoxo, Del
Previous Parts: The Work Husband Clause & The Best Friend Clause
Jack Abbot was going to propose to you. He had known that for a while now. Not in the vague, distant, maybe-someday way people talked about marriage when they were trying not to scare themselves with the size of what they wanted. Jack had passed that point weeks ago. Months, maybe. It was hard to track the exact moment when wanting forever with you had stopped feeling like a thought and started feeling like a fact. Maybe it had been the first time you fell asleep on his couch with one hand tucked under your cheek and one foot pressed against his thigh like you had decided he was furniture.
Maybe it had been the morning you stole the last sip of his coffee, kissed his jaw, and told him you loved him before walking out the door wearing two different socks. Maybe it had been the night you looked at him with a straight face and told him that your best friend needed to be consulted on any future ring purchase or proposal plan. Jack had laughed. Briefly. Naively. Like a man who did not yet understand that you and John Shen could turn a joke into binding infrastructure if given enough time, caffeine, and access to the Notes app. But Jack loved you. God help him, he loved you enough to take the request seriously.
Which was why he was sitting in the back corner of a coffee shop on his day off with a black coffee, a notebook, three printed proposal outlines, five ring photos, and a level of preparation that would have embarrassed him if he had not been so determined to get this right. He had chosen the table carefully. Back corner. Clear sightline to the door. Not too close to the register. Not too close to the bathrooms. Not in your usual section of the café, because apparently, he now had to account for your caffeine habits as if planning a covert operation. There were easier ways to buy a ring. Jack knew that.
Normal men probably went to jewelry stores. Normal men probably texted a sister or a friend, asked a few questions, picked something beautiful, and moved on with their lives. Normal men did not arrange a committee meeting with their girlfriend’s work husband, best friend, former contractual betrothed, and active proposal advisor. Jack looked down at the top page of his notebook. Advisory Only. He had underlined it twice. Then the front door opened, and John Shen walked in wearing sunglasses, a baseball cap, and a jacket collar pulled high enough to suggest either espionage or a deeply suspicious errand. Jack stared at him.
In one hand, Shen carried a folder. He scanned the café once, spotted Jack, and crossed the room with the grim focus of a man approaching a hostage negotiation.
Jack waited until Shen reached the table. Then he said, “Absolutely not.”
Shen did not sit. “Meeting here was a tactical error.”
Jack looked at the sunglasses. Then the hat. Then the folder.
“Was the tactical error the coffee shop,” Jack asked, “or whatever this is?”
Shen removed the sunglasses and set them carefully beside Jack’s black coffee. “The coffee shop.”
Jack leaned back. “Why?”
Shen’s eyes moved once toward the counter. “She can sense when I’m getting coffee without her.”
Jack stared at him. Shen stared back.
“That is ridiculous,” Jack said.
Shen glanced toward the menu board. “I need coffee.”
Jack’s brow furrowed, “You just said meeting here was a tactical error.”
“Yes,” Shen replied. “The error has already occurred.”
Jack watched him walk to the counter. He was thirty seconds into the meeting, and Shen had already arrived in disguise, declared the location compromised, and left Jack alone with a folder labeled in neat black marker. Jack looked down.
Proposal Committee: Preliminary Review
God give me patience. He thought. At the counter, Shen ordered something Jack could not hear. The barista nodded. A minute later, Shen returned with a cinnamon latte. Jack looked at the drink. Then at Shen.
Shen sat down. “Seasonal offering.”
Jack picked up his black coffee. “Of course.”
Shen’s phone rang. Both men looked down. Your name lit up the screen. For one perfect, terrible second, neither of them moved.
Then Shen said, very quietly, “Oh no.”
Jack looked from the phone to Shen. “Answer it.”
“I can’t,” Shen said.
Jack’s eyes narrowed. “Why not?”
Shen looked genuinely alarmed now, which was, frankly, more unsettling than the sunglasses. “She’ll kill me if she finds out I got coffee without her.”
Jack stared at him. Shen stared back. The phone kept ringing. Shen’s gaze dropped to it.
“Answer it,” Jack said. “Or she’ll get suspicious.”
Shen looked at him as if Jack had just suggested walking directly into traffic.
Jack pointed at the phone. “Dunkin.”
Shen exhaled once, then picked up the call with the stiff posture of a man accepting his fate.
“Hello,” Shen said.
Jack immediately closed his eyes. Shen’s voice was too calm. You were going to hear it.
“Hey,” you said, bright and easy on the other end. “Jack had to go to some hospital meeting, so I’m bored. Do you want to get coffee?”
Shen’s eyes went wide. Jack’s head snapped up. Shen looked across the table at Jack like this was somehow Jack’s fault. Jack mouthed, No. Shen blinked at him. Jack shook his head once, sharper this time. No.
“No,” Shen said.
Jack’s eyes widened. There was a pause on the other end.
“You can’t get coffee?” you asked.
Shen sat perfectly still. “Correct.”
Jack dragged one hand down his face. God give him strength.
You were quiet for half a second. Then, suspiciously, you said, “John.”
Jack pointed sharply at Shen and mouthed, Errands. Shen’s gaze flicked to him. Jack mouthed it again, more aggressively. Errands.
“I am running errands,” Shen said.
Jack gave him a tight nod.
“Oh,” you said. “Great. I wanted to stop at the mall. We could meet up there?”
Shen froze. Jack froze with him.
“The mall?” Shen asked.
“Yeah,” you said. “Victoria’s Secret is having a sale, and I wanted to pick something up to surprise Jack.”
Jack’s forehead dropped to the table. Not hard. Not enough to hurt. Just one quiet, controlled thunk against the wood. Why? He thought. Why did his girlfriend tell Shen these things? Why did Shen receive these things like standard operational updates? Why was this his life? Jack asked any higher power with relevant insight. At this point, he wasn’t picky. Across the table, Shen’s eyes widened.
“John?” you asked.
Jack stayed face-down beside the ring photos. Shen stared at him.
“John,” you said again. “What was that?”
Shen lifted one hand and knocked twice on the table beside Jack’s head. Jack did not move. Shen knocked again, faster this time. Jack turned his head just enough to glare at him with one eye. Shen pointed sharply at the phone. Jack mouthed, Fix it.
Shen straightened. “Nothing.”
There was a pause.
“That was not nothing,” you said.
Shen’s grip tightened around his phone. “ I’m at the grocery store.”
Jack slowly closed his visible eye.
You were quiet for half a second. Then you said, “John.”
“I have to go,” Shen said quickly.
“What?” You asked, confused.
“Groceries, checking out, ” Shen said. “Bye.”
“Okay, talk to you lat—”
Shen ended the call and lowered the phone to the table with extreme care. Neither of them spoke. Jack still had his forehead pressed to the table. Shen waited. Jack did not move. Finally, Shen lifted one finger and knocked once beside his head.
Jack’s voice came muffled against the wood. “Do not knock on me.”
“I knocked near you,” Shen said.
Jack lifted his head slowly. “Why does my girlfriend tell you these things?”
Shen adjusted the folder in front of him. “Because we are best friends.”
Jack stared at him.
Shen added, “Best friend clause active.”
Jack pointed at him. “Do not invoke the clause during a Victoria’s Secret incident.”
Shen nodded once. “Boundary noted.”
Jack leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. This was his life. This was how he was planning to propose to his girlfriend. Sitting in a coffee shop across from John Shen, surrounded by ring photos, proposal notes, and the knowledge that you were apparently out in the world, attempting to buy lingerie while Jack attempted to behave like a composed adult. Fan-fucking-tastic. He thought. Shen’s phone lit up. Both men looked down.
You: If I find out you went and got that new cinnamon latte without me, I will murder you.
A second text appeared.
You: Jack will help me hide the body.
Jack stared at the screen. Shen stared at the screen. Then, slowly, both of them looked at the drink Shen had ordered. The cinnamon latte. Untouched. Obvious. Damning.
Jack’s eyes lifted to Shen. “You got the cinnamon latte?”
Shen’s expression remained perfectly still. “It was a seasonal offering.”
Jack’s eyes widened. “She specifically named it.”
“I did not know she had surveillance capacity,” Shen replied, clearly distressed.
Jack dragged a hand over his mouth. Shen turned the phone face down.
Jack leaned back in his chair. “She’s going to kill you.”
Shen adjusted the folder with great care. “You are named as an accomplice.”
“I am not helping her hide your body,” Jack replied.
Shen frowned, “The text suggests otherwise.”
Jack looked at him. “Dunkin.”
Shen looked down at the latte again. Then he slid it across the table toward Jack. Jack looked at the cinnamon latte. Then down at his own black coffee. Then back at Shen.
“What are you doing?” He asked.
“Drink it,” Shen said.
Jack’s eyes lifted slowly. “No.”
Shen’s eyes widened in panic, “We have to get rid of the evidence.”
“I have coffee,” Jack replied, lifting his coffee.
Shen pushed the latte closer, “This is different coffee.”
Jack pointed at the cup, “This is a murder latte.”
Shen looked mildly horrified. “It is not a murder latte.”
Jack shrugged, “My girlfriend just threatened homicide over it.”
“She threatened my homicide,” Shen said. “You were listed as logistical support.”
Jack stared at him.
Shen pushed the cup another inch closer. “Drink it.”
Jack pushed it back with two fingers. “Absolutely not.”
“Abbot.” Shen pleaded.
Jack sighed, “Dunkin.”
Shen glanced toward the front windows, then back to the latte. “If she finds us, the latte becomes material evidence.”
Jack looked at the latte. Then at Shen. Then at the proposal folder. God give me strength. He thought. Jack loved you. That was the thing. He loved you enough to consult John Shen before buying your ring. He loved you enough to honor the ridiculous best friend clause. He loved you enough to sit here while Shen treated a cinnamon latte like contraband in a federal investigation. He did not love anyone enough to drink the murder latte.
“I’m screwed, aren’t I?” he muttered.
Shen paused. Then he picked up his pen. “Emotionally or logistically?”
Jack looked at him. “Do not write that down.”
Shen wrote something down.
Jack pointed at him. “Dunkin.”
Shen did not look up. “Noted.”
Jack closed his eyes. For one second, he let himself imagine proposing to you in a world where none of this was happening. A quiet room. Your hand in his. The ring in his pocket. Your face when you realized what he was asking. No folders. No committee language. No seasonal beverages with criminal implications. Then Shen opened his folder. Jack heard the soft scrape of paper against paper. He opened one eye. There were tabs. Internally, he said, God give me strength. There were tabs.
Shen clicked his pen. “We are already behind schedule.”
Jack stared at him. “Behind whose schedule?”
Shen looked down at the folder. “The proposal committee’s.”
Jack sat forward and flattened both hands on the table. “There is no proposal committee,” he said.
Shen glanced at the ring photos. “Then why am I here?”
Jack held his stare. Shen held it back. The cinnamon latte sat between them like evidence.
Finally, Jack exhaled through his nose, “Advisory only,” he said.
Shen nodded once. “Limited strong advisory.”
“Do not start,” Jack warned.
Shen looked down at his folder. “Starting is item one.”
Jack stared at him. Shen slid a printed page across the table. At the top, in clean, merciless lettering, it read:
Proposal Committee: Preliminary Review
Jack looked at the page. Then at Shen. Then at the murder latte.
“I should have proposed in private and lied to everyone,” Jack said.
Shen picked up his pen. “She would have known.”
Jack hated that he believed him. Shen looked down at the page, then toward the front windows.
“We need to get down to this before she finds us,” Shen said.
Jack stared at him. “Do not make my girlfriend sound like an approaching weather event.”
“She is mobile, suspicious, and under-caffeinated,” Shen said.
Jack hated that Shen was right. You were out there somewhere. Mobile. Suspicious. Under-caffeinated. Potentially armed with a Victoria’s Secret bag and the ability to detect cinnamon-based betrayal through walls.
Jack dragged a hand over his mouth. “Fine,” he said. “We start with the ring.”
Shen nodded once. “Agreed.”
He opened the folder. Jack saw the tabs immediately. Ring Preferences. Proposal Constraints. Wooing Requirement. Embarrassment Avoidance. Post-Proposal Notification Protocol.
Jack pointed at the last one. “What the hell is post-proposal notification protocol?”
Shen glanced down. “I assume you will notify me after she says yes.”
Jack paused. “After,” he said.
Shen looked up. “I am not asking to be present.”
Jack relaxed by two percent.
Then Shen added, “Unless requested.”
Jack pointed at him. “You will not be requested.”
Shen nodded once. “That seems likely.”
Jack dragged one hand over his mouth again. “This is already too much.”
“You asked for advisory input,” Shen said.
Jack pointed at him, “I asked for limited advisory input.”
“Yes,” Shen replied. “We should begin with the ring.”
Jack looked down at his own notebook, then at the ring photos stacked beside his black coffee. Fine. That was why they were here. Not the latte. Not the tabs. Not the fact that Shen had arrived dressed like he was about to commit a minor felony. The ring. Jack pulled the photos closer. Shen’s gaze dropped to them, then shifted briefly to Jack’s notebook.
Jack covered the page with one hand. “No.”
Shen blinked. “I did not say anything.”
“You were about to,” Jack replied.
Shen frowned, “I was observing.”
“Observe the rings,” Jack said.
Shen nodded once. “Reasonable.”
Jack slid the first photo across the table. “Start there.”
Shen picked it up. For all the nonsense, for all the committee language and the cinnamon latte currently threatening to become a crime scene, something in the air shifted when Shen looked at the picture. Jack felt it immediately. This was why he was here. Not because he could not choose a ring. He could. He had. Mostly. But you had asked for Shen to be consulted, and Jack had listened. Because he loved you. Because Shen mattered to you. Because forever, apparently, came with advisory obligations.
Shen studied the first photo for half a second. “No,” he said.
Jack blinked. “No?”
“No,” Shen repeated.
Jack frowned, “You looked at it for half a second.”
“That was sufficient,” Shen said.
Jack’s jaw flexed. “Reason?”
Shen set the photo down. “It is trying too hard.”
Jack looked at the ring. Then at Shen. “It’s a ring.”
“It is a ring with anxiety,” Shen said.
Jack stared at him.
Shen folded his hands. “She would feel obligated to like it.”
Jack looked down at the photo again. Annoyingly, that made sense. He hated it when Shen made sense. Jack slid the first photo aside and picked up the second one.
“Fine,” he said. “Next.”
Shen accepted the second photo.
This time, he looked at it for three seconds. “No.”
Jack leaned back. “You’re going to have to start using more words.”
“She would like this for someone else,” Shen said.
Jack frowned. Then, against his will, he understood exactly what Shen meant. The ring was pretty. Elegant. Clean lines. Not too much. The kind of thing you would point out in a store window and say was beautiful. For someone else. Jack took the photo back without arguing.
He slid the third photo across the table. “This one.”
Shen picked it up. He did not reject it immediately. That was something. Jack kept his face still, but his fingers tightened once around his coffee. Shen studied the photo longer than the others. His eyes moved over the center stone, the setting, the band, the details Jack had looked at for far too long the night before.
Finally, Shen set it down. “Closer,” he said.
Jack’s chest tightened. “But?”
Shen tapped the edge of the photo with one finger. “Still not hers.”
Jack looked down at it. He had known that too. It was close. Closer than the others. Romantic without being loud. Pretty without trying to announce itself from across the room. But not quite right. Not quite you. Jack exhaled through his nose and moved it aside.
Shen watched him. “You already knew.”
Jack did not answer.
Shen’s expression did not change, but his voice shifted slightly. “You brought comparison options.”
Jack looked up. Shen looked back at him calmly.
Jack’s jaw moved once. “I brought options.”
“You brought one option,” Shen said. “And supporting evidence.”
Jack stared at him. Shen waited. Jack reached for the final photo. He did not slide it across right away. For a second, his thumb rested on the corner of the paper. He had found it last. After hours of looking. After too many tabs open on his laptop. After too many rings that were beautiful and wrong and almost and no. He had found this one and gone quiet in his kitchen with his phone in his hand because, suddenly, he could see it. Your hand in his. Your fingers brushing his jaw. The ring catching light when you reached for his coffee. Your face when you realized what he was asking. Jack slid the photo across the table.
Shen picked it up. This time, he said nothing. Jack did not rush him. The coffee shop moved around them, quiet and warm and ordinary. Someone laughed near the counter. Milk steamed behind the bar. The murder latte sat between them, untouched and irrelevant for the first time since Shen had ordered it.
Shen looked at the ring. Then he looked at Jack. “That one,” Shen said.
Jack’s chest loosened before he could stop it. “Good,” he said.
Shen held the photo out.
Jack took it back carefully, his thumb brushing over the edge. “That’s the one I liked best.”
Shen nodded once. For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Shen said, “Then you did not need me.”
Jack looked down at the photo. The ring was not flashy. Not plain, either. It had detail where it mattered, small and intentional, something you would notice more the longer you looked at it. Like you. Like the life he wanted with you.
“I didn’t need you to choose it,” Jack said.
Shen waited.
Jack looked up. “I needed to ask.”
Shen went very still. It was subtle. Almost nothing. A pause in his hands. A slight shift in his eyes. The kind of reaction most people would miss. Jack did not.
Shen looked down at the photo again. “She will like that.”
Jack glanced at the ring. “The ring?”
“No,” Shen said. “That you asked.”
Jack’s throat went tight before he could stop it. He looked down at the picture again because that was easier than looking at Shen. Then Shen picked up his pen.
Jack’s eyes narrowed immediately. “Do not write down that I’m emotionally evolved.”
Shen paused.
Jack stared at him. “Were you going to?”
“No,” Shen said.
Jack did not believe him.
Shen looked back at the folder. “I was going to write that ring selection is complete.”
Jack leaned back. “Good.”
Shen turned another page in his folder. “Proposal plan.”
Jack looked up. “I have one.”
Shen paused with his pen over the page. “One?”
“One,” Jack said.
Shen studied him for a second. “You brought four ring options.”
“Three comparison options and one ring,” Jack corrected.
Shen’s mouth barely moved. “Progress.”
Jack ignored that and opened his notebook to the page he had written the night before. There were not three plans. There were no backup locations, alternate timelines, or a ranked list of restaurants based on privacy and lighting. There was one plan. Because every time Jack tried to imagine asking you anywhere else, it felt wrong. Too staged. Too public. Too much like he was trying to perform forever instead of ask for it. Shen leaned forward as Jack turned the notebook around.
Jack tapped the page once. “At home.”
Shen looked down. Jack watched his face carefully.
“Dinner,” Jack said. “Her favorite takeout. Not something too formal. Candles, but not too many. Flowers, but not some apology-looking arrangement.”
Shen’s eyes flicked up.
Jack looked at him. “What?”
“Nothing,” Shen said.
Jack narrowed his eyes. “That was not nothing.”
Shen glanced back at the page. “You accounted for apology flowers.”
“She hates arrangements that look like someone is trying to apologize,” Jack said.
Shen nodded once. “Correct.”
Jack hated how good that felt.
He moved his finger down the page. “Music. A playlist, songs she actually likes. Songs from us.”
Shen kept reading. Jack’s thumb rested near the last line. He did not tap it right away.
Then Shen looked up. “Location?”
Jack exhaled through his nose. “Kitchen.”
Shen went still.
Jack bristled on instinct. “What?”
Shen’s gaze stayed on him. “Why?”
Jack looked down at the page because that was easier than explaining it while Shen watched him like that.
“Because she always ends up there,” Jack said.
Shen did not interrupt.
Jack’s voice went quieter despite himself. “She sits on the counter when I cook. Steals food off the cutting board. Drinks my coffee even when she has her own.”
Shen’s expression did not change, but his attention sharpened.
“If she’s upset, she stands by the sink and pretends she’s getting water until she can talk,” Jack said. “If she’s happy, she dances there. Sometimes badly.”
Shen blinked once.
Jack glanced up. “Do not write badly.”
Shen looked down at the folder. “I did not.”
Jack did not believe him. He kept going anyway.
“She thinks the kitchen is where nothing big happens,” Jack said. “Which is why everything does.”
Shen was quiet. The coffee shop noise moved around them. Milk steaming behind the counter. A chair scraping against the floor. Someone laughing near the door.
Jack looked down at the notebook. “I can’t really imagine doing it another way.”
Shen looked at the page for another second. Then he nodded once. “Good.”
Jack lifted his eyes. “Good?”
“This is perfect,” Shen said.
Jack went still. Shen did not soften the words. He did not make them bigger than they needed to be. He just looked at Jack across the table and said it like a fact.
“She will know what it means,” Shen said.
Jack’s throat tightened before he could stop it. He looked back down at the notebook. The word kitchen sat there in his own handwriting, underlined once. He had written it because it felt like you. Because when he pictured asking, really pictured it, he did not see a restaurant or a scenic overlook or some perfectly orchestrated setup with strangers nearby and flowers arranged by someone who did not know you. He saw you barefoot in his kitchen. He saw you laughing at something he said under his breath. He saw your hand on his chest. He saw himself reaching into his pocket because he could not wait one more second.
Shen tapped the page once. “The goal is not to make it look like a proposal.”
Jack looked up. “That is the point.”
“No,” Shen said. “The point is to make it look like you know her.”
Jack went quiet. There it was. The thing he had been circling for weeks. Not spectacle. Not performance. Not proof for anyone else. Just you. The way he knew you. The way he loved you. The way he wanted to ask in the middle of an ordinary place because nothing about loving you had ever felt ordinary to him.
Jack swallowed once. “Kitchen,” he said.
Shen nodded. “Kitchen.”
Jack pointed at him. “No committee language.”
Shen looked down at his notes. “I will avoid it during the proposal.”
Jack stared at him. “During the proposal?”
Shen paused. “Before and during the proposal.”
“Better,” Jack said.
Shen made a note.
Jack leaned forward. “What did you write?”
“Kitchen plan approved,” Shen said.
Jack looked at him.
Shen added, “No committee language.”
Jack sat back. “Good.”
Shen wrote one more thing.
Jack’s eyes narrowed. “Dunkin.”
Shen did not look up. “I am writing that the wooing requirement is satisfied.”
Jack closed his eyes. God give me strength. By the time Jack left the coffee shop, the ring was no longer a photo. It was purchased. Ordered in your size. Expected to arrive in six to eight weeks. Jack had stared at the confirmation email in his car for a full minute before putting his phone facedown in the cupholder and breathing like a man who had just done something irreversible. Which, technically, he had not. He had not asked yet. You had not answered yet. The ring was not even physically in his possession. But it was yours. That was the part that got him.
Somewhere, in some warehouse or workshop or carefully organized back room, there was a ring being prepared for your hand. Jack sat in the driver’s seat and let that fact settle into him. Then he drove home, hid every piece of evidence with the kind of precision usually reserved for narcotics and classified documents, and spent the next ten minutes making absolutely certain there was no chance you would find the folder, the notes, the receipt, the confirmation number, or the phrase ‘Wooing requirement satisfied’ written anywhere in his home. Only then did he let himself come looking for you.
Your shoes were by the door. One heel tipped sideways near the entryway. Jack looked at it and \ immediately thought of Shen’s story about the emotionally load-bearing heel. God help him, even your shoes had lore now.
“Baby?” Jack called.
“Bedroom,” you answered.
There was something in your voice. Jack stopped with one hand on the back of the couch. Not suspicious. Not exactly. But soft. Warm. Waiting. His pulse shifted before he could talk himself out of it. Jack walked down the hall, still carrying the leftover tension from the coffee shop in his shoulders. The ring. The confirmation email. Shen’s folder. The murder latte. Advisory capacity. Limited strong advisory. The exact shape of forever. He had been thinking all day. Planning all day. Trying to keep every secret tucked safely behind his teeth.
Then he reached the bedroom doorway. And every thought in his head went silent. You were sitting on the edge of the bed. For one impossible second, Jack did not understand what he was seeing. Then he did. The bag from the mall was folded on the chair beside you. The receipt was on the dresser. You were wearing something soft and pretty, something that held your body in a way that made Jack’s heart forget what it was supposed to do. Something you had picked for him. That was the part that stole the breath from his chest.
Not just the lace. Not just the delicate straps or the way the bedroom light touched your skin. You had stood in a store, thought of him, and chosen this. For him. Jack stopped in the doorway. All day, his mind had been full. Now there was nothing. No thoughts. No schedule. No committee. No higher power accepting inquiries. Just you.
Your smile started small. “Hi.”
Jack stared at you.
You tilted your head. “You okay?”
Fuck no. He thought. Absolutely not. I am not okay. Jack opened his mouth. Nothing came out.
Your smile widened. “Jack?”
He blinked once. Then, very carefully, he said, “I need a second.”
You laughed softly. “A second?”
Jack nodded once, still staring. “Maybe several.”
Your expression softened, but the amusement stayed at the corner of your mouth. “Bad meeting?”
Jack let out a low, helpless laugh. Complicated did not begin to cover it. He had spent his afternoon with John Shen in a coffee shop, choosing the ring he was going to put on your finger and planning the night he was going to ask you to keep him forever. He had listened to Shen say the words ‘wooing requirement’ with a straight face. He had ordered a ring. He had hidden the evidence. He had come home prepared to act normal. And then there you were. Sitting on his bed in something you had bought with him in mind, looking at him like he was exactly where you wanted him.
“Complicated,” Jack said.
“With administration?” you asked.
His eyes lifted to yours. The lie sat there for half a second.
Then Jack walked toward you. “Something like that,” he said.
You watched him come closer, your smile shifting into something softer, warmer, almost shy now that he was close enough to touch. Jack liked that too much. He liked all of it too much.
You reached for the front of his jacket and hooked your fingers there, drawing him between your knees. “You look tense.”
“I was tense,” Jack said.
You raised a brow, “Was?”
His hands settled at your waist. You were warm beneath his palms. Real. Here. His. Not officially. Not yet. But soon. God, soon. Jack looked down at you, and the thought hit him so hard he almost had to close his eyes. He had spent the whole day trying to plan the moment he would ask you to marry him. And now you were in front of him, soft and warm and smiling, and the question felt almost ridiculous. Not because it mattered less. Because in every way that mattered, it was already true. You were his future. You were sitting in his bedroom wearing something meant to surprise him, and Jack could barely remember how to breathe.
Your fingers smoothed over the front of his jacket. “You’re thinking too much.”
Jack looked down at you. For the first time all day, that was not true.
“No,” he said, his hand sliding along your waist. “I’m really not.”
Your smile went quiet. Jack bent and kissed you. Slowly at first. Carefully. Like he had time. Like he had all the time in the world. Your hands moved up his chest, and Jack felt the last of the day leave him. The coffee shop. Shen’s folder. The tabs. The timeline. The ordered ring tucked somewhere safely out of reach. All of it went quiet. You made a soft sound against his mouth, and Jack’s hand tightened at your waist. There you are, he thought. Not the proposal. Not the plan. Not the future arriving in six to eight weeks. Just you. Right now. Jack pulled back only enough to look at you.
Your eyes opened slowly. “Hi.”
His mouth curved. “Hi,” he said.
You touched his jaw. “You’re better now.”
Jack’s thumb brushed over your side. “Yeah.”
You smiled, pleased with yourself. “Good.”
Jack looked at you sitting there, soft and beautiful and entirely unaware that somewhere in the world, a ring was being made for your hand. He pressed another kiss to your mouth. Then one to your cheek. Then one to the corner of your jaw, just because he could.
Your fingers slid into his hair. “Jack.”
His eyes closed for half a second. He loved the way you said his name. He loved that you had no idea what was coming. He loved that even if you did, Shen would probably claim you had known because of abnormal detection patterns, and Jack would probably have to hear about it for the rest of his life. He smiled against your skin.
You leaned back slightly. “What?”
Jack lifted his head. “Nothing.”
Your eyes narrowed with familiar suspicion. “That was not nothing.”
“No,” Jack said, his hands warm at your waist. “It was good.”
You studied him for another second. Then your suspicion softened into something sweeter.
“Okay,” you said.
Jack bent and kissed you again before you could ask anything else. Because he could keep the secret. He could. For six to eight weeks, he could keep this tucked safely inside his chest. He could wait for the ring. He could plan the kitchen. He could survive Shen’s advisory committee. Probably. But standing there with you, looking at him like that, Jack knew the truth. The ring was coming. The question was coming. The rest of his life was coming. And for once, he was not thinking too much. He was only thinking yes. Six weeks and four days later, the ring arrived.
Jack knew because he had checked the tracking more often than was medically reasonable. He had checked it before work, again between patients, once in the parking lot, and one final time while standing outside his front door with his keys in his hand and his heart somewhere dangerously close to his throat. Delivered. A single word on the screen. Small. Ordinary. Absolutely devastating. For one second, Jack just stood there.
He had known it was coming. Obviously, he had known. He had ordered it. Paid for it. Read the confirmation email until the words started to blur. Spent six weeks pretending he was not thinking about the ring every time you reached for his hand. But knowing it was coming was different from knowing it was here. The ring was no longer a photo. No longer a plan. No longer a coffee shop conversation with John Shen, a murder latte, and the phrase ‘Wooing requirement satisfied’ haunting him from a folder with tabs. The ring was real. The ring was here. The ring was yours.
Jack found the small delivery box exactly where the notification said it would be, tucked near the side door, hidden enough that you would not have noticed it first if you had come home before him. Jack stared at it for half a second too long. Then he picked it up, unlocked the front door, went straight to the bedroom, and hid every trace of the packaging with the focus of a man handling evidence.
Box broken down. Shipping label removed. Receipt tucked away. Jewelry box transferred to the inside pocket of the jacket he had already laid out for the night. Confirmation email archived. Deleted from the visible inbox. Recently deleted cleared. Then checked again. God give me strength. He was proposing marriage, not committing wire fraud. Still, with you, caution felt appropriate. Only when the evidence was gone, and the ring box was safely hidden, did Jack let himself breathe.
