summary: After escaping your abusive boyfriend, you get pulled into the dangerous world of the Cody family and unexpectedly become the center of Pope Cody’s obsessive attention. As dark secrets unravel around you, Pope grows fiercely protective, pulling you deeper into his chaotic life until the line between safety and danger disappears completely. andrew ‘pope’ cody x f!reader / cw: DD:DNE, hard warning for smurf, naiveish!reader, she’s naive until she isn’t, not timeline specific, could be season one related but idfk tbh, pope says two words and reader is on her knees (who wouldn’t be), I imagine pope has his curly hair, possessive!pope, obsessive!pope, bestie!deran, deran goes crazy, the brothers really like reader except baz is sneaky with smurf, abusive relationship, damsel trope, reader has doe eyes and is called bambi, maybe ooc characters, drinking, reader is super taken by pope the second she meets him, murder!!!, blood, gore, canon violence, SMUT!! (they shower together it’s steamy, soft!dom pope, voyeurism,pervish!pope (my favorite), mentions of choking, dacryphilia, unprotected piv, creampie), mentioned sexual assault (not on reader), mention of sexual predators. word count: 14.8k amalia’s love note: 1000 followers special!!!! love you all thank you so much for supporting me always. If you hate this don’t say anything i’m extremely sensitive rn. Also i rewatched euphoria last week and totally based her bf off nate lol.
The music hit you before the house even came into view. Heavy bass rolled through the humid Oceanside air hard enough to rattle the windows of the massive beachside property perched at the edge of the cliff. The Cody house glowed gold against the dark, crowded wall to wall with people drinking, smoking, laughing too loud. Surfboards leaned crooked against the fence. Expensive cars packed the driveway bumper to bumper. Jetskis and dirt bikes sat scattered across the lawn like abandoned toys. Somewhere in the backyard a girl shrieked with drunken laughter loud enough to cut through the music.
You stumbled through the open gate barefoot, your pink heels dangling from two fingers. Your chest burned from running. Tears blurred your vision, hot and humiliating.
Your knees were scraped raw from slamming against the pavement after Nate shoved you down outside the bar. One side of your face still throbbed where he’d slapped you hard enough to split the inside of your lip maybe fifteen minutes earlier.
You hadn’t thought about where you were going. You’d just run.
And somehow your body dragged you here.
To the one place you’d been specifically told not to come.
Deran had mentioned the party offhandedly two days ago while fixing the walk-in freezer at the bar, half buried in tools and swearing at the wiring. Your shifts there had been sparse lately while finals swallowed your life whole, but somehow the routine of seeing him had become one of the few stable things you had left.
You weren’t even sure why your feet brought you to him.
Maybe because Nate hated him.
Maybe because Deran was one of the only people who ever looked at Nate like he saw exactly what lived underneath his skin.
Or maybe because somewhere along the way Deran Cody had turned into the closest thing you had to family. The older brother neither of you would ever admit out loud you needed. You knew things about him nobody else did. Dark things. Ugly things. And he knew yours too.
Which was exactly why he’d warned you more than once that Smurf’s house was not somewhere he wanted you.
You pushed through the side yard, adrenaline making you dizzy.
Nobody stopped you. Nobody really noticed you at first. You probably looked like every other fucked up girl stumbling through Oceanside at two in the morning. Mascara smeared under your eyes, dress strap hanging broken from one shoulder, blood drying on your knees.
The kind of girl people learned not to look at too hard.
Bodies crowded around the pool. Drunk girls danced in bikinis beside giant speakers while shirtless guys launched beer cans into the water. The whole place smelled like chlorine, weed, sweat, tequila, salt air.
Then Deran saw you.
His face changed instantly.
Not confusion. Not surprise.
Fear.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered, already crossing the yard toward you. Fast. “What happened?”
Your throat tightened before the words could even come out. “I know you said not to come here, but-”
Deran grabbed your arm carefully, fingers surprisingly gentle as he turned your face toward the pool lights.
The second he saw the bruise blooming across your cheek, something in his expression went cold. “That fucking asshole hit you?”
You looked away automatically.
That was answer enough.
“Craig,” Deran barked sharply.
A blond guy sitting on top of a cooler looked over immediately. Beside him, another man with dark hair and calmer eyes straightened from his chair too.
“What happened?” the dark-haired one asked.
Deran didn’t take his eyes off you. “Her boyfriend hit her.”
Craig stood so fast the cooler tipped sideways behind him. “Are you fucking serious?”
“It wasn’t-”
“Don’t,” Deran snapped instantly. The sharpness of it made you flinch. His jaw clenched hard enough you could see the muscle ticking beneath the skin. “Don’t do that shit.”
You’d seen Deran angry before. At customers. At his family. At himself.
This was different. This looked dangerous.
“Where is he?” the dark-haired man asked calmly, already getting to his feet.
Baz, you remembered suddenly. That was his name.
You swallowed hard. “I don’t know. I ran.”
Deran looked like he wanted to tear somebody apart with his bare hands.
Then another voice cut through the tension behind him.
“Well,” she said smoothly. “Who’s this?”
You turned slowly, still clutching the broken strap of your dress against your chest.
Smurf Cody stood near the patio doors with a cigarette balanced elegantly between perfectly manicured fingers.
Beautiful in a way that didn’t feel warm. Sharp blonde hair untouched by the humidity. Gold jewelry glittering beneath the lights. She looked at you the way people looked at horses before buying them. Assessing. Calculating.
Like she could find every weak spot you had in under thirty seconds.
Deran exhaled through his nose. “Smurf.”
She ignored him completely.
Her eyes stayed fixed on you.
“You’re pretty,” she said casually. “Too pretty to be crying over a man.”
Heat crawled into your face immediately.
“This is Bambi,” Deran said tightly. “My best friend.”
“Friend,” Smurf repeated, amused.
And suddenly you understood an alarming amount about Deran’s issues.
Smurf stepped closer, gaze drifting over the ripped strap hanging off your shoulder, the bruise on your cheek, the blood on your knees.
“A boy do this to you?”
You nodded once.
Her expression barely changed.
“Hm.”
Something about the sound chilled you more than if she’d yelled.
Deran snatched his keys off a folding table. “We’re gonna go find him.”
Baz stood slower, calmer. “Deran.”
“I’m not gonna fucking kill him,” Deran snapped.
Craig gave a sharp laugh. “I might.”
Smurf waved her cigarette lazily through the air. “Just don’t bring cops back to my house.”
Then her eyes flicked back toward you.
“You can stay here tonight, sweetheart.”
“Oh, I couldn’t-”
“Yes, you could,” Smurf interrupted smoothly. “You look half dead.”
Deran turned toward you again, still vibrating with restrained anger.
“You good here?”
You nodded slowly, though you weren’t entirely sure that was true.
His jaw flexed as he looked around the party.
“Stay inside.”
Then the three of them disappeared through the side gate.
And just like that, they were gone.
You stood awkwardly near the pool while the party swallowed the moment whole. Nobody cared. Nobody even really looked twice. Music still blasted. Somebody cannonballed into the pool. A girl stumbled past you laughing with glitter smeared across her chest.
The world kept moving like nothing happened.
Smurf tilted her head toward the house. “Come inside.”
The kitchen felt strangely quiet compared to the chaos outside.
The bass still pulsed faintly through the walls, but softer now. Distant. Smurf moved around the massive kitchen like she owned every atom inside it. Which, honestly, she probably did.
“You hungry?” she asked.
“A little,” you admitted nervously.
She opened the fridge, pulling containers out without ever really stopping watching you.
The house was beautiful in an intimidating sort of way. Expensive without looking staged. Polished wood floors. Massive windows overlooking the black ocean. Family photos lining the walls.
Every room felt lived in.
Claimed.
Smurf moved through it like royalty.
Which, in a deeply fucked up way, she was.
“You and Deran sleeping together?” she asked casually.
You nearly inhaled your own spit. “Oh my God, no. No.”
Not that the idea itself was horrifying. Deran was objectively attractive and you had functioning eyes. But it was also probably one of the least likely scenarios imaginable considering Deran had spent the better half of your friendship pointing out hot men to you with alarming enthusiasm.
“Hm.” Smurf pulled leftover pasta from the fridge. “That’s disappointing. He needs prettier girlfriends.”
You laughed nervously.
“I’m serious.”
The smile fell from your face.
You genuinely couldn’t tell if she was joking.
Smurf handed you a plate before leaning against the counter, cigarette balanced between two fingers as she studied you openly.
“You’re too soft for my boys anyway.”
The statement landed strangely hard. It irritated you more than it should have. She didn’t know you. Not really. The first thing she’d ever seen from you was this version. Crying. Bruised. Shaking.
Weak.
“I’m just his friend,” you said quietly.
“Mm.” She lit another cigarette. “Girls always think they’re just friends with Cody men.”
She pointed at you lightly with the cigarette.
“Especially the pretty ones.”
You looked down at the plate in your hands.
“Does the boy do this often?”
You hesitated. “Sometimes. He was angry tonight.”
Smurf’s expression stayed unreadable.
Cold almost.
“You should learn now,” she said quietly. “Men don’t hit women they love.” She took a slow drag from the cigarette. “They hit women they own.”
The bluntness stunned you into silence.
Before you could answer, movement outside the kitchen windows caught your attention.
Someone sat near the fountain in the backyard, half hidden in the shadows.
You hadn’t noticed him before.
Large frame. Broad shoulders curled slightly forward, elbows resting on his knees. Dark curls falling over his forehead. Freckles dusted across skin that disappeared beneath the sleeves of a faded gray t-shirt. Around him the party carried on at full volume, people screaming over music, splashing into the pool, stumbling through clouds of smoke.
But he sat completely still.
Just watching.
His eyes moved slowly across the yard, detached from all of it like he existed outside the noise.
Then his gaze landed on you.
And stayed there.
Something twisted low in your stomach.
Not fear exactly.
Awareness.
Like some instinct deep in your body already knew who he was before anybody said it.
Smurf noticed immediately.
“Oh,” she murmured softly, almost amused. “There’s Pope.”
Pope.
The name alone tightened something in your spine.
Deran had warned you about him enough times.
If you ever meet Pope, avoid him.
Why?
Because he’s fucking weird.
You glanced back toward the window.
Pope was still staring directly at you.
Not smiling. Not moving. Just staring with an intensity that made your skin feel too tight.
“He just got out,” Smurf said casually, like she was discussing the weather. “Prison makes socializing difficult.”
You didn’t know how to respond to that.
“He’s harmless,” she added after a second.
The way she said it somehow made you feel the exact opposite.
“You should say hi.”
“No, I’m okay-”
“Pope!” Smurf called loudly through the open sliding door.
Your stomach dropped so fast it almost hurt. You shot her a horrified look while she smiled lazily around her cigarette. For a second you genuinely wondered if she was fucking with you. Testing you maybe. You still couldn’t tell when Smurf was being genuine and when she was setting somebody up for entertainment.
Outside, Pope lifted his head immediately.
“Come meet Deran’s friend,” Smurf called.
Your palms started sweating.
A minute later the sliding door opened.
Up close, he was even bigger than you expected.
Not polished like Baz. Not clean-cut like Deran.
Pope looked rough in a way that felt accidental instead of curated. Sharp eyes. Scarred hands. Thick shoulders that made the kitchen suddenly feel smaller. There was something restless underneath his skin even while he stood perfectly still.
And he looked at you like he was trying to figure something out.
“This is Bambi,” Smurf said smoothly.
Pope kept staring.
You shifted awkwardly under the weight of it, suddenly hyperaware of your ripped dress and smeared mascara.
“Hi,” you said quietly.
“Hi,” he echoed.
His voice caught you off guard.
Soft. Almost gentle.
Smurf looked between the two of you with obvious amusement sparkling in her eyes.
“Well,” she said, pushing off the counter. “Try not to scare her, baby.”
Then she disappeared down the hallway, leaving you alone with him.
Silence settled heavily into the kitchen.
You looked literally anywhere except directly at him.
“I like your dress,” Pope said suddenly.
You blinked. “Oh. Thanks.” You tucked a strand of hair behind your ear awkwardly.
“It’s ripped.”
Your eyes dropped to the broken strap hanging off your shoulder.
“I guess, yeah.”
Pope leaned back against the counter, arms folding loosely across his chest, but his eyes never left you.
You tried focusing on the food instead.
“You’re bleeding,” he said after another moment.
You looked down at your scraped knee. Blood had dried in messy streaks down your shin. “Oh.”
Without another word Pope opened the freezer and grabbed an ice pack.
When he handed it to you, your fingers brushed accidentally.
He pulled his hand back immediately.
Too fast. Like the contact surprised him.
And maybe you imagined it, but for half a second his entire expression changed when you looked at him directly. Something almost startled flickered across his face before he looked away.
You didn’t know it, but Pope spent most of his life disconnected from people. Numb to them. Detached. But there was something about you standing in his mother’s kitchen bruised and trembling with those wide, wet doe eyes fixed on him that hooked somewhere deep beneath his ribs before he could stop it.
Maybe it was how vulnerable you looked while still trying to pretend you were fine.
Maybe it was the softness in your voice.
Maybe it was the fact that you looked at him without immediately looking afraid.
He didn’t know.
He just knew he liked it.
“Thanks,” you said quietly.
He nodded once.
Now he was the one avoiding your eyes.
God.
Deran was right.
He was weird.
Not creepy exactly.
Just… off.
Like his brain worked differently from everybody else’s.
You glanced toward the backyard where music still pounded through the walls.
“You don’t like parties?”
“No.”
“Then why are you here?”
Pope’s eyes shifted toward the window again. “Don’t like all these people in my space.”
You made a small oh with your mouth before he continued.
“They always break stuff.”
That felt oddly reasonable coming from him.
“You ran here?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
You shrugged awkwardly. “I knew Deran was close.”
Pope considered that for an uncomfortably long amount of time.
“You trust him.”
“I do.”
Another silence stretched between you.
“He said Nate hurts you sometimes.”
Your head snapped up. “Deran told you that?”
The question slipped out sharper than you intended.
Why would Deran tell them about you? About your relationship? About the ugly parts of it?
Had he told all of them?
Or just Pope?
Pope frowned slightly, like he could tell your mood shifted but wasn’t fully sure why.
“He said he doesn’t like him.”
That sounded far more believable.
You relaxed a little, pressing the ice pack carefully against your cheek.
Pope watched the movement intently.
Not flirtatiously.
Not even curiously.
Just intensely.
Like he noticed every little thing your body did.
It made you hyperaware of yourself. Of the way you sat. The way your fingers trembled slightly. The way your dress slipped against your skin.
You cleared your throat quietly.
“So…” you started. “What exactly do you think your brothers are doing right now?”
Pope didn’t answer immediately. You could practically see him debating how honest to be.
“Probably beating the shit out of him.”
Your stomach twisted hard.
“You think?”
Pope looked genuinely confused by the question.
“Yes.”
And somehow the certainty in his voice scared you more than the answer itself.
Nate hit the pavement hard enough to split the skin across his cheekbone.
The crack echoed through the empty marina parking lot like a gunshot.
Before he could even suck in a breath, Craig grabbed him by the collar and hauled him upright again like he weighed nothing.
“You like to hit women?” Craig snarled.
His fist slammed into Nate’s ribs hard enough to fold him sideways with a broken wheeze.
Nate choked violently, gasping for air that wouldn’t come.
The marina stretched empty around them. Black water crashed against the docks below while Baz’s truck headlights cut harsh white beams across the pavement. Boats rocked slowly in the distance, chains clinking against metal poles in the wind.
Deran paced nearby like something feral trapped in human skin.
He couldn’t stop moving.
Every few seconds his eyes snapped back to Nate, rage crawling visibly beneath his skin like he was seconds away from tearing him apart with his bare hands.
“You touch her again,” Deran snapped, voice low and shaking, “I’ll fucking drown you myself.”
Nate spit blood onto the concrete.
“She’s a lying-”
Craig kicked him hard in the stomach before he could finish.
Nate crumpled with a strangled noise.
“Wrong answer,” Craig muttered.
Baz stayed leaned against the truck, cigarette glowing faintly between his fingers while he watched the scene unravel with the exhaustion of someone who already knew this was spiraling too far.
“Enough,” he said finally.
“Enough?” Deran barked. He turned so fast the movement itself looked violent. “He beat the shit out of her.”
Nate groaned weakly on the pavement, curling onto his side.
Deran looked down at him with something far worse than anger.
Hatred. Pure, ugly hatred.
The kind that sharpened every edge of his face until he barely looked human anymore.
“We should tie a fucking cinderblock to him and dump him in the ocean.”
Craig immediately pointed at him. “That’s what I said.”
Baz rubbed a hand down his face slowly. “And then what? We explain a dead body to Smurf?”
Deran ignored him completely. “He put his hands on her.”
His voice cracked slightly on the last word. Almost disbelieving. Like his brain still couldn’t process the image of you standing in Smurf’s backyard bruised and crying.
Nate coughed wetly, trying to push himself up onto one elbow.
Huge mistake. Deran crossed the distance so fast Baz barely had time to move.
He grabbed Nate by the front of his shirt and slammed him against the side of the truck hard enough to rock it violently on its suspension.
“You think you get to touch her like that?” Deran hissed.
Nate cried out as the back of his head cracked against metal.
Craig’s expression shifted instantly.
The amusement disappeared. “Hey,” he said carefully now. “Deran.”
But Deran either didn’t hear him or didn’t care.
“You think because she stays with your sorry ass that means you can keep doing it?” he snapped. “You think she belongs to you?”
Nate’s face had gone pale beneath the blood smeared across it. “I didn’t mean-”
Deran slammed him against the truck again.
“Bullshit.”
Baz straightened immediately, cigarette dropping to the pavement.
He pushed off the passenger door and started toward them fast.
“Deran.”
Warning this time. But Deran didn’t back off.
He sidestepped Baz entirely, grabbed Nate by the throat with one hand and yanked him upright again. His other hand caught the open passenger door.
“You feel like a big-”
Deran slammed the truck door into the side of Nate’s head. The sound cracked through the marina.
“-tough-”
Another slam. Nate screamed this time.
“-man?”
The final hit sent Nate collapsing onto the pavement in a limp heap, blood streaking down the side of the truck.
Silence hit for half a second except for the waves crashing below the docks. Even Craig froze.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” he muttered under his breath.
Nate lay sprawled on the concrete unmoving for a second too long.
Baz moved immediately, shoving past Deran to crouch beside him.
“You trying to fucking kill him?” Baz snapped.
Deran stood there breathing hard, chest rising and falling violently. But he kept staring at Nate like he still wasn’t done.
Like every instinct in his body was screaming at him to finish it. Craig glanced toward Baz briefly. That look alone said enough. Even Craig was getting nervous now.
Nate finally groaned weakly, curling into himself as blood dripped from his nose onto the pavement.
“She always made me fucking crazy,” he slurred through swollen lips.
The second the words left his mouth, Deran snapped again. He lunged so violently Craig barely caught him in time, grabbing him around the waist before he could get to Nate.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Craig barked, struggling to hold him back now.
Deran fought against his grip anyway. Actually fought him.
“She was crying!” Deran shouted. “Did you see her fucking face?”
“Yes,” Craig snapped back. “I saw it.”
Deran shoved hard against him, chest heaving violently.
“I should kill him.” And the terrifying part was nobody thought he was bluffing anymore.
Baz stepped between them now, calmer than both of them but visibly tense for the first time all night. “We scare him,” Baz said firmly. “That’s it.”
Deran laughed once. “You think this shit scares him?”
Nate stayed curled on the pavement bleeding and shaking, but Deran still looked unsatisfied. Like nothing short of irreversible damage was going to quiet the rage clawing through him.
Three days later the bruise on your cheek had finally started turning yellow around the edges. It still hurt when you touched it.
You stood behind the bar beside Deran, wiping down glasses while music hummed low through the speakers overhead. The lunch rush had died an hour ago, leaving the place quieter than usual. Sunlight spilled through the open windows facing the street, warm salt air drifting inside with the sound of traffic and distant waves.
Craig sat at the far end of the bar half drunk already, arguing with Baz about whether or not a guy outside had stolen his parking spot.
“You can’t just threaten people with a wrench every time you get annoyed,” Baz said flatly.
Craig looked genuinely confused. “Why not?”
Deran snorted softly beside you while restocking bottles.
For the first time in days things almost felt normal. Almost. Nate was in a coma.
Nobody said it out loud, but everybody knew Deran had gone way too far at the marina.
You tried not to think about it.
Tried not to think about how part of you felt relieved.
The bell above the front door chimed. Then the entire room changed. You felt it before you even looked up.
Deran froze beside you instantly. A man stood in the doorway.
Older than Nate by maybe twenty years. Thick build. Weathered face. The kind of man who looked mean even standing still. His eyes swept across the bar once before landing directly on you.
Your stomach dropped so hard it made you dizzy.
