Joel Miller is back home running his family’s ranch, the work coming back to him easily even as the house fills with the memories of what happened thirty years ago.
He hires a young farm hand, expecting nothing more than help around the barn. Instead, he finds someone just as lost as he is.
|| fluff, drabble, sickly sweet, not entirely sfw, idk man they're in love, retiredpornstar!joel, cowboy!joel, home video making ||
a/n: I'm sorry this took me so long! I went back and forth between what I wanted to do with this, and I've been having a hard time with some writer's block. I figured I'd prefer to give it to you as a sweet drabble than hold it hostage for any longer. for those who have enjoyed this story, thank you again, ilysm
"This thing on?"
The camcorder sat precariously on the dresser, propped up on a crooked stack of books so it faced the bed, one corner dipping just slightly where the top hardcover had bowed from age.
"Can't believe I got talked into this," Joel said from the bed.
He was breathtaking like this, laid back against the pillows of his king bed, the light pouring in beautifully from the tall windows to the right. The whole room was warm with the late afternoon sun laying itself across the dark wood of the furniture and the new quilt you had insisted on because of the pretty green color that brought out his eyes in the early mornings.
The room that had once belonged to his father had finally become Joel's.
Well— yours.
Both of yours.
The same landscape painting still hung above the bed, that quiet stretch of land that had watched the room for decades, but everything else had been made new for him. A heavier bed frame, new dressers, blankets that smelled like soap and cedar instead of dust. The place felt settled now in a way it never had before, like the house itself understood that it belonged to him.
And there he was, spread back against the headboard, bare and thick and waiting for you.
His legs, bent at the knee, were wide, showing his beautifully thick cock resting back over his belly, twitching as you turned around to face him. You couldn't help but admire him for a long moment, the thicket of hair dusting his chest, the dark trail leading down to another thick bunch of hair gathered around his shaft. His balls nestled against him in eager anticipation for release.
You were staring. You knew you were staring.
"Dunno why you're actin' shy," you said finally, glancing back at the camera, making sure the little red light still blinked, before looking at him again. "This used to be your bread and butter, Mr. Wrangler."
He gave a soft huff, the corner of his mouth turning up.
"Ain't shy," he said. "Just a bit rusty." You saw how his eyes dragged over you slowly, taking you in, "But I know that camera's gonna love you. C'mere."
You turned and climbed onto the bed, the mattress dipping under your weight, your panties already damp, your bra half tugged down from where his hands had gotten impatient earlier before you’d remembered this was something you'd wanted to finally try.
You settled onto his thighs carefully, knees braced on either side of him so you didn’t press too hard, your legs opening around his as you straddled him.
"You are the prettiest thing I've ever seen, Joel Miller," you sighed, your hands coming down to thread through the wiry hair on his chest, your fingers catching slightly on the curls.
His hands came up to rest on your hips, warm and so, so steady— thick fingers and rough callouses you'd memorized, that you wanted and reached for every day since the first time. And he looked up at you with that look in his eyes you had grown accustomed to seeing more and more these days. The one he no longer tried to hide. Soft, gentle… Happy.
"Are you nervous?" he asked, voice low, squeezing your hips gently.
You hooked your teeth over your bottom lip, worrying it for a moment, before shaking your head. He cocked an eyebrow.
"I think I'm more nervous for the rodeo tomorrow." you admitted.
"Ellie will be alright." he said, easily, "She out to be a real good filly, didn't she?"
You weren't sure why the two of you were whispering. There was no one on the farm but you, him, and the herd.
"Are you?" you asked when he kept looking at you like that.
He shook his head, his eyes so soft, glistening in the late golden hour of the day that peeked through the window shades.
"What is it?" you murmured, your fingers flexing lightly in his chest hair.
He tipped his chin just a touch, a small shrug that didn’t quite answer.
You leaned down, brushing your mouth over his top lip, letting your tongue drag there just a second, enough to pull a low eager groan from him.
"Do you think we could win?" you asked against his mouth.
He chuffed another breath of a laugh, "I know— you can—'n'— you will," he said between warmer, firmer kisses, growing longer and longer between words.
You hummed into the next one, a smile pulling at your mouth.
"Love you, baby," he added, softer now, his hand sliding up your back, flattening there. "’N I mean it. You two… you make a good team. She trusts ya."
You smiled wider at that, something fond settling in your face as you pulled back just enough to look down at him, your hands coming up to tangle into his hair.
"I love you too," you said quietly.
And then you kissed him longer, and for a moment, it felt like that's where the conversation had ended.
Your mind drifted anyway to that two year old in the barn — Ellie, all legs and attitude now, ears flicking and sweet little nickers when you called her name. Tomorrow would be her first rodeo. Yours too. You’d stood at the rails a handful of times now, watching Joel. The way he moved out there was… it was as if he’d never left, like it had been waiting for him to come back all along. You felt it again now, that aching swell in your chest.