Then he went back to the kitchen and started setting up. He had done exactly what he said he would do. Favorite takeout ordered. Candles, but not too many. Flowers, but not the kind that looked like someone was apologizing. Music playing softly from the speaker by the cookbooks. Not proposal songs. Not anything obvious enough to make your eyes narrow the second you walked in. Songs you liked. Songs from the two of you. A real date night at home. Private. Warm. Specific. The kitchen plan. Shen had called it perfect. Jack had tried not to care about that. He cared.
The front door opened before the food arrived. “I’m home,” you called.
Jack’s hand stilled near the wineglasses. For one impossible second, he forgot what he was supposed to be doing. Then you appeared in the doorway, still in your coat, your bag on your shoulder, your eyes moving over the kitchen with immediate suspicion and a slow, pleased smile.
“Oh,” you said, softer now. “You meant date night.”
Jack looked at you. “I said date night.”
“You say a lot of things,” you said, stepping farther into the kitchen.
His mouth curved. “Do I?”
You set your bag down on one of the chairs. “You also say them in your serious voice, and then I have to decide if you mean dinner or a medical emergency.”
“This is not a medical emergency,” Jack said.
Your eyes moved over the counter. The candles. The flowers. The wine.
Then your gaze came back to him, warmer than before. “Good.”
Jack held your eyes for one second too long.
You noticed. Your head tilted slightly. “You okay?”
Jack turned toward the drawer before you could see too much on his face. “I’m good.”
“You sound weird.” You replied.
Jack looked at you, “I’m getting silverware.”
Your brow furrowed, “That does not usually affect your voice.”
Jack opened the drawer. “Maybe I care about presentation.”
You laughed and crossed the kitchen toward him. “You do not care about presentation.”
“I care about presentation for you,” Jack said.
That quieted you. Jack felt it happen before he looked at you. When he did, your expression had gone soft in that way that made his chest feel too full for the space inside it. Jack’s hand tightened around the silverware. God. Six weeks and four days. He had waited six weeks and four days. He could wait through dinner. He could. That was the plan. You moved closer, rose onto your toes, and kissed the corner of his mouth. Jack closed his eyes for half a second. No. No, he probably could not. The doorbell rang before he could make a catastrophic decision in the middle of the kitchen.
You pulled back, smiling. “Saved by takeout.”
Jack looked at you. “Temporarily.”
Your eyebrows lifted. Jack took the opportunity to turn away before you could ask him what that meant.
“I’m going to change,” you said, already stepping back. “Give me five minutes.”
Jack nodded once. “Take your time.”
You narrowed your eyes playfully. “That sounded suspiciously patient.”
“I am capable of patience,” Jack said.
You smiled as you backed toward the hall. “Sure.”
Then you disappeared into the bedroom. Jack stood still until he heard the door close. Then he exhaled. Jack tipped the delivery driver too much, locked the door, and carried the bags into the kitchen with both hands. This was it. Favorite takeout. Candles, but not too many. Flowers that did not look like an apology. Music low by the sink. The ring in his jacket pocket. Six weeks and four days of waiting, and now he was arranging containers of noodles and rice like his entire future depended on whether the dumplings went near the vegetables. God give me strength. He set out plates. He opened containers. He poured wine.
The bedroom door opened down the hall. Jack turned. You came back into the kitchen barefoot. That was what did it. Not the candles. Not the wine. Not the music. Not the ring sitting heavy in his jacket pocket. You. Barefoot in his kitchen, smiling. You had changed into jeans and a sweater, your hair tucked behind one ear, your sleeves pushed to your elbows like you were ready to steal food off the counter before he finished setting it out. You looked comfortable. Happy. Home. Jack stopped with a takeout container in his hand. He was not making it through dinner.
You came closer, eyes dropping to the open containers on the counter. “Oh my God, you got my favorite.”
Jack set the container down. “Obviously.”
“And extra sauce?” You asked hopefully.
He nodded. “Obviously.”
Your smile went bright. “I love you.”
Jack looked at you. He knew you meant the food. Mostly. Probably. It did not matter.
“I love you too,” he said.
Your expression softened again, but then the music shifted, and your smile came back. You reached for the wineglass he had poured for you, took a sip, and climbed onto the counter like you had done a hundred times. Jack watched you settle there, one knee bent slightly, your bare feet kicking lightly against the cabinet beneath you. You bounced your shoulders a little to the song playing from the speaker. Just once. Barely anything. Enough to ruin him completely.
“This smells amazing,” you said.
Jack stared at you.
You took another sip of wine and looked over at him. “What?”
Nothing. Everything. The ring was in his jacket pocket. The kitchen was warm. You were sitting in front of him, barefoot and happy, moving to the music like the whole world had narrowed to this one room and this one night and the woman he could not imagine living without. Jack let out a breath that was almost a laugh.
“I was going to do this after dinner,” he said.
Your feet stopped moving. The wineglass lowered slowly from your mouth. “Do what?”
Jack looked at you for one more second.
Then he shook his head, helpless against it. “I can’t wait.”
Your lips parted. Jack turned, reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, and felt the box fit into his palm like it had been waiting there forever. When he turned back, you were completely still.
“Jack,” you whispered.
He stepped closer. “I had a plan,” he said.
Your eyes dropped to his hand. Then back to his face. “You did?”
Jack smiled faintly. “A whole one.”
You made a small, shaky sound that might have been a laugh if your eyes had not already started to shine. Jack moved between your knees, close enough now that he could see your breath catch.
“I was going to let you eat first,” he said.
You blinked quickly.
“I was going to be patient,” Jack continued.
Your mouth trembled.
“I was going to wait for the exact right moment.” He looked around the kitchen, then back at you.
Then his voice softened. “But this is the exact right moment.”
Jack opened the box. For half a second, the world went very, very quiet. Your hand flew to your mouth.
“Yes,” you said immediately.
Jack froze. Then he laughed. It broke out of him before he could stop it, startled and breathless and happier than he had any right to be when he had not even gotten the question out.
“Baby,” Jack said, smiling so hard it almost hurt. “At least let me ask.”
You were already crying. “Okay.”
Jack took a breath. You nodded at him, helpless and eager and already reaching for him even though he still had the box in his hand. Jack’s chest went tight. He loved you so much it was almost inconvenient.
“I love you,” he said.
Your face crumpled.
Jack’s voice stayed low. “I love this. I love coming home to you. I love finding you in our kitchen, stealing my food, drinking my coffee, dancing badly when you think I’m not watching.”
You laughed through the tears. “Badly?”
“Beautifully badly,” Jack said.
You pressed one hand over your heart. Jack looked at you sitting there in the kitchen, your wine forgotten beside you, your eyes wet, your whole face open and shining like you already knew every answer he could ever ask of you. His throat tightened.
“I love the life I have with you,” he said. “I love every quiet part of it. And I want all the rest of it, too.”
You made a small sound.
Jack held your gaze. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” you said again.
Then you launched yourself off the counter. Jack caught you with one arm around your waist, the ring box still clutched safely in his other hand, as you wrapped yourself around him. Your mouth found his, messy and smiling and wet with tears. Jack kissed you back, laughing against you, holding you so tightly your feet barely touched the floor.
“Yes,” you said against his mouth.
Jack’s arm tightened around you. “I heard you.”
“Yes.” You said again.
Jack exhaled a happy laugh, “I heard you the first time.”
You kissed him harder. Jack let himself have it for another second. Two. Three.
Then he pulled back just enough to breathe. “Baby.”
You chased his mouth. “What?”
He laughed softly and lifted the box between you. “Let me put it on you.”
You looked down at the ring like you had forgotten there was a step after saying yes.
“Oh my God,” you whispered.
Jack took your left hand. Your fingers were trembling. So were his. He slid the ring onto your finger slowly, carefully, watching it settle exactly where it belonged. It fit. Of course, it fit. Shen would be unbearable about that later. But Jack could not care about Shen right now. Not when you were staring down at your hand, crying and laughing at the same time, turning your fingers slightly so the kitchen light caught the ring.
“Oh my God,” you said again.
Jack looked at it. Then at you. Then back at the ring. His chest went tight and full and almost painful.
“It’s perfect,” he said, his voice rough.
You looked up at him. Jack shook his head a little, like he still could not believe he was seeing it outside his own imagination.
Your mouth trembled. “The ring?” you asked.
Jack smiled, helpless and sure. “You.”
You looked down at the ring again. For a few seconds, neither of you said anything. You only held your hand between you, fingers trembling slightly, turning it one way and then the other so the stone caught the kitchen light. Jack watched your face. Not the ring. Not really. The ring was perfect. He knew that. He had known it when he saw the photo, when Shen confirmed it, when he opened the box in the quiet of your bedroom after it arrived. But this was different. This was your face while you wore it.
This was you crying in your kitchen, wine forgotten on the counter, takeout going cold behind him, your bare feet still tucked close to his on the floor. This was everything.
You lifted your eyes to his. “We’re engaged.”
Jack’s smile came slow and helpless. “Yeah.”
You let out a laugh that broke halfway into another sob. “We’re engaged.”
Jack’s hands found your waist. “Yeah, baby.”
You looked down again, then back up at him, like you needed to make sure both things were still true. The ring. Him. The life suddenly opening in front of you.
“You asked me to marry you,” you said.
Jack brushed his thumb over your side. “I did.”
“In the kitchen.” You continued.
His mouth curved. “I did.”
You beamed. “With my favorite takeout.”
“Romantic,” Jack said.
You laughed wetly and pressed your forehead to his chest. Jack wrapped both arms around you, holding you there, his chin dipping toward the top of your head. He closed his eyes for half a second. There it was. Quiet. Finally. No tracking updates. No hidden receipts. No Shen folder. No committee language. No murder latte. Just you in his arms, your ringed hand curled against his shirt, saying yes over and over again without saying a word. Jack breathed you in. Then you went very still. He felt it immediately.
Jack opened his eyes. “What?”
You lifted your head. “John.”
Jack closed his eyes again. “No.”
You pulled back enough to look at him. “Yes.”
“No,” Jack said, more firmly.
“He needs to know.” You insisted.
Jack groaned, “He can know in the morning.”
Your eyes widened like he had suggested something deeply unethical. “Jack.”
“We have been engaged for less than five minutes,” Jack said.
“And he has post-proposal notification rights.” You replied.
Jack’s eyes opened. He stared at you. You stared back, beautiful and tearful and absolutely serious.
“I knew that tab was going to ruin my life,” Jack said.
You were already reaching for your phone on the counter. “This is not ruining your life.”
“It is interrupting my life.” Jack amended.
You shrugged, “It is part of your life now.”
Jack pointed at you. “That sounded like Shen.”
You smiled through your tears. “Best friend clause.”
Jack grimaced, “Do not invoke the clause during our engagement.”
You lifted the phone. “Too late.”
Jack dragged a hand over his mouth as you tapped Shen’s contact and started a FaceTime call.
“Can we have one private moment before committee notification?” Jack asked.
You looked up at him with watery, sparkling eyes. “We did.”
“That was thirty seconds,” Jack replied.
You nodded seriously, “It was a very meaningful thirty seconds.”
Jack stared at you. You smiled. God give me strength. He thought. The call connected on the second ring. Shen’s face appeared on the screen. He was in scrubs, standing somewhere that looked suspiciously like a hallway at PTMC, his expression flat and expectant in a way that told Jack he had absolutely been waiting for this.
“Accepted?” Shen asked.
You made a strangled sound. “John.”
Shen blinked once. “That was not an answer.”
You laughed and cried at the same time, turning the phone so your face and Jack’s shoulder were both in frame. “Yes.”
Shen’s expression did not change much. But Jack saw it. The slight softening around his eyes. The small release in his jaw. The way his gaze flicked from your wet face to Jack and then back to you, as if confirming that you were happy before allowing himself to react.
“Good,” Shen said.
You laughed again. “Good?”
Shen nodded once. “Expected, but good.”
Jack leaned closer to the phone. “Expected?”
Shen looked at him. “Yes.”
Jack’s brows lifted. “You couldn’t give me that level of confidence six weeks ago?”
“You did not ask for reassurance,” Shen said.
“I asked for advisory input,” Jack replied.
Shen shrugged, “Different category.”
Jack pointed at the phone. “Dunkin.”
You wiped under your eye with your free hand. “Look.”
You held your left hand up to the camera. For the first time since he answered, Shen went completely still. His eyes dropped to the ring. You turned your fingers a little so he could see it properly. Shen studied it for two seconds.
Then he nodded once. “Correct.”
You let out a watery laugh. “Correct?”
Jack closed his eyes. “Of course, that’s what he says.”
Shen looked at you through the screen. “It is the correct ring.”
Your mouth trembled.
Shen’s voice softened by the smallest degree. “It’s perfect.”
That did it.
Your face crumpled again. “Oh, John,” you whispered.
Jack’s annoyance disappeared before it could fully form. Because Shen was quiet on the screen. And you were looking at him like the little piece of history between you had just folded itself into this new thing, this future Jack had asked for, this life that somehow had room for all of it.
Shen cleared his throat once. “Are you happy?”
You nodded quickly. “So happy.”
“Good,” Shen said.
Jack’s hand settled at your waist.
Shen’s gaze shifted to him. “Well done.”
Jack went still. You looked up at him.
Jack looked at Shen through the screen. “Thank you.”
Shen nodded once. “The kitchen was the correct choice.”
You froze. Jack froze. The kitchen went silent except for the music still playing low by the sink. Slowly, you turned your head toward Jack. Jack looked down at you. Your eyes narrowed.
“John knew,” you said.
Jack closed his eyes. “Here we go.”
“John knew?” you repeated.
Shen looked between you two on the phone. “I was consulted.”
Your mouth fell open. “You were consulted?”
Jack opened his eyes. “Advisory only.”
Shen added, “Limited strong advisory.”
Jack pointed at the phone. “Do not help.”
You stared at Jack, then at the phone, then back at Jack. “You asked John to help plan my proposal?”
Jack’s jaw shifted. “You told me to.”
Your expression changed. The shock softened first. Then the realization. Then something so tender crossed your face that Jack forgot how irritated he was supposed to be.
“You listened,” you said.
Jack’s voice went quieter. “Of course I listened.”
Your eyes filled again. Shen looked down briefly, giving you privacy in the only way he knew how.
Jack touched your cheek. “You said he needed to be consulted.”
You laughed through another tear. “I was mostly joking.”
Jack’s thumb brushed under your eye. “I wasn’t.”
You stared at him. For one second, Shen did not exist. The phone did not exist. The food did not exist. Only Jack’s hand on your face and the ring on your finger and the knowledge that he had taken every ridiculous, silly, sacred piece of you seriously.
Then Shen said, “The wooing requirement was satisfied.”
Jack’s eyes closed. “Dunkin.”
You gasped softly. “A girl needs to be wooed.”
Shen nodded once. “Correct.”
Jack looked toward the ceiling. Any higher power currently accepting inquiries, this was still a good time.
You looked at Jack, glowing now. “You satisfied the wooing requirement.”
Jack’s eyes dropped back to you. “I proposed to you in my kitchen.”
“Our kitchen,” you corrected softly.
Jack stopped.
Your smile trembled. “Our kitchen,” you said again.
Jack’s hand tightened at your waist. Something in his chest gave way. He looked at you for a long second, then bent and kissed you, because there were only so many words a man could survive in one night. You kissed him back, smiling against his mouth.
On the phone, Shen cleared his throat. “Post-proposal notification protocol is complete.”
Jack pulled back just enough to glare at the screen. “Goodbye, Dunkin.”
Shen looked at you. “Congratulations.”
Your smile softened. “Thank you.”
Shen paused.
Then he said, “You were never going to die alone.”
The kitchen went quiet. Your breath caught. Jack felt it. He remembered the story from the bar. You on the floor with pizza. One heel still on. Shen sitting across from you with the worst comfort imaginable and somehow exactly enough of it. Your eyes filled all over again, but this time your smile was different. Older. Softer. Grateful.
“I know,” you said.
Shen nodded once. “Good.”
Jack could not even be annoyed at that. Not this time.
You held up your hand again. “I’m getting married.”
Shen’s mouth barely moved, but it was almost a smile. “Yes.”
“To Jack.” You added.
Shen looked at Jack through the phone. “Also correct.”
Jack shook his head. “That’s your blessing?”
Shen paused, “That was my factual acknowledgment.”
You laughed.
Jack reached for the phone. “And that’s enough.”
“Wait,” you said, pulling it away.
Jack looked at you. “Baby.”
You turned back to Shen. “I love you.”
Shen went still. Jack’s hand paused at your waist. On the screen, Shen blinked once.
Then he said, quietly, “I love you too.”
Your mouth trembled. Jack kissed your temple.
Then Shen looked at Jack. “Take care of her.”
Jack’s expression shifted. He did not make a joke. He did not bristle.
He only nodded once, steady and sure. “Always.”
Shen studied him for a second. Then he nodded back. “Committee adjourned.”
Jack closed his eyes. “There it is.”
You burst out laughing. Shen’s mouth twitched.
Jack finally took the phone from your hand. “Goodnight, Dunkin.”
“Goodnight, Abbot,” Shen said.
Jack ended the call.
You looked up at him immediately. “That was rude.”
“We are engaged,” Jack said, setting your phone facedown on the counter. “He’ll survive.”
You smiled and wrapped your arms around his neck. “We’re engaged.”
Jack’s hands settled at your waist. “Yeah.”
You looked down at your ring again. The kitchen light caught it. Jack watched your face soften.
Then you looked back up at him. “Our kitchen?”
His throat tightened. “Our kitchen,” he said.
You smiled. Jack kissed you again, slow and certain, his hands warm at your waist, the takeout cold on the counter, the flowers catching candlelight beside the sink, the music still playing softly around you. No committee. No notes. No hidden evidence. No higher power needed. Just you. Your ring. His kitchen. Your kitchen. And the rest of his life saying yes.
summary — loving jack always had a price. you just assumed you’d seen the worst of it.
warnings — 5k words. abortion/termination of pregnancy (discussed), unplanned pregnancy, divorced couple, toxic relationship dynamics, heavy angst, mild medical content (reader sutures a laceration on jack), overall feelings of being unwanted, flashback scenes, lmk if i missed anything!!
author’s note — also made a playlist for this fic if anyone was wodnering + got a little carried away with it again oops
The kitchen had the dinner you’d half-finished and abandoned on the counter, his keys in the bowl by the door, the one good knife drying in the rack because he never trusted the dishwasher with it.
“I think the wound makes you look hot.”
You said it from the kitchen doorway and Jack was at the table under the bad overhead light the two of you kept meaning to replace, shirt off, with a suture kit kept on the dish towel. He was trying to close a four-centimeter laceration on his left forearm, because of course he was. Waking you would have made him a man who woke people to help him, and Jack would sooner bleed quietly at two in the morning than be that.
“Come here, then.” He glanced up—took you in, cotton socks on your feet, the hem of his shirt at your thighs—and then looked back down at the needle pinched in the driver. “If it’s doing it for you.”
You pushed off the doorframe. You’d come out for water, not for this, but the cold of the tile stopped mattering the second you were close enough to see the work he’d done on himself.
He was two stitches in, set too far apart, wider than he’d ever leave a stranger’s arm, faster—as though his own body was a job to get through and not one to do well. A cotton ball gone brown sat on the towel.
“You’re gonna scar this,” you said.
“Then fix it.”
He held the driver out to you, handle-first, like he was handing out an instrument to a scrub tech. He turned his forearm over the towel so the cut faced up. The arm, he’d give you. The arm bled where he could see it; the arm could be sutured and taped and called fixed. The rest of him sat somewhere you'd never been handed the instruments for.
You took the driver. The chair beside him was too far and you didn’t want it anyway, so you sat across his right thigh, and he made a low sound—half a word of complaint, no complaint underneath it—and his free hand came to your hip, pulling you in slightly closer to his own body.
“Hold still.”
“I’m still.”
“You’re not.” You set your palm flat against his sternum, mostly to pin him, and got caught for a second on the slow, even knock of him, unbothered. Nothing ever reached the middle of Jack; you’d spent years with your hand on his chest in one way or another, trying to feel for the place where it sped up, and it hardly ever did. “There. Stay.”
He stayed. His chin came down to rest on the top of your head, and you got to work, stitches smaller than he’d have bothered with.
“What was it this time?” you asked quietly.
“Glass.” His eyes watched over your hands work for a moment. “Window came in quick and I was closer than I should’ve been.”
You tied off the first throw and stayed silent, because his words were practically his medical history, the through-line of every scar you’d closed on him. The burns, the labrum, a thin silver line by his eyebrow. You pulled the next stitch through, neat, and felt his thumb move against your hip idly. You knew his body better than he did sometimes. He gave it to you after the fact, already healing, and never while it hurt.
“There,” you said, taping down the last of it. “Barely a scar now.”
He turned his arm to the light, looked at the thin clean line of it, then looked at you in his lap with your blood-tacky fingers, your hair a disaster, and his shirt swallowing you.
“Better than mine,” he said.
From Jack, that was a sonnet. You turned in his lap and folded into him, tucking your face into the warm side of his neck.
He let out the huff he always did, the put-off sound that fooled neither of you, because in the same breath his arm came up across your back and pulled. He arranged you against him, like a cat claiming the one heated corner in the house. He drew you in until there was no slack left between you two.
The kitchen had gone quiet around the two of you and his hand had found the hem of the shirt and settled against the bare small of your back, warm.
“I really, really hate,” you said into his neck, after a while, “that you let yourself get hurt this much.”
His thumb went still against your spine. “It’s just a small cut. I’m okay.”
“It can be a bigger one someday,” you said, voice lowering.
“Could wrap my car around a pole one day.” His thumb moved up your spine. “You worry about the pole?”
“You go through doors people are shooting through. That’s not a pole. You do that.”
“Somebody’s gotta go through first.”
“And it’s always you.”
He tipped your chin up with two fingers and looked at you, brows furrowing together slightly. “Hey, I come home every time. I’ve got a perfect record of coming home.”
“You come home bleeding.”
“To my wife who patches me up. I like that.” He kissed the corner of your mouth before you could argue it, a full stop to the argument dressed as easy affection.
Later, in the dark, you lay with your cheek against the slow knock of his heart and your hand resting on the arm you’d just stitched. The gauze was rough under your fingers, the warmth of him idling underneath.
You knew his sleep. You'd made a study of it without meaning to, the way you made a study of all of him—the small last loosening that went through his shoulders when he finally went under, the way his breath dropped long and even and his hand went slack wherever it had been holding you.
You knew it the way you knew his pulse and his gait and the four gray henleys. And it wasn't coming. He was holding still for you, careful, generous, keeping his body quiet so you could drift off against it, but underneath the stillness he was wide awake.
You could feel it in your palm where it sat over his heart, the slow steady knock that should've been a sleeping man's and wasn't, the body humming at a frequency just below the skin, still keyed, still out there in the dark with the window and the entry and the thing that had come in faster than it should have.
You could tell asleep-Jack from awake-Jack with your eyes closed, from a single breath. It was the most useless thing you knew and you were proud of it the way you were proud of nothing else.
“You’re not asleep,” you said into his chest.
“Workin’ on it.”
“You’re a bad liar,” you whispered, letting your hand rest on his chest. “You’re all wired up. You’re not coming down for hours.”
“I’ll come down.”
“You always say that,” you said, voice losing any heat. “You work nights and when you don’t, you come home wired and you lie here until the sun comes up. And then you sleep all day while I’m at work, and we just—” You made a small gesture at him, two hands passing. “—miss. Like that. Every day.”
“We don’t miss,” he said, words coming out through a short-lived chuckle. His hand found your hip. “We’re in bed right now.”
It was such a small thing to want. You felt almost stupid saying it out loud; you could’ve asked for the moon, for more of him than he had to give, but you wanted the two of you under at the same time in the dark. You could’ve asked for anything. You asked for that. It embarrassed you a little, how little it was and how much you wanted it anyway.
“You know what I mean. I want to sleep with you. Not—” You huffed when you saw the light bounce off his sudden grin. “—not like that. Go under at the same time. Wake up and you’re still here and not three hours into a coma I’m not allowed to wake you out of.” You poked him. “I miss you and you’re right here. It’s stupid.”
“Huh.” He was still smiling. You could hear it in his voice. “Didn’t take you for—” and then, in the same breath, the grin going wider against your hair, “You getting sentimental on me, sweetheart?”
You felt yourself pull back into yourself a little, the soft thing you’d just set between the two of you suddenly mortifying out loud, because you'd said a true plain thing for once with no teeth on it and he'd gone and made it cute and sentimental. It felt like you'd confessed a crush instead of told him you missed your own husband.
“Forget it.” You started to take your hand back off his chest. “Go think about whatever it is you think about.”
He caught your hand before it cleared his chest and pressed it flat back down over his heart, covered it with his own, and held it there.
“Hey.” The teasing was gone out of his voice now. “C’mere. Didn’t mean it like that.”
“It’s fine.”
His thumb moved over your knuckles, slow, pinning your hand under his. “Don’t take it back.” He let out a breath. “I heard you.”
You were still half-curled away from him, your pride doing the stupid thing it did, and his heart was going under your palm, and you hated that he could feel it, that he had your hand trapped right over the proof of how much the small dumb sentimental thing had actually mattered.
“I didn’t know you wanted that,” he said quietly. “The—sleeping. You never said.”
“Because it’s stupid. Some people wanna be in finance. I wanna be unconscious with my husband. Not everyone dreams big.”
He huffed, but he didn’t let you have the deflection. “It’s not stupid,” he said flatly. Then, after a second, he added, “I miss you, too. Obviously.”
You let the word sit. You wanted to push. You knew, even then, his words were a door he was closing softly, and some part of you wanted to put your foot in it.
“Then switch to days,” you said instead. “Or some days. I’d take some days,” you added
“Somebody’s gotta work nights.” His thumb kept moving on your knuckles. “People have got kids and things at night. I’m good for it.”
“Right,” you said flatly against his skin. “Nothing keeping you home.”
You felt him still underneath you; his thumb stopped on your knuckles and his body went quiet underneath you.
“That came out wrong,” he said after what felt like a whole minute.
You swallowed, because if you didn’t, you didn’t know what you’d say. “Did it?”
“You know what I meant.” His hand came up to the back of your head, big and careful, fitting itself to your skull. “You’re the reason I come home at all. I’ll try to switch. Give it a few weeks and be home with you.”
“You’re not gonna switch.” You were sure of it. “You say it every time. You like it too much.”
He was quiet for a moment. “I’d switch for this,” he said, voice low like it was far from himself. “You know that, right? I’d give up a lot for—” He turned his hand and laced his fingers through yours over his chest. “This exact thing. You being a pain at two in the morning. I’d take days for that.”
“So do it.”
“I will.” His arm tightened around your back, pulling you in off your half-curl until you gave up the pride and let yourself fold back into him, your cheek over the knock of his heart. “I’ll talk to Robby this week. Days. You and me. We can carpool.”
And you believed him, belief was just true the way the floor was. You could already see it, the slow mornings, his face on the next pillow, the both of you stupid and unhurried with the light coming in. You let yourself have the whole picture. It was free to have. You took as much of it as you wanted.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” His hand slowly slid up your back. “I’ll get to wake you up for once. We’ll brush our teeth together.”
It landed somewhere warm and you let it marinate there, the picture of it—him at the next sink over, the ordinary unbearable nothing of it—and you had to press your face into his neck so he wouldn't see what a stupid little promise had done to you.
“You’re being weird,” you said into his skin. “You’re never this nice. What do you want?”
“Guess.” His hand stopped its slow track up your spine and settled, broad and warm between your shoulder blades, holding you to him instead of going anywhere with it. His chin came down to rest on the top of your head again, tucking you under it. “Ask me for more stuff this late at night. It works, apparently.”
You thought about it for a moment. “Wanna use our day offs. A vacation. Sun. You with your phone off.”
“Okay.”
You pulled back enough to look at him, because it had come too fast, no weighing in it. “Okay?”
“Okay,” he said again, like it was the easiest thing you’d ever asked him. “Pick a place. I’ll get us there.”
“You’re not gonna say something like February’s bad?”
“Alright. February’s bad.” His mouth tipped. “Pick somewhere in March, then. I don’t care. Pick the place.”
You put your face back down against his chest. “Okay,” you said, voice coming out quiet.
You felt his chest shake under you, a suppressed laugh. “It’s not the sacrifice you think it is, sweetheart.” He pulled you in flush against him. “Easiest yes I’ve got.”
You kissed him because you couldn’t not. He made the low sound into your mouth and pulled you over on top of him, careful of the arm and not careful of anything else, and you stopped keeping track of the time.
You had all night. You had every night. There was no version of it where you didn't, no edge to it you could find with your hands, and you didn't go looking, because why would you, because his heart was finally going fast under your palm and you were exactly where the whole world began and ended. You were sure of it. You were so sure.
Can I come to drop Kilo off at 1 instead?
You read it with the mug going cold in your hand and didn’t think much of it. He probably had a shift, or a thing—Jack always had a thing—and three o’clock was that because the lawyer’s office had made it that, but it wasn’t sacred, it was just a dog. You had the early afternoon free. You’d been planning to shower off the morning and the appointment and the long bright hour you’d spent on a table on the sixth floor not letting yourself feel anything. One o’clock was as good as three for handing off a German Shepherd who didn’t care what time it was as long as he got fed.
You had nothing in you today to correct him on the name, type back ‘Kevin,’ the way you would have any other Friday. You let the dog keep his wrong name; you were too, too fucking tired to do the bit.
Door’s open. Just leave him in my living room. I’ll be in the shower.
It was easier this way, for the doorway hadn’t worked. No handoff where you had to look at his face and breathe the same square foot of the hallway air. He’d let himself in, set the dog down, and be gone before you were even out of the water. The apartment would be yours again by five past one and you could be not-a-person about any of it.
You never thought about the lock anymore. It had stopped being a decision a long time ago, somewhere in the first year after he left, when you'd kept the deadbolt open till dawn for months and called it forgetting. You didn’t call it anything now. You set the phone face-down and went to start the water, and the last clear thought you had before it ran hot was that you were glad, at least, that you wouldn't have to see him.