Because Nate had his father’s eyes.
“Oh,” Craig muttered quietly. “Fuck.”
The man walked inside slowly. Every instinct in your body screamed. You backed up automatically.
Deran moved immediately, stepping in front of you slightly. “What do you want?” he asked coldly.
Nate’s father ignored him completely. His eyes stayed fixed on you. “So,” he said slowly. “This is where the little bitch that ruined my son’s life works.” Your breath caught.
The room suddenly felt too small.
Deran’s expression darkened instantly. “Watch your fucking mouth.”
The older man finally looked at him.
“You’re Deran Cody.” Not a question. “You put my son in the hospital.”
Deran didn’t answer. Didn’t deny it either.
The man laughed once under his breath, but there was nothing amused about it. “You know what Nate told me?” he asked, eyes flicking back toward you. “Said she cries real pretty.”
Your face went cold. You took another step backward unconsciously. And then you felt someone beside you. Solid. Quiet.
Pope.
You hadn’t even seen him come out from the back office. Your fingers wrapped around his arm before you could stop yourself “Andrew,” you said quietly. Nervously.
The name felt strange in your mouth after hearing everybody call him Pope for days.
But his real name fit him more somehow.
Pope looked down at your hand gripping his forearm. Normally he hated being touched. Most people knew better than to try. Craig once joked Pope reacted to physical affection like a feral dog. But he didn’t pull away from you. Didn’t tense. Instead he shifted slightly closer. Enough that your shoulder brushed against his chest.
And instantly, unbelievably, the panic inside you eased. You couldn’t explain it, Pope made you feel calm. Safe. Like if you stayed close enough to him nothing terrible could reach you. The feeling settled through your chest warm and strange and deeply confusing.
Nate’s father noticed immediately. His eyes narrowed. “That your new boyfriend?” he asked cruelly. “You spread your legs for the whole family now?”
Deran lunged forward instantly.
Baz caught him hard across the chest before he could reach him.
“Deran.”
“No,” Deran snapped violently.
But Pope moved first. He stepped fully in front of you now, blocking you from view entirely. The shift was subtle. Terrifyingly subtle. His face stayed calm, but something in his eyes changed.
“You should leave,” Pope said quietly.
Nate’s father laughed. “And what?” he sneered. “You gonna stop me?”
Pope tilted his head slightly. “Yes.”
Silence dropped heavily across the bar.
Nate’s father took another step toward you anyway.
You grabbed the back of Pope’s shirt tighter instinctively. The movement made Pope go completely still.
Then Nate’s father pointed directly at you.
“You think you’re safe now?” he snapped. “Girls like you always go back. You’ll crawl right back to him if he wakes up.”
Something cracked across Deran’s face.
“You need to get him out of here,” Baz said carefully.
But nobody moved. Nate’s father laughed again, uglier this time. “You Codys think you’re untouchable?” He looked around the bar. “Whole family’s fucking rotten.”
Then his eyes landed on you again. “And you.” Your body stiffened instantly. “You should’ve kept your mouth shut.” Pope stepped forward once.
Nate’s father finally seemed to realize something dangerous stood in front of him. Because for the first time since walking in, he hesitated. Then he scoffed and backed toward the door. “This ain’t over.”
The bell chimed again when he left. Silence swallowed the room immediately after.
You were still clutching Pope’s arm. Still half hidden behind him. Nobody pointed it out.
Deran stared at the door long after the man disappeared outside. That same frightening stillness settling over him again.
Baz saw it immediately. “No,” he said firmly.
Deran didn’t look at him.
Craig leaned back slowly against the counter. “He threatened her.”
“No,” Baz repeated harder.
But Deran was already somewhere else mentally. You could see it happen. That cold detached look settling into his face.
Pope glanced back toward you then. His eyes softened slightly when he saw how shaken you still were. “You should go upstairs,” he said quietly.
Deran owned the apartment above the bar. You’d slept there the last two nights because the idea of going home alone suddenly made your skin crawl. You nodded slowly. Your fingers slipped from Pope’s arm reluctantly. The loss of contact felt immediate. Strange, Pope noticed it too.
Something unreadable flickered across his face before he stepped back.
“I’ll lock up,” Deran said flatly.
Baz looked between both brothers and swore under his breath.
Later, long after you finally drifted asleep curled against the arm of Deran’s couch upstairs, the brothers left through the alley behind the bar. The city had gone quiet by then.
Streetlights reflected off damp pavement. The ocean air felt colder at night, heavier somehow, carrying the distant sound of waves crashing somewhere beyond the buildings.
Deran locked the back door without a word.
Pope stood beside the truck waiting calmly, hands shoved into the pockets of his hoodie. His face looked unreadable in the dark.
Deran slid behind the wheel while Pope watched the apartment windows upstairs for one last second. The living room light was off.
Satisfied, he climbed into the passenger seat. The truck rolled silently out of the alley.
They found Nate’s father exactly where they expected. At the same liquor-stained dive bar off the harbor road where guys like him spent every night slowly rotting themselves from the inside out.
Deran parked across the street beneath a dead streetlamp.
The windows of the bar glowed dim yellow against the dark while old motorcycles lined the curb outside. Inside, Nate’s father sat hunched over the counter already half drunk, laughing too loudly at something the bartender said. Pope watched him quietly through the windshield. “You think he hits women too?” he asked.
Deran’s jaw tightened. Neither of them asked how the other knew that he did. Some things were obvious.
An hour passed. Then another. Neither brother spoke much.
Every once in a while Deran drummed his fingers once against the steering wheel before stopping himself again. Too much energy sitting beneath his skin. Too much anger still trying to claw its way out.
But Pope stayed perfectly still.
Around two in the morning Nate’s father finally stumbled out of the bar alone.
The brothers followed. His truck drifted lazily between lanes as he drove through the sleeping streets of Oceanside toward the edge of town. Small houses gave way to emptier roads. Fewer streetlights. Fewer witnesses.
Finally he pulled into a narrow gravel driveway beside a run-down one story house near the marshes. No nearby neighbors. No barking dogs. Perfect.
The porch light flicked on as he staggered toward the front door fumbling with his keys.
Pope watched carefully from the passenger seat.
Deran killed the engine two houses down. The darkness swallowed the truck instantly.
Ten minutes later the kitchen light inside the house flicked on briefly before disappearing again. Then nothing.
Pope checked his watch. “Give him twenty.”
Deran nodded once. The wait almost killed him. He sat leaning forward slightly, jaw clenched hard enough to ache while rage simmered quietly beneath his skin. Every time he closed his eyes he still saw you standing in the bar clutching Pope’s arm with fear written all over your face.
Girls like you always go back.
The memory alone made his hands tighten.
Twenty-three minutes later Pope opened the passenger door. The brothers moved silently through the yard.
Pope picked the back lock in under thirty seconds.
The house smelled stale inside. Beer. Cigarettes. Old grease. A television played quietly somewhere in the living room.
Nate’s father had passed out half reclined on the couch with an empty bottle hanging loose from one hand. Pope closed the back door carefully behind them.
The man woke slightly at the sound. “Huh?”
Deran moved first. He crossed the room in three steps and drove his forearm across the man’s throat hard enough to pin him against the couch before he could fully react.
Confusion flashed across the older man’s face. Then recognition. Then fear.
“What the fu-”
Pope grabbed the bottle before it hit the floor. Quiet. Always quiet.
Nate’s father struggled violently beneath Deran’s grip now, but alcohol slowed him down. Age slowed him down more.
“Don’t tell me you didn’t see this coming.” Deran said quietly.
The man wheezed against his arm. Pope stepped closer calmly, expression empty. Pope looked at him the same way somebody looked at a broken appliance they needed to get rid of. “You scared her,” Pope added softly.
Nate’s father started fighting harder then. Panic setting in.
Deran slammed him backward against the couch again hard enough to daze him.
“Left her scared in my fucking bar,” Deran hissed.
The older man reached desperately for the side table. Phone. Weapon. Anything.
Pope caught his wrist instantly. Then twisted. A wet crack echoed through the room.
The scream barely had time to leave his mouth before Pope clamped a hand over it.
“You should’ve stayed away from her,” he said.
Afterward, they cleaned everything carefully. Pope wiped surfaces while Deran staged the kitchen. A shattered beer bottle near the counter. Water spilled across the tile.
The body positioned wrong enough to look accidental but believable.
A drunk man falls hard enough onto the corner of a counter and sometimes he doesn’t get back up. Sad. Common. Forgettable.
By the time they left, the house looked untouched.
The brothers washed their hands at a gas station fifteen minutes later. Deran scrubbed blood from beneath his fingernails in silence while Pope leaned against the sink watching the empty parking lot through the window.“You think she’s asleep?” Pope asked quietly.
Deran nodded once. Pope looked back down at the water running pink briefly before turning the faucet off. Then they drove to the hospital.
The city was beginning to pale blue with early morning by the time they parked in the visitor garage.
Nate’s room sat on the fourth floor.
Critical condition. Machines breathing for him. Deran stared through the small window in the door for a long moment before entering. Nate looked smaller like this.
Bruised face swollen beyond recognition.
A machine beeped steadily beside him in the darkened room.
Pope closed the door quietly behind them. Nate’s eyes fluttered weakly at the sound. For one horrifying second he almost looked aware. Then his gaze landed on Deran. Fear flooded his face instantly.
Good, Deran thought.
He should be scared.
“You should’ve left her alone,” Deran said softly.
Nate tried to speak. Nothing came out around the breathing tube.
Pope walked calmly to the door, peeking once through the narrow window toward the empty hallway before looking back at his brother. Deran stepped toward the bed.
And by the time the sun finally rose over Oceanside, Nate’s room had become just another tragedy inside a hospital full of them.
It had been a few weeks. A few strange, chaotic, strangely comfortable weeks where the Cody family somehow became woven into your life before you fully realized what was happening.
You’d officially met everyone now.
J had shown up at the bar one afternoon quiet and observant, watching everybody with the same careful expression Pope wore sometimes. Nicky was sweet in an exhausting sort of way and latched onto you immediately after discovering you owned actual skincare products. Lena adored you after exactly ten minutes because you sat on the floor with her and helped untangle one of her necklaces without getting annoyed.
And Smurf… Smurf had become dangerously fond of you. Not in a normal way either. It felt more like she’d picked you out. Like she was studying you the same way she studied her sons. Watching your reactions. Learning your weak spots. Encouraging certain behaviors while quietly steering you away from others.
You noticed it more lately.
“You apologize too much,” Smurf had told you three nights ago while helping you clean up after dinner.
You blinked. “What?”
“You say sorry before you even speak sometimes.” She handed you a wine glass. “Men smell weakness, sweetheart.”
You laughed awkwardly. “I think that’s a little dramatic.”
“No,” Smurf said calmly. “It isn’t.”
Then she’d taught you how to hold eye contact during confrontation like it was a lesson worth learning.
And weirdly enough Pope started hovering more whenever Smurf was around. At first you thought you imagined it. But then you noticed how he lingered nearby anytime Smurf cornered you into conversations. How his eyes tracked the two of you constantly. How he interrupted more. Redirected you away from her. Like he knew something you didn’t.
Which honestly happened a lot with the Codys.
You were beginning to realize there were entire conversations happening beneath the surface around you. Things you weren’t understanding.
Like the fact that none of them ever talked directly about what they actually did.
You heard rumors, obviously. Everybody in Oceanside heard rumors about the Codys. Crime. Robberies. Violence.
But then Deran would make you coffee exactly how you liked it without asking, or Baz would walk you to your car after work, or Craig would spend twenty minutes teaching Lena how to cannonball properly into the pool while Pope sat nearby staring at you like you hung the fucking moon.
They didn’t feel dangerous around you. Not really. Just damaged.
And Pope… Pope was becoming something else entirely. Possessive wasn’t even the right word anymore. It was quieter than that. More constant. Like gravity. He always knew where you were in a room. Always noticed immediately when another man looked too long at you. Always positioned himself close enough to touch you somehow without making it obvious.
His hand brushing the small of your back. His knee pressed against yours under tables. His fingers curling around your wrist absentmindedly while you talked.
And the eye contact.
Jesus Christ.
Pope looked at you like he physically could not stop.
Sometimes it genuinely made you nervous how intensely he listened whenever you spoke. Like every word mattered. Like every facial expression was something worth memorizing. But you liked it more than you should’ve. Way more.
Which was probably why you found yourself currently squeezed tightly beneath Deran’s arm at one of Smurf’s massive pool parties wearing a bikini that barely qualified as fabric. A bikini Smurf picked out herself.
You should’ve known that alone was dangerous.
“Oh my god,” you muttered earlier that afternoon holding the tiny black swimsuit up between two fingers. “This is insane.”
Smurf looked unimpressed from her closet doorway. “No, sweetheart. It’s expensive.”
“It’s basically underwear.”
“Exactly.”
You laughed nervously. “Nate would’ve had an aneurysm.”
Smurf’s eyes sharpened instantly. “Good.”
And somehow you ended up wearing it anyway.
Now music pounded through the backyard while bodies crowded around the pool beneath strings of warm patio lights. Somebody was doing shots off a surfboard table. Craig had already thrown two people into the water fully clothed.
Deran sat beside you on one of the lounge chairs, arm hooked around your shoulders mostly because he was still paranoid about men approaching you at parties now.
You leaned comfortably against him sipping from a drink while laughing at something Nicky screamed near the pool.
Then you felt it. That familiar feeling. Being watched. Your eyes lifted automatically across the crowded backyard. Pope sat near the outdoor kitchen talking to Baz.
Well. Baz was talking. Pope was staring directly at you. Even from across the yard you could feel the intensity of it.
His eyes moved slowly over you once before locking back onto your face. Heat crept into your chest immediately.
Deran noticed your distraction and followed your gaze. “Oh my fucking god,” he muttered.
“What?”
“He’s doing it again.”
You looked innocent. “Doing what?”
“Looking at you like a psychopath.”
You snorted into your drink. “He’s not that weird.”
Deran turned toward you slowly. “Yes,” he said flatly. “He is.”
“I think you exaggerate.”
“Yeah?” Deran barked out a laugh. “Because you don’t work with him.”
You frowned immediately. “What work?”
The second the question left your mouth, Deran’s expression shifted.
“Nothing,” he said.
“That sounds weird.”
“It’s not.”
“You literally just made it more suspicious.”
Deran rubbed his forehead already irritated.
“You ask too many questions.”
“And yet you avoid all of them.”
“Smartest thing I’ve ever done.”
You narrowed your eyes slightly.
Again. That weird feeling.
Like everybody around you knew something you didn’t. Before you could push further, Craig suddenly cannonballed into the pool hard enough to soak half the patio.
You yelped as cold water splashed across your legs. “CRAIG.”
He surfaced laughing wildly. “That was for saying i’m six foot something with shampoo-commercial hair and I only have exactly three surviving brain cells fighting for fourth place earlier.”
“Was I wrong? You do have shampoo-commercial hair.”
Craig pointed dramatically. “See?”
While everybody argued around the pool, your eyes drifted back toward Pope automatically. Still watching you. Except now his expression looked darker somehow.
You followed his line of sight downward and immediately realized why. Deran’s hand rested against your bare thigh.
Oh. You bit back a smile.
“Your brother looks homicidal,” you murmured.
Deran glanced over again. Then groaned loudly. “For fuck’s sake.”
“What?”
“He’s jealous.”
You nearly choked on your drink laughing “Pope? No.”
Deran stared at you like you were stupid “Bambi. He follows you around like a stray dog.”
“That is so mean. Don’t be mean to him.”
“It’s accurate.” He rolled his eyes.
Your smile widened despite yourself. Because maybe Deran wasn’t entirely wrong. Pope looked at you differently now. Not subtle either. Everybody noticed. Especially Smurf.
You caught her watching the interaction from near the grill with an amused little smile pulling at her mouth.
“You should go sit with him,” Deran muttered.
“What?”
“Before he burns holes through my skull.”
You laughed harder. “You’re being dramatic.”
Deran looked back toward Pope. Then immediately removed his arm from around your shoulders. “Nope. Absolutely not. Go.”
“Deran-”
“I’m serious. He’s freaking me out.”
You looked back across the yard again. Pope hadn’t looked away once. God. It should not have affected you this much. But it did.
Because unlike every other guy who looked at you, Pope never seemed distracted. Never checked his phone mid conversation. Never split his attention elsewhere.
When he looked at you, he looked only at you. Like the entire room disappeared.
You stood slowly from the lounge chair.
Almost immediately Pope straightened slightly where he sat.
Deran watched the reaction happen and muttered, “Jesus Christ,” under his breath.
You crossed the backyard toward him through the crowd.
Pope tracked every step.
By the time you reached the outdoor kitchen, Baz was already smirking into his beer.
“Well,” Baz drawled. “There’s the reason he hasn’t heard a word I said in ten minutes.”
Pope ignored him completely. His eyes flicked slowly over your bikini again before settling on your face. “You cold?” he asked immediately.
You blinked. “What?”
“You’re shivering.”
“Oh.” You laughed softly. “The pool water.”
Pope grabbed the towel beside him without hesitation and held it out. Your chest tightened a little. Always paying attention. Always noticing.
“Thanks, Andrew.”
The second you said his real name, something changed in his expression. Softened. It happened every single time. Pope loved when you called him Andrew. Loved it in that deep quiet way he loved most things concerning you.
Baz noticed too because of course he did “Oh my god,” Baz muttered. “You’re whipped.”
Pope didn’t even deny it.
You smiled trying to hide your embarrassment while taking the towel from him. Pope’s hand settled automatically against your thigh once you sat beside him.
Possessive. Casual. Like it belonged there.
And weirdly enough you let it stay there without thinking twice.
Across the yard, Deran watched the interaction happen before looking deeply exhausted. Smurf appeared beside him sipping wine. “Told you,” she said smugly.
Deran sighed. “This is gonna end in a body. Hopefully not hers.”
Smurf smiled wider. “Probably will be.”
The party got louder the later it got.
Music pounded through the backyard hard enough to shake the deck beneath your feet while bodies crowded shoulder to shoulder around the pool. The entire property glowed gold against the dark ocean behind it, strings of lights hanging from the balcony while drunk strangers danced barefoot across wet concrete.
Craig had somehow started an argument about sharks. “No, listen to me,” he insisted loudly, pointing with a beer bottle while half sprawled across a lounge chair. “If sharks can smell blood from like five miles away then obviously they can smell cocaine.”
“That is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” Deran said flatly.
“It’s literally dissolved in your bloodstream.”
“That’s not how drugs work.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I absolutely know that.”
J sat nearby trying unsuccessfully not to laugh while Nicky filmed the entire thing on her phone solely for future blackmail purposes.
“You’re embarrassing yourself,” she informed Craig cheerfully.
Craig pointed at her dramatically. “History’s gonna vindicate me.”
Beside you, Pope stayed stretched back against the outdoor couch with one arm hooked lazily along the cushions behind you. Well. Not really behind you anymore.
At some point during the conversation you’d shifted closer without thinking until your shoulder rested fully against his chest, your legs tucked partly beneath his along the couch. And Pope loved it. You could tell.
Not because he said anything. Because every time you touched him he got quieter. More focused. Like his entire body locked onto the feeling immediately.
His hand rested against your thigh now, large fingers spread lazily over sun-warmed skin while everybody argued around you. Every so often his thumb brushed absentminded little circles there.
Every single time it happened, his eyes flicked down toward your face. Checking. Watching your reaction carefully like he still hadn’t fully processed the fact that you let him touch you this much.
You leaned your head back slightly to look up at him. “You’re awfully quiet tonight.”
Pope’s eyes dropped to yours instantly. The height difference forced you to tilt your chin up slightly from where you rested against him. “I’m listening.”
“To Craig talking about drug-sniffing sharks?”
“Yes.”
You laughed softly.
Pope’s eyes lingered on your mouth a second too long afterward.
Across from you, Baz noticed immediately and smirked into his drink. The man was obsessed with you. Not even subtly anymore.
Smurf sat nearby with a glass of wine watching the entire interaction unfold with careful amusement. Like she was observing a particularly entertaining science experiment in real time.
You were halfway through making fun of Craig’s shark theory when a girl suddenly approached the couch hesitantly.
You recognized her vaguely from high school. Not close friends. Just familiar enough to know her name if somebody said it out loud. She looked relieved when she spotted you.
“Oh my god,” she said softly. “There you are.”
You frowned slightly. “What?”
“I’ve been trying to find you.”
Beside you, Pope’s hand engulfed your thigh more firmly instantly. Protective. Alert. His eyes lifted toward the girl carefully now.
Confusion twisted through you. “Why?”
The girl glanced awkwardly around the group before looking back at you. “You didn’t hear?”
Something in her tone made your stomach tighten immediately. You laughed nervously shaking your head. “Hear what?”
“Nate’s dad died.”
Everything around you seemed to go strangely muffled. Like somebody dropped water over your ears. “What?” you whispered.