Pride, plain and simple.
For her.
For him.
You pulled back just enough to press a kiss to the tip of his nose.
"Are you excited to see Sarah?" you asked, the thought slipping in easy as you looked at him.
His smile widened, something going even softer behind it.
"Yeah—yeah, I am."
"Good."
He watched you for a second longer than needed, then shifted, bringing one of his hands up to push a piece of your hair back behind your ear, his thumb catching briefly along your cheek.
"S'okay to be nervous," he said.
"I know."
"S'gonna be fun. Ain’t gotta be all that serious."
"I know."
He narrowed his eyes just a touch, a hint of amusement there.
"You know everythin’, cowgirl?"
"Oooo," you teased, your grin coming back, "say it again."
"My very own cowgirl," Joel said, that familiar tease in his voice, his hands settling firmer on your hips as he rocked you forward, "you wanna practice for me now? Ridin’, that is?"
"You are so corny," you laughed, giving his chest a light slap, but your arms slid around his neck all the same as you shifted your weight, easing him back against the mattress.
"Maybe," he agreed with a content groan, "but if you keep stallin’, that camera’s gonna run outta battery—"
The moment he said it, you remembered.
You turned your head quick, hair slipping over your shoulder as you looked back at the dresser. The camcorder sat where you’d left it, still crooked on the stack of books. The little screen flipped out and facing you had a perfect view of your backside, along with a blaring red "LOW BATTERY" in the top right corner.
"How much time you think we have?"
"You gonna rush me for a lil' home video?" he teased, but he was looking over your shoulder, his hand moving from your hips to your ass, giving it a little jostle while a smug grin played on his face.
"You are bad, Joel Miller," you laughed.
"That’s Mr. Wrangler to you, cowgirl," he said, before pulling you back down into him, his mouth finding yours again.
summary: tasked with watching over the late king’s daughter, joel miller finds himself confronted with feelings he believed had long since died with the rest of his past.
|| MDNI 18+ smut, angst, knight au, knight!joel miller x princess!reader, no outbreak, sarah death, grief, loss, mourning, power imbalance, this is as close to dbf i'll ever get lol, medieval au, no historical accuracy we're just having fun, f!masturbation, 'watch it grow' miller, f!receiving oral, kinda dirty talk more like praise, pinv, prone bone, spooning, no physical descriptions of reader, yes of course its corny its a knight au what do you want from me, bush lovers unite, forbidden love, possessive behavior & jealousy, kinda forced proximity, heavy drinking, drinking to cope, ptsd, joel doesnt really have a twang since ya know olde english vibes, bodyguard!joel kinda, slow burn, the smut is more like intimacy sorry I got too in my feels, virginity, tw: death by trampling (not joel or reader) ||
a/n: this is my submission for @fuzzy's knight au writing challenge with the namesake Ser Joel of the Dawn (tysm dulse!)
a/n II: a humungous thank you to @pearlessance my angel court for keeping me off the ledge throughout this entire writing process. for reading over some scenes and your reassurance, for loving me and letting me shout into the abyss over this fic. I love you down bad!!!!!
Inspiration & References: Meeting on the Turret Stairs by Frederic William Burton, Pride & Prejudice hand scene & proposal scene, Unlovely Bride by Alice Coldbreath, I listened to a lot of Charlie XCX's album for Wuthering Heights while I wrote this, title from this poem, dividers by @priestboy
wc: 23k....I am so sorry....
The night has a thousand eyes,
And the day but one;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
With the dying sun.
The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one;
Yet the light of a whole life dies
When love is done.
-Francis William Bourdillion
𝒯𝒽𝑒𝓃
𝓙oel wondered if he was always meant to be lonely.
Of all the things he could remember, there had always been a thread of loneliness running through him, no matter who he shared a bed with, a meal with, a child with. Even when his daughter was born—and she had been the most precious, most wondrous thing ever given to him—there had always been a churning certainty in his stomach that one day he would end up like this again. Alone.
Those among him told him he was paranoid, that he should pray and God would answer him, that He would keep her from harm. But Joel…he knew. He just knew. But he tried anyway. He prayed and prayed until his knees would ache on the stone floors of the chapel. He went to church more days than he missed back then. And yet, God had received him with nothing but pain and suffering. For his child died on his birthday, a cruel sort of curse to lay upon a man. What sin he had committed to deserve it, he could never quite say, as there had been many. He had been born a bastard, worked as a bastard, and fathered a child out of wedlock besides. What sympathy could any God bear for a man like him?
And so, he joined The Guild.
His brother had joined long before him, even though he was far younger and much more loved than Joel had ever been. Tommy had a mother and father that were wed before the Lord, had been raised by his mother's own breast and not by some wet nurse in a barn as Joel had. And yet, the brothers loved one another as if nothing of the sort ever mattered.