The water ran hot and you stood under it longer than you needed to. You’d been doing it all week, until the morning came off you by degrees; the paper drape, the cold gel, the small fast flicker on the screen you’d looked at and not been able to unlook at since. You’d carried it home under your ribs and into the shower and let the water take the edge off it, not the fact of it, just the edge. The fact was staying right there. The fact had a heartbeat now, you heard it.
You didn't hear the door. You wouldn't have, over the water—the old building ate sound, and a German Shepherd padding onto carpet made none. You took your time. You shaved your legs for no one. You stood with your forehead against the cool tile until the heat ran thin, and you thought about nothing, which was a skill you’d built like a muscle, and you were good at it right up until you shut the water off and reached for the towel and heard, through the door, low and unmistakable, a man's voice telling a dog to sit.
You went still with the towel half around you.
He should have been gone. That was the whole set up of it; door open, dog down, gone, the clean drop you’d structured precisely so this wouldn’t happen, and there’d be no version of the afternoon where Jack Abbot was a fact on the other side of your bathroom door while you stood dripping and bare and unarmed. You'd built the morning around not seeing him. And here he was, still here, fifteen minutes past when he had no reason to be, and your stomach did the slow cold drop it had done on the floor of the bench two weeks ago, the one that meant your body knew something a beat before you did.
He was on the fucking couch. Sitting and settled, his elbows on his knees, and Kevin was flopped against him. Jack had the ultrasound in his hand.
He was looking at it, eyes not moving up when you opened the door, not right away. You got one unguarded second of him—the two days of stubble, the way he was holding the little glossy strip too carefully, by the edges, the way you'd hold something that wasn't yours and might tear—before he registered the door and his head came up.
His jaw was set wrong and there was color high on it and his eyes, when they found you in the towel with your hair dripping down your back, were doing a thing they almost never did, a thing you'd seen maybe twice in five years.
“Is this a joke to you?” His voice came out flat as he held the strip up, almost in a brandish, his hand not entirely steady.
“No.”
He lowered it to look at instead of at you. “I know I fucked up. I’m not—I know that.” He let out a breath through his nose. “So why do you want to keep on doing this to me?”
“I’m not doing anything to you.”
“You left it out.”
“I live here, Jack.”
“You knew I was coming,” he said, voice still level. “You could’ve put it away. You could’ve told me you went. You did neither, you did the—” A muscle ticked in his jaw and he looked at the strip again. “You always pick the worst way. Every time. There’s always an easier way to do it and you pick the one that—” He pinched his eyes shut and shook his head. “I don’t get it,” he said flatly.
Your fingers tightened around the towel. “I didn’t ask you to go into the kitchen.”
“I went to put his food—God, can’t we just talk about this properly?”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” you said reflexively, voice rising.
“There is.” He looked at the strip in his hand and then set it down on the table, careful, like it needed both hands, like he was buying himself a second. “I don’t—”
He pressed the heel of his hand against his mouth and dragged it down. You watched him try and find the words and come up empty, the same way it had for five years.
“You asked me,” he said finally, voice rough, looking anywhere but at you. “On Wednesday—to say one true thing and I couldn’t. I stood there and I—I couldn’t get it out. I never can, you know I never—”
“Jack.”
“I want it back.” His voice came out wrong, too loud and forced past something. He almost looked startled that he’d said it. “Alright? That’s—I want it. You. The whole—I want it back and I don’t know how to say it without sounding like—” His hands worked at nothing beside him. “I’d really like it back,” he said, quieter. “That’s it. There. I said it. Took me more than a year, but I—I said it.”
The thing you'd asked him for in a hundred dark bedrooms with no teeth in it and never gotten. Arriving now. In your living room. Eighteen months too late, over a strip of paper, with the dog drinking water in the kitchen. You should have known h’'d pick now. He only ever knew what he wanted when it was already going.
“Why are you doing this to me?” Your words came out broken, hardly a question, your voice gone somewhere beyond your control. “You don’t get to want this now. You don’t.”
“Why not?” he said, sounding like he genuinely didn’t know. “Tell me why not.”
“Because.” Your voice caught, and you had to force it flat. “Because you don’t want it, you want it now. You always want it now, when it’s—” You shook your head. “You wanted me back the second I was gone. You want this the second I—” You had to force yourself to stop, trying to find the best words for the worst situation. “I can’t even trust you with myself, how do you think I can put a baby into our mess?”
“Then tell me how.” He took a step forward. “Tell me how to fix it and I’ll do it. I’ll do anything you—I’m asking. I never asked before, you’re right, I never did. I’m asking now.”
And God, he meant it. You could see he meant it, the whole of him meant it. That was what made your chest cave, because he was asking now, with his whole face open and his hands half-up like he’d hold whatever you put in them. You’d have given a year of your life for this exact man during your marriage, and he hadn’t existed then, and he existed now, and it didn’t matter. It was the cruelest story there was; the right man, too late, made out of the wreckage of the wrong one.
“You can’t do anything,” you said quietly. “You don’t get it. There’s nothing to do. You can’t fix it by trying hard now. It’s fucked, Jack. It’s all just—fucked. You don’t know what you—” You stopped, because you'd gotten too close to it, the thing under the thing, the living room you didn't drive past. “You don’t know what it did. You have no idea what it did to me.”
“Then tell me.” He pinched his brows together, lips twitching. “I keep doing the wrong thing to you, and I want to be able to do it right—”
“I don’t want anything from you,” you said, having to tilt your neck so you could look at the ceiling. “Why don’t you get it—I don’t want it. I want—I want it all done. I want it gone. You, all of it, gone.” You pressed the heel of your hand against your eye. “I want a different life, Jack. A whole different one. I want to meet someone who—I want to find out if I can do it again. If it can be normal. Easy. If I can come home to a person and feel like I’m not—”
Your throat closed, and he’d gone very still, silent enough that you weren’t sure he was inhaling or exhaling.
“I’d really like a clean shot at it,” you said, lower. “That’s all I’ve wanted for so long. To start something with someone who isn’t—” You took in a shaky breath.You gestured at yourself, the towel, the wet hair, the whole wreck of you standing in the apartment you'd bought to be free of him and weren't. “Look at me. Look at this. You drop off our dog and I’m—I can’t get free of you. I’m so tired of this; I’m so tired of losing to it. I want to find out if someone can stand to come home to me, and you can’t—can’t give me that.”
You made yourself look at him. One of his hands was tugging at the hem of his shirt, like he didn’t know what to do with them. You watched the recognition go through him like cold water, because he knew. Of course he knew. You'd handed him his own sentence back, the one he'd said once, clean and certain, and you watched him recognize his own handwriting on it.
“I never meant to make you feel like that,” he said, voice rough as he pinched his brows together. You watched him force himself to look at you, and you saw what it did to him.
You shook your head at him, lips curling at the words instinctively. “But you did,” you said quietly. “It’s not like you ever took it back.”
“I thought you wanted to leave,” he said, gruff.
“Because you never came home,” you said, words shaky. He stayed silent then, because it was true and he never argued the true ones. “So yeah, I thought you wanted to leave, too. I thought it for a year before you said it.”
He took in a deep breath and pinched his eyes shut for a moment. “Let me fix this.” His eyes opened. “Tell me how to do it. There’s gotta be a—you don’t spend five years with someone and just—there has to be a way to fix it.”
“Don’t be selfish, Jack,” you said, and your voice had gone quiet and almost kind.
He shook his head as he looked at you. “I can’t help that.”
“You saw an ultrasound and it’s making you think things. Don’t—don’t put that on me. Not now.”
His brows rose. “You don’t believe me.” He pressed his lips together. “Why would you think I’m making it up to myself?”
Because you are, you wanted to say. It was the oldest one in the book; a man stares down at a sonogram with his name half-printed over it, thinks about a heartbeat that’s partly his, and the body grabs and nests. It reaches for the warm thing and calls the grabbing as love. You’d seen it a hundred times in the orbit of the hospital; men who’d been ghosts for years suddenly desperate at the threat of a baby, lit up with a tenderness that had nothing to do with the woman and everything to do with the small new gravity of what she carried.
And Jack, who’d spent the last eighteen months perfectly content with having you in pieces—a bar, a bed, a Tuesday—had walked in, seen a flicker on a strip of paper, and convinced himself in fifteen minutes that he’d wanted the whole of you all along. You knew the difference, for you’d lived on the wrong side of it. The man who wanted you now was just the old gravity rerouted through a heartbeat, and the second the heartbeat stopped being a question—the second you handled it, the way you handled everything, alone—he’d settle back into the comfortable shape of a man who could take you in fragments and never once have to come home.
When you didn’t respond, he continued, “You think this is—it’s not the ultrasound. I’ve had that for fifteen minutes. I’ve had you for—” He dragged a hand down his face. “It’s not about that.”
You weren’t foolish enough to believe that you’d be the outlier. People always thought they were the exception. That was the engine of half the heartbreak in the building; we’re different, he’s different, it won’t go the way it goes for everyone else. You’d believed it yourself once, at your own wedding, when Jack lost the paper with his vows on it and said them anyway, his hands shaking so hard you'd had to reach out and hold them still in front of two hundred people. A man who’d held people together under fire, who’d never once shaken doing it, undone by eight sentences about you. The whole room had gone soft watching it, a little envious, because they could see the rare thing sitting out in the open.
You’d been so sure that day. Bone-sure. The couple people pointed at don’t end up in a beige room four years later signing the most ordinary divorce in the world, the kind a thousand had probably signed on the same Tuesday.
But there was no exception. There was only you, and Jack, and the long ordinary way love stopped being enough to live inside. And you weren’t going to stand in your living room and let him convince you that the strip of paper had made him, finally, the exception to himself. He'd had you for years, warm and legal and asking for nothing but for him to come the rest of the way home, and he never had. You knew the difference between what he felt and what he could do. You'd lived in the country between them. And a heartbeat wasn't going to build the road.
chapter four of pope’s girl 🖤 | series masterlist | also on AO3
summary: As you settle into your new job at The Pig, the bar starts to feel like something of your own, separate from the Cody family. But when Deran becomes part of the bar’s day-to-day and Pope keeps getting closer in ways neither of you are ready to name, the line between your world and his begins to blur.
notes: The support has been so overwhelmingly kind! 🖤 Thank you to everyone who’s loved reading this so far!! Also apologies for how long the chapters are getting 🫣. I also want to note that this isn’t stopping at 5 chapters… there’s a lot more in the story to tell!
warnings: SMUT, 18+, canon-divergent timeline, swearing, smoking, mentions of criminal activity, pope is a yearner, no use of y/n, shower sex, pope and reader are down bad for each other, smurf just sucks
Please do not translate, repost, redistribute, or adapt this story on any platform without my explicit permission. Reblogs are welcome and encouraged!
chapter 4 | safe spaces
For a few weeks, things with Pope stay almost easy.
Almost, because easy isn’t the right word for anything involving him. Not with the way he shows up at your apartment without warning, then stands in the hallway like he isn’t sure whether he’s allowed to knock. Some mornings, he leaves before sunrise so quietly that you only know he’s gone because the bed has cooled where his body used to be. The money is still part of it sometimes, but less often now, and never with the same feeling it had in the beginning.
The arrangement is still there, barely, held together only by the fact that neither of you has named it anything else.
But Pope makes it complicated in all the ways he probably doesn’t mean to. He keeps a carton of your cigarettes in the glovebox even though he complains when you smoke too much. He remembers you hate onions, then removes them from a burger before handing it to you without looking at you. Even the nights he stays over feel different now. Familiar in a way you’re scared to trust. His arm heavy over your waist, his breathing slowing against your neck, his hand finding yours beneath the sheets without seeming to think about it.
Sometimes he says things that stay with you for hours.
You’re beautiful.
Stay.
I got you.
They sound different from him because he doesn’t throw words around. He says them like once they’re out, there’s no taking them back. Every time he does, another part of the arrangement slips out of reach, and you tell yourself not to look too closely at whatever’s replacing it.
Working at the Pig helps. It fills your days in a way that leaves less room for overthinking. There are shifts to cover, customers to serve, glasses to wash, orders to remember. There’s always something that needs doing, and for a few hours at a time, it feels like relief.
It takes some time before the job feels like yours. At first, every shift leaves your feet aching and your shirt smelling like fryer oil, beer and whatever cheap cologne men seem to bathe in. Tracy yells from the back when the kitchen gets behind or when someone forgets to write down what they took from the walk-in. You figure out pretty quickly that she doesn’t yell because she’s angry. She yells because the place is always two bad nights away from falling apart, and she refuses to let it.
By the third week, you know which regulars tip in cash, which ones need to be cut off before they start getting brave and which ones only want someone to listen while they complain about wives, ex-wives, bosses, surf conditions or all of the above. You learn the drawer under the register needs to be kicked once before it opens. You learn the taps pull too much foam if you rush them. You learn the jukebox skips on the same sad country song every Thursday because some old guy named Ron keeps feeding it quarters and pretending it doesn’t happen.
Cath teaches you the things nobody says out loud.
She doesn’t soften herself just because she’s helping you. She corrects you when you stack glasses wrong, nudges you aside when you’re moving too slowly and tells you which customers to smile at, which ones to ignore and which ones are only looking for an excuse to keep you talking.
“Don’t let Terry run a tab,” she says one afternoon, nodding toward a man hunched over the far end of the bar.
You glance over. “He looks harmless.”
“He is harmless. He’s also broke.”
“Good to know.”
“And if Stan asks for anything top shelf, he’s showing off for whoever’s sitting beside him. Pour something cheap unless he points at the bottle.”
You raise an eyebrow at her.
Cath glances toward Stan, then back at you. “He’s not paying attention to what he’s drinking. He’s paying attention to who’s watching him drink it.”
You laugh before you can stop yourself. Cath’s expression barely changes, but the corner of her mouth moves before she looks away.
That becomes the closest thing to friendship she offers to you. Practical information. A glass slid your way when you forget to drink water. A quiet “switch with me” when a man watches you too long from the corner booth. She never makes a big thing of it, which makes it harder not to notice.
Patrick comes in sometimes too.
Always off duty. Always alone. He sits near the end of the bar with a beer he makes last too long, and talks to Cath when she has time to talk. He’s friendly with you in a way you don’t know what to do with at first, mostly because he doesn’t seem to want anything from you.
You don’t think much of him. Not beyond the easy jokes, the polite distance or the way he steps in once when a customer gets too close for comfort.
“Think she heard you the first time,” Patrick says, voice calm.
The man turns, already annoyed, until he sees Patrick standing there. Patrick doesn’t raise his voice or move closer. He doesn’t have to. Something in his posture changes, and the man backs off with a muttered curse.
You look at Patrick.
“Was that your good deed for the day?”
He shrugs. “Seemed like he was done talking.”
“Didn’t look like he knew that.”
“Most guys don’t.”
Across the bar, Cath watches for a second too long before looking back down at the glasses in front of her.
Later, Patrick helps her carry a case in from the back, and their voices drop low enough that you can’t make out the words beneath the music and clink of glassware. Cath’s arms are crossed. Patrick’s face has lost the easy warmth he uses out front. Whatever he says makes her look toward the door first, then back at him.
Her answer is short. His response isn’t.
After a moment, she takes the case from him and walks it behind the bar herself, leaving him standing there with his hands at his sides.
You don’t ask either of them what happened.
You’ve spent enough time in Oceanside to know there are things people say out loud, and things they carry from room to room, hoping nobody drops them. The Pig is full of both.
For a while, at least, it feels separate from the Codys.
Smurf exists everywhere else. In the beach house with its clean sheets and stocked fridge. In Pope’s phone when it buzzes and his jaw tightens before he even looks at the screen. In the way he can be warm against your back one minute and gone the next because family called, and family almost always means her.
But she doesn’t come into The Pig.
So you let the place become familiar. The noise. The regulars. The corners where the floor sticks after closing. The small rhythm of standing beside Cath behind the bar and knowing what needs doing before someone tells you.
For a few shifts at a time, you let yourself believe there are still places Smurf hasn’t touched.
Pope is waiting outside when your shift ends.
He doesn’t come into the bar. He rarely does unless he has to. Instead, he leans against the side of his car near the edge of the parking lot, one boot crossed over the other, cigarette held low between his fingers while the evening light turns the smoke thin around his face.
You hate how good he makes it look.
Pope never looks effortless. There’s always something restless about him, even standing still, but there’s something about him waiting there after your shift, shoulders broad against the car, eyes lifting the second you step outside, that makes the ache in your feet the last thing on your mind.
His gaze moves over you once, quick but thorough.
“You done?”
“Yeah.”
He drops the cigarette to the pavement and crushes it beneath his boot before moving around the car. When he opens the passenger door before you can reach for it yourself, you pause beside him.
Pope sees your face and his eyes narrow slightly, like he already knows you’re about to make it into something.
“Get in,” he says.
You do, still smiling as he shuts the door behind you.
Inside the car, there’s a paper bag waiting on the passenger seat. Grease has already stained the bottom corner, and the smell reaches you as soon as you pick it up. Hot fries from the diner near your apartment, the one you told him you liked because they were cheap and always slightly salty.
You look over as Pope gets in on the driver’s side.
“You stopped?”
He starts the car.
“You didn’t eat today.”
It isn’t a question.
You open the bag and take out a fry, still hot enough to burn your fingers a little.
“Thank you,” you say.
“You’re welcome.”
That’s all he says. Just you’re welcome, quiet and matter-of-fact, like he didn’t drive out of his way to get you something because he noticed a habit you hadn’t meant to give him. Like he hasn’t started collecting small pieces of you and putting them somewhere safe.
You eat a few fries while Pope drives, the paper bag warm in your lap and something on the radio playing too low to make out.
His hand leaves the gearshift once you’re on the main road.
He doesn’t ask first anymore. His palm just settles on your thigh, fingers resting just above your knee, warm through the thin fabric of your skirt.
You look down at his hand as he keeps his eyes on the road.
“Shift okay?” he asks.
You take another fry, mostly to give yourself a second.
“Busy. Tracy yelled from the back a few times. Regulars were fine.”
Pope’s thumb moves once against your leg.
“She yell a lot?”
“Only when money’s bad, I think.”
Pope nods once, like that makes sense to him.
“Cath there?”
“Yeah.”
“How’s that going?”
The question is simple enough, but there’s something careful under it.
“It’s okay,” you say. “She’s helping me learn where everything is.”
Pope doesn’t answer right away.
“Good.”
You eat another fry and look out the window. The road bends toward the water, streetlights beginning to glow against the night sky. You already know where he’s going before he asks.
“My place?” he says.
His place.
The words should mean the beach house. The one with the deck facing the ocean, folded towels in the bathroom and dishes in cabinets he didn’t stock himself. The one Smurf handed him with a key and a smile, close enough to her house that even the distance feels supervised.
It’s his place because he sleeps there now, because his boots end up by the door and he keeps things arranged in neat rows without seeming to notice he’s doing it.
But it still doesn’t feel like his.
Pope glances over when you don’t answer right away.
“You don’t want to?”
His hand starts to move from your thigh, but you cover it with yours before he can pull away. The motion happens before you think too hard about it.
“No,” you say. “I do.”
His fingers stay beneath yours.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
You keep your eyes on the road ahead.
“Just tired.”
Pope watches you for another second, then turns back to the road. He doesn’t press. He only leaves his hand where it is, under yours, and keeps driving toward the house neither of you has figured out how to call home.
A few days later, The Pig is slow enough that Tracy starts finding things for you to clean.
She has you wiping down menus that already look clean while Cath restocks the beer fridge. The afternoon light comes through the front windows in dull strips, catching dust in the air and the smudges on the glass Tracy keeps saying she’ll get to before the weekend.
“You keep rubbing that same spot, you’re gonna go through the table,” Cath says without looking up.
You glance down at the rag in your hand.
“I’m being thorough.”
“You’re bored.”
“That too.”
It feels like a regular day. The men at the far table have stopped pretending to watch the game and started arguing about something neither of them cares about.
The bell over the door rings.
You look up, expecting Patrick maybe, or one of the afternoon regulars who always claims he’s only stopping in for one beer and never means it.
Deran walks in instead.
He doesn’t hesitate in the doorway. He just walks in, mouth set in that bored line he uses when he wants people to think he doesn’t care who’s looking at him. A set of keys hangs from one finger.
You straighten a little behind the bar.
“What are you doing here?”
Deran drops the keys onto the counter.
“Guess I’m your new boss.”
For a second, you think he’s joking. Then Tracy comes out from the back office with a stack of papers in one hand and barely glances at him.
“Smurf put up an investment on the bar.”
You look from her to Deran.
“Investment?”
“Roof needs work. Freezer’s dying. Payroll’s a shitshow.” Tracy taps the papers against the register, already moving on in her head. “Money came at the right time.”
Deran leans against the bar.
“So, boss.”
Tracy gives him a look.
“My bar. Your money.”
Deran’s mouth shifts like he might argue, but Tracy’s already turned back toward the register. To her, that seems to be the only part worth caring about. The lights stay on. The taps keep working. People keep getting paid.
You try to look at it that way too.
Deran having keys is strange, but out of all the Codys, he’s not the one who makes your stomach twist. He’s prickly and defensive, usually halfway annoyed before anyone even speaks to him, but he’s also the one who dried plates beside you at Smurf’s because you handed him a towel and left him no graceful way to refuse.
The keys stay where Deran dropped them. Cath looks at them before she looks at him, and the bottle in her hand stops halfway to the fridge.
“I’m gonna grab napkins from the back,” Cath says.
She sets the bottle down and leaves before anyone can answer, disappearing through the stockroom door with her shoulders held carefully still.
You watch the door swing shut behind her.
Tracy tears a receipt from the register and looks between you and Deran.
“If you’re both standing around, at least make yourselves useful.”
You reach beneath the bar for a clean towel and pass it to Deran without making too much of it.
“Happy first day of work, I guess.”
Deran takes the towel, eyes cutting once more toward the stockroom before he turns to the open box of glassware sitting near the bar.
You lean against the counter and lower your voice.
“She didn’t know?”
Deran keeps his attention on the box.
“Guess not.”
“You did?”
His jaw shifts.
“Not ‘til Smurf told me.”
You watch him for a second.
“You okay with it?”
Deran gives you a look, not sharp enough to be anger but not easy enough to be humour.
“Doesn’t really matter, does it?”
The stockroom door opens before you can answer. Cath comes back out with a sleeve of napkins under one arm. Her face gives nothing away now. Deran watches her for a second, but she doesn’t meet his stare.
A man at the far table lifts his empty bottle and calls for another.
You grab the notepad from beside the register.
“Yeah. One sec.”
It gives everyone something to do. You head around the bar. Cath reaches for glasses that don’t need polishing, and Deran starts unpacking the box of glassware near his feet.
When you come back with the beer, your gaze drops to the keys again. Deran follows your eyes, then slips the keys into his pocket without saying anything.
Pope’s car is parked near the far side of the lot. He’s leaning against the driver’s side door with his arms crossed over his chest, head turned toward the street. No cigarette this time. Just Pope, quiet and restless, looking too big for the car behind him and too still for the noise spilling out of The Pig.
The sight of him does something to you every time, no matter how badly you wish it wouldn’t. You slow for half a second, letting yourself look before he turns and catches you doing it.
By the time you reach him, Pope has pushed off the car. His hands come to your waist, palms settling there like they’ve started to learn the shape of you through habit alone.
You put your hands on his chest, close enough now to feel the warmth of him through his shirt. Pope looks down at them for a second before his eyes come back to yours.
“Good shift?” he asks.
You look down at his hands before looking back at him.
“It actually wasn’t bad tonight.”
“Yeah?”
You nod. “Group of college guys came in to watch the game. Loud, annoying, ordered too many pitchers and tipped like they were trying to impress someone.”
Pope’s eyes stay on yours.
“They hit on you?”
You let out a small laugh.
“That’s what you took from that?”
“Did they?”
You study him for a second. His expression hasn’t changed, but his grip tightens slightly at your waist.
“Jealous?”
He glances toward the bar, then back at you.
“Just don’t like people thinking they got a chance.”
He says the words like he’s telling you the time, but heat still climbs up your throat because Pope has never been good at making want sound casual.
You tilt your head.
“I told you. I like my men older.”
His mouth shifts. Not the almost-smile you usually get. Not the faint twitch he buries before it can become anything.
A real smile.
Small, quick and uneven, but real enough to change his face before he can stop it.
You stare and Pope catches it immediately.
“What?”
“I like seeing you smile.”
The smile disappears, but not all at once. Some of it stays around his eyes for another second before he looks away.
“Get in the car.”
You keep smiling.
He opens the passenger door before you can reach for it yourself, hand settling briefly at the small of your back as you pass him.
Pope shuts the door behind you, then walks around to the driver’s side. He’s quiet when he starts the engine, one hand on the wheel, the other shifting into gear before settling near your knee once you’re out of the lot.
You wait until the bar is behind you before asking.
“Did you know about Deran?”
Pope’s hand stays where it is, but his fingers stop moving.
“Know what?”
“That he’s working at The Pig now.”
A pause.
“He told you that?”
“He walked in with keys and called himself my new boss.”
Pope looks back at the road before he answers.
“He’s not your boss.”
“Take it up with him.”
Pope glances over.
“Deran shouldn’t be anyone’s boss.”
You almost smile, but it fades before it fully gets there.
“Did you know?”
He looks back at the road. The streetlights pass over his face in pieces, leaving parts of his expression unreadable before you can make sense of it.
“Smurf wanted him doing something.”
“Something?”
“Not hangin’ around the house all day.”
“And she picked The Pig?”
“She knows Tracy needed money.”
You look out the window for a moment, watching the streets blur past. The answer shouldn’t bother you as much as it does. Deran working there isn’t the worst thing that could happen. Out of the Codys, he’s probably the least likely to make your life harder on purpose.
Still, you think about Cath’s face when he dropped the keys on the bar. You think about the way she left for the stockroom with a bottle still in her hand.
Your silence stretches long enough for Pope to look over.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s not nothing.”
You look back at him.
“It’s just weird.”
“Deran?”
“Smurf buying into the place where Cath works. Where I work.”
Pope’s eyes stay forward.
“It’s a bar.”
“You know it’s not just a bar.”
His hand moves against your thigh, not quite a squeeze, but more of a reminder that he’s there.
“Deran’s not gonna do anything to you.”
“I didn’t say he was.”
“Then what?”
You exhale through your nose and look toward the windshield. You don’t want to fight. Not over something you can barely explain without sounding like you’re accusing him of a decision he didn’t make.
“I don’t dislike Deran.”
“Good.”
“But Cath didn’t look happy.”
His hand goes still.
“She upset?”
“That’s not what I mean.”
Pope doesn’t answer right away.
“Smurf helped Tracy,” he says. “Deran has something to do. Place stays open.”
“You make it sound simple.”
“It is.”
You look at him until he glances over.
“Is it?”
For a moment, he says nothing. Then his eyes return to the road, and his voice comes flatter than before.
“Not like Cath’s got anything to hide.”
He says it casually enough that for a second you wonder if you imagined the edge beneath it. You turn your head toward the window, watching your reflection move over the dark glass.
“No,” you say. “Guess not.”
Pope’s fingers move once against your thigh.
He doesn’t ask what you mean.
He just keeps driving.
By the time you get back to your apartment, you’re still thinking about what Pope said in the car.
Not like Cath’s got anything to hide.
You’re still thinking about it when you climb the stairs, Pope behind you, his hand moving against your back every few steps like he knows the route by heart now.
You reach for your keys, already half turned toward him, when you hear something inside the apartment. Another sound follows, softer this time, a scrape against the floor and then a muffled laugh that cuts off too fast.
Your hand pauses on the lock as Pope glances at you, and from the look on his face, he’s heard enough too.
Still, you unlock the door before thinking better of it, pushing it open just enough to step inside. You see Simon’s bare ass first. Then Chrissy’s leg hooked around his waist. Then the kitchen table underneath them.
Pope’s hand moves over your eyes as he pulls you back into the hallway.
“Nope,” he says, shutting the door.
From inside the apartment, Chrissy yells, “I’m sorry!”
Pope lowers his hand slowly, and you blink hard like that might help erase what you just saw.
“I saw Simon’s entire ass.”
Pope’s mouth moves.
“Yeah.”
“On the table.”
His eyes flick toward the door.
“Yeah.”
“With Chrissy.”
Pope looks back at you, quiet for half a second too long.
“Considering what we did on that table,” he says, calm as anything, “think you’re even.”
The laugh comes out before you can stop it, muffled against his chest as you step into him. Pope’s hand settles at the back of your neck for half a second, and you feel the small movement of his breath when he almost laughs too.
From inside, Simon says something too low to make out.
Chrissy snaps, “Shut up, Simon.”
That only makes you laugh harder, your forehead still pressed to Pope’s shirt while he reaches for your hand.
“Come on,” he says.
You let him lead you down the hallway, still embarrassed by what you’ve just walked in on and trying not to laugh about it.
The next morning, you wake to sunlight pushing through the blinds and the sound of the ocean somewhere beyond the open window. Pope shifts behind you, his arm heavy around your waist, his chest warm against your back, and for a second, you don’t move.
Then you see the clock.
“Shit!”
Pope’s hand tightens at your stomach before his breathing changes.
“What?”
You sit up too fast, dragging the sheet with you.
“I’m late.”
He blinks, hair messy from sleep, face still rough from it. His eyes move from you to the clock, then back again.
“You’re fine.”
You reach for the shirt on the floor, but he catches the hem of it before you can pull it toward you.
You look back at him.
“Deran’s gonna kick my ass if I’m late.”
Pope pushes himself up on one elbow, the sheet falling low around his waist. He looks too good like that, bare chest warm in the morning light, mouth still soft from sleep and eyes fixed on you like he’s already decided he doesn’t care what time it is.
“If he tries,” Pope says, “I’ll kick his ass.”
You pause with the shirt in your hand.