The girl nodded quickly. “Yeah. Cops are saying he got drunk and slipped in his kitchen or something. Everybody’s freaking out because he was like… such a good guy..”
A good guy. Yeah fucking right.
You felt Pope’s entire body go still behind you.
The girl kept talking nervously. “And Nate…” Your chest tightened instantly. “He died Wednesday morning at the hospital.”
The words hit like ice water. Your body instinctively pressed backward into Pope’s chest before you even realized you were moving. And immediately Pope’s arm wrapped fully around your waist. His fingers slid beneath the tie of your bikini bottoms absentmindedly, anchoring you against him.
The touch made heat crawl up your spine despite the panic suddenly flooding your chest. Around you, every Cody had gone silent.
Especially Smurf. All of them watching your face carefully now. Measuring your reaction. Because you knew what happened at the marina. You looked between them slowly, heartbeat suddenly roaring in your ears “How?” you asked quietly.
The girl shrugged uneasily. “They said his ventilator malfunctioned or something. Like some weird glitch.” You suddenly became hyperaware of Pope’s hand tightening slightly against your waist. The girl laughed awkwardly into the silence. “Crazy, right? Anyway, his mom’s doing a service for both of them next week.”
Nobody answered her. Because now the atmosphere felt wrong. Heavy. You swallowed hard.
Your brain started racing violently. Nate dead. His father dead. The ventilator made no sense. The kitchen accident made too much sense.
And suddenly every rumor you’d ever heard about the Codys stopped sounding like rumors at all.
You looked toward Deran slowly. His expression stayed unreadable. Too unreadable. Like none of this was actually news to him.
Baz somehow looked calmer than everybody else which honestly made him scarier. Craig wouldn’t meet your eyes anymore. Even J looked tense now.
But Pope was only watching you. Like your reaction mattered more than the deaths themselves.
The girl shifted awkwardly under the silence. “I just thought you should know.”
“Yeah,” you said faintly. “Thanks.”
She disappeared back into the crowd quickly after that. But the weirdness stayed.
The party still raged around you. Music blasted through the backyard. Somebody screamed after getting shoved into the pool fully clothed again. Bottles clinked. People laughed too loudly. But around the couch, tension settled heavy and suffocating.
You sat stiffly against Pope’s chest now, barely realizing how tightly you’d pressed yourself into him. His hand stayed firm against your waist, thumb moving slowly against your side like he was trying to soothe you. Or maybe soothe himself. You honestly couldn’t tell anymore.
“Nate died?” you said finally, voice sounding distant even to yourself.
The words felt unreal. Deran exchanged a quick glance with Baz. Craig stared down into his beer bottle. J watched everyone carefully from the edge of the chair, quiet like always.
Smurf leaned back calmly, wine balanced elegantly between her fingers while sharp interest glittered behind her eyes.
The whole thing suddenly felt deeply wrong.
You looked around slowly. “Why is everybody acting weird?”
“No one’s acting weird,” Deran answered way too fast.
Your eyes narrowed slightly. “Yeah, you are.”
Pope’s grip tightened almost imperceptibly when your voice rose.
You looked up at him instinctively. His eyes were already on your face. Always.
“You okay?” he asked quietly. And somehow that almost made it worse.
Because he sounded genuinely concerned while everybody else looked tense as hell.
You swallowed hard. “I don’t know.” The girl’s words replayed violently in your head.
You suddenly stood up. “I need to leave.”
Pope immediately straightened beside you. “Hey-“
“I just…” You rubbed your forehead shakily. “I need a second.” Your fingers grabbed the nearest sweatshirt off the couch blindly before pulling it over your bikini top. You barely noticed the sleeves swallowed your hands completely.
Pope did. His eyes locked instantly onto the oversized hoodie hanging off your body. His hoodie. Something sharp and possessive flashed across his face so quickly only Smurf caught it.
Interesting.
You pushed through the side gate quickly. The metal slammed behind you. The second you disappeared down the street, Craig exhaled loudly.
“Good job not acting suspicious as fuck, guys,” Baz said sarcastically.
“Shut up,” Deran muttered.
Smurf swirled the wine slowly in her glass. “She knows something.”
J frowned slightly. “About what?”
Smurf’s eyes stayed fixed thoughtfully on the closed gate. “That girl didn’t react like someone upset her ex-boyfriend died.” Her expression sharpened slightly. “She reacted like she’s scared.”
Baz leaned forward now. “You think Nate told her something?”
“I think,” Smurf said carefully, “our sweet little Bambi is smarter than you boys thought.”
Pope stood immediately. “She’s not gonna say anything.”
Smurf’s gaze flicked toward him knowingly. “You sound very sure. You willing to bet your freedom on it?”
“I am.” The certainty in his voice shut everybody up briefly.
Because Pope trusted you completely. And honestly? That made him the most dangerous person in the family right now.
Smurf looked between her sons slowly before nodding once toward the street “Follow her.”
Deran groaned immediately. “Come on. She ran out of here looking terrified. She just found out her ex died.”
“And?” Smurf snapped lightly. “You think that girl’s stupid? She’s putting things together.”
Baz stood first. “Let’s go.”
But Pope was already moving toward the driveway before anybody else.
Because he knew the look on your face when you got overwhelmed. And more importantly, He wasn’t about to let anybody else get to you first.
Your hands shook so badly on the steering wheel you nearly blew through a stop sign.
The tires screeched slightly when you corrected too hard. Everything felt wrong.
Your thoughts kept colliding into each other faster than you could process them. Nate yelling. Nate crying the first time he begged you not to “ruin his family.”
Nate’s father smiling at barbecues while flipping burgers like some suburban dad straight out of a Home Depot commercial. Pretending he wasn’t a lousy drunk behind closed doors.
The hidden files on the computer. Your best friend sobbing in that video. God. Your stomach twisted so violently you thought you might throw up. The apartment complex came into view too fast.
You parked crooked and barely remembered shutting the car off before climbing out. The apartment you once shared with Nate was dark when you stepped inside. And it still smelled like him. Stale beer. Laundry detergent. Old cigarettes soaked into fabric and walls. You hated it instantly.
It hit you all over again why you hadn’t come back since the night he hit you. Why staying with Deran had somehow felt safer than being alone here. Your chest tightened hard.
The silence inside the apartment felt wrong now. Haunted.
You moved quickly toward the entertainment center near the living room wall, panic making your movements jerky. Books hit the floor one after another while you ripped them off the shelves searching.
“Come on,” you whispered shakily under your breath. “Come on, please…”
Your fingers slipped against the wood paneling behind the shelf before finally catching the loose edge. Relief hit so hard it almost made your knees weak. You pulled the hidden disk case free from inside the wall.
“Oh my god,” you laughed breathlessly to yourself. Not happy. Just relieved.
Your grip tightened around the case as you turned and nearly screamed. A solid wall of muscle stood directly in front of you. You stumbled backward violently before realizing it was Pope. A startled sound escaped your throat. His hand shot out immediately, grabbing your forearm gently before you could trip over the books scattered across the floor.
Your eyes snapped upward.
All four brothers stood inside the apartment doorway. The sight of them there made your pulse spike instantly.
“What the fuck?”
Pope stepped closer first. “Hey,” he murmured softly, saying your name like he was trying not to scare you. Too late. You took another step backward anyway.
“How did you even know I was here? Nobody answered immediately.
And for the first time since meeting them, the Cody brothers looked exactly like the stories people whispered about. Craig leaned against the doorway with his arms crossed, expression unusually serious. Baz’s eyes moved carefully around the apartment, taking everything in automatically. Deran looked tense enough to snap.
But Pope only looked at you. Or more specifically At the disk case clutched tightly in your hands.
Your heartbeat sped up immediately. “You followed me here?” you asked carefully.
Baz spoke first. “What’s that?”
Your fingers tightened around the disk instinctively. “Nothing.”
You shoved it behind your back too quickly.
The second Deran stepped forward with that cold unreadable look on his face, you regretted it. “Bambi,” he said carefully. “Why’d you come here?”
You looked between all of them uneasily. The atmosphere had shifted. Not violent exactly. But serious. Focused. Like they were trying to solve a problem.
Pope took another slow step closer. “You scared us.”
A nervous laugh escaped you. “So your solution was following me to my apartment?”
“Yeah,” Craig muttered. “Because you looked like you were about to have a fucking breakdown.”
Your eyes lifted back toward Pope automatically.
His gaze dropped briefly toward the disk behind your back. Then back to your face.“What’s on it?” he asked softly. And somehow him asking gently broke you more than if he’d demanded it.
Your throat tightened. “It belonged to Nate’s dad.” You swallowed hard. “It’s why he said I should’ve kept my mouth shut.”
Every single one of them went still. The memory of that night at the bar flashed visibly across their faces. Deran’s expression darkened immediately.
You stared down at the disk case in your hands. “A few months ago Nate’s dad let me borrow his computer,” you said quietly. “I found videos on it.”
Baz’s face flattened instantly. “What kind of videos?”
You looked sick even trying to say it. “Girls.” Nobody spoke. “High school girls.”
Craig swore quietly under his breath.
“One of them was my best friend.” Your voice cracked instantly. “She was crying and he was hurting her.” Pope’s face changed. You sniffed shakily and kept talking too fast now, words tumbling over themselves. “She went missing our senior year. They found her body all the way out in Point Loma.”
Silence slammed into the apartment. Pope looked genuinely frightening now. Not toward you. Toward the thought of somebody making you cry like this.
Craig sat down hard on the couch suddenly, elbows braced on his knees while he dragged both hands down his face. “Jesus fucking Christ,” he muttered.
You rushed your words out quicker now through tears. “I wanted to go to the police but Nate kept begging me not to ruin his dad’s life and then we started fighting more and more and…” Your throat closed painfully. “The night he hit me was because I told him I was done protecting them.” Your breathing shook. “It had been seven years since she died and-” You stopped hard, trying to steady yourself. “Her parents invited Nate and me to breakfast every year after they found her body.” Your voice cracked again. “And I had to sit across from them pretending the person I was sharing my life with didn’t know his father murdered their daughter.”
Deran looked disgusted. Actually disgusted.
Pope stepped toward you immediately. His hand lifted carefully, fingers brushing against the side of your face almost hesitantly. “What…” he said softly, eyes searching yours. “What do you mean he knew?”
You swallowed hard. “Nate helped him.”
Even the air in the apartment felt different afterward. “That asshole helped his father?” Deran asked flatly. Not remorseful. Just colder somehow.
You nodded shakily. “He knew the whole time.” Tears slid down your cheeks faster now. “He wasn’t shocked when I told him what I found. He was angry I wouldn’t look the other way anymore.”
Baz rubbed a hand slowly over his mouth processing everything. Then finally he held his hand out toward the disk carefully. “Can I see it?”
You hesitated. And for one awful second, fear curled low in your stomach. Not because you thought they’d hurt you. Because suddenly you realized you didn’t actually know what these men were capable of. Now here they stood in a dead man’s apartment after silently following you across town.
You looked toward Pope carefully. He noticed the hesitation instantly. And it visibly hurt him. Something shifted in his expression almost imperceptibly. “Hey,” he said quietly.
Your eyes lifted toward him. “We’re not gonna hurt you.” The sincerity in his voice made your chest ache.
You nodded slowly before handing Baz the disk case.
Baz opened it carefully while Craig leaned over trying to see too. Deran cursed quietly under his breath almost immediately. Inside sat a plain burned CD labeled in black marker.
S. DAVIS — 3/18/2009.
“Her name was Sarah,” you whispered.
“Jesus Christ,” Craig muttered again.
You looked away immediately, humiliation mixing violently with grief in your chest. “I know I should’ve gone to the cops sooner.”
You completely misunderstood the look passing between them. You thought they were judging you. Wondering why you stayed quiet so long. You didn’t notice the other realization settling in instead.
That Nate and his father being dead suddenly looked a whole lot less suspicious if this ever surfaced.
“No,” Pope said immediately. Your eyes lifted toward him again. His expression softened instantly the second he saw your face. “You tried.”
The words hit harder than they should have. Because nobody else had ever said that to you. Not Nate. Not yourself. Pope stepped closer carefully now. Close enough that you could smell him mixed with the smoke and beer still clinging faintly to the oversized sweatshirt hanging off your body. His sweatshirt. You suddenly became aware you were still wearing it.
Pope noticed you realizing. His eyes dropped briefly toward the sleeves swallowing your hands. Something possessive flickered low across his face again. Then he looked back at you. “You were trying to protect people,” he said quietly. Your throat tightened painfully “Sarah deserves justice.”
Baz looked up from the disk then. “We can help with that.”
You blinked at him. “What?”
Deran nodded slowly now. “You take this to the cops, they’ll actually listen.”
“Especially now,” Craig muttered darkly. “Perfect dead suburban family man bullshit kinda falls apart once this gets out.”
You stared at all of them. “You’d help me?”
Baz feigned confusion by the question. “Why wouldn’t we?”
You almost laughed at that. Because ten minutes ago these men silently appeared in your apartment like something out of a nightmare and scared the hell out of you without even trying. And now they were calmly offering to help expose a predator.
Nothing about the Codys made sense.
Pope stepped even closer. Close enough that your pulse stumbled slightly. “You don’t gotta do this alone anymore,” he said softly. “I’ll take you to the cops myself.”
And the terrifying thing was you believed him immediately.
The police station took almost two hours.
Two exhausting, emotionally draining hours of sitting beneath fluorescent lights while detectives asked careful questions and copied files from the disk. You felt nauseous the entire time.
Pope never left your side once. Not once.
He sat beside you in stiff silence through every interview, large body angled slightly toward yours the whole time like some unconscious shield. Every time your voice shook answering a question, his eyes lifted immediately to your face.
One detective finally asked if he was your boyfriend.
Pope answered before you could. “Yes.” The word came out flat and immediate. You turned toward him in surprise. Pope didn’t even look at you. Just kept staring at the detective like daring him to question it.
The detective only nodded slowly and moved on. But your stomach had flipped violently anyway. Because Pope didn’t say things casually. Everything with him felt carved in stone.
By the time you finally walked back outside, the sky had gone dark. You stood near the parking lot rubbing your arms tiredly while Pope watched you carefully beside his truck.
“You okay?”
“No,” you admitted honestly.
Pope nodded once like he expected that answer. “You wanna stay alone tonight?”
The thought made your stomach twist immediately. Nate’s apartment suddenly felt unbearable now, and you knew Deran had Adrian over. You looked at him quietly. “Can I stay with you?”
Pope’s entire body went still. You noticed. Because you’d started learning him now. And Pope looked at you like you’d just handed him something precious.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “Yeah, okay.”
The drive to his apartment was quiet.
Pope drove one-handed, occasionally glancing toward you like he was checking to make sure you were still there. The apartment complex itself surprised you.
Small. Quiet. Nothing flashy.
Inside surprised you even more. Everything was spotless. Painfully spotless. You stepped inside slowly while Pope locked the door behind you. The apartment looked almost untouched. Counters completely clear. Shoes lined up perfectly near the wall. Blankets folded sharply across the couch. Not a single dish in the sink.
“You actually live like this?” you asked softly. Pope shrugged. “It’s cleaner than a hospital in here.”
“I don’t like mess.” You looked around again. The apartment felt exactly like him somehow. Every object carefully placed where it belonged. Even the air smelled clean.
Pope watched your eyes move around the room intently. Like he cared whether or not you approved.
You smiled faintly. “I like it.”
The tension visibly left his shoulders.
God. That should not have affected you as much as it did. You turned toward him fully then. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For helping me today.”
Pope frowned slightly like the answer was obvious. “You needed help.”
“I know but…” Your throat tightened unexpectedly. “Nobody’s ever really done something like that for me before.”
Pope stared at you so intensely your chest warmed. “You don’t gotta thank me for taking care of you.” There it was again. That dangerous kind of devotion sitting quietly beneath everything he said.
You swallowed hard. Pope’s eyes immediately dropped to your throat moving. Jesus Christ. The man stared like it physically hurt him not to touch you. “You can shower if you want,” he said suddenly. “I’ll find you clothes.” You nodded quickly mostly because you needed a second to breathe.
The bathroom was just as obsessively clean as the rest of the apartment. White towels folded perfectly. Everything organized. You caught yourself smiling slightly while turning on the shower. Of course Pope folded towels properly.
You stripped slowly, exhaustion finally crashing into your body as steam filled the room. The hot water felt almost painful against your skin at first. You closed your eyes beneath the spray immediately. For the first time all day, your brain quieted.
A soft knock sounded faintly through the bathroom. You barely heard it over the water. “Bambi?” Pope’s voice.
You called back weakly, “Yeah?”
“I got clothes for you.”
You hummed something unintelligible, eyes still closed beneath the water. A second later the bathroom door opened quietly. Pope stepped inside carefully holding a folded shirt and sweatpants. Then he froze. The glass shower door was partially translucent from the steam. Enough to see your silhouette beneath the water. Your head tilted back slightly. Wet hair slicked against your shoulders. Water tracing down your body slowly. Pope stopped breathing for a second.
You didn’t notice him immediately. Eyes still closed while water poured over your face. Pope should’ve left. Instead he stood there completely motionless staring through the steam like a man starving to death. His jaw flexed once hard enough to hurt.
Then you opened your eyes. And saw him.
For one suspended second neither of you moved. Pope looked almost caught.
Your heart started pounding instantly. But you weren’t scared. Not even a little. Because it was Andrew. Obsessive, strange, intense Andrew who looked at you like you were the only thing in the world worth seeing.
Slowly, you reached forward and pulled the shower door open wider. Steam curled out into the bathroom. Pope stared at you silently. Water dripped down your skin while his eyes moved over you openly now. No pretending otherwise.
Your voice came out soft. “You gonna just stand there?”
Pope swallowed hard. “You want me to come in there?”
You stepped closer instead of answering. Close enough now that steam dampened the front of his shirt. Then your fingers curled around the front of it gently and pulled. Pope came willingly. The second he stepped beneath the hot water, your mouths crashed together hard.
It wasn’t soft. Weeks of tension snapped all at once.
Pope kissed like he thought about it constantly. Hands immediately gripping your waist hard enough to bruise while yours tangled into his damp hair. A low sound left his throat when you kissed him back harder.
“You sure?” he murmured roughly against your mouth.
You answered by dragging his shirt upward impatiently. That nearly killed him. Pope pulled back just enough to yank the shirt over his head before grabbing your face again immediately. His hands were everywhere now. Like he couldn’t decide where he wanted to touch you most.
Your chest. Your waist. Your thighs. Always pulling you closer. Always needing more.
You kissed down his jaw while your fingers worked open his belt beneath the spray of water. Pope’s breathing turned uneven instantly. “Bambi,” he muttered warningly. But his hands tightened against you anyway.
You looked up at him through wet lashes. The eye contact alone almost destroyed him. Because Pope loved your eye contact. Loved seeing exactly what you felt while touching him.
You pushed his jeans down just enough to make him curse softly under his breath before his mouth found yours again harder this time. The steam thickened around both of you while water poured over his shoulders. Everything about him felt overwhelming up close. Big hands. Heavy breathing. The intensity. Even kissing you, Pope watched your face constantly like he needed every reaction. “You’re so pretty,” he whispered suddenly against your mouth.
The sincerity in it made heat rush through you instantly. Pure Andrew.
Your fingers slid across his chest slowly and Pope actually shivered beneath your touch. That realization alone nearly made you dizzy. Because this terrifying man, this obsessive, dangerous Cody, looked completely undone by you touching him back. His hands stayed locked around your waist beneath the spray of hot water while your mouths moved together desperately, steam thickening the air around both of you until breathing felt difficult. Not because of the heat. Because of him. Because every time you touched him, Pope reacted like it meant something.
Your fingers slid through his wet hair and his entire body tensed instantly. A rough sound left his throat before he kissed you harder, backing you slowly against the cool shower wall. “Andrew,” you breathed against his mouth. His forehead dropped briefly against yours while he stared at your face through wet lashes, breathing uneven.
“You keep doing that,” he murmured.
“What?”
“Calling me that.”
You smiled softly. “Well do you like it.”
“Yes.” Always honest. You laughed quietly and Pope’s eyes locked onto your mouth again instantly. Like he couldn’t help himself. The intensity of it made your stomach twist pleasantly. Water ran down his chest while your hands moved lower, tracing slowly across muscle and scar tissue. Pope shivered again beneath your touch and the realization almost drove you insane. This terrifying man who scared half of Oceanside looked completely undone just from you touching him gently. Pope suddenly grabbed your thighs without warning. You gasped softly as he lifted you effortlessly against him. His mouth found yours again immediately. Your legs wrapped around his waist instinctively while his hands held you securely like he never wanted to put you down again. Which honestly,
he probably didn’t.
Pope kissed down your jaw slowly before pressing his face briefly against your neck. Not even kissing for a second. Just breathing you in. The intimacy of it made your chest ache. Then suddenly he pulled back just enough to look at you again. Really look at you. Water dripped from his dark hair into his eyes but he barely blinked.“You wanna stop?” he asked quietly.
The question caught you off guard. Because despite all the intensity, all the possessiveness simmering beneath his skin Pope had been careful with you from the beginning.
You shook your head immediately. “No.”
Pope stared one second longer like he needed to make absolutely sure. Then he kissed you again and carried you straight out of the shower. You laughed breathlessly against his mouth as water dripped onto the bathroom floor.
“Andrew…”
He barely let you finish speaking before pushing open the bedroom door. The room matched the rest of the apartment perfectly. You didn’t even fully process it before Pope lowered you onto the mattress and climbed over you immediately. The second your back hit the sheets, something in him snapped. Like having you in his bed meant more than it should. His large hands slid beneath your thighs while he kissed you deeper, slower now, finally able to touch you without interruption.
You tugged him closer instantly. Pope practically groaned into your mouth. “You want me close,” he muttered against your lips almost like he was amazed by it.
“Yes.” His eyes flashed dark immediately. Pope loved hearing that. Loved anything that sounded like you choosing him. He kissed you again rougher this time while his hands moved over your body constantly. Your waist. Your hips. Your stomach. Like he couldn’t stop touching you long enough to think straight. Pope kept pulling back just enough to look at you. Watching your face every time you touched him. Every little sound you made. Every reaction. It was almost overwhelming how focused he was on you.
You reached up brushing damp hair back from his forehead gently. Pope froze for half a second. “What?” you whispered.
“You’re…” He swallowed hard. “You’re nice to me.”
The quiet sincerity behind the words hurt your chest unexpectedly. Like he genuinely wasn’t used to tenderness. You touched his face softer this time. “Andrew.”
His eyes shut briefly. You realized suddenly that Pope Cody would probably let you ruin him completely if you asked. The thought hit hard. Because underneath all the danger and obsession and intensity Pope was touch-starved in a way that felt almost painful. Every gentle touch visibly affected him. Every kiss. Every time your fingers dragged through his hair or across his shoulders. He reacted like he’d remember it forever.
Your hands slid down his chest slowly while he kissed along your throat, breathing rough and uneven against your skin.
“You smell good,” he murmured distractedly.
You laughed softly. “That’s a weird thing to say during a makeout.”
“I know.” Again with the honesty.
You smiled into another kiss while Pope’s hand tightened slightly against your waist. Like he physically needed to keep part of you underneath his hand at all times. His mouth moved slower now, deeper, tension simmering heavy between you both while the room stayed quiet except for uneven breathing and the occasional creak of the mattress beneath his weight. His mouth broke from yours only long enough to drag his lips down the line of your jaw, teeth grazing the sensitive skin just below your ear. The sound you made, breathless, broken, pulled a low hum of approval from his chest. Pope's hand slid from your waist to the small of your back, pressing you harder against him until there was nothing between you and the heat radiating off his body. “You have no idea,” he murmured against your neck, voice rougher than it had been moments ago, "how long I've been thinking about this."
You tilted your head back, giving him more space, and he took it without hesitation, tongue tracing down your throat, teeth sinking just enough to make you gasp. His other hand came up to cup your jaw, tilting your face so he could look at you. Those dark eyes, half-lidded and burning, swept over your expression like he was memorizing every detail. “I need you to understand something first.” His thumb traced over your lower lip, tugging it down just slightly. “If we do this-“ He paused, letting the weight of his words settle. “You belong to me. Not for tonight. Not for the weekend. You’re mine. You understand?”
The possessiveness in his voice sent a shiver straight through you, pooling heat low in your belly. You nodded, breath catching, and he shook his head slowly.
“Words, sweetheart. I need to hear you say it.”
“Yes,” you whispered, voice steadier than you expected. “I understand. I'm yours.”Something flickered in his gaze, satisfaction, hunger, and a tenderness that made your chest ache. His hand slid from your jaw to the back of your neck, pulling you into another kiss that wasn't gentle. It was claiming. His tongue swept into your mouth, and you moaned against him, fingers curling into muscle. He pulled back just enough to look at you again, breath mingling. “Such a good girl.” The words hit you like a live wire.
Pope’s hands cupped your breasts letting his knuckles drag across your skin as he went. His eyes dropped to your chest, and he let out a slow exhale. “Fuck,” he breathed. “You're so gorgeous.”
He didn't rush. His mouth followed the path his hands had taken, kissing down your collarbone, over the swell of your breasts, tongue circling your nipple and your back arched off the mattress. He sucked hard, then softer, then hard again, switching between the two until you were writhing beneath him, fingers tangled in his curly hair. His hand moved to your other breast, thumb rolling over the peak while his tongue worked the first.
“Please,” you gasped.
“Please what?” He lifted his head, dark eyes finding yours. His lips were wet, his jaw tight with restraint.
“Please-I need-“ You didn’t know what you needed.
“I know what you need.” His hand slid down your stomach, fingers circling your hip bone. “But I want to hear you say it.”
You swallowed, heat flooding your cheeks even as your hips bucked into his touch. “I need you inside me, Andy.”
The name, Andy, did something to him. His pupils dilated, his breath caught, and for a second he just stared at you like you'd given him something precious. “Say it again,”he commanded, voice rough.
“Andy.”
His mouth crashed into yours, hungry and desperate, and his hand finally, finally, slipped further fingers sliding through slick heat. He groaned into your mouth when he felt how wet you were. “That's for me,” he muttered against your lips. “All this, just for me.”
You nodded frantically, and he rewarded you by pressing two fingers inside you without warning. A cry tore from your throat, not pain, but pleasure sharp enough to make your vision blur. He curled them, found that spot immediately, and your hips jerked.
“Yeah,” he breathed, watching your face. “Right there. I know.” He worked you slowly at first, dragging his fingers in and out while his thumb pressed against your clit in tight circles. Your hands gripped the sheets, your moans growing louder, more broken, until you felt that familiar tension coiling in your gut.
“m’close,”you whimpered.
Pope shook his head, pulling his fingers out. “Not yet. I want to feel you come on my cock.” Your whine of protest died in your throat when he sat back on his knees, eyes fixed on you as he stroked his hard cock, and you watched, transfixed, as his head fell back and he let out such a deep groan. He was hard, thick, the tip already glistening. Your mouth went dry. Pope tightened his hand around his shaft, stroking once, twice, moving his head so. he never broke eye contact with you. “You want this?”
“Yes, fuck-yes, Andy.”
He leaned over you, bracing one hand beside your head while the other guided his cock to your entrance. He didn't push in, not yet. He just let the head rest against you, teasing, letting you feel the heat and the pressure. “Tell me you're mine.”
“I'm yours.” Your voice cracked, desperate. “I'm yours, Andy. Please-“
He pushed in. Slow. Impossibly slow. Every inch of him stretching you open, filling you until you couldn't breathe. Your eyes rolled back, a strangled moan escaping your lips. He paused when he was fully sheathed, letting you adjust, his forehead pressed to yours. “Fuck,” he whispered, voice shaking. “You feel-fuck.” He started moving. Long, deep strokes that hit exactly where you needed him. His pace was steady, controlled, each thrust a deliberate claim. Your legs wrapped around his waist, pulling him deeper, and he groaned at the angle. “Yeah, just like that.”
One of his hands found yours, fingers interlacing, pinning it to the mattress beside your head. His other hand, you saw it twitch toward your throat, saw the want flash in his eyes, and you tilted your chin up in silent invitation. But he pulled his hand back, gripping your hip instead.
“I can't,” he said, voice strained. “I can't, God, I want to, but I can't stand the idea of hurting you.”
“It wouldn't hurt me,” you breathed. “I want it.”
“I know you do.” His thrusts grew harder, faster, chasing his own edge. “But I won't. I'll give you everything else, every fucking thing, but not that.”
You wanted to argue, but the way he was fucking you made any thoughts impossible. He angled his hips, and suddenly he was hitting a spot that sent electricity through your entire body. Your nails dug into his back, and he hissed in pleasure.
“That's it. Let me feel you.” The pressure built again, faster this time, and your mouth fell open in a cry. Pope watched your face, drinking in every expression, and when your eyes welled with tears, from the intensity, from the sheer overwhelming pleasure, his breath stuttered. “Fuck,” he groaned, his rhythm faltering. “Look at you. Crying on my cock.”
The tears spilled over, tracking down your temples into your hair. He lowered his head and licked one off your cheekbone, the gesture strangely tender in the midst of the brutality of his thrusts.
“You're so beautiful like this,” he murmured. “So perfect. I want you to come. I want to feel you squeeze me.” His hand slipped between your bodies, fingers finding your clit and rubbing in tight, fast circles. That was all it took. The orgasm crashed through you, violent and consuming, your body arching off the bed as a broken scream tore from your throat. Pope kept moving through it, fucking you through the aftershocks, groaning as your walls clenched around him. “That's it,” he panted. “Fuck, that's it.”
He didn't stop, couldn't stop. He flipped you onto your stomach in one smooth motion, pulling your hips up and entering you from behind. The new angle was deeper, harder, and you buried your face in the pillow to muffle your cries as he took you apart. His hand tangled in your hair, pulling your head back just enough so he could lean down and speak against your ear.
“You're taking me so well. You feel that? That's me inside you. No one else. Ever.”
Words failed you. All you could do was moan and push back against him. His pace grew erratic, his grip on your hip bruising. “I'm gonna come inside you. Fill you up. You want that?”
“Yes-yes, Andy, please-“
His hand slid around to your front, fingers pressing against your clit again, and you felt a second orgasm building, impossibly fast.
“Come with me,” he commanded. “Now.”
Your body obeyed. The second wave hit as he drove into you one last time, burying himself deep, his groan long and guttural as he spilled inside you. Hot pulses of release filling you, and you felt every one.
He collapsed forward, chest heaving against your back, his lips pressing lazy kisses to your shoulder. Neither of you moved for a long moment, just breathing, just existing in the aftermath.
Finally, he pulled out slowly, and you felt the warmth of his cum trickling down your thigh. He turned you over gently, gathering you into his arms, his hand stroking your hair with a tenderness that made your eyes well up again. “You okay?” he asked softly.
You nodded, voice gone. Pope stayed wrapped around you for a long moment afterward, both of you breathing hard in the dark quiet of his apartment. The room smelled faintly like steam and laundry detergent and him. His forehead rested against the back of your shoulder while one large hand spread slowly across your stomach, almost absentmindedly keeping you pulled tightly against his chest. Like he physically couldn’t let go yet.
Finally, he shifted carefully, easing you up the sheets. His movements slowed immediately the second he saw your face twist slightly from sensitivity. Instant concern. “You hurt?” he asked softly.
“No,” you whispered quickly. “No, I’m okay.”
Pope searched your expression another few seconds anyway. Making sure. Then he leaned down pressing a slow kiss against your forehead before reaching toward the nightstand for a towel. The tenderness of it nearly undid you. He cleaned you up carefully, almost shy despite everything that had happened minutes earlier. Every time you flinched slightly from sensitivity, his hand smoothed automatically over your thigh or stomach in silent apology.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asked again.
You nodded, throat tight. Pope noticed immediately. “You’re crying.”
You touched beneath your eye in surprise.
God. You were.
“I don’t know why,” you admitted quietly.
Pope’s expression softened instantly. He climbed back beside you without hesitation and pulled you into his chest again, one arm wrapping tightly around your waist while the other hand moved slowly through your damp hair. The repetitive motion felt calming immediately. Safe. “Do you regret it?” he asked after a moment.
Your head lifted quickly. “No.” The answer came so fast it visibly affected him. Relief crossed his face so openly it hurt your chest “No,” you repeated softer this time. “Not even a little.”
Pope stared down at you in silence. Then his hand moved gently across your cheek. “You sure?”
You nodded. And maybe it was emotional exhaustion or the intimacy of being held like this, but suddenly your chest ached with it. Nobody had ever touched you like Pope did. Like your comfort mattered more than his own. Like he was constantly paying attention. You curled closer instinctively beneath the blankets. Pope immediately tightened his arm around you. His eyes dropped toward the top of your head where it rested against his chest. “You fit good there,” he murmured quietly.
You laughed softly against his skin. “That’s such an Andrew thing to say.” The second the name left your mouth, his fingers tightened slightly in your hair. He loved that name from you. Loved it in that deep quiet way he loved everything involving you “Y’know you’re the only one who calls me that,” he said.
“Is that okay?”
“Yes.”
You tilted your head up enough to look at him. Pope was already staring back down at you. Of course he was. You smiled sleepily. “You stare a lot after sex too, huh?”
“I stare at you all the time.”
You laughed quietly and his expression softened watching it happen.
For a while neither of you spoke. Pope kept tracing slow patterns against your back beneath the blankets while you listened to his heartbeat under your ear.
summary: even after swapping from nights to days, you just can’t seem to escape the inconveniently attractive night shift attending. then a ptmc night out, a sparkly dress, and a not-so-innocent game of never have i ever leads to dr. jack abbot making sure you can never utter the words “never have i ever finished during sex” ever again.
notes: i really hope you guys enjoiy this! it was so much fun to write and i just feel like jack is a little easier to put into silly situations than robby, so here i am torturing the poor man! i'm sorry in advance if the smut is kind of mid, i was fighting tumblr's block limit rule with this fic so i feel like i didn't get indulge as much as i would have liked, but still! i hope you guys love it, and please, please let me know what you think! (p.s. i think i mentioned the title was originally 'unaffected' but i like this one better)
warnings: swearing, alcohol, blushing, italics, jealousy, implied age gap, jack is a yearner, reader wears a "revealing" dress (but description is very vague and there's zero detail about body-type), mildly uncomfortable male encounters, friend!santos, pittlings chaos, garsantos mention, jack gets a little possessive, reader has long enough hair to sweep off her neck, and SMUT (making out, fingering, "panties", a tiny bit of dirty talk, unprotected piv, "good girl", and jack says sweetheart a lot) 18+ only please, mdni.
word count: 18889
Jack Abbot had never thought of himself as a jealous man.
Possessive, maybe. Protective, definitely. But jealous? Never.
He had never really had anything to be jealous of.
Until now.
Now there are far too many things.
Like the pen between your lips—and the way you bite down just hard enough to leave a little dent in the plastic while you read through Dana’s notes.
Or Dana herself, and the way you’re looking at her—soft, sleepy, warm in a way that twists something tight in Jack’s chest. The same way you used to look at him in the quiet hours at the end of a night shift.
Or your scrubs—God, your scrubs—and the way they fit just a little too well tonight. Too tight in all the right places. Distracting in ways that are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.
Jack has never needed to be jealous of anything before, but now he finds himself jealous of inanimate objects, coworkers you barely glance at, and your goddamn clothes.
So, yeah. Jack Abbot had never thought of himself as a jealous man—until you came along.
“Dr. Abbot,” Dana calls, peering over the top of her glasses. “You’re early.”
Beside her, you glance up from your tablet, meeting his eyes across the ER with that same soft smile.
“Dr. Abbot,” you say, like you can’t quite help yourself.
Jack squares his shoulders and starts toward the nurses’ station, determined not to let Dana and her all-knowing, all-seeing bullshit clock exactly why he’s at work almost two hours earlier than he needs to be.
“Yeah, I’ve got some stuff I didn’t get to wrap up this morning,” he lies.
Princess pops up from behind the desk. “I thought you said you stayed back this morning to make sure everything was sorted?”
Jack’s gaze cuts to her. “Yes. But I forgot something.”
Dana narrows her eyes. “Mhm. What’d you forget?”
“A few notes from the three a.m. GSW,” he replies quickly—too quickly.
It’s weak and he knows it, but there’s nothing else he could think of with Dana watching him like that and your warm, sleepy gaze still lingering from across the desk.
Dana nods slowly, adjusting the chart in her hands. “Right. Two hours early for a few notes.”
Jack just shrugs, avoiding her gaze as he walks past—and he doesn’t look back until he’s safely around the corner, standing in front of his locker. Only then does he risk a glance, just briefly over his shoulder, quick enough to catch a glimpse of you disappearing down the North hall.
God. It’s ridiculous, really. He’s a grown man.
More than that—he's an old man.
Yet here he is staying late at work and coming in early just to see more of you. Because ever since you swapped from nights to days, Jack doesn’t quite know what to do with himself. Sure, he could barely concentrate when you were on shift together, but who knew not having you around would be even worse?
He spends the first half of his shift hating himself for being so hung up on someone so young and so impossibly out of reach—then spends the second half anxiously awaiting your arrival for the day shift.
And it’s only been two weeks.
But the absolute worst part?
He doesn’t even know why you swapped shifts. You never even spoke to him about it. You just told him at four a.m. two Saturdays ago that you were switching to day shift. No reason. No explanation. That was it.
At first he wondered if it was his fault—if maybe you’d simply decided you didn’t like working with him.
But you still greet him every morning and every evening with that same warm smile. You still look to him first whenever someone asks for an attending and he’s still around. You still text him whenever the ER cat shows up outside the ambulance bay—which apparently happens much more often during the day shift.
And Jack still buys a packet of freeze-dried liver treats every Sunday to keep in the cupboard above the break room fridge—because he knows how much you love feeding that cat.
“What’re you doing here?”
Jack’s head whips around at the sound of his friend’s voice.
“I—uh—came in early to fix up a few notes,” he says, turning back to shove his bag into his locker.
Robby’s brows lift. “Two hours for notes?”
Jack sighs, slinging his stethoscope around his neck and shutting his locker before turning to face his fellow attending. “Are you of all people really going to lecture me about not having a life outside of this ER?”
Robby chuckles quietly, lifting both hands out of his pockets in surrender. “I wasn’t judging.”
“Good,” Jack mutters, already starting back toward central. “Anything I need to know?”
Robby falls into step beside him. “North Three’s waiting on a CT for possible appendicitis. Kid in Five came in with chest pain but his labs look clean so far. Dana’s still fighting with bed control about moving the pneumonia admit upstairs.”
They both stop at the nurses’ station, glancing up at the board.
“Otherwise it’s been unusually calm,” Robby adds. “Which probably means you’re about to get slammed.”
Jack gives him a flat look. “Thanks.”
“Anytime.” Robby claps him on the shoulder. “Oh—and that R2 you gave me?”
“What about her?”
Robby shrugs. “She’s great.”
“I know,” Jack says, keeping his voice carefully even.
Robby studies him for a second, eyes narrowing just a fraction, the corner of his mouth threatening to lift. The man might be a disaster when it comes to his own feelings, but he has an uncanny talent for spotting everyone else’s.
“We’re alright out here if you want to catch up on your notes,” he says after a moment, already turning away. “Or go make the rounds. Get some very thorough handovers from the residents.”
Jack keeps his eyes fixed on the board. “I hate you.”
Robby huffs out a quiet laugh. “Then why are you here two hours early?”
Jack exhales sharply and steps forward, pulling one of the tablets from the rack.
“Notes,” he says, a little louder than necessary.
Robby just shakes his head, still smiling faintly as he disappears down the North corridor.
For a moment, Jack doesn’t move. He lingers at the nurses’ station, tablet in hand, pretending to analyse the board while ignoring the incredibly unsubtle looks from Perlah and Princess—both of them watching him with the kind of interest that usually means someone’s about to become the subject of a very entertaining conversation.
Then, with a polite nod to each of them, he clears his throat and steps away, turning toward the break room—trying very hard not to hope he runs into you on the way.
And trying not to be disappointed when he doesn’t.
The break room is empty when he steps inside, the noise of the ER dulling as the door falls shut behind him. He sets his tablet on the table—next to someone’s half-eaten lunch and a discarded Lean Cuisine container—and grabs a clean mug from the cupboard, pouring the last of the coffee pot into it.
Then he drops into the seat furthest from the door, his back to the bulletin board, and taps the tablet awake, pulling up the notes for the three a.m. GSW. The same notes he already finished in detail while staying back this morning—before Robby told him to get the hell out of his ER and get some sleep.
He barely makes it through two lines of the chart before the door swings open again.
“Shit, sorry,” you say quickly, stepping toward the table.
Jack’s pulse does the same stupid thing it always does whenever he sees you, making his chest feel hot and his head a little fuzzy.
“What are you sorry for?” he asks, as if it isn’t obvious.
You’ve already stacked the Lean Cuisine container on top of the half-eaten bowl of something grey and mushy-looking and are halfway to the sink with them.
“I only got, like, a five-minute break today and had to run out for a trauma, then completely forgot about my lunch,” you explain, cheeks flushed as you glance down at the bowl. “This is gross. I’m so sorry.”
Jack shifts in his chair. “I’ve seen worse in here, I promise.”
You glance over your shoulder as you turn on the tap, the corner of your mouth lifting just slightly. “Really?”
He nods. “Really.”