“You’re not gonna fight your brother because I’m late to work.”
“I’ve kicked his ass for worse.”
“Pope.”
His mouth barely moves.
“What?”
You point at him before heading for the bathroom.
“Stay there.”
Pope lies back against the pillow, but his eyes follow you the whole way.
The shower pressure is better than Deran said it was, though not by much. You tip your head back beneath the shower head, working shampoo through your hair and trying not to think about Pope still in bed, warm and half-naked and probably watching the bathroom door like staying put is taking more effort than it should.
You’re rinsing the shampoo from your hair when the shower door slides open, and the cooler air moves around you before Pope steps in behind you, naked and already too close.
“I’m late,” you say.
“I’m saving water.”
You turn your head enough to glare at him through the steam.
“That’s not what this is.”
His hands find your hips, warm even under the water, and for a second he only stands there behind you. His thumbs press once into your skin. His chest brushes your back, his breathing slow near your ear, and then you feel him getting hard against you, the change immediate enough to make your stomach twist.
“You’re gonna make me later.”
Pope kisses the spot just below your ear.
“You said stay there.”
“And look how well you listened.”
His hands slide around your waist, pulling you back against him. The water runs over both of you, down his arms as they move across your body, over your breasts, your stomach, the fronts of your thighs. His mouth moves along your neck, unhurried at first, until your head tips back against his shoulder and his breath changes.
“Pope.”
“Yeah.”
“Don’t sound so pleased with yourself.”
His mouth drags lower, teeth grazing lightly enough to make your fingers curl against the tile.
“You like it.”
You should argue. Instead, your hand reaches back into his hair, combing through the damp curls at the back of his head until his breath catches against your shoulder.
Pope makes a low sound, and the teasing leaves him fast after that. His hands move over you with more purpose, one palm sliding up to your breast while the other travels lower, over your stomach and between your legs. He doesn’t rush, but there’s nothing lazy about it. His fingers find the place that makes your hips jerk, then stay there, pressure steady while his mouth keeps moving against your neck.
You turn your face toward him, and he kisses you hard.
It’s awkward for half a second, both of you wet and too close, your shoulder pressed against his chest, his hand still working between your thighs. Then he adjusts you easily, turning you until your back is against the tile and his mouth is on yours properly. Your hands move over his arms as he turns you, feeling the flex of his muscles as he holds you steady.
The wall is cool behind you but all you feel is his warmth.
“You’re gonna get me fired,” you breathe.
Pope’s eyes stay on your mouth.
“I’ll drive you.”
“That doesn’t fix it.”
His hand slides down to your ass.
“Helps.”
You huff a breathless laugh, but it breaks apart when he lifts your leg against his hip and presses closer. His mouth goes to your throat again, kissing you there while his fingers keep moving with slow, deliberate pressure.
“Pope.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re making it worse.”
His mouth moves against your throat.
“I know.”
The way he says it makes your stomach twist again.
Then his fingers shift, and your next breath catches hard enough that his mouth parts against your skin.
“There,” he says, rougher now.
You grip his shoulder.
“Yeah.”
He keeps you there until your thighs start to shake around him, until your hand slips in his wet hair and pulls without meaning to. Pope exhales against your neck, almost a laugh, except there’s too much hunger in it to sound amused.
His hand comes back to your thigh, and he pauses just long enough to look at you. Water runs down his face, dripping from his lashes.
You hook your hand behind his neck and pull him closer.
He shifts your leg higher, guiding himself against you before pushing in slow. The first stretch steals your breath, your head tipping back against the tile while Pope goes still with his mouth near your jaw.
“Fu—”
The sound breaks low in his throat.
You grip his shoulders and his eyes lift to yours immediately. He exhales once through his nose.
Then he pushes deeper, hard enough to knock the air from your lungs.
The first few thrusts are careful after that, like he’s still trying to remember you’re standing in a shower and late for work and pressed between his body and tile. Then your nails dig into his back, and the restraint starts coming apart. His hips move harder, the water slick between you, his hand firm on your ass while the other braces against the wall near your head.
Your breath keeps breaking against his mouth. His name slips out once, then again, and every time it does, his control goes a little thinner. He kisses you like he’s trying to swallow the sound, then pulls back just enough to watch your face.
Water runs down his face and over the hard line of his jaw. He’s not careful enough to hide how badly he wants you now. It’s in his mouth, his hands, the way his body presses you harder into the tile every time you tighten around him.
“Fu—” You grip his shoulder. “Feels so good.”
His hand leaves the wall and slips between you, fingers finding you again with the same focused pressure from earlier. Your body jerks against his, and Pope catches the movement, holding you steady while his hips keep working into yours.
He lowers his mouth to your neck.
“Tell me.”
You can barely think around the feeling.
Your nails drag against his back.
“Harder.”
Pope’s breath breaks against your skin.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Your forehead tips against his shoulder. “Fuck me harder.”
You feel him react before the words have even fully left your mouth.
His hand slides under your thigh, lifting you higher against him, and then he drives into you deep enough that your nails scrape down his back. A broken whimper leaves you, and Pope covers it with his mouth like he wants to keep it for himself.
He gives you more, rougher now, but still careful with you. One hand stays beneath your thigh, keeping you steady while the other braces against the tile near your head. He watches your face every time he pulls back from your mouth, following every sound, every shift, every answer your body gives him.
Pope’s grip tightens beneath your thigh, and his mouth drags against your jaw.
“Good girl,” he says, voice rough.
Your whole body tightens.
“Pope—”
“Yeah,” he breathes. “I got you.”
You come hard and fast, forehead pressed to his shoulder, one hand locked in his hair and the other gripping his back. Pope holds you through it, arm tight around your waist, his mouth at your neck as his own rhythm turns uneven.
“Fu—” His hips jerk once, then again. “I’m gonna—”
He follows seconds later, sound buried against your skin, body shuddering as he holds you close enough that there’s nowhere for either of you to go.
The water keeps falling over both of you, loud enough to cover how hard you’re still breathing.
Your leg slips slightly, and he catches it before you can lose your balance, palm smoothing once along the back of your thigh.
“You okay?”
You nod, still breathing hard.
“Now I’m really late.”
His mouth rests against your shoulder.
“Yeah.”
“You don’t sound sorry.”
“I’m not.”
That makes you laugh softly, breath still uneven, and his arms tighten around you for a second before he loosens them again.
When he finally pulls back, he kisses you once more. Slower this time. Almost gentle. Then he reaches behind you and turns the water a little hotter, like he knows you’ll complain about being cold before you do.
You watch him for a second, wet hair falling over his forehead, shoulders filling the narrow shower.
“What?” he asks.
You shake your head.
“Nothing.”
Pope looks at you for another second, then turns you gently beneath the water. His hands move over your skin with a care he would never know how to say out loud.
He leaves a kiss on your shoulder. Then another, smaller one, close to the first.
Pope calls Deran from the car, one hand on the wheel and the other resting on your thigh like the whole thing about you being late is settled because he decided it is.
“She’s gonna be late,” he says.
You look over at him.
“That’s it?”
“Yeah.”
Deran says something you can’t hear. Pope’s eyes flick to you for half a second.
“Shut up, dick,” he says. “She’ll be there soon.”
Then he hangs up.
By the time you get to The Pig, you’re thirty-three minutes late.
Deran’s behind the bar when you walk in, leaning over an open box of liquor bottles with a pen tucked behind one ear. The bar isn’t open yet, chairs still flipped upside down on tables, morning light showing every smear on the front windows and every place the floor sticks from last night.
He looks up once, and his eyes move over you before you can stop him from noticing. Your hair is still damp, tucked badly behind one ear, and your shirt is buttoned one hole off beneath your jacket.
“You’re late,” he says.
You drop your bag behind the counter and reach for your apron.
“You were warned.”
“Yeah,” Deran says, setting a bottle onto the shelf. “Didn’t make it less annoying.”
“Sorry,” you say, keeping your eyes on the apron strings.
Deran stares at you for another second before his face twists.
“Jesus. Don’t tell me.”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah, you do.” He gives you a look, like he’d rather be anywhere else. “You and Pope ever take a day off from fucking?”
Your hands stop around the knot.
“Deran.”
“What? He calls me from the car, you show up half an hour late with wet hair and your shirt buttoned wrong. I’m not an idiot.”
You look down at your shirt. Deran snorts and goes back to the bottles.
You fix the button quickly, cheeks warm, pretending it has more to do with rushing across the parking lot than anything he just said. Deran keeps working, checking Tracy’s handwritten inventory list every few bottles and muttering under his breath when the shelves don’t match what’s on paper.
The two of you work around each other after that, both of you moving through the quiet bar before opening. Deran complains when something’s in the wrong place, then complains again when you point out he has keys now and can move it himself.
While you’re drying a glass, you glance toward him.
“How’s Adrian?”
The bottle in his hand pauses halfway to the shelf. Then he sets it down and looks at you.
“Why?”
You keep the towel moving over the rim of the glass.
“Just asking.”
He looks down at the bottle in his hand, thumb dragging once over the edge of the label.
“Don’t,” he says.
You nod once.
“Okay.”
Deran keeps looking at you, like he expects the rest of it. When it doesn’t come, he reaches for the bottle again and takes too long reading the label.
After a while, Deran says, “He’s fine.”
You don’t look at him right away.
“Good.”
“That’s it?”
You set the glass on the shelf.
“That’s it.”
Deran watches you for another second, suspicious of how little you’re asking from him. Then he looks away and puts the bottle in place with more care than he gave the others.
After that, the two of you keep working, the silence beside him a little less sharp than it was before.
An hour later, The Pig has picked up just enough to keep you moving.
A few regulars sit at the bar, two tables are taken near the window and somebody’s watching the game with the sound too low to matter. Deran stays behind the counter, moving between customers and restocking bottles whenever there’s a lull, settling into the rhythm of the place more than he probably realizes.
You’re carrying a tray of empty glasses toward the bar when the front door opens.
Cath steps in with Lena tucked close to her side.
Lena catches your attention first because she looks smaller than usual, one hand wrapped around Cath’s fingers and the other pressed against her stomach. Her hair is pulled back messily, and her cheeks have that warm, tired flush kids get when they’re trying hard not to cry in public.
Cath looks around before she fully comes inside. Her gaze moves through the room, landing on Deran for half a second before she looks away.
“Hey,” you say, setting the tray down. “Everything okay?”
Cath gives you a smile that doesn’t make it all the way to her eyes.
“School called. She threw up.”
Lena leans into her mother’s leg, looking embarrassed more than anything.
“I didn’t mean to.”
“I know, baby,” Cath says, brushing a hand over the top of her head. “You’re okay.”
Deran looks over from the register.
“She sick?”
Cath’s hand stays on Lena’s shoulder.
“Looks like it.”
He nods and looks past Cath to Lena for a second longer than he probably means to before turning back to the register.
Cath guides Lena to the end of the bar, the far side where she can see her from almost anywhere behind the counter. She helps her onto the stool and places her backpack on the one beside her, then checks her forehead with the back of her hand.
“You should take her home,” you say quietly. “I can cover the rest of your shift.”
Cath shakes her head before you finish.
“It’s okay. Just need to finish a couple things.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
She says it too quickly, then reaches into Lena’s bag and pulls out a crumpled pack of crayons. A few roll across the bar before you catch them.
Lena watches you with tired eyes.
“You want ginger ale?” you ask her. “Might help your stomach.”
She looks at Cath first.
Cath nods.
“Just a little.”
You fill a small glass halfway, add a straw and set it in front of Lena with a stack of napkins.
“For emergency colouring,” you say, pushing the napkins closer.
Lena smiles at you, small and tired.
“I’m not really good at drawing on napkins,” she says.
“Perfect. Me neither.”
Cath looks at you then, and some of the tension leaves her face. She mouths a quiet thank you before looking away.
You leave Lena with the ginger ale and move closer to where Cath is looking through the schedule.
“How’s she doing?”
Cath looks over at Lena before answering.
“Better than she was.”
At the end of the bar, Lena is carefully colouring a napkin with one of the crayons from her backpack, her ginger ale untouched for the moment.
“Poor thing,” you say.
Cath nods once and smooths a hand over the schedule in front of her.
“Yeah.”
Her hand stays on the edge of the counter, thumb rubbing once against a scratch in the wood. From across the bar, she looks fine. Up close, she is holding herself too still.
“Deran being here upset you?” you ask, low enough that he won’t hear from the register.
Cath doesn’t answer right away.
“Deran’s not the problem.”
She flips the schedule page even though she hasn’t read the first one.
“He walks in with keys because Smurf says so, and suddenly everybody’s acting like that makes it normal.”
Her voice stays even, but her eyes drift to Lena at the end of the bar before settling back on the schedule.
“Tracy needed money,” you say carefully.
Cath lets out a quiet breath.
“Tracy always needs money. There’s always a reason. There’s always something that makes it make sense if you don’t look at it too hard.”
She closes the schedule and sets it down.
Across the bar, Lena has started colouring the straw wrapper too, shoulders rounded over the napkins. Deran glances at her once, then at Cath, then busies himself with the register like he was never looking.
Cath sees him anyway.
“She buys her way in,” she says quietly. “Then everybody starts telling you it’s not a big deal.”
You think about the day Deran walked in with those keys, the way the bar kept moving like nothing had changed.
Cath looks at you then.
“Smurf doesn’t show up anywhere by accident.”
Neither of you says anything until Lena coughs softly at the end of the bar. Cath turns before the sound is finished.
“You okay, baby?”
Lena nods, sipping carefully from the straw.
Cath watches her for another second, hand resting on the counter, ready to move if she needs to. Then she looks back at you, face closed again.
“I’m gonna try to finish what I can and take her home.”
“Okay.”
You glance toward Lena at the end of the bar.
“If you need help, let me know.”
Something in her expression eases for a second.
“Thanks.”
She reaches for a glass from the rack and starts drying it, eyes never straying too far from Lena.
Cath heads to the stockroom a little later, leaving Lena at the far end of the bar with her backpack, a glass of ginger ale and a growing mess of napkins covered in crayon.
The shift has slowed again. The late afternoon crowd hasn’t arrived yet, leaving only a handful of customers spread through the room. Glasses clink softly against tabletops, the hum of conversation rising and falling beneath the music playing overhead.
Lena stays quiet, hunched over her drawing with her knees tucked against the stool. Every now and then she takes a careful sip from the straw, then goes back to colouring.
“You doing okay, sweetie?” you ask.
She looks up, cheeks still flushed, crayon held in one hand.
“I’m okay.” Her eyes move to the glass. “Can I have more ginger ale, please?”
“Coming up.”
You take her glass and refill it halfway, not too much because Cath had said just a little. When you set it back down, Lena pushes one of the napkins toward you.
It’s covered in purple lines, a shaky horn and what looks like four stubborn little legs.
“That a horse?” you ask, looking closely at the napkin.
Lena gives you a tired little smile.
“It’s a unicorn.”
“Oh.” You lean closer. “Obviously. My mistake.”
The front door opens before you can say anything else, and Patrick steps inside. He glances toward the bar, then toward the back hallway where Cath disappeared.
“Hey,” he says.
“Usual?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
You grab a beer from the cooler and set it in front of him.
“How’s your day been?”
You huff a quiet laugh.
“Y’know. Same shit, different day.”
“Sounds about right.”
Patrick takes the beer when you set it down, his attention already drifting toward Lena at the far end of the bar.
“That Cath’s daughter?”
“Yeah. School called. She wasn’t feeling well.”
Patrick’s expression softens, but he doesn’t move too close. It’s something you’ve noticed before, the way he gives people space without making a point of it.
“Rough day, huh?” he says to Lena.
Lena nods, then slides the napkin closer to herself like she’s worried he might inspect it too closely.
Patrick tilts his head.
“Nice dog.”
Lena laughs, sudden and bright enough that you look over at her.
“It’s a unicorn.”
Patrick nods like this is serious information.
“Right. I saw that.”
Lena smiles down at the napkin, looking pleased with herself. Patrick stays where he is, leaning one elbow on the counter, his beer untouched in front of him while he asks her whether the unicorn has a name. Lena tells him it doesn’t yet because naming things is hard.
You’re about to suggest something ridiculous when the bell over the door rings again.
You hear Deran before you look up.
“What are you doing here?”
Smurf steps inside, sunglasses pushed into her hair, a smile already in place. Her eyes move to Deran first, warm and amused, like his tone is something cute rather than an actual warning.
“Can’t a mother check on her youngest baby?”
“You checked.”
Smurf keeps walking.
“Don’t be rude, Deran. I wanted to see how our new investment’s doing.”
Deran doesn’t answer. Instead, he turns back toward the bottles with too much focus, hands moving over labels and glass while every part of him stays aware of her.
Smurf’s attention finds you next.
“And there you are,” she says. “Settling in?”
You wipe the bar once, though it doesn’t need it.
“Fine.”
Smurf looks around the bar, then back at you.
“My Andrew’s been spending a lot of time with you lately.”
You set the rag beside the sink instead of answering too quickly.
“He spends his time where he wants.”
Smurf’s smile warms.
“That so?”
You meet her eyes.
“I don’t keep him anywhere he doesn’t want to be.”
The words sit there between you, quiet enough that anyone listening could mistake them for nothing.
“No,” she says softly. “Don’t suppose you do.”
Patrick’s eyes move between you and Smurf, not obvious enough to make a scene, but enough that you know he hears something under her words. He reaches for his beer and takes a sip before setting the bottle down.
Smurf’s gaze shifts to him before you can turn away.
“Friend of yours?”
Patrick answers before you can.
“Just a regular.”
He offers his hand.
“Patrick Fischer.”
Smurf looks at his hand for a fraction of a second before taking it.
“Janine Cody.”
Her voice is sweet. Polished. Almost welcoming.
“My son manages the bar.”
Patrick’s face doesn’t change much, but something in him shifts into caution.
“Nice to meet you.”
“You too.” Smurf’s eyes stay on him. “You come here often, Patrick?”
“When I can.”
“Lucky us.”
You don’t like the way she says his name, like she’s already placed him somewhere in her head, filed him beside Cath, beside you, beside anything she might want to pull apart later.
Patrick reaches for his wallet.
“I should head out.” He leaves a few bills on the bar. “Tell Cath I said bye?”
You nod.
“I will.”
Patrick leaves before Smurf looks away from him.
The door shuts behind him, and Smurf’s attention returns to you.
“Friend of Cath’s?”
“He comes in sometimes.”
“Wasn’t what I asked.”
You meet her eyes.
“It’s the answer I have.”
Smurf’s smile holds without moving.
Then Lena coughs at the end of the bar. The sound pulls Smurf’s gaze.
“Well,” she says, brightening. “Is that my Lena-roo?”
Lena looks up from her napkin.
“Hi, Grandma Smurf.”
Smurf moves easily across the room, crossing to the end of the bar with her arms opening just enough to make it look welcoming. Lena brightens the second she sees her, sitting up a little straighter on the stool despite how tired she looks.
“Look at you,” Smurf says, brushing Lena’s hair back from her cheek. “What are you doing here, baby?”
“I got sick at school.”
“Sick at school?” Smurf’s face softens. “Poor thing.”
Lena holds up the napkin.
“I drew a unicorn.”
“I see that.” Smurf takes the napkin carefully. “Beautiful.”
Cath comes through the stockroom door carrying a stack of clean bar towels and stops short when she sees Smurf.
The pause barely lasts a second before she starts toward Lena, setting the towels down beneath the bar as she goes. There’s nothing hurried about it, but the change in her is impossible to miss.
“What are you doing here?”
Smurf turns, still holding Lena’s drawing.
“I told Deran. Wanted to see the place.”
Cath’s eyes move from Smurf to Lena.
“Lena’s not feeling well.”
“I heard.” Smurf touches Lena’s cheek again, thumb light against the flushed skin. “Should’ve called me.”
“She’s fine with me.”
“I didn’t say she wasn’t.”
Smurf smooths a hand over Lena’s hair. From across the bar, it would look warm, ordinary, the kind of attention any grandmother might give a sick child. But Cath’s hand has found Lena’s shoulder now, fingers resting there like she’s ready to pull her back.
Deran watches from near the register, his mouth tight.
Smurf looks down at Lena.
“You want Grandma Smurf to take you home? Let your mommy finish work?”
“No,” Cath says.
The word comes out sharper than she means it to.
“I have my car,” she says, calmer this time. “I can take her home.”
Smurf looks at her for a second before smiling.
“I know you can.”
She smooths Lena’s hair once more.
“You take good care of our girl.”
Cath’s hand tightens on Lena’s shoulder.
Smurf’s eyes flick toward you, then toward Deran, and for a second no one in the room seems to know where to look.
“Well,” she says, stepping back from Lena. “I won’t keep you all from work.”
Deran doesn’t move.
“Call next time.”
Smurf turns her head toward him.
“Why would I do that?”
His expression stays flat.
“So I know you’re coming.”
Her smile warms.
“Baby, if I have to make an appointment to see my own son, something’s gone very wrong.”
Deran looks away first, turning back toward the bar with his hand moving over the bottles without picking one up.
Smurf looks around the bar one more time.
“It’s a nice place,” she says. “I can see why everyone likes it here.”
Then she lowers her sunglasses back over her eyes and leaves.
The room stays quiet for a moment after she’s gone. Then a bottle clinks somewhere behind you, someone at the far table laughs and the television keeps playing above the bar like nothing happened.
Cath starts moving, gathering Lena’s crayons, stuffing them into the backpack and folding the napkin drawings before sliding them into the front pocket. Lena watches her, confused and tired.
“Mommy?”
“We’re going home.”
You step closer.
“You okay?”
Cath doesn’t look at you right away.
“Yeah.”
The answer comes too fast.
“I can cover the rest of your shift,” you say.
“Thanks.”
She lifts Lena off the stool and settles the backpack over one shoulder. She keeps her eyes on Lena while she adjusts the strap, smoothing a hand over her daughter’s hair before turning toward the door.
Lena looks at you as Cath takes her hand.
“Thank you for the ginger ale.”
You smile back at her.
“Feel better, sweetie.”
Cath’s eyes meet yours then, and for a second you think she might say something. Instead, she only nods once and leads Lena toward the back entrance, keeping her close the whole way.
When the door shuts behind them, you look at Deran.
“Did you know she was coming?”
“No.” Deran reaches for a bottle beneath the bar. “If I knew she was coming, I would’ve left.”
You glance toward the back, where Cath and Lena disappeared.
Deran follows your look, then reaches for the towel beside the sink.
“She doesn’t just stop by,” he says.
You look at him.
“Smurf?”
Deran gives you a look.
“Who else?”
The rest of the shift keeps moving. Orders come in. Glasses pile up. Somebody complains about the game on television and somebody else complains about the beer.
Still, every time the door opens, your eyes lift before you can stop them.
By the time your phone buzzes near the register, your nerves are already worn thin enough that the sound makes your hand pause around a glass.
got held up
can’t get you
Another message comes through a few seconds later.
can i come by after?
The tightness in your chest eases before you can stop it. Then you type back.
i’d like that
A few more seconds pass before his answer appears.
see you later
You stare at the message longer than you mean to, then slide the phone back beneath the register and reach for the next glass.
Pope gets to your place a little after midnight.
When you open the door, he’s standing under the weak hallway light with his shoulders slightly hunched, one hand tucked close against his side and a dark smear of blood running from beneath the sleeve of his shirt.
Your eyes go straight to his arm.
“What the hell happened?”
Pope glances down like he forgot it was there.
“It’s not bad.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
You step back, keeping the door open.
“Get in.”
Pope comes inside without a word. He closes the door behind him with his other hand, slow and quiet, while you keep looking at the blood on his sleeve.
“Sit down,” you say.
“I’m fine.”
You point toward the couch.
“Sit.”
He looks at you, then at the couch. By the time he drops onto it, you’re already moving toward the bathroom, pulling the little first aid kit from beneath the sink.
It used to be mostly bandages, aspirin and a few old alcohol wipes Chrissy bought after cutting her finger on a broken wine glass. Now it has gauze, tape, antiseptic and enough little packets of ointment that you try not to think too hard about why you keep replacing them.
When you come back, Pope’s jacket is off and the sleeve of his shirt is pushed up. The cut runs along his forearm, not deep enough to need a hospital but ugly enough to make your stomach turn anyway.
He watches you open the kit.
“Since when do you have all that?”
You sit beside him and tear open an alcohol wipe.
“Since someone I care about keeps showing up bleeding.”
His eyes flick to your face, but you keep your attention on his arm because it’s easier than looking at him after saying it.
“And if that someone wasn’t off doing god knows what every other night, maybe I wouldn’t have to keep half a hospital under my sink.”
Pope’s mouth pulls slightly at one corner, like he’s trying to make it nothing. It doesn’t work, not with the way he keeps looking at you.
“Half a hospital?”
“Don’t start.”
He lets the subject drop and holds still while you clean the blood from his skin. The first touch of antiseptic makes him wince, but he breathes through it, taking the pain with a quiet stubbornness that makes you angrier than if he complained.
“What happened?” you ask.
“Shit went sideways.”
“That doesn’t tell me anything.”
Pope looks down at his arm.
“Piece of metal caught me.”
“From what?”
He hesitates.
“Pope.”
“Fence.”
You pause with the gauze in your hand.
“A fence?”
“Door was supposed to open,” he says. “Didn’t. Craig got loud, Baz got pissed and we had to go over before somebody heard.”
“So you climbed a fence with your arm bleeding?”
His mouth moves faintly.
“Started bleeding after.”
You look at him.
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“Wasn’t trying to.”
You wrap the gauze around his forearm, careful not to pull too tight.
“Was J there?”
Pope looks toward the window.
“Yeah.”
“Doing what?”
“Tech shit,” he says. “Phones. Cameras. Telling us when to move.”
You tape the gauze down.
“He know how to do that?”
Pope’s mouth tightens.
“Smurf’s giving him things to learn.”
He doesn’t explain more than that, and you don’t ask. Not tonight.
You smooth your thumb once along the edge of the gauze to make sure it holds. His skin is warm beneath your fingers, his arm heavy in your lap, and suddenly the apartment feels too quiet around both of you.
“Chrissy home?” he asks.
“No. She’s been at Simon’s most nights.”
Pope looks toward the kitchen, then back at you.
“Since the table?”
“Pretty much,” you say, a smile lifting at the corner of your mouth.
His mouth moves, but the amusement doesn’t last. He looks down at the bandage again while you fold up the alcohol wipe.
“How was work?” he asks.
“Long.”
His hand moves to your knee.
“Something happen?”
“Cath had to bring Lena in,” you say. “School called. She got sick.”
Pope’s attention shifts.
“She okay?”
“Think so. Just a stomach thing.”
He nods, but the concern stays in his face longer than he probably means it to. It gets to you more than you expect, the way his concern turns toward Lena without having to think about it.
Your attention drops back to his bandaged arm.
“Smurf came by.”
Pope doesn’t look surprised, which bothers you even though you already knew it would.
“She talked to Lena,” you say. “Cath didn’t like it.”
You glance at him.
“Did you know Smurf was going to show up?”
“No.”
The answer comes quick enough to be true. You reach for the first aid kit and start putting things back inside, one by one.
“Patrick was there too.”
Pope goes still. You don’t look up, but you feel the change in him, the way his hand slips from your knee before he says anything.
“He came in before Smurf,” you say. “Had a beer. Talked to Lena about her drawing. Left before Cath came back out.”
You snap the lid of the first aid kit closed, harder than you mean to.
“He didn’t do anything.”
Pope’s eyes stay on the kit in your hands.
“I didn’t say he did.”
“No,” you say. “I know.”
“Smurf see him?”
You look at him then.
“Yeah.”
The words sit there between you, quiet and edged.
You should say Patrick isn’t the part of this that worries you most. You should tell him Smurf walked into The Pig like she already knew where everything was. Like she’d been there before she ever opened the door.
Instead, you look at the white strip of gauze wrapped around his arm and feel how tired you are of trying to keep fear from turning into a fight.
“I’m tired,” you say.
Pope looks at you for a moment, quiet. Whatever he was about to say doesn’t make it out. There’s blood on his sleeve, dark circles under his eyes, and the night still sitting heavy in his shoulders.
You take the kit back to the bathroom. When you come back, he’s still on the couch, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, bandaged arm resting across one thigh. He looks worn down in a way you don’t see often.
You sit beside him again, closer this time.
Your eyes drift back to the bandage, the white gauze already darkening where the cut sits underneath. You think about how easily he talks about the jobs, like blood is just something that happens sometimes. Like cuts and bruises are only problems if they slow him down.
“I hate this,” you say.
Pope looks over.
“What?”
You touch the edge of the bandage, careful not to press.
“You showing up bleeding, acting like it’s nothing.”
He glances down at the bandage like he still doesn’t understand why it matters this much.
“It’s just a cut.”
“That’s not the point, Pope.”
You keep your hand near his arm.
“I hate thinking about you getting caught,” you say, quieter now. “Going back inside. Getting hurt worse than this. Or…”
You stop before you have to say the rest.
Pope’s eyes move to you. Neither of you says anything right away.
“Don’t,” he says.
You swallow.
“Pope.”
“I’m here.”
“For now.”
The words leave your mouth before you can make them softer.
You look down at your hand on his arm.
“I’m not saying that to start a fight.”
“Then why are you sayin’ it?”
“Because I’m scared.”
Pope doesn’t answer right away. His hand stops moving, and for a second, he only looks at you.
“I know what you do,” you say. “I’m not pretending I don’t.”
You rub your thumb once along the clean edge of the gauze.
“But I know that’s not all you are.”
Pope doesn’t answer and the room feels smaller after you say it.
“You don’t have to say anything,” you add.
His hand moves then, fingers reaching your jaw first, the backs of them rough against your skin, and then his palm settles there, warm and careful.
His thumb moves once along your cheek, and his voice drops lower.
“I’m here,” he says again, firmer this time.
It isn’t the same thing and you know that.