He could almost swear your smile lifts a little higher before you turn back to the sink, scrubbing hurriedly at the bowl of slop that probably shouldn’t be going down the drain anyway.
Jack clears his throat. “But—uh—Lean Cuisine? Really?”
You look back at him again, brows drawn. “What’s wrong with Lean Cuisine?”
“Nothing,” he says lightly. “If you’re trying to survive a very stressful twelve-hour shift on only four hundred calories.”
You huff a quiet laugh, turning back to the sink. “I actually managed to eat lunch today. That’s already a win.”
“It’s mostly sodium and sadness,” he adds, almost absently. “Not much protein.”
You finally turn the tap off and spin around, leaning a hip against the counter. “Alright, Dr. Abbot. When I find the spare time to start meal prepping between my very stressful twelve-hour shifts, I’ll let you know.”
Jack opens his mouth—then closes it again. Because what he wants to say is ridiculous.
But it comes out anyway.
“…I cook.”
You blink.
“You cook?”
Jack clears his throat, suddenly very interested in his coffee mug.
“Yeah. Well.” He shrugs. “I’ve been told I’m reasonably good at it.”
You stare at him for a second, brows knitting slightly as you clearly try to figure out where the hell that came from.
“Well,” you say with a quick smile, “I guess your dinner guests are pretty lucky.”
Before he can respond, you grab the Lean Cuisine packet, toss it in the bin, and step toward the door.
“Sorry again for the mess.”
Then you’re gone—leaving Jack alone with his coffee, his notes, and the growing suspicion that there might actually be something seriously wrong with him.
-
“Is that Dr. Abbot in the break room?” Santos asks, falling into step beside you.
You keep your eyes fixed on your tablet.
“Yep.”
She leans closer, steering you out of the way of a gurney.
“But night shift doesn’t start for like two more hours.”
“I’m aware.”
“So, why is he here?”
You exhale sharply and finally look up from your tablet. “I don’t know, Trin. Maybe because the universe hates me.”
She snorts. “Or maybe because he likes you.”
You roll your eyes, turning toward the South corridor. “Please don’t start.”
“I’m not starting anything,” she insists. “I seriously think that old man has a thing for you.”
“Don’t call him that,” you mutter.
“Okay, fine. I seriously think that hot, older man has a thing for you,” she says, stopping beside you at the South desks. “And we all know how you feel about him, so—”
“No,” you snap. “We don’t all know how I feel about Ja—Dr. Abbot.”
She presses her lips together to keep from laughing.
“Besides,” you go on, dropping into a chair. “I swapped to day shift so I could stop being distracted by my attending and actually focus on being a good doctor—so could you please stop distracting me?”
She leans a hip against the desk, completely ignoring you. “And don’t you think that’s a little strange? I mean, you swapped to day shift—what, two weeks ago?”
You glance at her from the corner of your eye. “And?”
“And,” she says dramatically, “for the past two weeks Dr. Abbot has been staying back every morning and coming in early every afternoon.”
Your gaze slides back to the computer. “So?”
She sighs, exasperated. “It’s not a coincidence.”
“Actually, I think it is,” you argue.
She stares at you for a second, eyes narrowing. “You’re impossible.”
“And you’re annoying.”
She rolls her eyes and pushes off the desk. “Whatever. You’re still coming out tomorrow night, right?”
Your fingers hesitate over the keyboard. “Uh—I’m not sure yet.”
“Dr. Ellis is the only person from night shift that’ll be there,” she says.
You let out a quiet sigh of defeat.
“Fine,” you mutter. “I’ll come.”
“Good.” She grins, already turning away. “Come to my place around six. We can get ready and pregame.”
“Why can’t I get ready at home?” you ask.
“Because,” she calls over her shoulder, “I get to pick what you wear.”
And before you can argue, she slips into a patient room, effectively ending the conversation.
“Great,” you mumble, turning back to the computer. “Can’t wait.”
It’s not like you’re not looking forward to finally joining in on a night out now that you’re no longer on the night shift.
You are. You’re just... nervous.
Nervous, perpetually stressed out, and still adjusting to life as a day-walker. And Santos knows that. She probably knows you better than anyone else at PTMC—even though you’ve spent the better part of ten months working opposite shifts.
Which is exactly why she’s pushing you to join this night out. Because she knows you need it. She knows you need to relax, forget about work, and do something other than obsess over the night shift attending who’s had you completely undone since the day you first met.
God.
Jack Abbot. The single most dangerous man in Pittsburgh.
Not only is he stupidly hot, but he’s also annoyingly competent, irritatingly attentive, and has the starring role in every single one of your most inappropriate fantasies.
He’s also the very reason you’re terrified of having to redo your second year of residency, because that man affects your focus so much you literally can’t function. Like three weeks ago, when you walked straight into the glass door of Trauma One because you were too busy watching him take his jacket off.
His damn jacket.
That was the moment you finally decided you needed to swap shifts—because Dr. Shen couldn’t look at you for the rest of the night without bursting into laughter.
Jack Abbot is a liability to your health and wellbeing—which means he is a liability to your career. And even though asking Dr. Robby to swap to day shift was one of the most ridiculously difficult things you’ve done since starting at PTMC, you stand by the fact that it was the right decision.
The smart decision. The professional decision. Even if… it might not be working yet.
Because now you can’t just glance across central anymore and see Jack leaning against the desk, talking through a case with Lena. You can’t have him step up beside you when you’re unsure about something and quietly walk you through it. He’s not the one across from you in the trauma bays. And there isn’t a coffee cup that magically appears in front of you during the three o’clock lull.
Now you just… think about him instead.
But it’s only temporary. You’re sure of it. You just need to get used to the day shift and figure out how to get Jack Abbot out of your head.
Which… you have a sneaking suspicion is what Santos plans on helping you with this weekend.
You’re pretty sure you overheard her the other day telling Whitaker that the only way to get over someone is by getting under someone else. And maybe that’s exactly what you need to do—get under someone else so you can stop thinking about the maddeningly hot man who’s nearly twice your age and most definitely does not have a thing for you. Regardless of what Santos seems to think.
You spend the rest of your shift catching up on charting and trying very hard not to think about Dr. Abbot.
When someone asks for an attending, you call Dr. Robby. When you hear his voice just around the corner, you change paths as quickly and inconspicuously as you can. And when your notes are up to date and night shift starts rolling in, you find Dr. Ellis and give her—and only her—the rundown on your patients.
By the time you shut your locker and sling your bag over your shoulder, the sky outside is dark and there are only a few day shifters left lingering around the nurses’ station.
“Did you drive today?” Whitaker asks, shutting his locker only a moment after you.
“Yeah,” you reply. “Need a ride?”
He nods sheepishly. “That’d be great. Santos left already, said I was taking too long.”
You roll your eyes. “Yeah, I bet it had nothing to do with whatever she and Garcia were whispering about in the stairwell.”
Whitaker winces. “I just hope they’re at Garcia’s tonight.”
You huff a small laugh and hitch your bag higher. “You ready?”
He nods.
You both turn and start back toward central—but just as you reach the nurses’ station, his steps slow.
“Do you need to…?”
He jerks a thumb over his shoulder.
You frown. “Need to what?”
He hesitates. “Don’t you normally say goodbye to Dr. Abbot?”
Your eyes widen slowly. “Uh—no. Why would you say that?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. I just thought you two were close.”
“We’re not close,” you say, a little too quick.
“Sorry,” he mutters, raising both hands in surrender. “I just—I don’t know. I thought because you were his resident you two were… close.”
“I’m not his resident,” you snap. “I’m just… a resident. I don’t belong to him.”
“Okay,” he says slowly, brows drawing together. “I’m sorry, I just thought—”
“You thought wrong,” you mutter, glancing over your shoulder to make sure no one is listening.
Thankfully, the two nosiest nurses in the ER have already gone home for the day.
“Let’s just go.”
You grab his wrist and walk quickly toward the ambulance bay doors, giving Ellis and Shen a small nod as you pass—completely missing the middle-aged attending who just overheard most of your conversation.
The car ride to Santos and Whitaker’s isn’t long. Whitaker fills most of it anyway—rambling about the shift, about the kid in Five and whether night shift is going to get slammed, about how Dana looked like she was two seconds away from strangling bed control by the end of the day. And every few minutes he circles back around to apologising for making you drive him home.
You wave him off each time.
“It’s fine, Whitaker.”
“Seriously though,” he says as you pull up outside their building. “I really appreciate it.”
He slings his bag over his shoulder and climbs out of the car, pausing on the sidewalk to give you one last wave before heading toward the front door.
The moment the passenger door falls shut, the quiet settles in. You let out a long breath, tipping your head back against the headrest and letting your eyes fall shut for a moment. And immediately—inevitably—your brain drifts straight back to the same place it always does.
Jack Abbot. Of course.
You scrub a hand over your face before shifting the car back into gear and pulling away.
The rest of the night passes the way most nights do—with a quick shower, something vaguely edible scavenged from the fridge, and half-heartedly scrolling through your phone until exhaustion finally drags you to bed.
When your head finally hits the pillow, you tell yourself you’re too tired to think about him. It’s been a long day—long week—and all you need right now is sleep, not fantasies.
But that doesn’t stop your brain from doing it anyway. Because sometime in the early hours of the morning, Jack Abbot shows up in your dreams. Not in the ER. Not standing beside you at the nurses’ station or leaning over a chart.
He’s in a kitchen. Cooking.
Sleeves rolled up to his elbows, moving around the stove with the same quiet confidence he carries through the hospital—like he knows exactly what he’s doing and expects the rest of the world just to trust him.
And in the dream, you do.
You lean against the counter and watch him the way you sometimes watch him in the trauma bays, telling yourself you’re just observing. Just curious. Just learning.
He glances over his shoulder eventually, catching you staring—and says something you can’t quite hear over the soft clatter of the pan. But he’s smiling.
Then the dream shifts the way dreams tend to—logic slipping sideways until suddenly you’re standing much closer than you should be. Close enough to smell whatever he’s cooking. Close enough that when he turns toward you the space between you disappears entirely.
His hand settles at your waist like it belongs there.
Your back meets the edge of the counter.
And when his mouth brushes your neck—
You wake with a sharp inhale, staring up at the ceiling, heart racing.
“Fuck,” you mutter, dragging a hand over your face.
So much for getting him out of your head.
For a while, you just lie there, staring at the ceiling, watching the first pale line of sunlight creep across until it touches the wall opposite your window.
At some point you realise you’re still replaying the dream in your head.
The kitchen. The way his hand had felt at your waist. The warmth of his mouth against your neck.
You groan quietly and drag the blanket over your face.
“Get a fucking grip.”
Then you throw the covers back and force yourself out of bed, heading straight into the kitchen in search of coffee.
Your small apartment is always quiet—but this morning it feels too quiet. Too still as you silently sip your coffee, one hip leaned against the kitchen counter. Which, unfortunately, leaves far too much room for your brain to wander right back to its favourite topic.
Jack Abbot.
After coffee, you take yourself for a long walk around the block, hoping the cool morning air might help clear the remnants of the dream from your head.
It doesn’t.
But by the time you make it back to your apartment, your legs feel loose and your mind feels a little quieter, and for the briefest moment you almost manage to convince yourself that you’re excited about tonight. That you’re going to be able to do what Santos is clearly angling for and go home with an attractive stranger so you can stop draining your vibrator battery with inappropriate thoughts of your attending.
The rest of the day drifts past in a slow blur of small, forgettable things. Laundry. Answering a couple of messages in the group chat. Half-heartedly reviewing a few notes from earlier in the week before deciding you absolutely refuse to think about work on your day off.
Eventually the afternoon light begins to soften and stretch across the floor, which means it’s probably time to start getting ready if you’re actually going to make it to Santos’ place before she decides you’re bailing and comes knocking to drag you there herself.
So you shower, change, pack a bag, and throw it over your shoulder on the way out the door—trying very hard not to feel disappointed that Dr. Ellis is the only person from night shift who’s going to be at the bar tonight.
It really is for the best.
You, alcohol, and Jack Abbot in the same room is a terrible idea.
“Alright, I’m ready,” Santos announces, finally stepping out of the bathroom.
You, Javadi, and Whitaker—who have spent the last twenty minutes on the couch chatting and sipping beer—look up.
“Aw, I wish I could do winged eyeliner like that,” Javadi says. “It just doesn’t suit my eye shape.”
“Don’t look too close,” Santos mutters. “It’s super uneven, but I don’t have time. I still have to fix this one before we go.”
She tips her chin toward where you and Whitaker are sitting on the opposite end of the lounge.
Whitaker’s eyes go wide. “Me?”
Santos scoffs. “Not you, Huckleberry. God, I don’t have enough time in the world to fix whatever’s going on there.”
Whitaker frowns, glancing down at his navy-blue button-up shirt. “What’s wrong with this?”
“Everything,” Santos says, already turning away.
Whitaker lifts his head, glancing between you and Javadi. “Is it really that bad?”
Javadi leans forward, lowering her voice. “There’s nothing wrong with it, Whitaker. You look great.”
You pat his shoulder. “It’s fine, really. She’s just—”
The words die on your tongue as Santos reappears, holding what can only be described as a sparkly scrap of fabric on a hanger.
Javadi tilts her head. “What’s that?”
Santos grins. “A dress.”
Whitaker chokes on his beer. “That’s… not a dress. That’s a glittery napkin.”
“Oh my God.” Javadi snorts. “My mom would kill me just for buying that.”
“I didn’t buy it,” Santos says lightly. “A friend in college gave it to me, but it’s never fit quite right.”
She steps forward, extending the hanger toward you.
“But I know you’ll be able to pull it off,” she adds, her grin sharpening.
You stare at it—glinting in the low evening sun spilling through the windows.
“Santos… this is a work thing,” you mutter.
She rolls her eyes. “It’s not a work thing. It’s just an outing with people from work.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?” Whitaker asks.
Santos sighs. “No, it’s not. And are you forgetting our main objective?”
You blink at her.
“To get you laid.”
Javadi giggles nervously, trying to hide it behind a swig of beer.
“Come on,” Santos says. “Just put it on and if it doesn’t work, we try something else.”
You hesitate, staring at the glittery thing like it might catch fire at any moment. Which, given enough sunlight, it probably could.
“Fine,” you say at last, pushing off the couch. “I’ll try it on, but that does not mean I’m wearing it.”
Santos’ eyes sparkle with excitement. Or maybe it’s just the dress.
“That’s my girl.”
You take the hanger from her and trudge into her room, nudging the door shut behind you. It takes a minute for you to figure out how the glittery napkin is supposed to go on—but once you do, you shed your comfortable clothes and shimmy into the most sparkly piece of fabric you’ve ever worn.
And somehow, the shimmering scrap of nothing turns out to be an actual dress—short, sparkling, and just structured enough to stay where it’s supposed to while still feeling mildly illegal.
With a deep breath, you turn away from the mirror and open the door, stepping back out into the lounge room.
“So?”
For a moment, no one says anything.
Whitaker’s mouth falls open.
Javadi’s eyebrows lift. “Oh.”
Santos, meanwhile, tilts her head appreciatively, one hand on her hip, eyes gleaming as she looks you over from head to toe.
“I knew it,” she says smugly.
Whitaker blinks. “That is not a dress.”
Javadi elbows him. “Stop talking.”
You tug awkwardly at the hem—which doesn’t actually move much because there isn’t very much hem to tug.
“Santos,” you say carefully, “I’m not sure—”
“Relax,” she says. “You look incredible.”
She circles you slowly, like a stylist inspecting her work.
“And you’re definitely going to get laid.”
“I feel like I shouldn’t be here,” Whitaker mutters, his face bright red.
Santos rolls her eyes. “You’re only here because you live here, Huckleberry. Now go grab that bottle of tequila from on top of the fridge—we’re going to need some liquid courage before we head out.”
After two shots of tequila and Santos’ finishing touches to your makeup, you all head out the door. Whitaker calls an Uber, the four of you pile in, and you carefully keep Santos’ leather jacket wrapped around yourself for some semblance of modesty.
You don’t really plan on taking it off for the rest of the night—even if it isn’t that cold.
The ride to the bar isn’t nearly long enough. Javadi spends most of it excitedly talking about how she can finally go out drinking now that she’s twenty-one, which Santos encourages with the enthusiasm of someone who clearly intends to make the most of that milestone.
You mostly just stare out the window. Trying not to think about the dress you shouldn’t have agreed to wear and the night shift attending you definitely shouldn’t be missing right now. Because if someone asked you where you’d rather be tonight—the bar or the ER with Dr. Abbot—your honest answer would be incredibly depressing.
Who would rather be at work than out with their friends on a Saturday night?
“We’re here,” Santos announces, nudging your side a little too hard.
You all thank the driver before climbing out, gathering yourselves on the sidewalk in front of the familiar establishment Santos loves dragging everyone to.
“Relax,” she says, dropping a hand on your shoulder. “You don’t need this.”
She tugs at the leather jacket, pulling it off your shoulders until it’s bunched at your elbows.
“I feel naked,” you mutter. “Like this is some nightmare where I show up to work in my underwear.”
Whitaker snorts. “Not far from it.”
Santos rolls her eyes. “Well, you’re not at work. You’re at a bar. And this is supposed to be fun.”
Right. Fun.
That is the entire point of tonight. Go out. Have a drink. Meet someone who isn’t Jack Abbot. Ideally forget Jack Abbot exists for at least a few hours.
Completely achievable.
Right?
“Fine.”
You draw a deep breath and drop your arms, letting the jacket slide off completely. Santos grins as you sling it over one elbow, trying not to instinctively hold it in front of your body like armour.
“See?” she says. “Much better.”
“Let’s just go inside before I change my mind,” you mutter, already starting toward the door.
Javadi loops her arm through yours. “You look amazing. Seriously.”
You give her a small smile, trying not to feel quite so awkward as Santos leads the way toward the main entrance.
It’s just a bar. Just a normal Saturday night. You’ll be fine after a few more shots of liquid courage.
You glance through the front window as you approach—more out of habit than anything else, your eyes drifting lazily over the crowded room inside.
People. Low lights. Patrons lingering around the bar.
And—
Your brain stalls.
Because there’s a man leaning against the bar with one elbow braced on the countertop, his shoulders broad under a tight black shirt, head tipped slightly as he talks to someone beside him.
A familiar someone.
Dr. Ellis.
And the man—
Oh.
Oh fuck.
Your stomach plummets.
Jack fucking Abbot.
Your feet stop moving, your whole body suddenly forgetting how to function.
Your pulse kicks violently against the inside of your throat as a wave of heat rushes up the back of your neck, sudden and dizzying and sharp enough to make the edges of your vision blur for half a second.
Because he looks—
He looks so good.
Relaxed in a way you’ve never seen at work. One hand curled loosely around a glass as he frowns slightly at something Ellis is saying, that small crease between his brows you know far too well.
And suddenly you are extremely, violently aware that you are standing outside a bar wearing approximately three square inches of glitter.
“Hey,” Javadi says beside you. “What’s—”
“Santos.”
She doesn’t stop.
“Santos,” you say again, your voice almost breaking.
She glances over her shoulder. “Hm?”
“You knew.”
She stops, her hand hovering near the door.
Whitaker glances between the two of you. “What’s happening?”
“Technically,” Santos says slowly, “I didn’t know. I just... suspected.”
“You said Ellis was the only one from night shift who’d be here.”
She winces. “I did, but what I meant is… Ellis is the only one who actually told me she’d be here.”
You stare at her. “So you did know?”
“I knew it was his night off.”
“Santos, I—” You glance back at him through the bar window. “I can’t go in there like this.”
“Like what?” she asks. “Smoking hot?”
“Half naked.”
She rolls her eyes. “Yes, you can.”
“I will actually die.”
“No, you won’t,” she says firmly. “You’re an adult. You can wear whatever you want, talk to whoever you want, and just because your incredibly inconvenient attending crush happens to be inside does not suddenly revoke your civil liberties.”
She pulls the door open.
“Now stop panicking and get in the bar.”
-
“He swore the chest pain had nothing to do with the seven energy drinks he’d had that night,” Ellis says, still rambling about a patient who pissed her off two nights ago, “which was a bold position to take with a heart rate of one-forty.”
Jack snorts softly. “And did you believe him?”
Ellis’ eyes go wide, and she takes a long drink before continuing her rant about night shift patients and the strange confidence people have when explaining why their terrible decisions definitely have nothing to do with the symptoms they’re currently experiencing.
Jack nods along, offering the occasional comment or question where needed, meeting her gaze now and then—but mostly keeping his attention on the door. Waiting. Because he’s not stupid enough to ask anyone if you’re going to be here tonight, but he is naïve enough to hope you will be.
He wasn’t even supposed to be here tonight—his first night off in two weeks.
He was supposed to be at home, cooking something decent for dinner, enjoying the rare luxury of not wearing scrubs, and inevitably indulging in his favourite guilty pleasure—involving nothing but his hand and some very inappropriate thoughts of you.
But he’s not.
He’s here. In a crowded bar, sipping cheap scotch, listening to Ellis complain about the night shift patients and their weird confidence, just… waiting.
For you.
He’d wanted to ask you yesterday if you were coming to the bar tonight—before he agreed to join—but he’d barely seen you before the end of your shift. And you didn’t even say goodbye. Which isn’t unusual, given how chaotic the ER can be, but then he’d overheard your conversation with Whitaker—and something about it made his chest feel too tight.
It wasn’t anger. Not exactly. Not jealousy, either. It was just... wrong. Not because what you said was wrong, but because he hates that it was right. That you don’t belong to him. Even if Robby calls you ‘his R2’ and Whitaker thinks you’re close because you’re his resident—none of it changes the fact that he has no real claim over you.
Which is ridiculous. He knows it.
He shouldn’t feel territorial. He shouldn’t want this. Want you. And yet, his chest still feels too tight—a slow, hot coil of frustration and longing curling up into his throat, and he hates it. Hates hearing it out loud, hates how much it matters, hates that he can’t make it not matter.
“Oh.” Ellis glances over her shoulder. “Looks like Santos and the others are here.”
Jack’s gaze flicks back to the door.
He tries not to react, not to straighten, not to square his shoulders as if he’s bracing for something—but he can already feel his composure slipping.
Santos steps in first, her head turned slightly as she talks to Whitaker, who walks in behind her. Then it’s Javadi, an unusually wide smile on her face as she looks at—
You.
Oh.
Oh fuck.
Jack stops breathing.
His chest burns. His stomach flips. His hand tightens dangerously around his scotch glass.
It’s you. Of course it’s you. You’re perfect.
But then—
That dress.
God.
That dress—short, sparkling, clinging just enough to make every nerve in his body snap awake. It shimmers under the low lights as you move, and he hates himself for noticing every subtle curve, every shift of fabric, as if time itself has slowed just to torture him.
It’s all too much.
He can feel his pulse in his throat, heat burning beneath his skin, blood rushing in the one direction it really, really shouldn’t be right now. In public. In front of his coworkers.
He blinks, finally tearing his gaze away from you.
And that’s when he notices the rest of the bar. All staring. All stunned.
He hates them all.
He hates that they can even look at you. Hates that the universe allows it. Hates that they might see even a fraction of what he sees—and feel a fraction of what he feels.
And he hates, more than anything right now, that you’re not his.
“Dr. Abbot,” Robby says, appearing beside him and slinging an arm across his shoulders. “What’s your poison tonight?”
Jack lifts his drink, knuckles still white around the glass. “Scotch.”
Robby claps his shoulder, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly. “You might not want to have too many of those.”
Then he slips past both Jack and Ellis and raises a hand to flag down the bartender.
“Alright,” Ellis says, pushing off the bar. “I’m going to go grab a seat before the table gets too crowded.”
Jack nods, but he doesn’t follow. He stays beside the bar, rigid now, eyes fixed on the group of men at a high table just a few feet from the front door. They’re muttering to each other, leaning in, voices low—but nothing about it is subtle. Their gazes are glued to you as you weave through patrons and tables to greet the rest of the PTMC crew gathered in a booth near the back.
One of them—the dumbest looking one, Jack’s already decided—slowly slides off his stool, nodding along while his friends murmur their advice.
Jack glances back at you, now standing beside McKay, sliding your arms into the leather jacket you’d been carrying. Santos grabs your wrist, tilting her head toward the bar as she starts dragging you with her.
And, like a fourteen-year-old boy with a crush, Jack’s pulse starts racing.
“Dr. Abbot,” Santos says, grinning as you both approach the bar. “Fancy seeing you somewhere other than the ER on a Saturday night.”
“I do have a life outside of work, you know,” he says dryly, lifting his drink and looking anywhere but at you.
“Like playing bingo at the senior centre?” Santos asks, resting both forearms on the bar.
You step up on her other side, squinting at the shelves of liquor on the back wall like they’re the most interesting thing in the room.
“Bingo’s on Wednesdays,” he says mildly. “Try to keep up.”
Santos snorts, shaking her head as she reaches for the small leather-bound bar menu. But out of the corner of his eye, Jack sees your head dip—just slightly—and you try to hide a small laugh against your shoulder.
Jack feels it like a punch to the ribs.
Because you’re listening.
And apparently… you think he’s funny.
“Alright,” Santos says, lifting a hand. “I think we need some tequila over here.”
The bartender steps away from where he’d been serving farther down the bar, but his attention quickly drifts past Santos and lands on you. He leans in, resting one palm flat against the bar while he wipes down the counter with a rag that doesn’t really need wiping.
“So,” he says to you, not Santos. “What are you drinking tonight?”
Santos blinks.
“I just told you,” she says flatly. “Tequila.”
The bartender barely glances at her.
Jack’s jaw tightens.
You look briefly confused, glancing between Santos and the bartender.
“Uh—whatever she orders is fine.”
“Yeah. Tequila,” Santos repeats, slower this time.
The bartender laughs like she’s joking—and Jack sets his scotch down slowly. Carefully.
His eyes stay locked on the man now lining up four small glasses in front of you, still completely ignoring Santos. The way he’s watching you is too much. Too close. The faint curl at the corner of his mouth makes Jack want to punch the smirk right off his face.
And by the way you shift a little closer to Santos—pulling your jacket tighter around yourself—he knows you’re uncomfortable.
His hand clenches at his side.
Robby pauses as he walks past, a beer in each hand.
“Easy, tiger,” he mutters. “She can handle herself.”
“I know,” Jack says, voice low. “Doesn’t mean she has to.”
Robby gives him a look—a brief, knowing glance, somewhere between amusement and warning. “Careful.”
Jack doesn’t respond. He just turns back to you and Santos, watching as you each knock back two shots of tequila, your nose scrunching as the burn hits. And he can’t help the small twitch at the corner of his mouth, because the face you make as you set the second glass down is ridiculously cute for someone wearing a dress like that.
“Okay,” Santos says. “I need a vodka soda before I start making bad decisions.”
The bartender nods, already reaching for another glass—and before he can even ask if you’d like another drink, someone else steals your attention.
“Hey,” the guy says, stepping up beside you. “Can I get you another one?”
He leans in, just enough to be heard over the noise—but it’s still too close.
You shift slightly, angling toward him. “Oh. Uh—sure.”
Santos presses her lips together, clearly fighting a smile as she turns back to the bar, suddenly very invested in whatever the bartender is doing. The second he sets the vodka soda in front of her, she scoops it up and drops a few bills on the counter.
She lifts the drink to her lips as she turns away, pausing just long enough to glance at Jack over the rim of the glass.
Her brows lift. “You really gonna let that happen?”
Jack frowns. “What—”
But Santos is already gone, drink in hand, halfway back to the booth where everyone else is.
Where Jack should be headed too—because there’s no reason for him to stay here. No reason for him to linger, to hover, to make sure you’re okay, to stand there glaring at the guy buying you a drink like that’s going to change anything.
It’s not like he can blame him. If Jack thought he had a shot with you, he’d take it too. The difference is, Jack wouldn’t need the dress. Or the drinks. Or the crowd. He’d take that shot with you even when you’re tired and stressed out and covered in blood at the end of a bad shift in the ER. He’d take it any time. Any place.
But Jack doesn’t get that shot.
Because you’re young. You don’t have baggage. And you’re a resident—maybe not his resident, but still a resident.
It’s just too inappropriate.
Jack sets his glass back on the bar a little harder than necessary—and the bartender glances over, brows raised as if silently asking if he’d like another, but Jack just shakes his head.
His eyes flick back to you. To the way you’re smiling now—soft, not uneasy. To the way you seem to have forgotten about keeping your jacket closed, and now the idiot talking to you is looking anywhere but your face.
Then you laugh—light, easy—and something in Jack’s chest tightens again.
He looks away. He can’t keep standing here. He’s not going to stand here and watch you flirt with some idiot at the bar like he has any right to care.
With a deep breath, he forces himself to turn away and start walking back to the table.
Where he should have been five minutes ago. Where he plans on staying for the rest of the night.
Half an hour later, most of PTMC’s day shift staff are gathered in the booth, half still wearing their scrubs after coming straight from the hospital. The volume of conversation builds with the growing collection of empty glasses in the middle of the table, voices overlapping, getting louder with every round—but Jack doesn’t order another scotch. At some point, Ellis sets a beer in front of him, which he nurses until it’s too warm to enjoy.
Every now and then, he makes a point of nodding or laughing or glancing at someone across the table—pretending to follow the conversation, pretending he’s paying attention—when really, all he can focus on is you. You and your smile. And your laugh. And the way your hand settles lightly on a man’s bicep when he says something that makes you blush.
Not the same man as before, either. No—this one is new. This one swooped in when the first one excused himself to take a phone call, and now that one is back at the table with his friends, sulking.
Kind of how Jack is right now, sitting at the table with his friends. Sulking. Glaring. Plotting.
He knows he shouldn’t. He knows it’s none of his business. But he can’t stop himself from trying to come up with an excuse to interrupt you. To get you away from those men and their lingering stares.
Not that he’s any better.
“Abbot.” Robby nudges his side. “Hungry?”
Jack blinks, finally dragging his gaze away from you to where Ellis is standing, looking expectant.
“Hm?”
“Are you hungry?” Ellis asks. “I’m going to order some wings.”
Jack frowns. “Uh—no. I’m good. Thanks.”
Ellis nods once and turns away, heading straight for the bar.
Robby huffs a quiet laugh beside him. “You might want to turn your hearing aids up, old man.”
Jack doesn’t even look at him. “Funny.”
“I’m serious,” Robby says mildly. “You’ve missed, what, three questions in the last five minutes?”
“I heard her,” Jack mutters. “I was just... thinking.”
Robby hums like he doesn’t believe that for a second.
Jack shifts, pushing his chair back as he sets his warm beer on the table. “I’m gonna hit the head.”
Robby’s brows lift, slow and knowing, his gaze flicking briefly toward the bar.
“Mm,” he says. “Sure you are.”
Jack does, in fact, turn toward the bathrooms first—mostly because he needs a second away from all the music and chatter to try and clear his head. To try and stop himself from doing what he really left the booth to do.
He locks himself in the accessible bathroom—not that he needs it, but it’s more private than the men’s—and stands in front of the vanity. He presses his palms into the porcelain sink, shifting his weight forward with a deep, steadying breath.
This is ridiculous, and he knows it.
He’s a grown man. He shouldn’t be acting like this.
This is trivial shit, for God’s sake. Jack is a vet. A seasoned ER doctor.
So why is a goddamn crush undoing him like this?
Why are you undoing him like this?
He lifts his head and stares at his reflection—jaw tight, shoulders rigid—trying to get a grip. Trying to remember that he is a grown ass man, not some idiot who can’t keep his shit together.
His gaze drifts across his face—the day-old stubble, peppered hair—then to the reflection of the bathroom behind him. The graffitied walls, covered in stickers and spray paint, a chaotic collection of late nights and inebriated thoughts. He wonders, briefly, how many people came in here intending to leave something behind.
Then he spots something scrawled in the corner of the mirror in thick black marker.
HESITATE AND SOMEONE ELSE WON’T.
Jack tilts his head.
That’s not exactly... subtle.
But that’s the thing, isn’t it?
He doesn’t hesitate.
Not in the trauma bay. Not out in the field. Not when it matters. Not when someone’s life is on the line and everyone else is waiting for someone to make the call.
So what the hell is this?
This… standing back. Watching. Letting it happen.
Like he doesn’t know what he wants. Like he hasn’t already made up his mind.
He drags a hand over his mouth, shaking his head once—sharp, annoyed.
“Jesus Christ.”
It’s not caution. It’s avoidance.
With another deep breath, Jack reaches for the tap and braces his hands beneath the stream. He scrubs them together—quick and thorough—then turns off the water, grabs a paper towel, and dries his hands with more focus than necessary. He tosses the towel in the bin on his way out the door, his gaze sharpening as he scans the bar—finding you immediately.
You’re still standing where you were, maybe a few steps closer to the back of the room. There’s a new guy in front of you now, closing you in, crowding your space just enough to make Jack’s eyes narrow.
The man’s hand settles at your waist, a little lower than what could be considered innocent. And anyone else watching might think you’re okay with it—but Jack knows you. He sees the small flicker of discomfort that crosses your face, the subtle drop of your shoulder as you try to angle yourself away without seeming rude.
Good thing Jack doesn’t mind being rude.
He’s already moving before he’s fully decided to. Just a few long strides and he’s there—close enough to cut through the space between you and the guy without touching either of you, his presence alone enough to interrupt whatever the hell this is supposed to be.
He looks at you. Just you.
“Hey.”
Your head turns immediately—and the shift in your expression is instant. Relief.
“Oh—hey,” you say, a little breathless.
And then you step into him. Not too close. Not in a way that draws attention or suggests anything—but enough to make Jack’s pulse jump. Enough for him to feel your warmth and the way it settles under his skin.
“Hey, man,” the guy says, holding out a hand. “I’m Trent.”
Jack ignores him.
“You alright?” he asks you.
You nod slowly. “I am now.”
Your fingers curl into the back of his shirt, just for a second—like you didn’t even think about it. Like you just needed something solid to hold onto.
Jack goes still.
Trent clears his throat. “Sorry—uh—who are you?”
You glance at him with a tight smile. “This is my attending.”
Jack likes being called your attending.
Trent frowns. “What?”
“Remember how I said I was a doctor?”
Trent just stares at you.
“Well, Dr. Abbot is my attending,” you go on anyway. “He’s like my supervisor. I’m his resident.”
His resident.
“Right,” Trent mutters, eyeing Jack. “Cool. So—you’re a doctor?”
Jack doesn’t even look at him. His eyes stay fixed on you.
“Are you hungry?” he asks. “Ellis is ordering wings—we can grab a menu.”
“Starving,” you reply, the corner of your mouth lifting slightly as you look up at him.
“Great.” His hand settles at your shoulder, firm but casual. “Let’s get back to the others.”
“Wait,” Trent says. “Are you—”
“It was nice meeting you,” you cut in, flashing him one last tight-lipped smile before Jack steers you away.
He keeps his arm around your shoulders until you’re halfway back to the booth of PTMC doctors and nurses. Only then does he pull back, clasping his hands behind his back like he needs the physical restraint.
“Thanks for that,” you murmur. “He just wouldn’t take a hint.”
Jack nods. “I noticed.”
He doesn’t look at you as he turns back toward the other end of the table, toward his seat beside Robby—because if he did, he might not be able to leave your side. From the corner of his eye, he sees Santos reach for you, already asking what happened as she pulls you into the seat between her and McKay.
And for twenty blissful minutes, Jack feels okay. The most okay he’s felt all night.
Because you’re here, at the table, talking to Santos and McKay—and not some idiot who thinks he deserves a chance with the prettiest girl in the room. In the world, according to Jack.
But only for twenty minutes—because once you finish your drink, Santos drags you back to the bar.
Another shot. Another drink. Another guy.
Jack shifts in his chair, trying to listen to whatever it is Ellis and Mateo are arguing about, but he can’t focus—not when your hand settles lightly on this new guy’s shoulder. And especially not when it slides down his bicep, flirty in a way that makes Jack want to get out of his chair.
He tells himself he’s not going to. That he shouldn’t.
But the second the lights dim and the music gets louder, he pushes out of his seat.
He finds you at the edge of the dancefloor, catching your wrist before you can disappear into the crowd.
“Hey,” he says, voice raised over the music.
Your head whips around, your brows lifting slightly in that soft, expectant way—like you’re waiting for him to say whatever it is that’s so important he had to stop you right here.
Jack clears his throat. “Have you been drinking water?”
You frown. “Um. Not really.”
“You should really drink some water,” he says, tipping his head toward the bar.
You hesitate, glancing back over your shoulder at the man waiting for you to follow him into the crowd.
Then you look back at Jack.
“Uh, yeah. Okay. Water.”
He knows he shouldn’t have done it. He knows it was stupid and petty and jealousy-driven—but he can’t help the flicker of satisfaction when you follow him to the end of the bar with the self-serve water tower.
The music is too loud for conversation—and even if it wasn’t, he’s not sure what he’d say. Not when you’re looking at him like this. A little drunk. A little curious. Your brows drawn, your skin glistening with a thin sheen of sweat, your lips wet from the water.
God. This has the be the finest form of torture.
Because here you are—so young and so sweet, so trusting in Jack that he’s just trying to look after you, when all he can think about is the fact that you’re not his. That they think you’re fair game. That every man in this room thinks he has a chance.
And the fact that he’s not going to let them anywhere near you.
-
The third time Jack Abbot appears at your side, he catches your elbow just as you’re about to step out the door with a man named Leo. Not to leave the bar—just for some air—but then Jack says something about Mateo buying a round of shots and guides you back inside.
You don’t mind. Not really. Especially not when a free drink is involved.
So you line up beside your coworkers and sink another shot of tequila with a grimace before Santos drags you back to the dancefloor.
The fourth time Jack Abbot intercepts you, you’re just about to start dancing with a handsome stranger Santos accidentally made you bump into—but before you can even take the man’s hand, Jack pulls you away, insisting you take a seat for a minute and drink more water.
Which, fine. Whatever.
But by the fifth interruption, you’re starting to notice a pattern.
And you’re getting a little annoyed.
“Oh my God,” Santos says, her eyes going wide as the opening notes to ABBA’s Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! start blaring through the speakers. “We have to dance. Come on!”
You barely have time to scoop your drink up off the bar before she’s dragging you onto the dancefloor—into the throng of warm bodies all moving to the beat beneath the single, sparkling disco ball.
The music pulses through the floor beneath your feet, the bass thrumming in your chest as Santos drags you deeper into the crowd. Somewhere between Mateo’s round of shots and your tenth song on the dancefloor, your jacket disappeared—and now your dress catches the light with every movement, glittering under the shifting colours as bodies press in from all sides.
The bar is still pretty full, even if the PTMC booth has already lost a few soldiers. There are still plenty of prospects—plenty of strangers who might offer to take you home and make you forget all about Jack Abbot. Which is still very much the plan.
If only the man himself would stop interrupting every interaction like he’s doing you a favour.
At some point during the second—or maybe third—chorus, Santos subtly steps away and a guy ends up in front of you. You’re not even entirely sure how. One second you’re dancing and screaming the lyrics, the next he’s there—close enough that you can feel the heat of him, his hands hovering like he’s trying to decide where to put them.
You let it happen. Because this is what you want, right?
This is the plan.
He leans in and says something you don’t quite catch over the music, but you laugh anyway—more out of obligation than anything else.
Then his attention shifts.
His eyes flick past you. And just like that—he falters.
It’s subtle, but you feel it. The hesitation. The way his body pulls back a fraction, like something just snapped him out of it.
“Uh—actually,” he mutters, already stepping away. “I—yeah. Sorry.”
Then he’s gone.
You blink, frowning slightly as you glance over your shoulder and—
Of course.
Jack Abbot, standing just beyond the edge of the dancefloor, drink in hand, eyes locked on you with a look that makes your stomach drop.
Not angry. Not exactly.
But intense. Sharp. Focused in a way that feels… deliberate.
You stare at him for a second—frustration flickering across your face—then turn back to Santos, who is still dancing with her vodka soda lifted in the air.
You lean in, raising your voice just enough to be heard over the music. “Your plan isn’t working!”
She turns to face you, frowning. “What do you mean it’s not working?”
You stare at her. “The plan to get me laid? It’s not working.”
“Why not?”
You huff out a laugh, incredulous.
“Because of him,” you say, nodding toward Jack. “Because I let him save me from one bad interaction and now he’s just—hovering. Interrupting. Scaring people off.”
Santos’ mouth twitches.
“I think he thinks he’s being helpful,” you add, shaking your head. “Like he’s doing me a favour or something, but—God, I’m never going to get a stranger to take me home with a hundred-and-ninety-pound war vet glaring over my shoulder every five minutes.”
Santos just looks at you for a second—then smiles. Slow. Knowing.
“And what part of my plan isn’t working?”
You frown. “Are you even listening to me?”
“I said I was going to get you laid,” she says, lifting her drink to her lips. “I never said anything about going home with a stranger.”
It doesn’t land straight away.
You blink at her, still frowning as you try to follow the logic—because that doesn’t make sense, that’s not the plan. If you’re not going home with a stranger, then who—
And then it clicks.
Your stomach drops.
“Wait—Santos,” you start, eyes widening. “You don’t mean—”
Santos just looks at you over the rim of her glass. Calm. Patient. Smiling faintly, like she’s been waiting for this exact moment all night.
You glance toward the side of the dancefloor again—to the man still focused on you in a way that feels far too intentional now. Arms folded, jaw set. He doesn’t even pretend to look away when you meet his stare.