But he is here. On your couch. Bleeding through a bandage you wrapped. Looking at you like he doesn’t know what to do with your fear or the fact that you’re still close enough to touch.
After a while, your fingers slide over his.
“Come to bed,” you say.
Pope looks at you for another moment, then nods.
You stand first, still holding his hand. He follows slower than usual, careful with his arm, but he doesn’t let go.
In the bedroom, you pull back the sheets and climb in. Pope gets in behind you, close before you’ve fully settled, his chest warm against your back.
His bandaged arm stays above your waist at first, held a little higher than usual. Then his hand spreads over your stomach, familiar and heavy, like he can’t sleep unless he knows you’re still there.
description: you and your attending butt heads—and it’s no secret around the ED that Dr. Jack Abbot is harder on you than the other residents. He pushes you further, critiques you sharper, expects more—and you’re done with it. Just as you’re about to go to Dr. Robby to request a switch to days and finally put some distance between you and him, your patient—and his patient—tests positive for COVID-19. Suddenly, you’re both exposed, and with hospital protocol leaving no room for argument, you have no choice but to quarantine together.
wc: 7.5k
tags/warnings: 18+, forced proximity, implied age gap, power imbalance, quarantining when no one does that anymore, tension, some more angst but then repaired with smut and fluff ;)
series masterlist
I DONT HAVE A TAGLIST. Pls follow @meep-updates and turn your notifications on <333 the tags aren’t fully working so i want to make sure everyone gets notified
The blissful ignorance of the night before came to a swift halt the second your eyes flew open.
For a few precious seconds, you simply stared at the ceiling, still in that strange space between sleeping and waking where nothing felt real yet. Then reality caught up.
The argument in the laundry room.
The conversation that had somehow turned years of assumptions inside out.
And, maybe worst of all, the conclusion you’d arrived at afterward.
You groaned softly, dragging a hand across your face before letting it fall back onto the mattress.
The guest bed no longer felt nearly as comfortable as it had yesterday. The room itself had changed somehow. Before, its privacy had felt welcome, even necessary. Now it just felt lonely.
Your eyes drifted toward the closed bedroom door.
On the other side was the hallway. The kitchen. The smell of coffee that was probably already brewing. Jack.
The thought alone made your chest tighten.
Which was ridiculous.
There had been far more days during this quarantine where you’d dreaded seeing him than days you’d looked forward to it. You remembered lying awake in this exact room during the first week, mentally preparing yourself for whatever disagreement awaited you over breakfast. Wondering what sarcastic comment would annoy you first. What criticism would stick with you for the rest of the day.
Before, facing Jack Abbot had felt like a chore.
Now it felt impossible for very different reasons.
You rolled onto your back and stared at the ceiling again.
The more you thought about it, the more absurd it became.
For years, you had convinced yourself that what existed between you was frustration. Tension. Competition. You had built an entire narrative around that explanation because it was easier than the alternative.
Easier than admitting that his opinion mattered more than anyone else’s.
Easier than examining why you could brush off criticism from another attending but spend an entire evening replaying something he said.
Easier than asking yourself why every shift somehow felt incomplete when he wasn’t there.
The signs seemed embarrassingly obvious now.
Like discovering the answer to a question that had been sitting in front of you the entire time.
You buried your face briefly in the pillow.
“Fantastic,” you muttered.
Because that was the real problem.
Not the quarantine ending.
Not returning to PTMC.
Not even the complicated logistics of whatever relationship the two of you were trying to build.
The problem was that somewhere along the way, this had stopped being a silly crush.
You thought about him standing beside the washing machine yesterday, frustrated in a way you’d rarely seen. About the look on his face when you’d told him what those years had felt like from your side. About the quiet honesty underneath all that annoying confidence when the conversation turned serious.
You thought about how carefully he’d handled you from the very beginning of this. How willing he had been to give you space, even when it clearly wasn’t what he wanted.
And suddenly it felt impossible to dismiss any of it.
You exhaled slowly and sat up, resting your elbows on your knees.
Maybe that was why seeing him this morning felt so daunting.
Because nothing had actually changed.
Jack was still Jack.
The house was still the same.
The quarantine would still end tomorrow.
But now you were different. What you were willing to face about yourself. What you were potentially willing to admit after all this time.
And once a truth like that settled in, it had a way of changing everything around it.
Including the way you looked at the man waiting somewhere on the other side of that bedroom door.
Eventually, the prospect of starving to death became less appealing than facing your feelings.
Barely.
You lingered in your room longer than necessary, going through a morning routine that normally took fifteen minutes and somehow stretching it into forty-five. You reorganized your toiletry bag. Folded a sweatshirt that didn’t need folding. Checked your phone despite there being nothing new on it.
Anything to delay the inevitable.
But eventually there were no more excuses left.
With a deep breath, you opened the bedroom door.
The house was quiet. Too quiet.
You padded down the hallway cautiously, as if the truth would manifest itself into some physical, earthly object and jump out at you.
The thought was ridiculous.
You still checked anyway.
The smell of coffee reached you before the kitchen did.
Of course, the man still made coffee after asking to spend the night apart.
When you finally rounded the corner, you found him exactly where you expected.
Jack was standing at the counter with a mug in hand, dressed in a faded PTMC t-shirt and sweatpants. Reading glasses sat low on his nose as he looked over something on his tablet, one hand absentmindedly wrapped around his coffee.
The sight of him hit you like a truck.
Not because he was doing anything particularly remarkable.
Quite the opposite—he looked painfully normal.
Comfortable.
Like this belonged to him.
Like you belonged here with him.
Oh, this was going to be a long day.
Unfortunately, Jack looked up at that exact moment.
His eyes found yours, and immediately narrowed.
You froze.
He froze.
A beat passed.
Then another.
“…Why are you standing like that?”
You blinked.
“What?”
“You look like you’re about to deliver bad news to a patient’s family.”
Offended, you straightened.
“I do not.”
“You do.”
His attention returned briefly to the tablet.
“Is somebody dead?”
“No.”
“Are you dead?”
“No?”
“Then come have coffee.”
The ease of it almost pissed you off.
There he’d been all night in your head, starring in every catastrophic scenario imaginable, and meanwhile he was standing in his kitchen looking concerned only that you hadn’t had any caffeine yet.
You crossed toward the island, trying very hard to act normal—whatever that was.
Jack was already reaching for a second mug before you sat down.
Muscle memory.
The realization struck unexpectedly.
He didn’t ask if you wanted coffee anymore.
He just made it. Exactly how you liked it.
The mug settled onto the counter in front of you.
You stared at it.
Then at him.
Then back at the mug.
His eyes flicked upward. “There it is.”
Your heart sank.
“There what is?”
“That look.”
“What look?”
“The one you’ve had since you walked in.”
You groaned immediately.
Jack set his tablet down.
“You’ve been awake for approximately ten minutes and you’re already thinking too hard.”
You scoffed. “I’ve been awake for way longer than that.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah.”
“I should’ve known. I can practically hear the gears turning in your head.”
You hated that he knew you so well.
Maybe that was the problem.
It wasn’t quarantine or returning to work.
Or the fact that you’d spent half the night realizing you were hopelessly in love with him.
It was that Jack Abbot had become intimately familiar with you.
Not in the way Shen knew your preferred corner of the ED for charting, or the way Ellis could predict the exact face you make when a patient informed you they’d ignored your medical advice in favor of a Google search.
Those were workplace observations. The byproduct of spending long shifts together.
This was different.
Jack knew you.
He knew when you were hungry before you did. Knew the difference between your genuinely angry silence and the silence that meant you were thinking too hard. Knew that when you started cleaning something that didn’t need cleaning, you were anxious. Knew that you always forgot your stupid glass water bottle at home and always had a bottle from the vending machine ready.
More terrifyingly, he knew how your mind worked.
He could predict your next argument before you made it. Could identify the exact moment you started spiraling. Could look at you from across a room and somehow know what emotion you were trying—and failing—to conceal.
You weren’t sure when that happened.
Or maybe the scarier possibility was that it had always been happening.
This familiarity made uncertainty harder.
It made the idea of walking back into the emergency department tomorrow and pretending this hadn’t fundamentally changed both of your lives feel almost impossible.
Your gaze dropped to your coffee.
“Good morning to you too,” Jack said dryly, definitely in tune with the thoughts running through your head as you were too invested in them to respond.
Despite yourself, you laughed.
“Sorry, just… long night.”
“Me too.”
You lifted your gaze back up.
For a moment, your eyes moved between his, searching for something. Some hidden message. Some indication of what his night had looked like after you’d retreated to separate rooms.
Did he lie awake, too?
Did he replay every conversation you’d had over the last two weeks? Did he think about the future? About the hospital? About you?
You tried to find the answers in his expression.
And came up with nothing.
Not because he was cold or guarded.
But because Jack had always been harder to read than most people.
That notion hit you like a ton of bricks.
For someone who knew you so well, you weren’t entirely sure you knew him the same way.
You knew pieces of him, certainly.
You knew he preferred the night shift because he liked the unpredictability of it. You knew he woke up early no matter how late he’d gone to bed. You knew he took his coffee black and that he pretended not to care about holidays despite secretly participating in every department event.
You knew he carried more grief than he ever talked about. You knew he hid pain behind sarcasm. You knew he was kinder than he wanted people to realize.
But there were entire parts of him that still felt unexplored.
You’d spent so much energy trying to survive him that you never stopped to understand him.
Every time you found yourself wondering why he acted a certain way, you’d defaulted to the simplest explanation.
He’s irritated with me.
He doesn’t trust me.
He doesn’t like me.
Those answers had been easier.
Now, sitting across from him with a cooling mug of coffee between your hands, you found yourself realizing just how much of him remained a mystery.
And strangely, that didn’t feel discouraging.
It felt…exciting.
Because for the first time, you weren’t wondering how to make Jack Abbot like you.
You were wondering who he was when he wasn’t your attending.
The thought must have shown on your face somehow.
Which, to him, it usually did.
One of his brows lifted slightly. “What?”
You blinked.
“What, what?”
“You’re staring at me.”
Heat immediately climbed into your cheeks.
“No, I’m not.”
A familiar look settled onto his face.
One that suggested he found your denial deeply unconvincing. One you’d grown to unfortunately love.
“You absolutely are.”
You took a sip of coffee solely to avoid answering.
Unfortunately, Jack knew you well enough to recognize that maneuver too.
His mouth twitched.
And for the first time that morning, you found yourself smiling back.
“Share with the class, sweetheart,”
“Don’t wanna,” you mumbled behind your mug.
“Mm.” His tone softened, but it didn’t lose that quiet insistence. “What’s going on in that beautiful head?”
The words came out too smoothly.
You’d seen that voice work before. Not in theory, not in stories—right in front of you. The way it could cut through tension in a trauma room, steady a panicked patient, bring order to a room that was seconds away from spiraling.
But this version of it wasn’t for patients.
It was for you.
And your body reacted to it like it had its own memory of him, independent of everything your brain was still trying to sort out.
“I just…” You let out a breath, setting the mug down with more care than necessary, elbows coming to rest on the counter. “Worry I don’t know you as well as you know me.”
The silence that followed was immediate.
Jack actually paused.
Not in the casual, teasing way he usually did when you pushed back at him. This was different. His expression shifted slightly, like he was recalibrating what he’d just heard.
And honestly, so were you.
Because you hadn’t meant to say it like that. Not so honestly, anyway. Especially not at nine in the morning, standing in a kitchen with sunlight starting to spill and tension beginning to thicken.
But something about him made honesty slip out of you before you could stop it.
His gaze stayed on you for a long moment.
“Why would you think that?” he asked finally.
You hesitated, then shrugged slightly, eyes dropping to the countertop.
“Because you… notice everything.” Your fingers traced an imaginary line near your mug. “The way I work, the way I think, what I’m going to say before I say it. You’ve always been like that.”
A beat passed.
“And I spent years thinking I had you figured out,” you continued more quietly. “But I don’t know if that was ever real, or if I just… made up a version of you that made sense to me at the time.”
That landed heavier.
You could feel it in the way the air shifted.
Jack set his mug down more slowly than before.
When he spoke again, his voice wasn’t teasing anymore.
“It wasn’t made up.”
You looked up.
His expression was steady, but there was something behind it now. Something a little less controlled than usual.
“I’ve always noticed you,” he said. “That part is real.”
Your breath caught slightly at the simplicity of it.
He didn’t move closer. Didn’t try to soften it with humor or deflection.
Just stood there, meeting your eyes like he wasn’t interested in backing away from what he’d said.
“But you’re right about one thing,” he added after a moment.
Your brows furrowed slightly.
“What’s that?”
“You didn’t know me,” he said quietly. “Not really.”
It didn’t sting, per se.
Because he wasn’t accusing you.
He was agreeing with you.
“Doesn’t feel fair,” you huffed a quiet laugh.
“It’s not.” He shook his head once, like he didn’t see any point pretending otherwise. “So I want to even the score.”
That made you pause.
Your head tilted slightly, your attention sharpening in the way it always did when Jack had a proposition. “How?”
His gaze stayed on you for a moment longer than necessary, like he was weighing whether to say it out loud again.
Then he exhaled. “I’ll make you dinner tonight,” he said. “A real date.”
Your chest tightened at the phrasing alone.
“A date?”
“Yes.” No hesitation this time. “So we can get to know each other outside of the ED. Outside of… all of this.”
His hand moved vaguely between you, the weight of quarantine, everything that had compressed the last thirteen days into something neither of you could separate from the rest of your history.
You let out a small breath, almost a laugh again, but it didn’t fully form.
“Jack,” you started, then stopped, because you weren’t entirely sure what you were objecting to yet.
The idea itself?
Or how much you immediately wanted to say yes to it.
He noticed the hesitation, of course he did.
But he didn’t backtrack.
“I’m not trying to complicate things,” he added. “I’m trying to slow them down.”
That hit differently.
Intentional. Real.
Not the accidental intimacy of proximity and circumstance. Not the quiet escalation you hadn’t realized you were participating in until it was already happening.
A choice.
Your fingers tightened slightly around your mug.
“You’re aware we go back tomorrow,” you said quietly.
“I am.”
“Back at PTMC. With our colleagues. Back in the real world.”
“I know.”
The calm certainty in his voice made your stomach flip in the worst and best way at the same time.
Like he had already accounted for all of it.
Like he wasn’t asking you to ignore reality—but just to meet him in it.
Your eyes searched his face again, slower this time. Trying to find the catch. The hesitation. The part where he might pull back and turn this into a joke.
It didn’t come.
Instead, he just stood there, waiting.
Not pushing.
Just offering.
And that, somehow, was what made it harder to refuse.
“Dinner,” you repeated, quieter now.
“A date,” he confirmed.
A beat passed.
“Pick me up at 7,”
God bless Trinity Santos.
You thought in your head, holding up the one black dress she had somehow managed to pack into your duffel like she’d known, on some chaotic, intuitive level, that you would need it.
Casual enough that it didn’t feel like you were trying too hard. Cute enough that it absolutely still counted as effort. And somehow, exactly right for a “real date” with your attending physician in quarantine-adjacent emotional turmoil.
Of course she’d done this.
Of course she’d anticipated something you yourself had been actively refusing to acknowledge until approximately twenty-four hours ago.
You stood there for a moment longer, dress in hand, staring at it like it might offer guidance on what exactly you were supposed to do with the dilemma of either to date your attending or to shove it all back down in a box and light the box on fire.
The answer, unfortunately, did not come.
So you got dressed anyway.
By the time you stepped out into the hallway, you could smell it.
Food.
Not hospital food. Not takeout. Not something thrown together.
Your steps slowed slightly as you moved toward the kitchen.
Jack was already there.
The sight of him made you pause in the doorway without meaning to. He’d changed too—no scrubs, no work attire, just a simple shirt and dark pants rolled at the sleeves like he’d made a decision about this evening and committed to it fully.
The kitchen, meanwhile, looked like a place that had been subtly transformed. Nothing dramatic or staged. Just small, deliberate signs of effort. A pan still warm on the stove. Plates already set out. A bottle of something opened on the counter.
And him.
Waiting.
When he looked up and saw you, there was a brief stillness in his expression that he didn’t bother hiding.
You felt it immediately.
That shift.
Like the version of you in scrubs, in exhaustion, in argument, had been replaced by something he was still learning how to look at.
“You found a dress,” he said finally.
“I had help,” you replied, stepping fully into the kitchen now.
A faint exhale of amusement left him.
“I should’ve known Santos would get involved.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“I should be thanking her,” He chuckled. “Because you look beautiful,”
Your chest threatened to explode. Sure, he’d been complimenting you in more suggestive ways the past few days, but this was different. This was intimate. It was earnest.
He turned slightly back toward the counter, giving you a moment that felt suspiciously intentional.
“You hungry?” he asked.
“Starving,” you admitted.
“Good.”
There was a pause as he picked up the plate he’d been working on, then glanced at you again.
“Sit,” he added, nodding toward the table.
You hesitated for half a second before doing it, the chair scraping softly against the floor as you settled in.
It felt too normal.
Too much like something you could get used to without realizing it was happening.
Jack placed the food down in front of you, then sat across from you, not immediately filling the silence. Not rushing it. Just letting it exist.
For a moment, neither of you spoke.
The kitchen light was warm. Late-day sun filtering in through the window. Everything quieter than it had any right to be considering what this evening was supposed to mean.
You looked down at the plate, then back up at him.
“This is the part where I’m supposed to say something clever and cute,” you said.
A corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
“You usually do.”
“I’m off my game.”
“Understandable,” he replied, almost dry. “You’re on a date with your attending.”
You groaned softly, dropping your head back for a second.
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like it’s normal.”
His eyes flicked over you then, steady and unreadable in a way that felt new again.
“It’s not normal,” he said simply.
It was brutally honest, and somehow, more grounding than anything else he could’ve said.
You picked up your fork slowly.
“So,” you said after a beat, forcing a lighter tone, “what exactly is this version of Jack Abbot like outside the ED?”
His gaze held yours for a moment longer than necessary.
Then he leaned back slightly in his chair.
“The honest answer?” he said. “Boring.”
You blinked at him.
“Boring,” you repeated.
He nodded once, unbothered.
“Very.”
A laugh slipped out of you before you could stop it.
“Well, that I know,” you said, picking up your fork again. “I’m trying to learn new things about you.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” you admitted, gesturing slightly with your fork. “Anything that isn’t ‘man who verbally dismantles residents before 7 a.m.’”
That earned a faint huff of amusement from him.
“Fair.”
You took a bite, and for a moment the conversation settled into something easier. Not weightless, exactly, but no longer sharp at the edges either.
“I read,” he continued.
“That doesn’t surprise me.”
“Non-medical books.”
You paused.
“Okay, that’s new.”
His expression stayed neutral, but there was a slight flicker of something like satisfaction.
“Mostly history.”
You leaned forward a little, genuinely curious now.
“Any specific period?”
“Varies,” he said. “Right now it’s post-war reconstruction.”
You studied him for a second, like you were recalibrating the version of him you had in your head.
“You’re telling me,” you said slowly, “that beneath the emotionally constipated attending persona, there’s a guy who reads about infrastructure rebuilding in his free time?”
A low laugh left him, more relaxed now than he had been all day.
You noticed it immediately. The way his shoulders weren’t quite as tight. The way he wasn’t watching you like he was waiting for something to break.
It made something in your chest ease as well.
“So what about you?” he asked after a moment.
You frowned slightly.
“What about me?”
“This version of you,” he said, tilting his head slightly. “Outside the ED.”
You leaned back in your chair, considering that.
“I sleep a lot,” you admitted. “I complain less. I have hobbies that don’t involve watching people actively ignore medical advice.”
“Impressive.”
“Right?”
“Not reading about post-war reconstruction, I assume.”
“Oh, I’ll read,” you said, leaning back slightly in your chair, wine glass lazily in your hand. “But it’s usually some raunchy, enemies-to-lovers thing set in a small beach town.”
That earned a pause from him.
Then, quietly, “Educational.”
You grinned around your bite of food.
“You’d be surprised.”
The ease between you lingered after that, not rushing to be filled. The meal slowly disappeared between conversation and small interruptions—little comments about the food, teasing observations, the kind of back-and-forth that didn’t feel like effort anymore.
It just… happened.
At some point, the plates were empty without either of you really noticing.
Neither of you moved to clear them right away.
Instead, the conversation kept going.
Lighter things first.
Stories from the ED that weren’t arguments. Small absurd moments you both had witnessed but never had time to laugh about before. Patients who said outrageous things. Residents who tried too hard. Nurses who knew everything before anyone else did.
Almost like you were rebuilding a previously thought to be tarnished story.
And Jack laughed more than you expected him to.
Not loudly or performatively. Just enough that it changed the shape of him across from you. Less contained and measured.
And you realized, somewhere in the middle of it, that this version of him wasn’t new.
He had just never had space to exist like this around you before.
Eventually, the conversation slowed without either of you deciding it should.
The silence that followed didn’t feel like an ending. More like a natural pause.
Jack leaned back in his chair slightly, hands loosely clasped in front of him.
For a while, he just looked at you.
Not in a way that made you tense—just in a way that made you notice he wasn’t joking anymore.
“I didn’t talk about this much at work,” he said finally.
Your expression shifted slightly, but you didn’t interrupt.
He exhaled, gaze dropping briefly toward the table before returning to you.
“Loss,” he clarified. “Not in detail.”
Something in your chest tightened, but you stayed still.
“I’ve lost patients,” he continued. “We all do. That part you learn to carry. Or you don’t last long in the ED.”
A pause.
“But there’s a difference between losing patients and…” He stopped himself, jaw tightening briefly like he was choosing his words carefully. “And losing people who were supposed to stay in your life longer.”
You didn’t speak. Not because you didn’t want to. But because you could feel how deliberate this was for him.
Jack didn’t offer things like this easily.
“I had someone early in my career,” he said quietly. “Someone who made the days feel easier. Life felt…lighter. Losing a leg and having a tough job no longer felt as heavy.”
His fingers shifted slightly against each other.
“Then I lost her.”
The admission hung there for a moment.
“When that happened,” he continued, voice steadier now but lower, “I think I started treating everything like it had an expiration date. People. Relationships. Even good moments.”
His gaze lifted to yours again.
“I didn’t want to get comfortable in anything I might lose.”
The honesty of it made your throat tighten.
It wasn’t. dramatic. Or heavy in a way that demanded a response.
It was just what it was.
You let that sit between you both for a moment before speaking.
“So you stopped letting yourself stay in things.”
A faint, almost rueful smile tugged at his mouth.
“I tried.”
You studied him for a second, really studied him, in a way you hadn’t before when you were too busy being frustrated or angry or unsure of what he thought of you.
“And now?” you asked quietly.
His eyes held yours.
“Now I’m trying to be more intentional about what I don’t walk away from.”
The words landed harder than everything else that night.
Outside, the light had shifted further, softening into late evening gold against the kitchen walls. The house felt quieter now, but not empty. Just settled.
You realized you weren’t waiting for the other shoe to drop anymore.
You were just… there.
With him.
And that didn’t feel like something you had to escape from.
It felt like something you might not want to leave.
Jack didn’t move right away. Neither did you. The plates were still on the table between you, forgotten in a way that didn’t feel careless so much as inevitable. Like whatever this conversation had become had quietly taken precedence over everything else.
Outside, the light had shifted fully into evening now, stretching warm gold across the kitchen walls. It softened the edges of everything it touched, including him. Including you.
Jack broke the silence first, but not immediately. He looked down at the table for a moment, then let out a slow breath.
“I don’t know what this looks like outside of here,” he admitted.
You watched him carefully.
“I don’t either,” you said honestly.
That seemed to settle between you without tension. Only truth.
He nodded slightly, like that was enough for now.
Another pause passed.
Then his gaze lifted to yours again, and something about it had changed.
“I meant what I said this morning,” he said quietly.
Your heart picked up immediately, but you didn’t interrupt.
His fingers rested loosely on the table now, no longer clenched or guarded.
“When I said I wanted to be intentional,” he continued, “I meant with you.”
The air between you shifted.
You swallowed, suddenly aware of your hands resting still in your lap.
“Jack—”
He shook his head slightly, not cutting you off, just asking you not to rush him.
“I’ve spent a long time not saying things,” he said. “Not because I didn’t feel them. Because I thought it was easier that way.”
His eyes stayed on yours.
“And because I thought if I gave it a name, it would become something I could lose.”
The honesty of it made your chest ache.
You knew that feeling.
More than you wanted to admit.
He exhaled slowly.
“But I’m tired of treating everything like it’s temporary.”
A beat.
Then, quieter, like it cost him something to say it out loud at all:
“And I don’t want this to be temporary.”
Your breath caught.
Because that wasn’t vague. Or careful. Or any of the things you had grown to know about Jack Abbot.
It was right in front of you without the buffer of uncertainty he usually hid behind.
You searched his face for something that would soften it.
It didn’t come.
Instead, he added, even more quietly:
“I think I’m in love with you.”
The words didn’t echo.
They didn’t need to.
Your throat tightened immediately, like your body had decided to respond before your mind could organize anything coherent.
For a moment, you couldn’t speak at all.
All you could do was look at him.
Really look.
At the man who had spent years being your frustration, your challenge, your impossible standard. The man you had misunderstood for just as long as you’d unknowingly been circling something neither of you had been ready to name.
And now he was sitting across from you like it was the simplest truth in the world.
Like it had always been there—it had just finally been said out loud.
You let out a shaky breath, almost a laugh, but it didn’t fully form.
“That’s…” you started, then stopped, because your voice didn’t feel reliable anymore.
Jack didn’t push.
He just waited.
So you swallowed again, slower this time, forcing yourself to meet his eyes.
“That’s really unfair timing,” you said quietly.
A faint flicker of confusion crossed his face.
And then you exhaled, shaking your head slightly at yourself.
Because there was no point trying to dodge it anymore.
“Because I think I’m in love with you too.”
The silence that followed wasn’t empty.
It was full. Of everything that had been building for years without either of you giving it permission to exist out loud.
For a second, Jack didn’t move.
Neither did you.
Then, slowly, his shoulders eased, like something in him had been carrying that weight longer than he’d let on.
A small, almost disbelieving breath left him.
“Yeah?” he asked quietly.
You nodded once.
“Yeah.”
His gaze dropped briefly to your mouth, then lifted again, slower this time, as if he was making sure you were still there in front of him and not something he’d imagined into existence over the last thirteen days.
You didn’t move away. If anything, you leaned in slightly without thinking about it, closing the already fragile space between you by just enough that it no longer felt theoretical.
His hand came up carefully, pausing for a fraction of a second before settling at your jaw. Just resting there, like he was giving you one last chance to change your mind.
You didn’t.
The breath he let out was quiet.
Barely there.
And then he kissed you.
It wasn’t rushed.
It was controlled in the way someone is controlled when they’ve been holding themselves back for far too long and finally stop trying.
Like he’d made a decision and couldn’t afford to undo it anymore.
Your hand found his shirt without thinking, grounding yourself in something real as the world narrowed down to the space between you.
When he pulled back slightly, it was only enough to breathe, his forehead almost resting against yours.
“You’re sure?” He murmured, like he was giving you one last out. One last chance to decide this wasn’t what you wanted.
“I’m very sure,”
And that was it.
Whatever careful control Jack had been maintaining tonight shattered completely.
His hand tightened at your jaw, tilting your face up as he kissed you again, harder this time. Not asking permission anymore. Just taking what you'd both finally admitted you wanted.
Your fingers twisted in his shirt, pulling him closer, and the sound he made against your mouth sent heat flooding through your entire body.
Years of unspoken feelings.
And now there was nothing left to hold it back.
His other hand found your waist, fingers pressing into the fabric of your dress like he needed to confirm you were real. That this was actually happening.
You gasped softly when his mouth moved to your jaw, then lower, tracing a path down the side of your neck that made your grip on him tighten involuntarily.
"Jack—"
His name came out breathless, almost desperate, and you felt him pause for just a second against your skin.
Then he pulled back enough to look at you, his eyes darker than you'd ever seen them, pupils blown wide with want.
"Stand up," he said quietly.
It wasn't a command—but there was an edge to his voice that made your stomach flip.
You didn't hesitate.
The chair scraped back as you stood, and immediately his hands were on you again—one sliding to the small of your back, the other cupping the side of your face as he kissed you again, deeper this time.
You met him with equal intensity, your hands finding his shoulders, his neck, threading into his hair and pulling slightly without thinking.
He groaned softly against your mouth, and the sound of it—raw and unguarded—made something inside you snap.
Your back hit the edge of the counter.
Jack's body pressed against yours, solid and warm and real, one hand braced on the counter beside you while the other traced down your side, over the curve of your hip, gripping there like he couldn't help himself.
"All mine," he murmured against your lips, even as his hand slid lower, fingers pressing into your thigh through the fabric of your dress.
“All yours,” you breathed back.
That earned a low, almost disbelieving laugh from him before his mouth found yours again, harder, more demanding.
Your hands moved without thought—sliding down his chest, feeling the rapid rise and fall of his breathing, then lower still, tugging his shirt free from his pants so you could finally touch skin.
The moment your fingers made contact with the bare skin of his abdomen, he inhaled sharply, his grip on you tightening.
"Christ," he muttered against your mouth.
You smiled slightly, breathless, and did it again—letting your hands explore the planes of his stomach, his sides, feeling the way his muscles tensed under your touch.
His hand slid higher on your thigh, pushing the fabric of your dress up slightly, and the deliberate slowness of it made your breath catch.
"Jack—"
"I know," he said quietly, his forehead resting against yours for just a moment. "I know."
But he didn't stop.
His thumb traced small circles against your inner thigh, maddeningly close to where you wanted him but not quite there yet, and you made a small frustrated sound that made his mouth curve slightly against your jaw.
"Patience," he murmured.
"I've been patient for years," you shot back, breathless.
That made him pause.
Then he pulled back just enough to look at you properly, his expression shifting into something more serious, more intense.
"So have I," he said quietly.