“Actually,” Santos says, her hand closing around your wrist. “I think my plan is working perfectly. Now, come on—” she nods toward the booth where everyone else is, “let’s play a game.”
A game?
Before you can argue or even question it, Santos is dragging you off the dancefloor toward the booth at the back of the bar. The thrum of the music dulls the further you get from the crowd, and by the time you both slide into empty seats at the table, you no longer feel like you need to yell just to be heard.
The PTMC crew has thinned since you were last sitting here. Robby, Dana, and Donnie are gone, and McKay is holding her purse in her lap like she’d been trying to leave when Mateo cornered her with another rant about how no patient actually seems to understand the pain scale.
“Alright,” Santos announces, picking up someone’s abandoned drink and taking a sip like she owns it, “we’re playing a game.”
Whitaker leans forward. “A game?”
“Yes, Huckleberry. A game.” Santos glances around the table with a lazy half-smile. “It’s called Never Have I Ever.”
Mateo snorts. “That’s a middle school sleepover game.”
“Great,” Santos replies. “Then it should be easy for you.”
There’s a ripple of laughter around the table, but no one else seems to object.
“Can I start?” Mohan pipes up beside Santos. “I’ve got a good one.”
Santos nods. “Be my guest.”
You’re not entirely sure when Jack rejoined the table, since he’d been at the edge of the dancefloor just a few minutes ago, but now you’re suddenly very aware of his presence across from you. Like the few people that called it a night have unintentionally left a smaller, more intimate group behind—and now Jack Abbot is almost directly across from you while you play one of the most notorious, tension-raising middle school games of all time.
“Okay,” Mohan says, sitting up a little straighter. “Never have I ever… called in sick when I wasn’t actually sick.”
McKay laughs. Mateo groans. Almost everyone at the table lifts their drinks.
“Really?” Santos says. “That was your good one?”
Mohan shrugs. “I thought—”
“Never mind,” Santos cuts her off. “My turn.”
Her gaze moves slowly around the table before landing on you, the corner of her mouth lifting just slightly.
“Never have I ever,” she starts slowly, “fantasised about someone else sitting at this table.”
Your pulse jumps.
McKay snorts.
Mateo leans forward. “Like, intentionally. Or…?”
Whitaker frowns. “You’ve accidentally fantasised about someone here?”
He shrugs. “Sometimes the wrong people pop up, you know?”
Santos rolls her eyes. “Oh my God. Whatever. Intentional or not.”
Mateo nods once and lifts his drink. Javadi sinks lower in her chair as she lifts hers—and you try not to look around at the rest of the table as you bring your own up to your lips.
Beside you, McKay drops her purse to the ground and straightens, clearly invested now.
“Alright, I’ve got one,” she says, grinning. “Never have I ever… faked it.”
Javadi chokes, Santos snorts, and across from you, Jack huffs out a quiet laugh.
“Never?” Ellis asks, eyes wide. “So you always—”
“Oh, God, no,” McKay laughs. “Definitely not. I just refuse to fake it.”
Laughter moves through the table again, a little louder this time, and everyone takes a second to decide whether or not to raise their drinks.
You lift yours slowly, looking anywhere but at Jack.
“Okay, my turn,” Ellis announces, shifting in her seat. “Never have I ever… hooked up with someone at work.”
The table reacts around you, a mix of laughter and quiet protest, but it all blurs at the edges when you finally glance up—because Jack is already looking at you.
Not surprised. Not amused.
Just… watching.
He doesn’t laugh or say anything. He just lifts his drink, slow and deliberate.
And something sharp twists in your chest.
“What’ve you got, Langdon?” McKay asks, nodding at him across the table.
Langdon strokes his chin thoughtfully for a moment—then sighs.
“Alright, I already know I’m going to get shit for this, but—” He clears his throat. “Never have I ever… had sex in public.”
McKay laughs, loudly, and lifts her drink to her lips without hesitation. Ellis and Santos drink too, while Mohan laughs into her hand and Javadi sinks even lower in her chair.
Across from you, Jack sips his drink again like it’s nothing.
And that sharp twist in your chest doesn’t ease.
Because of course he has. Of course there are other people. Other women.
And you—
You catch Santos’ gaze from the other end of the table—sharp, knowing, daring.
Your grip tightens slightly around your glass.
And before you can talk yourself out of it—
“Okay, my turn,” you say lightly, sitting up a little straighter.
Everyone turns to you, but you keep your eyes fixed on your glass.
“Never have I ever,” you say slowly, “…finished during sex.”
For a second—nothing.
Then the table erupts.
“What—no—” Mateo is already laughing, leaning forward like he thinks you’re joking. “You’re kidding.”
Javadi chokes on her drink, coughing as she turns toward you. “Wait, seriously?”
“Oh my God,” McKay says, half-laughing, half-staring at you like she’s trying to figure out if you’re lying.
Langdon huffs out a quiet, disbelieving laugh, shaking his head. “Well… that’s unfortunate.”
Whitaker just blinks at you, caught somewhere between surprised and confused, like he doesn’t quite know what to do with that information.
Santos doesn’t say anything. She just leans back in her seat, watching you over the rim of her glass with a slow, satisfied smile.
And across from you—
Jack just goes still.
Completely still.
His expression doesn’t change, but something in his eyes does—sharp, dark, focused in a way that makes your stomach flip.
It takes you a minute to remember how to move. How to breathe. How to laugh and sip your drink and keep playing the game that doesn’t stop just because it feels like your heart did.
Eventually, everyone eases off the third-degree on your embarrassingly real confession, and Mateo pipes up next with something ridiculous that makes the table groan. Then Javadi comes out with something surprisingly rebellious—and blushes hard when Mateo flashes her a wink.
And so it goes on.
You know it does.
You can hear it—voices overlapping, laughter breaking out again, someone arguing over what counts, someone else swearing they’re being misrepresented—but it all feels… distant.
Like it’s happening a few steps away from you instead of right here at the table. Because now, all you can focus on is Jack. On the way he’s hardly moved. Hardly spoken. Hardly looked away from you.
At some point, he mutters his own confession with a small smirk and everyone laughs—but you don’t catch the words. You’re too aware of everything else to hear them. Too aware of your pulse pounding in your ears, the thrum of the music beneath your feet, the way Jack’s jaw ticks every time you glance back at him.
Another round starts. Then another.
Someone groans. Someone laughs too loud. Santos says something that earns a chorus of reactions—but it all slips past you, unimportant, forgettable.
Time stretches. Blurs.
Your drink empties, refills, empties again.
People shift in their seats. Someone stands. Someone leaves.
Then suddenly—
“You ready?”
You blink.
Santos is standing beside you, brows raised.
“Ready?” you echo.
She nods toward the door. “Time to go. Most of us have to work tomorrow.”
You glance around at the empty table. “Oh.”
Santos is already halfway to the door by the time you gather your things and catch up to her. You’re still pulling your jacket on as you step outside, bracing against the cool night air that nips at every inch of exposed skin—which, in this dress, is a lot of skin.
“The Uber’s just around the corner,” Whitaker says.
“Great,” Mohan mutters, hugging her jacket tighter. “I’m freezing.”
You’re not sure if it’s the alcohol or just the heat lingering beneath your skin from the way Jack had been watching you earlier, but you’re not nearly as cold as you should be.
“You sure you don’t mind if I stay over tonight?” Javadi asks, glancing between Santos and Whitaker.
Santos shrugs. “As long as you don’t mind the couch—and Dr. Shamsi isn’t going to have us arrested for kidnapping.”
Javadi lets out an awkward laugh. “Uh—no. It’s totally fine. I told my dad.”
“Are you working tomorrow?” Whitaker asks.
Javadi shakes her head. “Day off. You?”
Whitaker sighs. “Yeah.”
“So am I,” Santos adds. “And if I don’t get at least five hours sleep, I cannot be responsible for other people’s lives.”
“That’s reassuring,” Jack mutters, almost startling you as he steps out of the bar.
He buries his hands in his pockets, hardly sparing you a glance as he steps closer to the group. There’s a faint hitch in his step—something you recognise from the waning hours of a night shift, when he’s been on his feet for too long and starts to favour one leg.
“This is us,” Whitaker announces, nodding toward the car pulling up at the curb.
Mohan hurries forward first, yanking the door open and climbing into the back seat—and Javadi is next, flashing you a smile before she ducks in beside her. You step forward—then hesitate. Whitaker is already holding the front passenger door open, and Santos is standing at the curb, about to join the others in the back.
“Wait.” Your pulse jumps. “There’s too many—”
“You’re with Dr. Abbot,” Santos says lightly, her mouth twitching like she’s trying not to smile.
Your stomach drops.
“I—I’m what?”
Santos shrugs. “Javadi’s staying over and Mohan’s place is on the way to ours. Just makes sense.”
Then she climbs into the car, shuts the door, and rolls the window down.
“See you tomorrow!”
There’s a chorus of goodbyes from the others before the car pulls away from the curb—and the cool, quiet night settles in too quickly. The only sound is the dull thrum of music from the bar, and the pounding of your pulse in your ears.
For a second, you don’t turn around. You can’t. Not now that you’re alone with him.
Then—
“I’m this way,” he says, voice low and rough and maddeningly hot.
You nod, but don’t dare look at him as you start following the line of parked cars up the street.
The night air feels sharper now, cooler the further you get from the bar—and it makes you pull into yourself, arms folded tightly while your jacket barely does anything to help.
Jack keeps an easy pace beside you, not crowding you, not touching you, but close enough that you’re aware of him anyway. Of the space he takes up at your side. Of the way he adjusts slightly so you’re walking on the inside of the path, further from the curb, without making a thing of it.
Neither of you says anything.
It’s not awkward. It’s just… quiet in a way that feels heavy, like the silence is holding onto everything that happened inside instead of letting it go.
Your heels click unevenly against the pavement, catching slightly every few steps, and you’re suddenly, painfully aware of everything—the way your dress shifts as you move, the cool air against your skin, the way your pulse hasn’t quite settled.
You feel too sober. Too aware.
When his car finally comes into view, he moves ahead of you just slightly—just enough to reach the passenger door first and hold it open.
God. He’s so annoyingly considerate.
You give him a small, tight smile before climbing into the passenger seat.
The car is still warm, still holding onto the heat from earlier in the day, and it smells like him in a way that’s subtle but unmistakable—clean, familiar, something faintly sharp beneath it that you can’t quite place but instantly recognise. The seat gives slightly beneath you, softer than you expect, and for a second you just sit there, hands hovering like you’re not entirely sure where to put them.
It’s his.
All of it.
The way everything is exactly where it should be, nothing out of place. The faint scuff on the console. A pair of sunglasses tucked neatly into the centre compartment. His backpack thrown into the back seat like he’d discarded it in a hurry and never thought about it again.
The sound of the driver’s side door opening almost startles you.
You drop your hands into your lap, shifting slightly and smoothing your dress down over your thighs like that might ground you somehow.
The car immediately feels smaller when Jack climbs in. More intimate. Closer in a way that’s almost stifling.
You keep your eyes fixed out the windshield.
Waiting.
For the engine to start. For the car to move.
But nothing happens.
The silence stretches, thick and suffocating, settling into every inch of the space between you.
And then—
“You can’t say shit like that around me.”
You blink, finally turning toward him—and regretting it immediately. He’s so irritatingly handsome, so annoyingly gorgeous in a way that makes you want to be stupid and reckless and climb across the console into his lap.
“Say what?” you ask, your voice embarrassingly thin.
He looks at you—not fully, just turning his head slightly.
“You know what,” he says, his voice low and rough with something that sounds a little too close to control slipping.
And you do.
You know exactly what he means.
But before you can say anything else, he turns the key and the engine rumbles to life. The radio crackles a little before some late-night news station fills the silence—and he doesn’t move to turn it off, doesn’t even turn it down. He just drives.
The radio reporter’s voice hums through the car like white noise, talking about something you’re not really listening to as you try to focus on keeping your breathing even.
You can still hear his voice.
You can’t say shit like that around me.
The way he said it. Low. Controlled. Like it cost him something to keep it that way.
Your fingers shift slightly in your lap, smoothing over the fabric of your dress again without thinking, and your mind starts turning his words over before you can stop it—pulling at them, testing them, trying to make them mean something that makes sense.
Because what does that even mean?
You glance at him, quick, like you might catch something you missed—but he’s focused on the road, jaw set, one hand loose on the wheel like nothing happened. Like he didn’t just change everything with eight little words.
You look away again.
No. He didn’t mean it like that.
He’s just—he’s your attending. He’s responsible. Of course he’d say something. Of course he’d—
Except he didn’t say it like that.
Your stomach tightens as your thoughts circle back, slower this time, more deliberate.
The way he kept pulling you away from people tonight. The way he’d been watching you. The way he didn’t laugh, didn’t joke, didn’t let it go.
The way he said it.
Around me.
Not here. Not in front of people.
Around me.
Your breath catches slightly, and you shift in your seat, suddenly very aware of the space between you—of how close he is, of how easy it would be to just turn your head, lean in and—
No.
No, that’s not—
You swallow, gaze fixed stubbornly ahead.
You’re just reading into it. You have to be.
Because the alternative—
Your pulse jumps.
God. The alternative is too much to even consider.
But the thought lingers anyway.
It settles in the back of your mind, quieter now, but heavier—pulling at everything he said, everything he did, everything you might have missed until now. The words circle back, sharper this time—until—
The car stops—and you blink.
For a moment, you don’t move. You can’t.
Then Jack clears his throat.
“Oh—uh—thanks,” you mutter, reaching for your seatbelt buckle.
He nods once. “Anytime.”
You push your door open before you can think too hard about it, stepping out into the cool night air that hits a little harder this time. Your heart is still beating in your throat, your pulse still too loud, your thoughts are still circling those eight words—eight little words that feel like they weigh far more than they should.
You hesitate—one hand on the door, the other gripping your keys in your jacket pocket.
God.
This is stupid.
This is reckless.
This is—
“Do you—” You clear your throat, the words catching slightly before you force them out. “Do you want to come up?”
He stares at you for a second, then lets out a short, disbelieving breath, like he’s not quite sure he heard you right.
“You can’t be serious.”
Heat rushes up your neck, quick and unwelcome, and for a second you just stand there, wishing you could take it back—rewind a few seconds and keep your mouth shut.
What the hell were you thinking?
“Yeah,” you say, a little too quickly. “No, that was—that was stupid.”
You turn away before he can say anything else, pushing the door shut harder than you mean to as you step back onto the sidewalk. You don’t look back. You refuse to. You just keep walking toward the lobby door, drawing your keys from your pocket and fumbling through them to find the right one.
It takes longer than it should, but eventually you find the lobby key and wriggle it into the lock.
This door has never been your friend. It’s old, a little rusted, and the lock has always been janky—but now your hands are shaking, and this stupid old door seems to think that’s funny, because it won’t budge.
You jiggle the key and try again, but nothing changes.
Then—
“Here.”
His voice is low. Close.
Your hand stills as he steps in behind you, not touching, but close enough that you can feel the heat of him at your back—the solid line of his chest just shy of pressing into you as he reaches past your shoulder.
His fingers brush yours as he takes the key—and the lock turns easily this time.
Of course it does. Traitorous fucking door.
His arm lingers there for a second longer than it needs to—then he pushes the door open.
You don’t even glance at him as you step inside, already turning back to grab your key before the door swings shut—but he’s still holding it, barely a step behind you.
He tilts his head slightly, nodding toward the lobby. “Go.”
It’s quiet. Controlled.
Not a suggestion.
Your breath catches, just for a second, and you hesitate—long enough to feel it, whatever this is, tightening between you—
Then you turn and keep walking.
And he follows.
He follows you across the lobby, up the fire stairs, down the corridor, all the way to your apartment door. He stands a little closer than necessary as you unlock it—almost like he doesn’t think you know how doors work now—but the key turns smoothly this time.
You push the door open and step inside.
The apartment is quiet, dim, and you shrug out of your jacket without thinking. You can feel him watching you as you drape it over the arm of the sofa, and it’s a little... thrilling. Dangerous. Because Jack Abbot is in your goddamn apartment right now, looking at you like he’s a man on the edge—
And you’re daring him to jump.
“Drink?” you offer, keeping your voice light—innocent.
He clears his throat. “Water, please.”
You can’t help the small smirk on your lips as you brush past him, a little closer than necessary.
“So polite,” you murmur.
He doesn’t move, doesn’t shift—but you can feel him there, tense just beneath the surface.
You open the fridge and bend over to grab a bottle of water, letting your dress ride up the backs of your thighs in a way that’s totally unnecessary. Jack clears his throat again, just a little too sharp, and when you glance back toward him, he’s turned away completely.
You press your lips together to keep from smiling too wide as you straighten again.
“Here,” you say, stepping toward him and holding the water out.
He turns hesitantly, taking it. “Thank you.”
Your eyes catch his, a slow smile tugging at your lips before you bite the corner gently, just enough for him to notice. He looks away quickly, jaw tightening as he focuses on uncapping the water bottle.
You brush past him again, still a little too close, and move toward the sofa, dropping onto it and leaning forward to take off your shoes.
Jack takes a long swig of water, then clears his throat for the third time.
“Are you working tomorrow?” he asks.
You glance up, still leaned forward, and it’s hard not to notice the way his eyes dip from your face.
“Isn’t that something you should already know?”
The corner of his mouth twitches, like he can’t quite help himself.
“You’re impossible. You know that?”
Heat rushes up your neck at the way he says it—short, sharp, loaded—and you bite back a grin, letting your eyes glint just a little as you straighten.
“Am I?” you murmur, tilting your head just slightly. “Only one way to find out.”
He freezes for a second, shoulders tight, hand curling slightly around the water bottle—and it crackles softly under his grip. His breath hitches, just barely.
“I should go,” he mutters, voice low and clipped.
He takes a step toward the door—and you shoot up from the sofa, heartbeat racing.
“Wait—uh—before you go,” you say, stepping toward him, “could you help me with something?”
He hesitates, turning slowly, as if every second in here is costing him something.
You move until you’re almost between him and the door, looking up at him through your lashes.
“Could you help me out of my dress?”
The second the words leave your lips, you forget how to breathe.
Jack’s jaw tightens, his shoulders coiling ever so slightly. His fingers twitch around the bottle, just a whisper of movement, as if holding himself together by force. His eyes catch yours, dark and sharp, taking in the faint scrunch between your brows, the small pout on your lips, the way you’re offering him something he never thought he’d be allowed to have.
He nods once—careful, controlled—but the tension radiating off him is almost unbearable.
Your stomach flips.
Without a word, you turn, sweeping your hair out of the way while your pulse hammers in your ears.
You feel him shift, his warmth, and the ghost of his touch at the nape of your neck. And that first, tiny contact sends a shock straight through you—hot, sharp, impossible to ignore.
He pauses, just a heartbeat, and you catch the tiniest hitch in his breath.
Then he moves again, slow, deliberate, dragging the zipper down almost painfully slow, his knuckles grazing your skin—warm, rough, controlled, just enough to make your heart pound in your throat.
“How do you do it?” you whisper, voice catching slightly. “How are you always so… unaffected by everything?”
“Unaffected?” he murmurs, almost tasting the word, as if testing it against himself.
His knuckles brush the small of your back, pausing where the zipper ends—but he doesn’t stop. His fingertips graze your skin, deliberate, teasing, tracing the line of your spine upward again, slow enough that it drags your breath with it, sharp enough that heat blooms through every nerve.
“You have no idea,” he whispers, voice low and rough, almost breaking, “how much you affect me.”
Your breath catches, sharp and sudden. Everything in your chest pulls tight, something hot and dizzying blooming low as his words sink in.
You turn before you can stop yourself—and he’s closer now. Close enough that you can feel the warmth of him, the shift of his breath, the space between you narrowing into something fragile and dangerous.
For a second, neither of you move.
And then his hand finds your neck—
Not rough, not rushed—just firm enough to anchor you there, thumb pressing under your jaw like he needs to feel that this is real, that you’re real. His other hand tightens where it still holds the loosened fabric of your dress at your back, fingers curling into it like restraint is slipping through his grip.
He hesitates, just for a breath. Like he’s giving himself one last chance to walk away.
Then he kisses you.
It’s not tentative. There’s nothing careful about it. It lands like something he’s been holding back for too long, all that control finally snapping under the weight of you standing here, asking for him, looking at him like that.
His mouth is warm and certain against yours, a sharp inhale breaking through you as you lean into him without thinking, your hands finding him just as quickly—his stomach, his chest—anything to hold onto as the world tilts. He makes a low sound, barely there, but you feel it more than you hear it, the vibration settling deep in your chest as his grip tightens.
You melt before you can stop yourself.
Your head tilts back, giving him more, and he takes it immediately, deepening the kiss with that same quiet intensity that steals the breath right out of you. His thumb shifts along your jaw, not lingering, just enough to guide you where he wants you, and the control of it—God, the way he still tries to control it after everything, after all that restraint—makes something in your stomach flip hard.