And then his hand moved higher, finally, and your head fell back against the cabinet with a soft thud as a gasp escaped you.
His mouth found your neck again, kissing and biting gently as his fingers moved with deliberate precision, and you couldn't think anymore.
Couldn't do anything except hold onto him and let yourself feel everything you'd been denying for so long. Something about this time felt…different. Now with everything on the table, you could fully allow yourself to get lost in him.
Your hands found his belt, fumbling slightly with the buckle, and he made a low sound against your throat that might have been your name.
"Bedroom," he managed, voice rough.
You nodded, not trusting yourself to speak.
But neither of you moved.
Instead, his mouth found yours again, kissing you like he couldn't quite bring himself to stop long enough to walk the ten feet to the other room.
Your fingers finally got his belt undone, and his hand caught your wrist gently, stilling you.
"Bedroom," he repeated, more firmly this time.
This time, you listened.
He stepped back just enough to let you move, his hand finding yours and lacing your fingers together as he led you out of the kitchen.
The walk down the hallway felt both impossibly long and far too short.
The moment you crossed the threshold into his room, his hands were on you again—one sliding into your hair, the other at your waist, pulling you flush against him as he kissed you with renewed intensity.
You walked backward until your legs hit the edge of the bed, and then you were falling, pulling him down with you.
He caught himself on his forearms, hovering over you for just a moment, his breathing ragged.
His mouth moved down your jaw, your throat, finding that spot just below your ear that he'd discovered days ago—the one that made you gasp and arch into him every single time.
"Still so responsive," he murmured against your skin, and you could hear the satisfaction in his voice.
"And you're still so smug about it," you managed, your fingers threading into his hair.
"I am," he admitted without shame, his teeth grazing your pulse point. "I love how you react to me."
The word love landed differently now.
Made your breath catch in a way that had nothing to do with what his mouth was doing.
He felt it, the slight hitch, and lifted his head to look at you.
"Say it again," you whispered.
His eyes darkened, but his expression softened.
"I love you," he said, deliberate and clear. Then his hand slid up your thigh, pushing your dress higher. "And I love this. The way you look at me. The sounds you make."
Your hands found his shirt, working the buttons open with more coordination than you'd had in the kitchen. He helped you shrug it off his shoulders, and then your palms were on his chest, sliding down, relearning the terrain you'd mapped thoroughly over the past week.
When your fingers traced the line of his prosthetic, he didn't tense this time. Just watched you with an intensity that made your chest tight.
"I love you," you said, meeting his eyes as your hand moved deliberately along the edge where metal met skin. "All of you."
He exhaled roughly, then captured your mouth again, kissing you hard enough that you felt it everywhere.
His hands made quick work of your dress, the zipper sliding down with practiced ease. You lifted your hips to help him pull it off, and he tossed it aside without ceremony.
"Better," he muttered, his gaze raking over you in just your underwear.
"Your turn," you said, reaching for his belt again.
This time he didn't stop you.
You got his pants open, and he shifted to kick them off with his prosthetic, the movements efficient and unselfconscious in a way that made your heart squeeze.
When he settled back over you, there was nothing between you but thin fabric and intention.
"Come here," you said softly, pulling him down.
He went willingly, his weight pressing you into the mattress as his mouth found yours again. The kiss was deep, thorough, the kind that made you forget where you ended and he began.
Your legs wrapped around his waist, pulling him closer, and he groaned against your mouth.
"You're going to kill me," he muttered.
"Good," you said, rolling your hips deliberately.
His hand slid between you, fingers finding you through your underwear, and the touch was confident, knowing exactly where and how to press.
You gasped, your head falling back, and he took advantage, his mouth moving down your throat, across your collarbone, lower.
"Jack—"
"I know," he said, his voice rough. "I know what you need."
And he did.
He knew how to touch you, how to build the tension until you were trembling beneath him. Knew when to go slow and when to push harder. Knew the exact moment to slide your underwear down your legs and replace his fingers with his mouth.
"Fuck," you gasped, your hands fisting in his hair.
He made a low sound of approval against you, and the vibration nearly undid you.
It didn't take long—it never did with him—before you were gasping his name, your thighs trembling around his shoulders.
When he finally pulled back, his mouth was curved in that rare, genuine smile that you'd only started seeing in the past few days.
"I love watching you come apart," he murmured simply.
You pulled him up to you, kissing him hard, tasting yourself on his lips.
"My turn," you murmured against his mouth.
But he shook his head slightly.
"Not yet," he said. "I want—"
He paused, and something shifted in his expression. Something vulnerable.
"I want to be inside you," he said quietly. "I want to look at you. I want—"
"Yes," you interrupted, understanding immediately. "Yes, Jack."
When he settled back between your thighs, he paused, one hand braced beside your head, the other guiding himself to you.
"Look at me," he said softly.
You did.
His eyes held yours as he pressed forward, slow and deliberate, and the stretch of him was familiar now but no less overwhelming.
"Fuck," you breathed, your hands finding his shoulders.
"You feel perfect," he said roughly. "Every single time."
He started to move, and the rhythm was immediately familiar—the pace you'd learned together, the angle that made you both gasp.
But something was different now.
The way he looked at you. The way his hand found yours, lacing your fingers together and pressing them into the mattress. The way he said your name like it meant something more than it had before.
"I love you," he said again, the words coming easier now. "I love you so much."
"I love you too," you gasped, your free hand sliding down his back, feeling the flex of muscle as he moved. "Jack, I—"
"I know," he said, his forehead dropping to yours. "I know, sweetheart."
The endearment made your chest ache.
His pace increased, and you met him thrust for thrust, your body knowing exactly how to move with his.
"Harder," you said breathlessly.
He obliged immediately, his hips snapping forward with more force, and the sound you made was obscene.
"Like that?" he asked, his voice strained.
"Yes—just like that—"
His hand released yours to slide between your bodies, finding where you were joined, and the added pressure made you cry out.
"That's it," he murmured. "Let me hear you."
You were close—so close—and he knew it, could read your body like he'd been doing it for years instead of days.
"Come for me," he said roughly. "I want to feel it."
The command, the intimacy of it, the way he was looking at you like you were everything—it pushed you over the edge.
You came with his name on your lips, your body clenching around him, and he followed immediately after, his face buried in your neck as he groaned your name.
For a long moment, neither of you moved.
Just stayed there, breathing hard, hearts racing against each other.
Finally, he lifted his head to look at you, and his expression was soft in a way you'd never seen before.
"I love you," he said again, like he couldn't stop saying it now that he'd started.
You reached up, brushing his hair back from his forehead.
"I love you too," you said. "So much."
He kissed you then, slow and tender, before carefully pulling out and standing to walk over to the bathroom.
When he came back to bed, he cleaned you off before pulling you against him immediately, your head on his chest, his arm wrapped securely around you.
"Stay," he said quietly.
You smiled against his skin.
"I'm not going anywhere."
His hand traced idle patterns on your shoulder, and for a while, you just lay there in comfortable silence.
"This changes things," he said eventually.
"I know."
"I don't know what it looks like when we go back," he admitted. "But I meant what I said. I want to figure it out."
You tilted your head to look up at him.
"So do I."
He pressed a kiss to your forehead.
"Good."
Outside, the evening had fully settled into night, but inside, everything felt warm and settled and right.
Like maybe, despite everything, you'd both finally found something worth holding onto.
Summary: Jack Abbot books an oceanfront vacation house in the Outer Banks and insists every suspiciously luxurious feature is simply “for the house.” The private pool. The hot tub. The king bed facing the ocean. The indoor shower with the bench. The outdoor shower. It’s all very practical. Obviously. Except Jack has had this whole week planned from the start, and with no shifts, no alarms, no pagers, and nowhere else to be, all that focus, patience, and husbandly devotion has exactly one place to go. You.
Warnings: 18+ only, smut, oral sex f/m receiving, intercourse, outdoor shower sex, implied/mentioned sex in multiple places, married couple being obsessed with each other, vacation Jack is a menace, soft aftercare, body worship, prosthetic/accessibility mention, lots of consent/check-ins, excessive use of the word vacation.
Author’s Note: Vacation Jack has entered the chat, and he is everyone’s problem. This is married Jack, soft Jack, smug Jack, worships-his-wife-like-it-is-his-life’s-work Jack. I hope you enjoy him taking vacation extremely seriously.
Xoxo, Del
Jack had been weird since the airport. Not the kind of weird that meant he was standing in a security line while mentally triaging three patients who were not in front of him. Worse. Relaxed weird. He had moved through the terminal with one hand curled around the handle of his suitcase and the other settled at the small of your back, calm as anything. No pager. No phone call from the hospital. No schedule to double-check. No crease between his brows while he thought five steps ahead of everyone else. Just Jack in a soft gray T-shirt, sunglasses tucked into the collar, wedding ring catching the fluorescent airport light every time his hand shifted against you. It was unsettling.
“You keep looking at me,” Jack said from the seat beside you, his voice low enough not to carry.
You turned away from the plane window and looked at him properly. “Because you’re being weird.”
Jack’s mouth curved faintly. “Weird?”
“Calm,” you said, like the evidence was obvious.
His thumb moved once over your thigh, lazy and warm where his hand rested above your knee. “That’s weird?”
“For you?” You gave him a look. “Yes.”
Jack’s smile deepened. “I’m on vacation.”
“You keep saying that like it explains everything,” you said.
“It explains a lot,” Jack replied, his hand still warm on your leg.
You narrowed your eyes at him. Jack leaned closer, his shoulder brushing yours. “Hey, baby.”
Absolutely not. You knew that tone. You had been married to that tone. You had folded laundry with that tone. You had woken up to that tone pressed against the back of your neck and immediately lost whatever argument you had planned about needing sleep. You turned your head slowly. “Why did you say that like you’re about to be annoying?”
Jack’s mouth curved wider. “You in the mile-high club?”
You stared at him. “Jack Abbot.”
“That’s not an answer,” he said.
You leaned back against your seat. “Absolutely not.”
Jack sat back too, completely unbothered. “Worth a shot.”
“We have been on vacation for forty-seven minutes,” you said.
Jack glanced at his watch. “Strong start.”
“You are not serious,” you said, fighting the smile already pulling at your mouth.
“I’m very serious,” Jack said, his thumb sweeping over your thigh again. “I planned a whole week.”
“You planned a whole week, so naturally your first thought was sex in an airplane bathroom?” you asked.
“No,” Jack said, calm as anything. “That was my second thought.”
You pressed your lips together, trying very hard not to smile. Jack looked at your mouth, then back to your eyes. “You’re enjoying vacation Jack.”
“I’m concerned about vacation Jack,” you said.
“Good,” Jack replied.
“That was not the reassurance you thought it was,” you told him.
Jack lifted your hand, brought your knuckles to his mouth, and kissed them like he had all the time in the world. Which, unfortunately, he did. That was the problem. At home, there was always something. Work. Laundry. Groceries. A shift starting too early or ending too late. Jack coming home exhausted but still kissing you in the kitchen like he could not help himself. You falling asleep against his shoulder on the couch because you both had the best intentions and the worst schedules. At home, loving each other sometimes came in pieces. A hand on your hip while one of you reached for coffee. A kiss before sunrise. A shower taken together because it was the only private twenty minutes you could steal. Jack’s fingers brushing yours under a table. Your face tucked into his neck for exactly thirty seconds before one of your phones went off. This was different. This was Jack with no alarm set. Jack with his shoulders loose. Jack with nowhere else to be. Jack with an entire week and a look in his eyes that made you wonder, briefly and sincerely, if you had made a mistake getting on this plane with him.
By the time you landed in North Carolina, picked up the rental car, and started driving toward the Outer Banks, the feeling had only gotten worse. The windows were down. The air had gone warm and salty, slipping through the car and lifting the ends of your hair. Jack drove with one hand on the wheel and the other resting over your thigh, his thumb moving every now and then like he was not even thinking about it. You, unfortunately, were thinking about it a lot. You were thinking about his hand. His forearm. The way his shirt stretched when he turned the wheel. The quiet contentment on his face as the road opened in front of you and the sky went wide and blue above the water.
“You’re doing it again,” Jack said, eyes still on the road.
You blinked. “Doing what?”
His thumb dragged once over your thigh. “Looking at me.”
“I’m allowed to look at my husband,” you said, turning slightly in your seat.
Jack glanced over just long enough for you to catch the curve of his mouth. “You’re allowed to do a lot of things with your husband.”
You let your head fall back against the seat. “See? That. That is what I mean.”
His hand tightened on your thigh, warm and amused. “What?”
“Vacation Jack,” you said, pointing at him like the evidence was obvious.
Jack looked back at the road. “He sounds nice.”
“He sounds like a menace,” you said.
Jack’s smile deepened. “He rented you a beach house.”
“You rented us a beach house,” you corrected.
Jack shrugged one shoulder. “Same thing.”
That should have been your first warning. Not the mile-high joke. Not the hand on your thigh. Not even the way he kept saying vacation like it was both an explanation and a threat. That sentence. He rented you a beach house. Because when Jack finally pulled into the long driveway, gravel crunching beneath the tires, and the house came into view, you realized with sudden, full-body clarity that your husband had not rented a beach house. He had rented a house. A house. Oceanfront. Tall windows. Wide decks. Pale wood and white trim and a private path disappearing through dune grass toward the beach. It looked like something from an architectural magazine. The kind of house people stayed in when they owned linen pants unironically and knew how to arrange lemons in a bowl. You sat in the passenger seat and stared. Jack put the car in park. You did not move.
He glanced over. “You okay?”
“Jack,” you said, still looking at the house.
His hand paused on the gearshift. “What?”
“This is a house.”
Jack looked through the windshield. “That was the goal.”
“No.” You turned to him. “This is a house.”
“It had good reviews,” Jack said.
You stared at him. He added, “And beach access.”
“Jack.”
“And a kitchen,” he said.
“You’re not helping yourself,” you told him.
His expression stayed perfectly composed, but you knew him too well. You saw the smugness hiding at the corner of his mouth. You saw the way he looked at you instead of the house, like he had been waiting for this exact reaction. Your chest softened before you could stop it.
“Oh my god,” you said quietly. “You’re proud of yourself.”
Jack took the keys from the ignition. “I made a good choice.”
“You made an insane choice,” you said.
“I made a good insane choice,” he replied.
You got out of the car slowly, still staring up at the house as warm coastal air wrapped around you. Jack came around the back, opened the trunk, and started pulling out luggage like this was normal. Like he had not driven you up to a house with floor-to-ceiling windows and a view of the ocean glittering behind it. You followed him up the steps to the front door in a daze. “Before we go in,” you said, stopping behind him, “I need you to know that I am suspicious.”
Jack unlocked the door. “Of the house?”
“Of you,” you said.
He pushed the door open. “That’s fair.”
You forgot the rest of your sentence. The house opened wide in front of you, bright and airy and flooded with light. Pale floors stretched toward the back wall, which was almost entirely glass. Beyond it, the ocean moved blue and endless, sunlight breaking across the water in bright pieces. There was a living room with soft white couches, a huge kitchen to the left, and a deck beyond the glass doors that looked like it had been built specifically for long mornings, bare feet, and coffee gone cold because you were too busy watching the waves. For a second, you did not accuse Jack of anything. You just stood there. Jack set the bags down inside the door and came up behind you. His hand settled at your waist, careful and warm.
“Good?” he asked.
You swallowed. “Jack.”
His voice softened. “Yeah?”
“This is beautiful,” you said.
He did not say anything right away. When you turned your head, he was not looking at the ocean. He was looking at you. Like this had been the view he had actually been waiting for. Something tender pressed behind your ribs. Then Jack’s thumb moved against your waist, and the faintest hint of a smile returned to his face. “If we’re doing vacation,” he said, “we’re doing it right.”
You let out a breath that was almost a laugh. “That sounds like something a man says before revealing he spent too much money.”
“It was a reasonable amount of money,” Jack said.
You tilted your head. “Do not lie to me in this beautiful house.”
His mouth curved. “Vacation.”
“There it is,” you said.
Jack kissed the side of your head, then stepped around you and picked up two of the bags. “Come on.”
“You’re giving me a tour?” you asked, following him.
“I am,” Jack said.
“Should I be afraid?”
He looked back at you. “Probably.”
You followed him into the kitchen first. It was ridiculous. Huge island. Stone counters. Ocean view. A stove that looked nicer than your entire apartment had when you and Jack had first moved in together. There were glass-front cabinets, a farmhouse sink, and enough counter space to host a cooking show. You stopped beside the island. “This kitchen is bigger than our living room.”
Jack set one bag down near the pantry. “Good for cooking.”
“Are we cooking?” you asked.
“Probably,” he said.
You looked over at him. “That was vague.”
Jack came back to you and leaned one hip against the island, arms folding loosely over his chest, looking entirely too comfortable in a kitchen he had absolutely not chosen for practical reasons alone. You looked at him. He looked back. Your eyes narrowed. “Here?”
Jack’s eyebrows lifted. “Here what?”
“You know what,” you said.
His mouth twitched. “I pictured coffee.”
You stared at him. “You rented this kitchen for coffee?”
“Breakfast too,” Jack said.
“How domestic.”
His hand reached out, fingers hooking lightly around your waist to draw you a step closer. “You sitting right there while I cook.”
You followed his gaze to the wide stretch of counter beside him. “On the island?”
“Mm-hm,” Jack said.
You looked back at him. “That sounds innocent.”
“It started that way,” he said.
Your breath caught before you could stop it. Jack noticed. He smiled like he had not done a single thing wrong. “Coffee first.”
“You are being smug,” you said.
“I’m being honest,” Jack replied.
“You are being honest smugly.”
He leaned in and kissed you once, quick and warm. “Vacation.”
You pointed at him as soon as he pulled back. “You cannot keep using that as a defense.”
“I can,” Jack said.
“You can’t.”
“I am,” he said, stepping away before you could decide whether to pull him back or yell at him. Both felt appropriate. The tour continued through the living room, where Jack said he pictured you curled into the corner of the couch with a book and your feet in his lap. That one was sweet enough that you almost let your guard down. Almost. Then he opened the glass doors to the deck, and the ocean air rushed in. Outside, the house became even more outrageous. There was a private pool tucked into the deck below, blue water flashing beneath the sun. A hot tub sat beneath a covered section, shaded and close enough to the doors to be convenient. Beyond that, a path wound through sea grass toward the beach. There were chaise lounges lined up near the pool, angled toward the water, with tall privacy hedges and fencing positioned in a way that felt less accidental the longer you looked at it. You stepped onto the deck. Jack followed behind you. You looked at the pool. Then the loungers. Then the hot tub. Then Jack.
“No,” you said.
His mouth twitched. “No?”
“Absolutely not,” you said, pointing toward the pool.
Jack stepped beside you. “You don’t even know what I pictured.”
“I know exactly what you pictured,” you said.
“You’re projecting,” he replied.
“You picked a house with privacy hedges around the chaise lounges.”
“For shade,” Jack said.
You turned your head slowly. “For crimes.”
Jack laughed then, low and surprised, and the sound moved through you warmer than the sun. He caught your hand and pulled you closer, his arm sliding around your waist from behind as you both looked out over the deck. “Out there,” Jack said, nodding toward the chaise lounges, “I pictured you with a book.”
“That sounds sweet,” you said.
“It was,” he replied.
Your eyes narrowed. “Was?”
“And sunscreen,” Jack said.
You closed your eyes. “Jack.”
“What?” His mouth brushed your shoulder. “Sunscreen is important.”
“You are weaponizing responsibility,” you said.
“I’m taking care of my wife,” he said.
“You always say that right before doing something suspicious.”
Jack’s mouth curved against your shoulder. “You always like it.”
You opened your mouth. Closed it. Jack hummed, pleased and infuriating, and pointed toward the pool. “I pictured you in there, too.”
“Swimming?” you asked.
“Sometimes,” he said.
“Jack.”
“You asked for the tour,” he reminded you.
“I did not ask for the director’s commentary.”
“You’re getting it anyway,” he said.
You looked toward the hot tub. “And that?”
Jack followed your gaze. For once, he did not immediately make a joke. The hot tub sat under the covered deck, tucked into its own little pocket of shade and privacy. From there, you would be able to hear the ocean without seeing anything but the water, the sky, and each other. “That one was quiet,” he said.
You blinked. “Quiet?”
His hand spread over your stomach, pulling your back a little more securely against his chest. “You. Me. The ocean loud enough that we don’t have to be.”
Your stomach dipped. “Jack,” you said, his name coming out softer than you meant it to.
His voice stayed calm, but his mouth was close to your ear now. “You asked what I pictured.”
You leaned back against him because your knees had gotten a little unreliable. “I’m starting to regret that.”
Jack’s hand tightened gently at your waist. “No, you’re not.”
The worst part was that he was right. Then you saw the small structure tucked off to the side of the pool, its white door propped open to reveal shelves stacked with towels and beach chairs. You pointed. “Is that a pool house?”
“Storage,” Jack said.
You turned in his arms. “Storage?”
“Towels,” he said. “Floats. Probably cleaning supplies.”
You raised your eyebrows. “And you were definitely thinking about pool chemicals when you booked it.”
Jack’s eyes warmed. “Mostly towels.”
“That was worse,” you said.
His hands stayed at your waist. “I pictured you pulling me in there.”
You blinked. “Me?”
“You get bossy when you’re relaxed,” Jack said.
“I do not,” you argued.
“You absolutely do.”
“I would never,” you said, trying to sound offended.
Jack leaned closer, his voice dropping just enough to make your pulse jump. “I’m counting on it.”
For a second, you forgot how to answer him. He smiled, kissed the corner of your mouth, and then had the audacity to step back and continue the tour. By the time he brought the bags upstairs, you were starting to understand the full scope of your situation. This was not a house. This was a map. Jack had not just booked somewhere pretty. He had walked through the listing photos and imagined a whole week of you and him. Coffee and sunlight. Books by the pool. Salt on your skin. His hands on your body. Dinner on the deck. Sleeping late. No phones. No alarms. No one needing either of you before you had even opened your eyes. You were still processing that when you reached the primary bedroom. Then you stopped in the doorway. “Oh,” you said.
The bedroom was worse. Not worse, technically. Beautiful. Soft white bedding. Pale curtains. Glass doors that opened onto a private deck. A king bed facing the ocean, like whoever designed the room had personally declared subtlety dead. Sunlight moved over the sheets in warm, shifting bands, and beyond the windows, the water stretched wide and blue and endless. Jack set the suitcases near the dresser and came to stand behind you. He did not touch you right away. That somehow made it worse.
“And here?” you asked, quieter than you meant to.
Jack’s hand settled at your waist. His voice changed when he answered. Softer. Lower. Less teasing. “Here, I pictured you sleeping in.”
Your throat went tight.
“No alarm,” he said. “No phone. No shift. No one needing you before you even open your eyes.”
You stared at the bed, at the ocean beyond it, at the room he had chosen because he knew you. Because he knew how tired you got. Because he knew how often you woke already making lists in your head, already bracing for the day, already giving pieces of yourself away before breakfast. “That’s what you pictured?” you asked.
Jack stepped closer, his chest brushing your back. “Some of it.” There he was again.
You let out a shaky laugh. “Of course.”
His thumb traced a slow line along your hip. “I pictured this too.”
You looked over your shoulder. “What?”
He leaned down and kissed the side of your neck. Not rushed. Not hungry, not yet. Just warm and deliberate and certain. “Standing behind you,” Jack said against your skin. “Right here.”
Your eyes fluttered. He continued, “Watching you realize I planned this.”
“You are so smug,” you said.
“I am,” he replied.
“At least you admit it.”
His mouth moved higher, just beneath your ear. “I pictured you happy.”
That undid you more than anything else could have. Your hand found his over your waist. Jack’s fingers threaded through yours. “I pictured you rested,” he said. “Spoiled. A little sunburned even though I’m going to be annoying about sunscreen.”
You huffed a laugh. He smiled against your skin. “I pictured us here,” Jack said.
There it was. The whole thing. Not the pool. Not the hot tub. Not the ridiculous kitchen, the private deck, or the bed facing the water. Us. Your chest went so soft it almost hurt.
“You really thought about all of this,” you said.
“Yeah,” Jack answered.
You turned enough to look at him. “Every room?”
“Not every room,” he said.
“Liar.”
Jack’s mouth curved against your neck. “Fine. Most rooms.”
You turned fully in his arms, hands landing on his chest. “This house is insane.”
“No,” Jack said.
“No?” you asked.
His hands settled at your waist. “It’s exactly enough.”
You hated how easily he could do that. Take all your teasing and fold it into something earnest. Make you laugh one second and ache the next.
“You spent too much money,” you said, but there was no heat in it.
Jack’s expression softened. “I wanted you to have a week where nothing needed you.”
You looked up at him. His thumb moved once at your waist. “Nothing but you?” you asked.
Jack’s smile returned, slow and warm. “I’m allowed to need you a little.”
“A little?”
“Vacation,” he said.
You groaned. “You are impossible.”
“You married me.”
“I was young,” you said.
Jack laughed, and the sound loosened something in you. Then he kissed you. It was supposed to be quick. You could tell by the way he started it, soft and almost sweet, his hand lifting to your jaw while the ocean moved bright and endless beyond the windows. But then you kissed him back. And Jack, relaxed, rested, vacation Jack, did not rush. He kissed you like he had imagined this too. Like he had thought about getting you into this room, into this light, with nothing waiting for either of you except a whole week of time. His thumb brushed along your cheek. His other hand stayed low on your back, steady and warm, holding you close without trapping you there. When he pulled back, your breath had gone uneven.
Jack looked perfectly fine, which was unfair. “We should finish the tour,” he said.
You blinked at him. “There’s more?”
His smile turned dangerous. “Bathroom.”
“Oh no,” you said.
“Oh yes,” Jack replied.
The bathroom was somehow even more ridiculous than the bedroom. Double vanity. Huge mirror. Soft lighting. A tub positioned near a window overlooking the water. Smooth stone tile. A glass shower big enough for two people to move comfortably, with rainfall showerheads and a built-in bench along one wall. You stopped in the doorway. Jack stopped behind you. For a second, the joke rose automatically. A shower bench. Of course. Of course, Jack had seen that in the photos and gotten ideas. Of course, your husband, who loved showering with you on a normal Tuesday when both of you were half asleep and stealing time before work, would look at this gorgeous, oversized shower and imagine exactly—
Then you glanced at him. The teasing paused in your throat. Jack was looking at the bench. Not smugly this time. Not only that, anyway. Something quieter crossed his face. Practical. Honest. Familiar in a way that made your heart squeeze. Because it was not just another suspicious feature. It was space. Ease. A place for him to sit without balancing, without bracing himself against slick tile, without turning something as simple as a shower into a calculation.
“Oh,” you said softly. Jack looked at you. You reached for his hand. “Good.”
His brow lifted slightly. “Good?”
You nodded. “I want that for you.”
For a moment, he did not answer. Then his fingers tightened gently around yours. “Yeah,” Jack said. It was simple. Quiet. Enough. Then the corner of his mouth lifted. “I also pictured you in here.”
There he was. You stared at him. “Of course you did.”
“Wet,” Jack said.
“Jack.”
“Naked,” he added.
“Jack.”
“Letting me take care of you,” he said.
That got you quiet again. He stepped behind you and nodded toward the bench. “I pictured sitting there. Hot water on. You between my knees.” Your breath caught. His hands settled gently at your hips. “Washing your hair. Getting the sunscreen off your shoulders because you always miss right here.”
His fingers brushed the back of your arm, light and specific, and you hated that he was right.
“I do not always miss there,” you said.
“You always miss there,” Jack replied.
“I have survived this long.”
“Barely,” he said.
You laughed, but it came out thin because his mouth was near your neck again and his hands were warm through your shirt. “That’s what you pictured?” you asked.
“Some of it,” Jack said.
“You keep saying that.”
“I keep meaning it,” he replied.
You turned your head enough to look at him. “You love showering with your wife.”
Jack’s face did not change. “I do.”
“No shame?”
“None.”
“Not even a little?” you asked.
He leaned in, lips brushing your temple. “I love my wife wet and naked and close enough that I can put my hands on her. I also love when she lets me wash her hair because she makes that little sound when she relaxes.” Your mouth parted. Jack’s thumb slid beneath the hem of your shirt, just enough to touch warm skin. “So, no. No shame.”
You stared at him for a second. Then you pointed toward the bedroom. “You are dangerous in this house.”
“I’m dangerous at home too,” Jack said.
“At home, you have work.”
His gaze held yours. “Not this week.”
That sentence should not have affected you the way it did. It dropped low in your stomach and stayed there. Not this week. No shift. No alarm. No phone. No pager. No stolen pieces. A whole week. Jack kissed your shoulder once and then, cruelly, released you. “Come on,” he said.
You frowned. “There is still more?”
“One more thing,” Jack said.
You followed him because, apparently, you had learned nothing. He led you back through the bedroom, down the stairs, and out through the sliding doors. The deck was warm beneath your sandals. The ocean wind moved through your hair. Jack kept your hand in his as he guided you down the steps, past the pool, past the chaise lounges, past the hot tub you were absolutely not thinking about. Then he stopped near the outdoor shower. It was tucked against the side of the house behind a slatted privacy wall, open to the sky but hidden from the neighbors. Smooth wood. Brushed metal fixtures. Hooks for towels. A little shelf for soap and shampoo. Practical, beautiful, and so clearly part of Jack’s mental vacation itinerary that you almost laughed.
You looked at it. Then at him. “Sand?” you asked.
Jack nodded. “Sand.”
“And salt?” you asked.
“Definitely salt,” he said.
You crossed your arms. “And?” His mouth curved. You lifted your eyebrows. “Jack.”
He stepped closer, not touching you yet. “Water warming up.” Your breath caught because his voice had gone low again. “Your swimsuit still wet,” Jack said. “You accusing me of planning it.”
“You did plan it,” you said.
“I did,” he replied. No hesitation. No shame. Just Jack, standing in the sun, telling you exactly what he wanted because you were his wife and he knew you liked knowing.
Your pulse moved everywhere. “And then?” you asked before you could stop yourself.
Jack’s eyes warmed. Then he reached for you slowly, giving you every chance to step back. You did not. His hands found your waist. “Then,” he said, “I pictured kissing you before you could finish the accusation.”
“You think that would work?” you asked.
“I know it would,” Jack said.
“You are so full of yourself on vacation.”
“Only because I know my wife,” he said.
You opened your mouth to argue. Jack kissed you. It was not like the bedroom kiss. This one had heat under it immediately. Sunlight on your shoulders. Ocean air against your skin. His hands at your waist, steady and familiar. The outdoor shower beside you like a promise he had not cashed in yet. He kissed you once. Twice. A third time, slower, until your fingers curled into the front of his shirt and your body leaned toward his like it had already decided something your brain was still pretending to debate. When he pulled back, his mouth stayed close.
“See?” Jack murmured.
You took a breath. It did not help. “You’re being smug again,” you said.
“Yeah,” he replied.
“At least pretend to be sorry.”
“No,” Jack said.
You laughed, helpless and breathless, and tipped your forehead against his chest. Jack’s arms came around you, holding you there in the warm shade beside the house while the ocean moved beyond the dunes. For a moment, neither of you said anything. No phone rang. No one called his name. No one needed you. There was only the water, the wind, the house, his hands, your heartbeat, and the terrifying knowledge that Jack Abbot had planned an entire week with this much attention. Eventually, you lifted your head. “We should unpack,” you said.
Jack’s hands stayed on your waist. “We should.”
“Groceries,” you added.
“Eventually,” he said.
“Dinner.”
“Eventually,” Jack said again.
You narrowed your eyes. “You’re going to keep doing this all week, aren’t you?”
“Showing you what I pictured?” he asked.
You nodded. His thumb traced the edge of your jaw, gentle enough to make your breath catch all over again. “Only the parts you like,” Jack said. Your stomach flipped. “And only if you want me to,” he added.
There he was. Your Jack. Smug and impossible and gorgeous in the sun, but still your Jack. Still watching you closely. Still making sure. Still turning heat into something safe enough to melt into. You slid your hands up his chest. “Vacation Jack is a problem.”
His smile touched your mouth. “Vacation.”
“You are not allowed to say that anymore,” you said.
“I’m going to say it all week,” Jack replied.
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Jack kissed you again, slower this time, and you knew with sudden, humiliating certainty that groceries were not happening any time soon. Neither was unpacking. Dinner was looking unlikely, too. But Jack’s hands were warm. The ocean was loud. The house was empty. And for once, there was nowhere else either of you had to be.
Groceries did not happen. Unpacking barely happened. Dinner, as you had predicted, did not stand a chance. You made it back upstairs with two suitcases, one tote bag, and a truly admirable amount of denial. Jack carried most of it, because of course he did, one bag over his shoulder and another in his hand as he followed you into the bedroom. The sun had started to lower by then, warm gold spilling across the white bedding and catching in soft strips over the floor. Beyond the glass doors, the ocean moved steadily, loud enough to make the whole room feel separate from the rest of the world. You set your tote on the bench at the foot of the bed and opened it with purpose. “We are unpacking,” you said.
Jack set the suitcases near the dresser. “We are.”
You pulled out a folded shirt and set it on the bed. “We are being responsible adults.”
Jack leaned back against the dresser and watched you. “We are.”
You unfolded the shirt, refolded it badly, and pointed at him without looking up. “You’re doing it again.”
Jack’s voice stayed calm. “Doing what?”
“Looking at me like I’m another amenity,” you said, finally turning to face him.
His mouth curved. You should have known better than to give him that. Jack pushed away from the dresser and crossed the room slowly, his gaze never leaving yours. “You’re the reason I booked the amenities.”
Your fingers tightened in the shirt. “Jack.”
He stopped in front of you, close enough that you had to tip your chin up. “What?”
“You can’t say things like that when I’m trying to unpack.”
His hands settled at your waist. “You’re not trying very hard.”
You looked down at the shirt in your hand, then back at him. “That is not the point.”
Jack’s thumbs moved once over your hips. “No?”
“No,” you said, but your voice had already softened.
His gaze dipped to your mouth. “What’s the point?”
You swallowed. “That you’re distracting me.”
“I know.”
“You’re admitting it?”
Jack leaned in, brushing his mouth along your jaw instead of kissing you properly. “I’m looking at my wife in the room I pictured her in.” Your breath caught. His lips moved to the place just beneath your ear. “I’m allowed to be distracted.” The shirt slipped from your hand onto the bed. Jack noticed. His smile touched your skin. “There you go.”
“You are so smug,” you whispered.
His hands slid a little more securely around your waist. “Devoted.”
You huffed a laugh, but it came out uneven because his mouth had moved to your neck. “That is not the same thing.”
“It is tonight,” Jack said.
He kissed you then, slow and warm, one hand coming up to cup your jaw while the other stayed low on your back. You leaned into him without meaning to, your hands finding his chest, fingers pressing into soft cotton and the solid warmth beneath it. For a moment, it was just kissing. Just his mouth on yours, unhurried and familiar. His thumb brushing your cheek. The sound of the ocean filling the quiet spaces between your breaths. Then you tried to pull him closer. Jack let you for half a second. Then his hand tightened gently at your waist, slowing you.
You pulled back enough to glare at him. “Seriously?”
His eyes were warm. “We’re not in a hurry.”
“You keep saying that like it’s not a threat.”
Jack’s thumb traced the edge of your jaw. “It isn’t.”
“Jack.”
His mouth brushed yours. “It’s a promise.” That did something to you. Something obvious, apparently, because Jack watched your face change and went still in that careful way he had. Not uncertain. Not distant. Just attentive. “Still good?” he asked.
You nodded. Jack did not move. You exhaled. “Yes.”
His mouth curved, softer this time. “Good.” Then he kissed you again. Slower. Deeper. Like he had all night. Like he had all week. Like the entire house had gone quiet just to give him time to learn you again. His hands moved with infuriating patience, tracing your waist, your ribs, the line of your back. He touched you like none of it was routine. Like every inch of you had been missed. Like he had spent too many mornings kissing you quickly before work and too many nights pulling you against him half-asleep and now he had finally been handed enough time to do it properly. You tried to make a sound that was not desperate. It failed.
Jack’s mouth paused against yours. “I know.”
“You don’t even know what I was going to say,” you said.
His hand slid beneath the hem of your shirt, palm warm against your skin. “I know that sound.” Your eyes fluttered. He kissed the corner of your mouth. “I know what it means.”
You should have had a comeback for that. You had nothing. Jack took the silence for what it was and began to undress you slowly. Not in a practiced, showy way. Not like he was trying to prove anything. He just took his time, easing fabric over your head, letting his mouth follow where his hands had been. Your shoulder. Your collarbone. The soft curve beneath it. The inside of your wrist, when he lifted your hand and kissed there too, like even that deserved attention. By the time your shirt hit the floor, your breathing had changed. Jack heard it. His eyes lifted to yours. “There she is.”
You swallowed. “Don’t start.”
His hand smoothed over your side. “I haven’t even started.”
That was the problem. He had not. He had barely done anything, really. He had kissed you and touched you and watched you like he had nothing else in the world to do, and already you felt too warm, too aware, too seen. “You’re staring,” you said.
Jack’s hand settled over your hip. “I get to.”
Your mouth parted. He leaned in and kissed the center of your chest, then lower, then paused with his forehead resting lightly against you. His hands stayed gentle, thumbs moving in slow arcs against your skin. “I get you for a whole week,” he said. Your fingers slid into his hair. “No pages,” Jack said, kissing lower. “No alarms.”
“Jack,” you whispered.
“No one knocking on the door,” he continued, his mouth moving over your stomach. “No one needing either of us.”
You tried to steady yourself with a breath. “You sound very pleased about that.”
Jack looked up at you. “I am.”
“Smug,” you said.
His mouth touched your skin again. “Devoted.”
The word went straight through you. Jack guided you back until your legs met the edge of the bed. You sat because he wanted you to, because your knees were not doing much useful work anyway, and he sank down in front of you like the motion cost him nothing. Like this was exactly where he had intended to end up from the moment he walked you into the room. The ocean shifted blue and gold beyond the windows. Jack’s hands moved over your thighs. You looked down at him. “You pictured this too?”
He kissed just above your knee. “Some of it.”
“Of course you did.”
His eyes found yours. “I pictured taking my time.” Your stomach dipped. He kissed higher, still slow, still patient, his hands steady on you. “I pictured you letting me.”
Your fingers tightened in the bedding. Jack stopped immediately. His thumb swept over your thigh. “Still good?”
You nodded too quickly. “Yes.”
His gaze held yours for one more second. Then his mouth curved. “Good.”
He kept going. And he worshipped you. There was no other word for it. Jack kissed every place he uncovered. Every place his hands moved. Every place that made your breath change. He learned you as if he did not already know you, as if being married to you had only made him more interested, not less. Like familiarity had turned into devotion in his hands. You tried to stay clever. You really did. But Jack noticed everything. The hitch in your breath. The way your fingers twisted in the sheets. The little sound you made when his mouth found the inside of your thigh. The way you tried to swallow his name and failed. “Jack,” you breathed.
His mouth moved against your skin. “I know.”
“Please.”
“I’ve got you,” he murmured.
Your head tipped back. “Don’t stop.”
Jack’s hands tightened gently, holding you where he wanted you. “I’m not stopping.”
He did not. He took his time with you. That was the worst part. He did not rush, did not let you rush him, did not give in when your hips shifted restlessly beneath his hands. He only held you there, mouth warm and patient, learning every sound you tried to swallow until your body stopped pretending it could be reasonable. At some point, your hand found his hair. Jack made a low sound, pleased and rough, and your whole body reacted to it. “There,” he murmured against you. “That’s it.”
You shook your head, already too far gone to know what you were arguing against. “Jack.”
“I know, baby.”
“More,” you whispered.
Jack’s eyes lifted to yours. “More?”
You nodded, breath catching. “Please. More.”
His hand slid over your hip, firm enough to ground you. “There you are.”
He gave you more. Not rushed. Never rushed. His mouth and tongue worked you up slowly, paying attention to every shift of your body, every uneven breath, every broken little sound you could not keep in. The room blurred around the edges. The ocean got louder. Or maybe that was your pulse. You could not tell anymore. All you knew was Jack. His hands. His mouth. His voice. “Jack,” you gasped, fingers twisting in the sheets. “Yes. Yes, please. Don’t stop.”
He stayed with you, steady and relentless in the gentlest way, his voice low against your skin. “I’m right here,” he murmured. “Let go.”
Your whole body tightened beneath his hands. “Jack,” you said, voice breaking. “I’m gonna—”
“I know,” he said, holding you through the first helpless tremor. “I’ve got you.”
You came with his name in your mouth. Jack stayed with you through it. He did not pull away. He did not hurry you along. He kept one hand firm at your hip and the other spread over your stomach, grounding you while pleasure moved through you in waves and left you shaking beneath him. For a while, he only let you breathe. His mouth pressed soft, unhurried kisses to your thigh, your hip, the sensitive skin beneath your navel. His hands gentled immediately, no longer asking anything from you, only keeping you close while your heartbeat slowly found its way back to normal. “There you go,” Jack murmured, his voice rougher than before. “Breathe for me.” You made a sound that was supposed to be a laugh, but failed completely. His mouth curved against your skin. “Good.”
You lifted your head just enough to look at him. “You are very pleased with yourself.”
Jack kissed your hip. “I’m pleased with you.”
That was unfair. You dropped your head back against the bed. “That was worse.”
He smiled against your skin. You should have known he was not done. You realized it in the way his hand slid back over your thigh. In the way his mouth returned to your skin. In the way he watched you now, careful and intent, waiting for the exact moment your body softened again instead of simply trembled. “Jack,” you said, already suspicious.
He lifted his head just enough to look at you. “What?”
“You’re not done.”
His thumb moved slowly over your hip. “No.”
Your stomach flipped. “I just—”
“I know,” Jack said, softer. “I was here.”
You stared at him. He lowered his mouth to your thigh again, his eyes still on yours. “I’m still here.”
Your hand found his hair before you could stop yourself. Jack’s gaze darkened. Then he started again. Slower at first. Careful. His fingers joined his mouth, slow and careful at first, and your breath caught so sharply that he paused. His eyes lifted immediately. “Still good?”
You nodded, already overwhelmed. Jack stilled. “Words, baby,” he said.
Your hands found the sheets. “Yes.”
His mouth curved against you. “Good.”
Then he took you apart again. The second time came slower. Deeper. Meaner, somehow, because Jack knew exactly what he was doing now. He knew which sounds meant keep going. He knew when your thighs started to tense. He knew when your hand flew back to his hair and when your voice broke around his name. He noticed everything. He always did. “Jack,” you said, but it barely sounded like his name anymore. His answer was a low hum against your skin. “Yes,” you gasped. “Yes, please.”
Jack’s hand pressed gently against your stomach, holding you there, keeping you present. “That’s it.”
Your breath broke. “Feels so good.”
“I know,” he murmured.
“Don’t stop.”
“I’m not stopping.”
You tried to say something else. Something clever. Something teasing. Something that sounded like you had not been reduced to nothing but want and his name. What came out instead was, “Jack.”
His grip tightened slightly. “I’ve got you.”
“More.” He gave you more. Your breath caught hard, then broke. “Jack,” you gasped, hand tightening in his hair. “I’m gonna come again.”
His answer was a low, rough sound against your skin. “That’s it,” he murmured. “Let me have it.”
You came apart again with his name in your mouth and his hands holding you steady, the ocean moving beyond the windows and sunlight going soft over the sheets. Jack stayed with you through that, too, slower now, careful as your body shook and then softened beneath him. When it was over, you felt boneless. Overheated. Completely ruined in a way that should have embarrassed you but did not, because Jack was already kissing his way back up your body like he had not finished loving any part of you. Your hands found his face before he could say anything smug enough to destroy you further. “Come here,” you whispered.
Jack paused above you, eyes searching yours. “Yeah?”
You nodded, drawing him down until his weight settled carefully over you. “I want you close.”
His expression changed. The smugness eased out of him, leaving only heat and tenderness and something so openly adoring that your chest ached with it. Jack kissed you once, softer than you expected. Then again. Then he settled between your thighs, careful with you, still watching. “Still good?” he asked.
You wrapped your arms around him. “Jack.”
His mouth brushed your cheek. “Words.”
“Yes,” you whispered. “Please.”
That was all he needed. He entered you slowly at first. Careful. Close. One hand braced beside your head, the other tangled with yours against the sheets. His forehead dipped to yours, and for a moment, neither of you said anything. There was only the sound of the ocean, your uneven breathing, and Jack’s mouth brushing yours every time you made a sound he wanted to keep. He set a deep, slow pace. “There you are,” he murmured.
You clung to him. “I love you.”
Jack’s rhythm faltered for half a breath. Then his forehead pressed more firmly to yours. “I love you too,” he said, voice rough. “So much.”
You pulled him closer, needing the weight of him, the warmth of him, the familiar shape of his body over yours. “Feels so good.”
Jack kissed you, and the kiss caught on your next breath. “Yeah?”
You nodded, already losing the thread again. “Don’t stop.”
“I’m not stopping,” he said.
He did not. He gave you what you asked for. Slow at first, then less so when your body answered him, when your legs tightened around his hips, when your hands slid over his back and your voice broke softly against his mouth. He stayed close through all of it, kissing you when you got too loud, then pulling back just enough to hear you when you tried to hide. At some point, your words dissolved again. Yes. More. Jack. Please. I love you.
He took each one like it meant something. Like every sound was a gift. Like every breathless, broken version of his name had gone straight through him. “You’re so beautiful,” he said against your mouth. Your eyes burned suddenly, overwhelmed by the room, by the ocean, by the way he was looking at you like this was not just sex. Like this was everything he had been trying to give you since he opened the front door.
“Jack,” you whispered.
“I know.” His hand tightened around yours. “I’ve got you.”
You believed him. You always believed him. Your body tightened around him, pleasure building again so fast it stole the breath from your lungs. “Jack,” you gasped, clutching at his back. “I’m gonna come.”
His rhythm faltered, then deepened, his mouth pressing hard to your jaw. “I know, baby,” he said, voice rough. “Me too.”
“Don’t stop,” you whispered.
“Not stopping.”
When you fell apart for the third time, Jack followed you over with his face tucked against your neck and your name pressed rough and quiet into your skin. He held you through it, shaking once, then going still and warm above you while the last of the sunlight faded across the bed. For a long moment, neither of you moved. You could feel his heartbeat against yours. You could hear the ocean. You could feel his mouth brushing your shoulder, once, twice, like he still had not found a place on you he did not want to kiss. Eventually, Jack shifted his weight carefully off you, but he did not go far. He stayed close, one arm still draped over your waist, his face turned into your neck. You stared at the ceiling and tried to remember your own name.
Jack pressed a kiss beneath your jaw. “You with me?”
You let out a weak sound. “Unfortunately.”
His laugh was quiet against your skin. “Unfortunately?”
You turned your head to look at him. “I had plans.”
Jack lifted his head, hair mussed, mouth soft, eyes far too pleased. “Unpacking?”
“Groceries,” you said.
His hand moved over your stomach. “Dinner.”
You pointed at him with as much authority as you could manage while naked and boneless beneath a sheet. “Do not act like you care about dinner.”
“I care deeply about dinner,” Jack said.
“You destroyed dinner.”
“I delayed dinner,” he corrected.
“You personally dismantled dinner as a concept.”
Jack’s mouth curved. “That seems dramatic.”
“I am weak,” you said. “I have earned drama.”
His expression softened immediately. “Water first.”
You groaned. “Do not say hydration.”
Jack sat up, entirely too beautiful in the fading light. “Hydration matters.”
“I hate vacation Jack.”
He leaned down and kissed your bare shoulder. “No, you don’t.”
You closed your eyes because he was right and because your body still felt like it had been poured into the mattress. “I’m too tired to argue.”
“Good,” Jack said.
You cracked one eye open. “Good?”
He brushed his thumb over your cheek. “I like winning.”
“You are a menace.”
Jack kissed your forehead before he got out of bed. “Devoted.”
You watched him cross the room, reach for his shorts, and pull them on with the relaxed confidence of a man who had thoroughly ruined your life and intended to order takeout afterward. He grabbed a bottle of water from one of the bags, opened it, and came back to the bed. When he held it out, you took it only because he lifted his eyebrows at you. “You are very bossy for a man on vacation,” you said before drinking.
Jack sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m taking care of my wife.”
You swallowed, then lowered the bottle to glare at him. “You keep saying that after ruining me.”
His hand came up, thumb brushing a strand of hair away from your face. “Both can be true,” Jack said. You hated that your heart went soft. You hated more that he saw it happen. Jack smiled, warm and insufferable, and leaned in to kiss you again. This one was slow. Quiet. Almost sweet. When he pulled back, you reached for him without thinking, and he came easily, settling beside you on top of the sheets. You tucked yourself against him, cheek on his chest, your body still humming and loose. Jack’s hand moved up and down your back. Outside, the sky had gone dusky over the water. Inside, the room was warm and dim and wrecked in small, obvious ways. Your shirt on the floor. His shoes abandoned near the dresser. One suitcase open, untouched. The bedcovers twisted around your legs. Dinner still had not happened. Groceries definitely were not happening. You tilted your face against his chest. “We need food.”
Jack’s hand paused on your back. “I’ll order.”
“You planned that too?”
“I planned options,” he said.
You lifted your head to look at him. “Of course you did.”
His mouth curved. “Vacation.”
You dropped your face back to his chest with a groan. Jack laughed and kissed the top of your head. You felt the sound under your cheek. You felt the warmth of him around you. You felt, with sudden, dangerous clarity, that this was only the first night. And Jack still had a whole week.
You woke up to the ocean. Not an alarm. Not Jack’s phone buzzing on the nightstand. Not the quiet, practiced sound of him trying to get out of bed without waking you before your shift. The ocean. For a few seconds, you did not move. You stayed exactly where you were, cheek pressed into the pillow, body warm beneath the sheets, light spilling soft and gold through the curtains. The glass doors were cracked open just enough to let the sound in, waves rolling steady beyond the deck, the air carrying the faintest trace of salt. Then you became aware of three things at once. One, you were naked. Two, you were sore. Three, your husband was not in bed. That last one was suspicious. You opened one eye. Jack’s side of the bed was rumpled and empty, the sheet still twisted from where he had slept close to you most of the night. His shirt was still on the floor near the suitcase. Your suitcase was still open and mostly untouched. Your clothes from yesterday had been moved to the chair, which meant Jack had cleaned up just enough to be annoying about it. You lifted your head. The bedroom door was open. From somewhere downstairs came the low sound of cabinets, then the quiet clink of a mug against the counter. Of course. You rolled onto your back and stared at the ceiling. He had personally destroyed your ability to unpack, delayed dinner until takeout had been eaten in bed, made you drink an entire bottle of water while naked and boneless beneath the sheet, and now he was probably downstairs acting like a responsible adult because he had woken up first. You loved him. You hated him. You were going to marry him again. Slowly, carefully, you sat up. Your whole body protested. “Oh my god,” you whispered to the empty room.
From downstairs, Jack called, “You okay?”
You froze. Of course he heard you. Of course. You looked toward the open bedroom door. “Stop having doctor hearing.”
“I have husband hearing,” Jack called back.
You rubbed both hands over your face. “That is worse.”
“There’s coffee,” he said from somewhere near the kitchen.
You narrowed your eyes at the doorway. “Is that a peace offering?”
“No,” Jack called back. “It’s coffee.”
You tried not to smile. It took you a minute to find clothes. Not because you had unpacked, obviously, but because your husband had made an absolute ruin of any organized plan you had for this vacation. Eventually, you pulled on a soft pair of shorts and one of Jack’s T-shirts from the open suitcase, mostly because it was closest and partly because you knew exactly what it would do to him. You made your way downstairs slowly. Jack was in the kitchen. Barefoot. Hair still messy from sleep. Black sweatpants low on his hips. No shirt. Standing in front of the stove like he had not personally changed the chemical composition of your bones the night before. You stopped in the doorway. Jack looked over his shoulder, spatula in hand. “Morning.”
You stared at him. His eyes dipped once, taking in his shirt on your body, then returned to your face with a heat that did not belong anywhere near breakfast. You crossed your arms. “No.”
Jack’s brows lifted. “No?”
“You do not get to stand there like that.”
He looked down at himself. “Like what?”
“Shirtless,” you said.
Jack glanced back at the stove. “I’m making breakfast.”
“You are making threats,” you told him.
His mouth twitched. “Eggs.”
“Threatening eggs.”
Jack turned the burner lower, set the spatula down, and reached for the mug beside him. “Coffee?” You eyed him. He lifted a second mug from the counter. “Decaf for you if you want it. Regular if you want to live dangerously.”
You walked toward him, slow and careful. Jack noticed. His amusement softened immediately. “Sore?”
You stopped in front of him. “Do not sound proud.”
“I don’t,” Jack said.
“You do.”
His hand found your waist, gentle over the soft cotton of his shirt. “I sound concerned.”
“You sound like a man who caused a problem and then packed a first-aid kit.”
Jack’s mouth curved. “Hydration matters.”
You pointed at him. “You are not allowed to say that before nine in the morning.”
“It’s nine-thirty,” he said.
You glanced toward the clock on the stove. “That cannot be right.”
Jack handed you the mug. “You slept in.”
You took it slowly. For some reason, that was what got you. Not the house. Not the ocean. Not the ridiculous bedroom. Not even Jack standing shirtless in a sunlit kitchen making breakfast like some kind of vacation hallucination. You slept in. No alarm. No shift. No phone dragging you out of bed before your body was ready. No list already forming in your head before your eyes opened. Just sleep. Jack watched your face change. His thumb moved once at your waist. “Good?”
You looked down into the coffee. “Yeah.”
His voice softened. “Good.”
You took a sip, mostly so you would not have to respond right away. It was perfect. Of course it was. You lowered the mug and looked at him. “You’re very annoying.”
Jack’s eyes warmed. “I know.”
“You made good coffee,” you added.
“I did.”
You smiled softly. “You let me sleep.”
“You needed it,” Jack replied.
“You made breakfast.”
Jack turned back toward the stove. “Still making it.”
“And you’re shirtless,” you added.
He slid eggs onto a plate. “That part was for me.”
You laughed. “For you?”
Jack carried the plate to the island and set it in front of you. “I like when you look at me.”
Your stomach flipped because, apparently it had no loyalty to you whatsoever. You picked up your fork. “I’m eating.”
“You should,” Jack said.
Your eyes narrowed, “You are not distracting me from breakfast.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he replied.
You gave him a look. “You absolutely would.”
Jack reached for a glass and filled it with water. “I’m being responsible.”
You took the water when he slid it toward you. “You are being obscene with responsible vocabulary.”
His smile deepened. “Eat.”
You pointed your fork at him. “Bossy.”
“Concerned,” Jack said.
“Smug.”
“Devoted,” he corrected.
You hated that it still worked. Jack knew it did. He leaned across the island and kissed your temple before you could call him out for it. Breakfast was eggs, toast, fruit he had somehow remembered to pick up the night before when you had been half-asleep and wrapped in a sheet, and coffee that tasted better because you were drinking it in his shirt with the ocean visible through the windows. Jack ate standing at first, which lasted about thirty seconds before you pointed at the stool beside you. “Sit,” you said.
He looked at you over his mug. “I’m fine.”
“I did not ask if you were fine.”
Jack’s mouth twitched. “No?”
You pointed again. “Sit down and eat like a normal vacation person.”
“A normal vacation person?” he asked.
“Yes,” you said. “The kind who does not hover shirtless in a kitchen after committing crimes against his wife.”
Jack sat, still smiling. “Crimes?”
You took another bite of toast. “Several.”
His knee brushed yours under the island. “You seemed enthusiastic.”
You nearly choked on your coffee. “Jack.”
He reached over and steadied your mug with one hand. “Careful.”
“You do not get to say things like that and then ‘careful’ me.”
“I can do both,” he said.
“You keep doing both.”
Jack’s hand settled on your thigh beneath the island, warm and familiar. “That’s marriage.”
You looked at him. “That is not the official definition.”
“It’s ours,” he said.
That softened you before you were ready for it. Jack saw that too, because he saw everything. His thumb moved once over your leg. You looked out through the windows instead of at him. The pool glimmered below the deck. The chaise lounges sat in neat rows in the morning sun. The hot tub was quiet beneath the shaded overhang. Beyond the dune grass, the ocean rolled on like it had nowhere else to be either.
By the second day, you stopped pretending the kitchen was only for cooking. It happened after breakfast, when you were rinsing plates at the sink, and Jack came up behind you with his hands warm on your hips. You had meant to be useful. You had meant to clean up, change, maybe go for a beach walk before the sun got too high. Jack had kissed the side of your neck instead. You had told him the dishes were not done. He had reached past you, turned off the water, and said, very calmly, “They can wait.”
Then he had turned you around, lifted you onto the island he had claimed was for coffee, and kissed you until you forgot there were dishes in the sink at all. It was not the bed. It was not slow in the same way the first night had been slow. It was Jack standing between your knees in the bright morning kitchen, your hands in his hair, his mouth on yours, the whole house quiet around you while the ocean moved beyond the windows. It was your shorts on the floor. His hands under his shirt on your body. Your back against cool stone and Jack’s voice at your ear, low and wrecked, telling you he had pictured this too. Afterward, while you sat on the counter with his forehead against your shoulder and your breath still coming too fast, Jack reached blindly for the dish towel. You lifted your head. “What are you doing?”
“Cleaning the counter,” he said, voice rough.
You stared at him. “Jack.”
He lifted his head, eyes warm and shameless. “Responsible.”
“You just had sex with me on the kitchen island.”
“And now I’m cleaning it.”
You opened your mouth. Closed it. Jack smiled. “Vacation.”
By the third night, you stopped letting Jack say hot tub without narrowing your eyes. The hot tub incident happened after dinner, when the sky had gone dark, and the deck lights glowed warm against the water. Jack had said it would be relaxing. You had believed him because, apparently, marriage did not make you smarter. It had started relaxing. Warm water. His arm around your waist. Your back against his chest. The ocean loud beyond the deck. His mouth at your shoulder while his hands moved under the water, slow and unhurried, until relaxing stopped being the correct word for any of it. You had turned in his lap to kiss him. That had been your mistake. Or his. Probably both. The kiss deepened. The water moved around you. Jack’s hands settled on your hips, guiding you closer until there was no space left between you. By the time you realized neither of you had any intention of stopping, your arms were around his neck and his mouth was at your throat, both of you tucked beneath the covered deck with only the ocean loud enough to swallow the sounds you were trying not to make.
“No one’s close enough to hear you,” Jack had murmured against your skin.
You had clutched at his shoulders. “Jack.”
His hand had tightened at your waist. “That was also a selling point.”
Afterward, wrapped in a towel and glaring at him across the deck, you said, “I almost drowned.”
Jack handed you a glass of water. “You did not almost drown.”
“Emotionally, I did.”
His mouth curved. “That’s not drowning.”
“It felt medically significant.”
“Good thing I’m a doctor,” he said.
You narrowed your eyes. “You are not my doctor on vacation.”
Jack leaned in, water still in his hand, and kissed the corner of your mouth. “Vacation.”
You took the glass from him because he was right about hydration and because your legs felt unreliable enough that pride was no longer useful.
The chaise lounge was worse. That had started with sunscreen, which Jack insisted on with the solemn focus of a man completing a surgical checklist. He had made you lie on your stomach by the pool with your book open beside you and the sun warm across your back. “Responsible,” Jack said, warming sunscreen between his palms.
You rested your cheek against your folded arms. “You are using that word loosely.”
His hands settled on your shoulders. “I’m protecting your skin.”