His hand at your back slips under the loosened zipper, fingers pressing into your bare skin now, warm and steady, but there’s tension in it. You can feel it in the way his grip flexes, like he’s still trying—still—to hold the line even as he pulls you closer.
It doesn’t work.
Not when you press into him like this, not when your fingers curl tighter in his shirt, not when you kiss him back without hesitation, without thinking about consequences or lines or anything except how he feels against you.
He exhales against your mouth, sharp, like you’ve just undone him, and for a second the kiss falters—not because he’s pulling away, but because he’s trying to.
You feel it. The conflict. The split second where he almost stops.
Your hand slides up to his jaw, fingers catching there, holding him in place before he can even try.
“Don’t,” you whisper, barely pulling back, your lips brushing his as you speak.
And something in him gives.
You see it in the way his eyes darken, in the way his hand tightens at your back, pulling you flush against him this time, the last inch of space gone like it was never allowed to exist in the first place.
When he kisses you again, it’s deeper.
Less restrained.
Like he’s finally stopped pretending this isn’t exactly what he wants.
It’s different now—harder, hungrier, like something in him has shifted for good. His hand slides from your jaw to your waist, gripping tight as he steps into you, crowding you back without breaking the kiss, without giving you a second to think.
Your back meets the door with a soft thud.
He doesn’t stop.
If anything, it only makes him sharper, more certain, his mouth moving against yours with a kind of urgency that steals the air right out of your lungs. You barely get a breath before he takes it again, and you let him—God, you let him—tilting into him, giving him everything he reaches for.
His hand tightens at your waist, then slips lower, dragging you flush against him again, like he needs to feel exactly how close he can get before he loses control completely.
And you can feel it—how close he is.
It’s in the way his grip flexes, in the way his breath turns uneven against your mouth, in the way the kiss keeps deepening like he can’t quite stop himself from taking more.
Your fingers find his shirt again, pulling him closer, and he breaks the kiss just long enough to drag in a breath, his forehead almost brushing yours, like he’s trying—one last time—to get a handle on this.
He doesn’t.
His hands are on you again, immediate, sliding up your sides, pushing the straps of your dress from your shoulders in one smooth, decisive motion. The fabric gives easily, slipping under his hands like it was never meant to stay there in the first place—and it falls to the floor, pooling at your feet.
His breath catches, and his gaze drops—just for a second, but it’s enough.
“Tell me to stop,” he says, voice low, rough—nothing steady about it now.
You meet his eyes, chest rising and falling fast, heat still sparking under your skin.
“Bedroom,” you murmur.
For a second, he just looks at you.
Something in his expression shifts—tightens—like that word landed exactly where it shouldn’t. His gaze searches yours for a moment, checking for hesitation, for doubt.
But he doesn’t find any.
He nods once—and you turn, already moving toward the bedroom. You can feel him right behind you, close enough that his hand finds your waist again before you’ve even taken two steps, steady, grounding, like he’s not about to let you get too far ahead of him.
It’s barely a walk.
More like being guided—pulled—across the apartment toward your room, your pulse loud in your ears, every step charged with the knowledge of what you’ve just set in motion.
The door barely makes it closed before he’s on you again.
Not rushed—never rushed—but certain, like the decision has already been made and there’s no point pretending otherwise. His hands find you first, steady at your waist, turning you back toward him before you can take another step into the room.
Your breath catches as you look up at him. There’s something in his expression you’ve never seen before. It’s not soft, not gentle—just stripped of whatever distance he’d been holding onto all night.
Gone.
His gaze drags over you, slow and deliberate, and this time there’s nothing in the way of it—nothing to hide behind, nothing to buffer it—and the heat in it settles low in your stomach, heavy and immediate.
“Still want this?” he asks, voice rough, quieter now—but it lands heavier here.
You don’t answer. You just step into him.
And it’s all the permission he needs.
His hand tightens at your waist as he pulls you back into him, and the kiss this time is slower, deeper in a way that feels intentional—like he’s choosing it, not chasing it. His mouth moves against yours with a kind of controlled hunger, every shift measured, every breath deliberate, like he’s letting himself feel it fully instead of fighting it.
Your fingers curl into his shirt, and he exhales against your mouth, something unsteady finally breaking through.
His grip shifts—firmer now—guiding you back a step, then another, not hurried, not careless, but unrelenting all the same. You feel the edge of the bed behind your knees before you fully register moving at all, your focus too caught in the way he’s kissing you, the way his hand anchors you like he’s not about to let this get away from him.
His mouth breaks from yours just long enough to draw in a breath, his forehead pressing briefly to yours.
Not hesitation. Control.
Or what little he has left of it.
“Last chance,” he murmurs, quieter now.
You drop back onto the bed, gaze locked on his, breath still uneven.
“I’m not the one holding back.”
You barely have time to move up the mattress before he’s there, crowding over you, hands braced on either side as he follows you down. The mattress dips under his weight, the space between you gone in an instant—replaced by the solid heat of him, the firm press of his hips against yours.
His mouth finds yours again, hot and insistent, teeth catching your bottom lip just enough to pull a soft sound from you—but it’s different now. Slower. Not restrained, but deliberate. Curious, almost.
Like he’s learning you.
The way you react. The way you move under him. The way you give.
Your hands slide up his chest, fingertips digging in as heat coils low in your stomach—but they don’t stay there long. He shifts his weight slightly, steady, controlled, one hand lifting off the mattress to catch your wrist.
His fingers close around it—not tight, not forceful—just certain, guiding.
He lifts your hand above your head.
“Jack,” you whisper. “I—”
He shushes you.
“Let me do this, okay?” His voice is rough, thick with something unsteady beneath it—something that makes your stomach knot. “I’ve got you.”
And you believe him.
His hand slides down your body, slow and sure, brushing over your chest, your waist, the curve of your hip—each touch deliberate, like he’s taking his time even now, even like this. His fingers hook at the inside of your thigh, grip firm as he nudges your leg wider.
“That’s it,” he murmurs. “Good girl.”
The words go straight through you.
You can already feel the damp heat between your legs, the slick fabric pressed close, but the way he says it—the way his voice drops—makes your hips shift up instinctively, chasing something you can’t quite reach.
Chasing him.
And he notices. Of course he does.
You only just catch the faint lift at the corner of his mouth before his lips are back on yours, swallowing the breath from you as your back arches, pressing yourself up into him without thinking. Your fingers curl into the sheets above your head, tension pulling tight through your body as everything narrows down to where he’s touching you—where he isn’t touching you.
His hand drags back up your thigh, slower this time. Intentional. And when his fingers finally press against you through the thin fabric, you gasp.
He takes the sound from you immediately, mouth moving against yours, deeper now, like he’s feeding off it, like every reaction just pushes him further. His fingers start to move—slow, circling, testing—while his mouth leaves yours to trail along your jaw, your cheek, the side of your neck.
With your mouth free, the sounds slip out before you can stop them.
Soft. Unsteady. Needy.
And he loves it.
You feel it in the way his breath shifts, in the way his grip tightens just slightly, in the way his hips rock—slow, controlled, a subtle pressure of denim that’s more suggestion than friction.
“Jack—” your voice catches, breaking on his name. “Please. I want—”
“Tell me, sweetheart,” he murmurs, mouth brushing your shoulder, voice low and coaxing.
“More,” you manage, breath shaking. “Need more.”
He groans against your skin, the sound low and rough, his body settling heavier over yours like any space between you is something he can’t stand.
Then his hand shifts.
Your breath catches as his fingers slide beneath the damp fabric, dragging through your wet heat in one slow, deliberate stroke.
Your whole body jolts. “Fuck—Jack—”
The reaction pulls something from him—a sharp inhale against your neck, his mouth pressing there like he needs to ground himself for a second before he loses it completely.
You’ve never felt like this before. Never this hot, this open, this aware of every inch of your own body.
And you’ve never wanted anyone like this before.
“God,” he murmurs, voice thick, lips tracing back up your throat. “You’re so wet for me, sweetheart.”
All you can do is nod, whimpering softly, your hips lifting without permission, chasing him, asking for more without the words—and he gives it to you. Of course he does.
His finger slides inside you, slow at first, letting you feel it—the stretch, the heat—before he pushes deeper, and the sound that breaks from you is swallowed instantly as his mouth finds yours again, your back arching beneath him as he starts to move. Not fast. Never fast. He sets a rhythm instead, steady and controlled, curling his finger just enough to make your breath catch, just enough to make your hips move against him again.
And when you press into it, when your body starts to chase that feeling properly, he adds another finger, the stretch pulling a broken sound from your throat as your hands tighten in the sheets and your body rolls beneath him, helpless to it now, completely caught in the slow, deliberate way he works you open.
Every movement is intentional. Every curl hits deeper, sharper, building something tight and aching low in your stomach that makes your whole body tremble, your breath coming out in uneven gasps as you press into his hand, chasing, needing.
Then his thumb finds your clit, and the contact is immediate—devastating.
You cry out, sharp and breathless, your whole body tightening as he starts slow, deliberate circles that send heat spiralling through you, your hips lifting again, desperate now, unable to stay still under him.
You can’t answer—not when his mouth is everywhere, your throat, your jaw, the corner of your mouth, like he can’t decide where he wants you most before he finds your lips again, and this time the kiss is different again. Hungrier. Messier. His tongue presses into your mouth just as his fingers push deeper, his thumb working harder, more deliberate now, and the moan that tears from you is swallowed whole.
“Please,” you whimper against his mouth, breath breaking. “Please, I—need you.”
He lifts his head, dark eyes searching yours, brows pulling together just slightly.
“You sure?”
You stare at him, trying not to whimper as your whole body clenches around his stilled fingers, the sudden stillness almost worse than anything he was doing before.
“Never have I ever finished during sex, remember?” you manage, breathless but steady enough to land. “You gonna fix that, or what?”
Something feral flickers across his face.
And then it’s gone—replaced by something heavier. Something decided.
He kisses you again before you can catch your breath, all teeth and tongue, the restraint he’s been clinging to snapping clean in half as he groans into your mouth, the sound dragged straight from his chest. You feel the loss of his fingers immediately, your body protesting it, but it’s replaced just as quickly by the slow, deliberate roll of his hips, the friction of denim against your soaked panties making you gasp against him.
“Fuck,” he breathes, like he can’t quite believe it.
He pulls back just enough to shift, bracing himself on one arm while the other moves to his belt, not rushed but far from steady now. There’s a hitch in his breath, a tension in the way his fingers work at it, shoving his jeans and briefs down just enough to free himself, and your gaze drops before you can stop it.
He’s already hard—fully, heavily—flushed and slick at the tip, and the sight of it sends a sharp pulse of heat straight through you, your mouth going dry even as your body reacts in the complete opposite way.
“Fuck—” he chokes, the word breaking out of him. “I haven’t been this hard in—” His eyes flick back up to yours, dark and molten, and whatever he was going to say changes. “—ever.”
It hits you low and deep, twisting something tight in your stomach that makes your hips shift under him without thinking. You finally let go of the sheets, your hands finding him, sliding up to wrap around his neck as you pull him back down, needing him closer, needing him everywhere.
Your legs come up around his waist, drawing him in, urging him forward, and his breath stutters as he presses in, his swollen tip dragging against the damp fabric between you. The contact is just enough to make your head fall back, a broken sound slipping from your throat as he tries—tries—to hold himself up, one arm braced, the other moving between you.
You can feel the strain in him now, the way everything is slipping in real time, in the slight shake of his arm, in the uneven rhythm of his breathing as his hand hooks into the waistband of your panties.
“I’ll buy you new ones,” he murmurs against your mouth, voice rough, almost distracted, like the thought barely registers before it’s gone. “Promise.”
And then the fabric gives.
The sound of it tearing—sharp, sudden—goes straight through you, your breath catching hard as he pulls the fabric out of the way, the last barrier gone in an instant.
It shouldn’t be as hot as it is.
But it is.
Jack Abbot—controlled, composed, always holding the line—losing it enough to rip your panties off you?
Fuck.
He sinks into you in one steady thrust, and both of you gasp at the stretch—the sudden, overwhelming closeness, the way want crashes hot and heavy between you. Your pulse hammers in your ears, that dizzy edge of fear and urgency tangling together until all you can think is him—here, now, inside you.
For a moment, you just breathe—pant, really—eyes squeezed shut, hands locked on his shoulders as your body clenches around him, like you’re trying to keep him right there, like you never want to let him go. He drops his head to your neck, breath hot against your damp skin, and you feel the way it shakes out of him.
“You—fuck—you’re so tight, sweetheart,” he pants, voice rough and muffled where his mouth presses into you. “I’m not gonna last—”
“Then don’t,” you murmur, your voice softer but no less certain. “Just fuck me. Please, Jack.”
A groan tears out of him, low and wrecked, and you feel it through his chest as he shifts above you, hips pulling back, his cock dragging against your walls in a way that makes your stomach coil tight, sparks chasing across your skin. You suck in a sharp breath, your grip tightening on him—and before you can brace, he drives forward again, deeper this time.
“Fuck—” you cry out, the sound breaking loose without warning. “Jack—”
He doesn’t stop. His hips roll back again, slower now, controlled in a way that almost makes it worse, his head lifting so he can look at you, really look at you, like he’s checking, like he needs to see it.
The anticipation coils tighter in your chest, sharp and electric, lighting up every nerve in your body until it almost hurts.
“Mhm,” you manage, breath unsteady, nodding as your arms wind tighter around his neck, pulling him closer, needing him closer, like it still isn’t enough.
For a second—just a second—you’re distracted by something stupid, the feel of his shirt between you, the barrier of it, the way you want it gone, want skin on skin, want to see him, feel him, all of him—
And then he thrusts forward again. Harder again. And the thought disappears completely.
Your body jolts beneath him, every movement knocking the breath from your lungs, and the sound that leaves you is loud—too loud—echoing back off the walls in a way that would make you self-conscious any other time.
But not now.
Right now, you don’t care who hears. Not when it feels like this.
His name spills from your lips in broken gasps, tangled with raw cries, and he answers with a rough sound against your shoulder, biting it back as his hips drive into you at a relentless pace. He’s barely holding himself up now, his weight pressing into you in a way that feels like too much and somehow still not enough, the strain in him obvious in every uneven breath, every sharp exhale against your skin.
His hand drags down your side, back to your thigh, fingers digging in as he pushes your leg wider, and the shift—small as it is—hits something deeper, sharper, your vision flashing white as your head tips back and the knot in your belly pulls tight. His grip slides to your hip, anchoring you there, holding you in place so every thrust lands exactly where it needs to, deep and unrelenting, the sound of it filling the room, wet and rhythmic and impossible to ignore beneath the broken sounds you’re both making.
And then his hand moves between you.
You feel it immediately—the change, the focus—as his fingers find your clit in the slick mess between your bodies, steady despite everything else, despite the way he’s losing himself in every way. Your back arches, breath catching sharp as his touch turns deliberate, circling, pressing, coaxing, sending jolts of sensation straight through you until it’s too much, not enough, everything all at once.
“Jack—” you whine, the sound falling apart as soon as it leaves you. “Fuck, I—”
“I know, sweetheart,” he mutters against your jaw, voice wrecked. “Come on my cock, yeah?”
Your hips lift to meet him without thinking, chasing the rhythm he’s set, chasing the pressure, the friction, the way he’s working you with a precision that feels almost cruel now. His hand doesn’t falter, his fingers moving with intent, building and building, every touch sending sharp bursts of pleasure up your spine as the tension in your stomach pulls tighter, tighter, until it feels like it might snap.
It’s never felt like this before. You’ve never felt like this before.
Your whole body tightens, back arching, legs trembling around him as your hips grind up against his, desperate, chasing something you can’t hold onto. He keeps hitting that same spot, again and again, relentless, his pace rougher now, less controlled, while his fingers stay locked on you, steady, practiced, pushing you right to the edge and holding you there.
You cry out, the sound raw, breaking from your chest as everything finally tips.
The release hits all at once—sharp, overwhelming, tearing through you in a rush that steals your breath and leaves nothing behind but heat and tension snapping loose. Your body locks up around him, tightening, pulsing, your hands gripping at him as your legs shake, your hips still moving against his like you can’t stop, like you don’t want to.
“Fuck,” he groans, burying his face in your neck, his voice wrecked as he keeps moving inside you—slower now, but deeper, like he’s chasing every last pulse of you, like he doesn’t want to miss a second of it. “That’s it. That’s my girl.”
His rhythm falters, hips stuttering, and then he loses it completely—a broken sound tearing from him as he drives into you one last time, deep and hard, spilling inside you as his whole body tenses, shuddering above yours.
You feel it—every part of it—the way he comes undone, the way he clings to you through it, like he needs something to hold onto just as much as you do. Your bodies keep moving together, slower now, instinctive, chasing the last fading edges of it as your breathing stays uneven, your chests rising and falling in sync, skin slick and overheated where you’re pressed together.
It takes a moment to come back down—a long one.
But eventually, the tension drains from him and he collapses almost fully above you, face buried into your shoulder, his weight heavy and grounding as he exhales, slow and spent. It makes it a little harder to breathe—but you don’t mind.
Not when you can feel his heartbeat against your chest, strong and real, still racing like yours.
-
For the first time in two weeks, Jack Abbot isn’t stupidly early for his shift. He couldn’t be, really. Because he’d woken up late this morning, limbs tangled with yours in warm sheets that smelled so much like you it made his head spin—and that had thrown off everything else he needed to get done today.
If it was up to him, he wouldn’t have left at all—but he had to. He had police paperwork to finish, a neighbour’s cat to feed, and sleep he should’ve caught up on before being back in charge of an entire emergency department for twelve hours. But on the bright side? He knows you have a swing shift today, which means he doesn’t need to be early to see you, because you’re going to be stuck at PTMC until at least ten p.m. tonight.
With him.
And he really shouldn’t be looking forward to that as much as he is.
“Afternoon, Dr. Abbot,” Dana says, glancing over the top of her glasses. “Wasn’t sure we’d see you today. Aren’t you usually here by now?”
“I’m on time,” Jack mutters. “I’m a busy man.”
Dana hums, the corner of her mouth lifting slightly as her eyes drop back down to the tablet in her hands.
Jack tries not to appear too conspicuous as he scans the department, glancing toward the trauma bays and South corridor as he passes the nurses’ station. He shouldn’t be this anxious to see you again—not in the apprehensive kind of way, but in the way that makes it feel like his lungs won’t quite fill until you’re near him again.
“She’s not here,” Dana says without looking up from her chart. “Wasn’t feeling well, so Ellis came in early.”
Jack spots Ellis across central, exiting one of the rooms with Santos at her side, and he opens his mouth to say something—defend himself, maybe, lie about what or who he was looking for—but he hesitates, unsure what he could say that wouldn’t incriminate him further.
So instead, he just drops his head and keeps walking, fumbling for his phone in his pocket.
He’d seen you this morning. Just this morning. You were sleepy, had a headache, so he got you water and Tylenol and kissed you before he left—but you hadn’t said anything about feeling so unwell you were going to call in sick.
Jack doesn’t stop until he reaches the lockers, then turns back to survey the ED one last time before leaning a shoulder against the wall and pulling up his text thread with you. He hadn’t texted you today because he knew he’d see you tonight and didn’t want to seem… overbearing. Even now, he’s not sure if he should—but he feels off in a way he hasn’t in years, like he’s waiting on something he can’t control and it’s making him feel sick.
What if last night hadn’t meant what he thought it did? What if you regretted it? What if it was just—
“Hey, kid,” Dana calls from the nurses’ station. “Big night?”
Jack’s head snaps up—and there you are.
The relief hits before he can stop it, sharp and instant, loosening something in his chest he hadn’t realised was wound so tight. He swallows it down just as quickly, his expression settling before anyone can clock it.
“You don’t know the half of it,” you mutter.
Dana huffs a short laugh. “I have a feeling I don’t want to know.”
Jack can’t help but watch as you cross the floor toward him, your backpack hanging from one shoulder while the other hand presses two fingers to your temple, like you could massage the headache away. There’s a smug little smile on your lips when you reach him, slowing your steps until you pause just beside him—not too close, but enough to make his breath catch.
You glance down at his phone, at the open message thread where his thumb is hovering, and your smirk curves a little higher.
“Miss me?”
Jack locks his phone and tucks it back into his pocket.
“Thought you were sick.”
You lift one shoulder. “A little hungover, so Ellis swapped with me.”
For a second, neither of you move. He just looks at you—and you look right back, like you both know exactly what’s changed, even if neither of you is about to say it out loud. Not here. Not now.
“And I missed the night shift attending,” you say finally.
Then—before he can respond, before he’s even fully processed what you said—you lean in and press a quick kiss to his cheek. Only brief. Barely anything.
But it feels like everything.
And just like that, Jack Abbot is done pretending he isn’t yours.
2087
gummygunk
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