“You are enjoying yourself.”
“I can do both,” he said. He could. That was the problem. His hands moved with slow, thorough care, working sunscreen over your shoulders, down your back, along your arms. He was careful around the edges of your swimsuit, careful in a way that turned less careful the longer you stayed quiet beneath him. When his mouth eventually touched the back of your knee, you lifted your head.
“Jack,” you said.
His hand slid over your calf. “Missed a spot.”
“That is not where people put sunscreen.”
His mouth moved higher. “I’m being thorough.”
The book slid off the lounge and hit the deck. You did not pick it up. Jack kissed his way up the back of your thigh, turned you over with careful hands, and settled between your legs like the chaise lounge had been built for exactly this. He kept one hand spread over your stomach, holding you steady, while his mouth moved lower and the sun warmed every inch of skin he had just covered with sunscreen. You gripped the cushion. You said his name. Then you said it again, louder, because the privacy fence was apparently as private as the listing promised, and Jack loved proving a point.
Later, when you were lying boneless in the shade, and Jack was stretched out beside you looking entirely too pleased with himself, you turned your head and glared at him. “You said sunscreen first.”
“I applied sunscreen first,” Jack said.
“That does not make what happened afterward responsible.”
His sunglasses were low on his nose when he looked at you. “I disagree.”
“You would.”
He reached over and brushed his thumb along your wrist. “You liked it.”
You closed your eyes. “I loved it. That is not the point.”
“It feels like part of the point,” Jack said.
You hated how often he was right.
The indoor shower became a problem, too. That one was not fair, because it really was practical. The bench mattered. The space mattered. The ease of it mattered. You saw the difference in him the first time he used it, the way his shoulders loosened when he did not have to brace himself or calculate each movement against slick tile. So you did not make jokes at first. You sat on the bench because he asked you to, warm water running over both of you, steam softening the edges of the glass. Jack settled behind you, careful and steady, and washed the salt out of your hair with his fingers. For a while, it was sweet. It stayed sweet, even when his mouth found your shoulder. Even when his hands moved lower. Even when you reached back for him and heard his breath catch against your wet skin. Then you turned in his lap, water running over both of you, and kissed him until his hands tightened on your waist. The bench made everything easier. Safer. Close in a way that did not ask either of you to balance or brace or think past the next breath. Jack let you set the pace at first. Then he stopped being patient. By the time the water started cooling, your forehead was against his, your arms around his shoulders, his hands firm at your hips while he moved beneath you, and the shower glass had fogged so completely that the rest of the bathroom disappeared.
Afterward, wrapped in one of the absurdly soft white towels, you leaned against the vanity and watched Jack adjust his prosthetic with damp hair falling over his forehead. “That shower is a safety feature,” he said.
You pointed at him. “You are not allowed to weaponize accessibility.”
Jack looked up at you, mouth curving. “I was taking care of my wife.”
“You were doing several things to your wife.”
“Efficient,” he said.
You laughed so hard you had to sit down on the edge of the tub. Jack crossed the bathroom, still smiling, and kissed your wet forehead. “Worth the rental?” he asked.
You looked around the ridiculous bathroom, then back at him. “For the house.”
His laugh warmed the whole room.
By the fourth afternoon, you had stopped pretending Jack was the only problem. He was standing near the pool house, hair damp from the water, towel low on his hips, saying something completely innocent about grabbing another drink. You had taken one look at him and decided you were done being reasonable. “Come here,” you said.
Jack looked over, amused. “Need something?”
You hooked two fingers in the waistband of his swim trunks and pulled him toward the shade of the pool house. His amusement disappeared. “Oh,” Jack said, voice lower.
You smiled up at him. “Vacation.”
That time, Jack was the one who forgot how to argue. The pool house was cooler than the deck, shaded and private, the shelves stacked with towels behind him. You backed him against the closed door, kissed him once, and watched the last of his smugness disappear when you sank slowly in front of him. Jack’s hand found the wall. His head tipped back. For once, he was the one saying your name like it was the only word he had left.
The days started to blur after that. Not because nothing happened. Because everything did. Morning coffee on the deck with your feet in Jack’s lap. Beach walks with damp sand under your heels and his hand wrapped around yours. Long afternoons where you read three pages of your book and remembered none of them because Jack was stretched out beside the pool, sun-warmed and unfairly handsome, occasionally looking over at you like he was still picturing things. There were naps with the glass doors open. There were showers that took too long. There were groceries eventually, though Jack had kissed you against the rental car in the parking lot until you forgot half the list. There were dinners eaten outside while the sky turned pink and orange over the water. There were nights where Jack ordered food because neither of you felt like moving, and mornings where he made breakfast because he woke before you and apparently considered feeding you part of his vacation itinerary. There was water. So much water. Jack handed it to you constantly. At the pool. After the beach. After the hot tub. After sex. Before coffee. Beside the bed. On the deck. Once, insultingly, while you were brushing your teeth.
“You are obsessed,” you told him around your toothbrush.
Jack leaned against the bathroom doorway with a bottle in his hand. “You’re dehydrated.”
You spat into the sink and glared at him through the mirror. “Vacation Jack is a menace.”
His eyes met yours in the reflection. “Vacation Jack is keeping you alive.”
“Vacation Jack is the reason I need medical intervention.”
Jack held out the water. “Drink.”
You took it. Obviously.
By the fifth evening, you caught him in the kitchen again. He had one hand braced lightly on the counter while he looked into the fridge, his weight shifted in that subtle way you knew better than to comment on too directly. The day had been long in the sun. A good long. A beach-walk, pool-swim, shower-too-long kind of long. Jack was still moving like he intended to make dinner. Absolutely not. You crossed the kitchen and took the cutting board from his hand.
Jack looked down at it, then at you. “I was using that.”
“I know,” you said.
His brows lifted. “Do I get it back?”
“No.”
Jack’s mouth twitched. “Am I in trouble?”
“Sit down,” you said.
His expression changed, amusement softening into something more careful. “Baby, I’m fine.”
“I know.”
“I can cook,” Jack said.
“I know,” you repeated.
“Then why am I being banished?”
You set the cutting board on the counter behind you, rose onto your toes, and kissed him once. Slow enough to quiet him. Soft enough to mean it. When you pulled back, your hand stayed against his chest. “Because I want to take care of my husband.”
Jack went still. Not dramatically. Just enough that you felt the breath he did not quite take. Your thumb moved over his shirt. “You have taken very good care of me all week.”
His eyes softened. “Have I?”
You gave him a look. “Do not fish for compliments when you know exactly what you’ve done.”
Jack’s mouth curved again, but the tenderness stayed. “I know some of what I’ve done.”
“You know all of what you’ve done.”
“Most,” he said.
You pointed toward the patio doors. “Chair. Ocean view. Go.”
He glanced toward the patio. “You’re very bossy on vacation.”
You turned back to him. “You pictured that, remember?”
Jack looked back at you. For a second, his smile went quieter. “I did,” he said.
You pointed toward the patio again. “So go enjoy the accuracy of your imagination.”
He caught your hand before you could turn away and kissed your knuckles. “Thank you.”
You softened immediately. “For dinner?”
Jack’s thumb brushed over your wedding ring. “For knowing when to tell me to sit down.”
You hated how quickly your throat tightened. To cover it, you squeezed his hand and lifted your chin. “I’m very wise.”
“And bossy,” he said.
“You love that.”
Jack kissed your knuckles again. “I do.”
He went outside, finally, settling into one of the patio chairs with a view of the water. You watched him through the glass for a moment before you started dinner. He leaned back slowly, one hand resting on the arm of the chair, face turned toward the ocean. The evening light moved over him, softening the lines of his shoulders and catching in his hair. For once, he looked like he was letting himself be still. Not useful. Not on call. Not anticipating the next thing. Just Jack. Your Jack. The man who had built an entire week around giving you rest and laughter and ocean views and his full attention. The man who still needed to be reminded, sometimes, that he was allowed to receive those things too. So you made dinner. Nothing fancy. Pasta, a salad from whatever you had managed to buy at the store, bread warmed in the oven because Jack had insisted vacation bread was different from regular bread, and you had not had the energy to challenge him. You carried the plates outside as the sun lowered toward the water. Jack looked up when the patio door slid open. “That smells good.”
“You sound surprised,” you said, setting his plate in front of him.
“I sound grateful,” Jack said. His hand wrapped around your wrist before you could walk away. “Come here.”
You looked down at him. “I have to get my plate.”
“In a minute,” Jack said. You let him tug you closer. He looked up at you, warm and soft in the evening light. “Thank you.”
Your chest ached. “You already said that.”
Jack’s thumb brushed your wrist. “I’m saying it again.”
“For pasta?” you asked.
“For this,” Jack said. His thumb brushed your wrist. You knew what he meant. The chair. The ocean. The pause. The way you had noticed without making him explain. The way you had taken the knife from his hand and told him to rest like it was not up for debate. You leaned down and kissed him. Jack’s hand slid to your waist, gentle and familiar. When you pulled back, his eyes stayed on yours.
“You’re welcome,” you said softly.
His mouth curved. “Very wise.”
“And bossy,” you added.
“And bossy,” Jack agreed.
You touched his cheek once before stepping back. “Eat your dinner.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said.
You paused at the door and looked back. “Careful.”
Jack’s smile widened. “With what?”
“That tone.”
He leaned back in the chair, relaxed and too handsome for his own good. “Vacation.”
You pointed at him. “I am feeding you out of love.”
“I know,” he said.
You glared at him. “I can take it away.”
“You won’t,” Jack replied with a smirk.
You narrowed your eyes further. “You’re too confident.”
Jack picked up his fork, still smiling. “You love me.”
That was the problem. You did. So you got your own plate, came back outside, and sat beside him while the sky softened into pink and gold and the ocean kept moving below you. For a while, you ate in comfortable quiet. Jack’s foot brushed yours under the table.
You looked over at him. “Don’t start.”
He lifted his glass, eyes innocent. “I’m eating dinner.”
You watched his face. “You’re thinking.”
“I do that,” Jack said.
You sighed. “You’re thinking loudly.”
His mouth twitched. “I’m thinking this is nice.” That shut you up. He looked out toward the water. “You. Me. No plans.”
“We have plans,” you said after a second.
Jack turned back to you. “Do we?”
“Yes,” you said, gesturing with your fork. “Finish dinner. Clean up. Sit out here. Maybe actually watch the sunset like normal people.”
Jack nodded slowly. “Ambitious.”
“No detours,” you added.
His eyes warmed. “You sure?”
You pointed your fork at him. “I am taking care of you tonight.”
Something tender moved over his face. He set his glass down. “Okay.”
The ease of his answer made your heart hurt. “Okay?” you asked.
Jack reached across the small table and held out his hand. You slid yours into it. His thumb moved over your ring again. “Okay.”
So you watched the sunset. Actually watched it. The sky turned orange, then rose, then dusky purple at the edges. The ocean caught every color and broke it apart over the waves. Jack’s hand stayed around yours on the tabletop, warm and steady. Your plates emptied slowly. The air cooled enough that he went inside halfway through and came back with a sweatshirt for you without being asked. You took it from him, trying not to smile. “You are physically incapable of not taking care of me.”
Jack sat down again. “You looked cold.”
“I was cold,” you agreed.
Jack nodded once. “Then I was right.”
“You are very pleased when you’re right,” you said.
“I’m right a lot,” Jack replied.
You pulled the sweatshirt over your head. “That is deeply annoying.”
Jack’s eyes moved over you in his sweatshirt, and the look on his face made your stomach warm all over again. Then he seemed to catch himself. He picked up his water instead. You noticed. Your heart went soft. “Good choice,” you said.
Jack’s eyes flicked to yours over the rim of the glass. “I can behave.”
You laughed. “Since when?”
Jack lowered the glass. “Since you said you were taking care of me.”
That landed quietly between you. You reached across the table and touched his wrist. Jack turned his hand beneath yours, palm up. You threaded your fingers together. “Good,” you said.
His thumb moved over your knuckles. “Good?”
You looked at him, the man you loved, relaxed and sun-warmed and softened by the week, sitting still because you had asked him to. “Yeah,” you said. “Good.”
Jack brought your hand to his mouth and kissed your knuckles. For once, he did not make a joke. For once, you did not either. The sun disappeared behind the water. The deck lights clicked on around you. And for one whole evening, vacation meant dinner, quiet, ocean air, and Jack letting himself be loved back.
The beach did it. That was what you decided later. Not Jack. Not the house. Not the fact that he had been walking around all week looking sun-warmed and relaxed and married in a way that felt personally designed to weaken you. The beach. The beach was responsible. You had spent the afternoon in the water, letting the waves push against your legs while Jack stood close enough behind you to steady you every time the current pulled a little too hard. You had laughed when he caught your waist. He had laughed when you accused him of using the ocean as an excuse to put his hands on you. Then the sun had started to lower. The water had gone gold. Jack had kissed you in the surf with one hand at your back and the other at your jaw, salt on his mouth and ocean around your knees, and something about it had tipped the whole day sideways.
By the time you made it back up the private beach path, you were sandy, damp, warm, and too aware of him. Jack walked behind you, carrying the beach bag over one shoulder, his hair wet from the ocean, his chest bare, his swim trunks hanging low on his hips. His sunglasses were pushed into his hair. His skin was sun-warmed and salt-damp and unfairly golden in the late afternoon light. At the top of the path, you stopped beside the deck stairs and shook sand from one foot.
Jack came up behind you. “You good?”
You looked over your shoulder. “I have sand everywhere.”
His mouth curved. “That happens at the beach.”
“You know exactly what comes after beach,” you said.
Jack’s gaze flicked, very briefly, toward the side of the house. The outdoor shower. You pointed at him. “There.”
His face stayed innocent. “You need to rinse off.”
“You have been waiting all week to say that.”
Jack moved past you toward the side of the house. “Come on.”
You did not follow immediately. He stopped after three steps and looked back. The sun was behind him, low enough to catch along the edges of his shoulders and turn the wet ends of his hair gold. Beyond him, the outdoor shower waited behind the slatted privacy wall, practical and beautiful and ridiculous. Jack lifted his brows. “You coming?”
You stared at him. That was the problem. You had been, repeatedly, all week, and he knew it. His mouth twitched like he knew exactly where your mind had gone. You walked toward him mostly to prove you still had dignity. You did not. Jack set the beach bag on the low teak bench tucked beneath the towel hooks. He pulled out two towels and hung them neatly out of the spray. The normalcy of it made everything worse. He was just preparing. Just moving around the small space with the same quiet competence he brought to everything. Towels. Soap. Shampoo. His wedding ring flashing in the sun. Your swimsuit still damp against your skin. The privacy wall blocking the rest of the deck from view. The ocean loud beyond the dunes.
“You are very organized for a man about to be inappropriate,” you said.
Jack turned the shower knob. Water sputtered once, then streamed down against the wood slats and stone floor. He held one hand beneath it, testing the temperature. “I’m being responsible.”
“You keep saying that.”
He shrugged. “It keeps being true.”
You stepped into the shower space, arms crossed over your chest. “This is for sand.”
Jack looked at you over his shoulder. “And salt.”
“And?” you asked.
His hand stayed under the water. His eyes moved over you slowly. Not like the bedroom. Not patient. Not careful in the same soft, devotional way. This was sharper. Hungrier. Like the whole week had been building toward this exact moment and he was tired of pretending it had not.
“And this,” Jack said.
Then he reached for you. You had time to take one breath before his hands were on your waist and his mouth was on yours. The kiss was immediate. No slow beginning. No teasing pass. No careful little preview. Jack kissed you like he had spent the entire walk up from the beach thinking about it. Like the salt on your skin and the wet curve of your swimsuit and the warmth of the sun had all stacked up against him until even vacation Jack’s patience had limits. Your back hit the privacy wall with a soft thud. Jack’s hand came up behind your head before you could feel the wood, cushioning you automatically even while his mouth stayed urgent on yours.
That made it worse. The desperation. The care. The fact that even when he was losing control, he was still Jack. You grabbed at his shoulders and pulled him closer. He made a low sound into your mouth. The water ran beside you, splashing warm against the stone. Steam rose faintly where it hit sun-heated wood. Jack’s hand slid from your waist to your hip, then back again, like he could not decide where he wanted to touch you first and hated that he had to choose.
You broke the kiss only because you needed air. Jack did not go far. His mouth moved to your jaw, then your neck, salt and heat and pressure all at once. “You planned this,” you said, breathless.
His mouth dragged over the side of your throat. “I told you I did.”
You exhaled, “You admitted it too easily.”
Jack’s mouth moved lower.
Your stomach flipped. Jack’s hand found the tie of your swimsuit. He paused. His forehead pressed briefly to your temple. “Yes?”
You swallowed hard. “Yes.”
His fingers moved. The wet fabric loosened. Jack kissed the spot beneath your ear. “Tell me if you want me to slow down.”
You almost laughed. It came out as a shaky breath instead. “You’ve been slow all week.”
His mouth curved against your skin. “Not right now.”
“No,” you whispered. “Not right now.”
That was all he needed. He pulled you under the water with him. Warmth poured over your shoulders, down your back, over skin already hot from the sun and his hands. You gasped into his mouth when he kissed you again, and Jack caught the sound like he had been waiting for it. Your hands found his chest immediately. Saltwater. Warm skin. The steady beat of him under your palms. Jack looked down at you, breathing harder now, eyes darker than they had been all day.
“You,” he said.
It was not a sentence. It did not need to be. It was new enough to steal your breath. Jack, who always had a line. Jack, who could ruin you with three calm words and a raised eyebrow. Jack, who had spent the whole week walking you through exactly what he pictured. This Jack was looking at you like language had become inconvenient.
You pushed wet hair off his forehead. “Vacation Jack finally speechless?”
His hands tightened on your hips. “Not speechless.”
“No?”
His mouth came down hard against yours. “Busy.”
You laughed into the kiss, and then you stopped laughing because his hands moved with purpose. The water kept running. His mouth kept finding yours. Your swimsuit disappeared, guided away with hands that were both impatient and careful. Jack kissed each new place the water touched, but not with the unhurried reverence of the bedroom. This was needier. Messier. His mouth at your shoulder. Your collarbone. The top of your chest. His hands at your waist, your back, your hips, like he could not stand the thought of any part of you being out of reach.
“Jack,” you breathed. He hummed against your skin. You tipped your head back against the wall. “Oh my god.”
His mouth moved lower. Your hand flew to his hair. Jack looked up immediately. “Still good?” he asked, voice rough.
You nodded. His eyes held yours. You remembered what he needed. “Yes,” you said again. “Please.”
The heat in his face shifted. Not smug now. Not playful. Focused. Jack’s gaze dropped to the low teak bench beneath the towel hooks. Your breath caught before he said anything. His hand slid to your hip. “Sit.”
You looked from him to the bench. “Here?”
Jack’s eyes stayed on yours. “Here.”
The wood was warm from the sun when you sank onto it, water spilling over your shoulders and down your chest. Jack stepped between your knees, one hand braced against the slatted wall beside your head, the other sliding over your thigh.
For a second, he only looked at you. Wet. Bare. Breathless. His wife, exactly where he had pictured you. Then his mouth found your skin. Jack stayed standing between your thighs, bending to kiss the water from your stomach, your hip, the sensitive skin just beneath it. His hand hooked behind your knee, drawing you closer to the edge of the bench, and your fingers flew to his hair when his mouth and tongue moved lower. The sound you made was immediate and helpless and much too loud.
Jack’s grip flexed on your thigh. You looked down at him, water running over his shoulders, his eyes closed like he was the one being ruined by it. “Jack,” you gasped.
His answer was a low sound against your skin. You pressed one hand to the bench and the other into his wet hair, trying to breathe, trying to hold still, trying to survive him when he clearly had no interest in making that easy. This was not like the bedroom. The bedroom had been slow enough to make you ache with it. This was Jack taking what he had been imagining since the listing photos. This was salt on your skin and water over both of you and his patience finally fraying at the edges. He still noticed everything, but now he reacted faster. Greedier. The second your breath caught, he chased it. The second your hips shifted, he held you closer. The second his name broke in your mouth, he answered like he had been waiting for it.
“Jack,” you said again. “Yes. Yes, right there.”
His hand tightened at your thigh. You made a sound that did not even try to be quiet. The ocean was loud. The shower was louder. Jack loved that. You could tell by the way he looked up at you, eyes dark and wrecked, mouth still against you like he had no intention of stopping.
“You’re louder out here,” he murmured.
You tried to glare at him. It did not work. “You said no one could hear.”
His mouth curved. “I said no one was close enough.”
“Jack.”
“I like hearing you,” he said.
Then he lowered his mouth again before you could answer. Your thoughts scattered. Both hands went to his hair now, fingers slipping through wet strands, holding on because there was nowhere else for all of it to go. Jack kept you seated at the edge of the bench, one hand steady at your hip, the other sliding up your thigh with a kind of impatience that made your entire body go tight.
“Don’t stop,” you gasped. He did not. “Please.” He did not. “Jack, I’m—”
He groaned like he knew. Like he wanted it. Like the sound of you coming apart against his mouth was exactly what he had pictured when he stood in front of this shower for the first time and told you sand, salt, and. Your whole body tightened. “Jack,” you cried, hand fisting in his hair. “I’m gonna come.”
He held you harder. “Good,” he said, rough and low. “Let me have it.”
You came with the water running over you and his name breaking out of you, your thighs shaking around him, one hand in his hair and the other gripping the bench like it was the only solid thing left in the world. Jack stayed with you through it. He did not rush you. He did not pull away until your body softened beneath his hands and your breathing started to find a rhythm again. Then he straightened, one arm sliding around your waist before your balance could even think about failing. His mouth found yours, and you tasted salt and heat and him. You clung to him.
Jack kissed you like he was not done. You knew he was not done. You were not either. Your hands moved to his trunks. He made a sound against your mouth. You paused, breathless, fingers hooked at his waistband. “Yes?”
Jack’s eyes flashed to yours. For all his earlier desperation, he went still for that. Then he nodded once. “Yes.” Your fingers moved. His forehead dropped briefly to yours. “Baby,” he said, voice strained.
You kissed him. That seemed to be the end of his patience. Jack’s hands were on you again, guiding, lifting, turning just enough to get you both where he wanted without either of you slipping. Your back met the wall again, warm water streaming over your shoulders while the late sun burned gold through the slats. He checked you once more. Even then.
His mouth brushed your cheek. “Still with me?”
You wrapped your arms around his shoulders. “Yes.”
His hand slid beneath your thigh, urging it higher against his hip. “Tell me if you need me to stop.”
You shook your head. “Don’t stop.”
Jack’s breath broke. Then he was there. Close. Everywhere.
Your head tipped back against the wall, and Jack’s mouth found your throat at the exact moment your body took him in. The sound you made was not quiet. Jack’s hand slammed against the wall beside your head. “Fuck,” he breathed.
The word went straight through you. You clutched at him. “Jack.”
“I know.” His voice was rough now, almost unrecognizable. “I know.”
He moved carefully at first. Carefully because the floor was wet. Carefully because it was still Jack. But there was nothing patient about it. Not really. Not in the way his mouth kept dragging over your skin. Not in the way his hand gripped your thigh. Not in the way his breath kept catching against your neck every time you said his name. The shower poured over both of you. The ocean roared beyond the wall. His body was solid and hot against yours, pinning you there, holding you up, taking the weight you could not manage anymore.
You loved him. You loved him so much you could barely stand it. “I love you,” you gasped.
Jack’s rhythm faltered. His forehead pressed to your temple. “Say it again.”
You tightened your arms around him. “I love you.”
His mouth found yours, hard and desperate. “Again.”
“Jack.”
“Again,” he said, voice breaking around the word.
Your chest split open. “I love you,” you said into his mouth. “I love you, I love you.”
He groaned, rough and helpless, and buried his face in your neck. His hand shifted at your thigh, holding you closer, changing the angle just enough that your whole body jerked against him.
“Oh my god,” you gasped.
Jack’s mouth moved against your throat. “There?”
“Yes.” Your nails pressed into his shoulders. “Yes. More.”
He gave you more. The wall was solid behind you. Jack was solid in front of you. The water kept running over your skin, over his shoulders, between you, making everything slippery and hot and impossible to hold onto except him. You said his name again. Then yes. Then more. Then don’t stop.
Jack took every word like it hit him somewhere deep. He was not quiet either now. Not completely. His breath was rough at your ear. Your name slipped out of him once, then again, low and wrecked, like he was trying to keep himself together and failing because you were wrapped around him, wet and shaking and saying you loved him.
“Feels so good,” you whispered.
His hand tightened at your thigh. “Yeah?”
You nodded, forehead pressed to his. “So good.”
Jack kissed you hard enough to steal the rest of it. You felt yourself getting close again, too fast and not fast enough, pleasure building sharp and hot beneath your skin. Your fingers slipped on his wet shoulders. Your leg tightened around his hip. Your breath caught once, twice, and Jack knew. “I’ve got you,” he said.
You shook your head. “Jack.”
“I’ve got you,” he repeated, rougher this time.
“I’m gonna—”
“I know.” His mouth brushed yours. “Come for me.”
You did. You came hard, clinging to him, his name breaking out of you as the water ran over both of you and the ocean swallowed the sound. Jack followed almost immediately, one hand braced against the wall, the other holding you so close there was nowhere for either of you to go. For a moment, everything narrowed to heat and water and his mouth at your shoulder. Then slowly, Jack stilled. His breathing was ragged against your neck. Yours was not much better. You were both wet, shaking, and pressed against the wall of an outdoor shower in broad late-afternoon light like two people who had completely forgotten how vacations were supposed to work. Jack’s hand slid from the wall to the back of your head, cushioning you more gently now.
“Okay?” he asked. You tried to answer. Nothing came out. Jack lifted his head immediately. “Baby?”
You nodded quickly, then found your voice. “Yes.”
His face softened with relief, though his breathing was still uneven. “Yeah?”
You let your head fall back against the wall. “I think I saw god.”
Jack stared at you for half a second. Then he laughed, breathless and startled, dropping his forehead to your shoulder. You smiled up at the open sky. The shower kept running. His arms stayed around you. After a moment, Jack kissed your shoulder. “Can you stand?”
You frowned. “That is an offensive question.”
“It’s a practical question,” Jack replied.
You sighed. “It is offensively practical.”
His mouth curved against your skin. “I need to know if I should keep holding you.”
You tightened your arms around his neck. “You should keep holding me.”
Jack’s hand moved over your back. “Okay.”
For a while, he just held you under the water. No more urgency. No more desperate hands or frantic kisses. Just warm water, his body around yours, his breath slowly evening out against your temple. Eventually, Jack reached for the soap. You cracked one eye open. “Are you actually rinsing off now?”
Jack’s mouth twitched. “That was the original plan.”
You returned his smile. “You told me this was for sand.”
“It was,” he said.
“And salt,” you added.
He nodded. “Also true.”
“And?” you murmured.
He started washing your shoulder, gentle now, careful around skin he had just kissed like he was trying to memorize it. His eyes met yours. “And this,” he said.
Your heart flipped over itself. You let him wash the salt from your skin. Let him turn you carefully beneath the water. Let him smooth soap over your shoulders, your arms, your back. Let him be soft again because that was Jack too. Desperate one minute, devastatingly gentle the next. When he reached your hip, his thumb moved once, almost absent.
You looked up at him. “Do not start again.”
Jack’s eyes lifted to yours, innocent in a way that fooled exactly no one. “I’m rinsing you off.”
“You are thinking,” you replied.
Jack smirked. “I do that.”
You sighed. “You’re thinking loudly.”
His mouth curved. “I’m thinking we need dinner.”
You stared at him. “That is not what you were thinking.”
“No,” Jack admitted. “But we do need dinner.”
You laughed, tired and happy, and leaned forward until your forehead rested against his chest. Jack kissed your wet hair. “You okay?” he asked again, quieter.
You nodded against him. “Yeah.”
His hand moved over your back. “Good.”
You tipped your face up. “You?”
His eyes softened. “Yeah.”
“You sure?” you asked.
Jack’s smile turned smaller, warmer. “Very.”
You reached up and pushed wet hair off his forehead. For a second, he let you. No teasing. No smugness. Just Jack, standing with you beneath the outdoor shower, sun going soft around the privacy wall, water running over both of you while the ocean moved beyond the dunes.
Jack kissed you once more, slow and satisfied and warm under the water. This time, neither of you rushed. This time, the shower was actually for rinsing off. Mostly.
On the last morning, you woke to Jack still in bed. No coffee brewing downstairs. No suitcase zipped by the door. No quiet, careful attempt to start the day before you were ready. Just Jack behind you, warm and bare under the sheets, his hand spread over your stomach while the ocean moved beyond the cracked-open doors.
“You’re awake,” you murmured, your voice still rough with sleep.
Jack kissed your shoulder. “So are you.”
You shifted slightly against him. “You’re usually doing something by now.”
His thumb moved slowly over your skin. “I am doing something.”
You smiled into the pillow. “Holding me hostage?”
“Memorizing,” Jack said.
Your chest went soft. You turned in his arms enough to look at him. “Was it what you pictured?”
Jack’s eyes moved over your face, warm and tired and entirely too pleased with himself. “No.”
Your brows lifted. “No?”
His mouth curved. “Better.”
You groaned and tucked your face into his chest. “I need a vacation from vacation Jack.”
Jack’s hand slid over your back. “We can book another one.”
“Absolutely not,” you said against his skin.
“Different house,” he offered.
You lifted your head. “No.”
“Better shower,” Jack said.
“Jack.”
His smile widened. “Vacation.”
You laughed despite yourself, and Jack’s arms tightened around you. “You are not allowed to say vacation anymore,” you said.
His mouth brushed your temple. “Vacation.”
You pinched his side lightly. “I hate you.”
Jack laughed softly. “No, you don’t.”
No, you didn’t. Outside, the ocean kept moving. Inside, the suitcases stayed empty for a few more minutes, and Jack’s hand stayed warm at your waist.