Tommy had always known what he wanted. It was as if he had come into the world already in pursuit of duty, reaching for his destiny of becoming a knight. From the moment he could walk and speak the boy had been possessed by talk of steel armor and winning battles. He believed, with a certainty Joel had never possessed about anything in his life, that the truest honor a man could claim in their world was to serve The Crown, to stand as a soldier of the king and fight in his name. And so the moment Tommy turned seven he began the long road toward it: first as a page, then years later as a squire, until at last, when he was one and twenty, he was made a knight of the kingdom.
Joel, on the other hand, came to it another way entirely.
Their king had always hungered for things that were not glamour or gold, but blood and power. War was his vice, and it made him cruel and demanding, a man who chased battle even when peace would have served the kingdom just as well. Campaign after campaign men were pulled from farms and workshops alike to fight his wars, to take lands that once belonged to others and plant his banner there instead, spreading the name of their kingdom across rivers and mountains and oceans.
Joel had joined when he was at his worst, his lowest, not long after Sarah had died.
Because he had became hungry too. Not for dreams of honor, nor because of anything noble— but because there was a cold, ugly pit growing inside him that was bitter and starved for a place to feed it.
At first he was nothing but another man with a sword in a line of many others. He slept on wet earth beside his comrades, ate hard bread that cracked through his molar once, shared rations of cheese with them, marched when he was told to march and killed when he was told to kill. He felt himself becoming cold and uncaring, but he did not linger on these thoughts. Some days when he caught his reflection in a stream or upon his comrades armor, warped in the curve of it, he would only see a man in silver plated steel. He never had to look himself in the eye under his visor or make sense of it before his eyes would close from exhaustion.
It was not long before he was noticed for it. Not for skill—though he had that, too—but for his willingness. He did not hesitate when orders were given, did not balk when others slowed. He stood where he was placed and saw things through to their end. That was enough.
One day, before another march upon a northern land, the king’s legion summoned him, and Joel found himself stationed not only among the king’s protection but beside the king himself. He remembered the command tent was thick with the smell of cooked meat and spilled wine, maps pinned beneath daggers along the table. Nothing like the dried meat and old bread his comrades were given in rations. But he carried out his duties there nonetheless, sharing meats and sweet fruits and mead at the king’s table, listening to the fat man speak of his battles, his victories, and the lands he had claimed. Joel would watch the grease shining along the man's beard as he tore into roasted fowl, never once imagining the day would come when he would see the king dead before his very eyes.
Because not long after, on the morning after the Battle of Black Lake, when light was just beginning to break over the ridge behind him, catching along the edge of his armor where it had been scraped and dulled, turning the metal faintly gold where it struck. And when the fog still laid low to the fields and half his comrades had fallen, Joel Miller found the man with a sword through his stomach. That was all he was, after all. A man. Laid in the mud with the same red blood as his soldiers. It pooled into the earth beneath him, giving his life source back to whence it came.
The king stirred when he saw Joel approach. His breath was shallow, his jewel-crested armor dark with blood, yet his hand still found its strength enough to reach forward, gripping at the top of Joel’s breastplate.
The battle had been won, yet Joel felt neither victory nor grief as his eyes settled upon the pale king before him. What surprised him the most, were the man's last words to him. For they were not of a battle well won in honor, nor to conquer more lands and spill the blood of new enemies.
They were simply this:
Protect my daughter, Ser Joel of the Dawn — she is the only light left for men like us.
𝒩𝑜𝓌
𝓙oel had been standing outside the council chamber doors for the better part of the morning, hands folded over each other, the metal of his gauntlet gloves creaking when he'd clench and unclench his fingers upon the pommel of his sword, the leather beneath them pulling tight across his knuckles. Every inch of him was covered in steel—from the tip of his helm to the ends of his boots, the plates fixed close through his chest and shoulders, the weight of it held in place by the straps drawn tight beneath. He preferred it this way, this life. No one could see the weariness of his gaze nor study the change in his expression, not through the narrow slit of the helm, not with his face kept where no one could reach it.
He'd been watching the light crawl slowly across the stone floor while the voices inside rose and settled in an endless, grinding clamor. The noise felt like it was gathering beneath his helm as though his skull were swelling, every word and scrape and thud ringing not within the walls of the castle but against the steel of his helmet, driving a dull pulse between his eyes. Men talked over one another, a chair dragged across the floor, the blunt thud of someone’s bejeweled knuckles striking the council table was all felt between his eyes, echoing inside the metal until it throbbed through his head like a bruise.
It had been hurting since dawn, starting as a dull ache somewhere in his temple and had growing steadily worse the longer he stood there listening to the council of old men argue through the door. He did not know what they were arguing about, nor did he care. Those things belonged to The Crown and its advisors, and Joel had long ago learned that men like him were better served staying clear of such matters.
Still, the noise had a way of burrowing into a man’s skull.
He pressed his tongue against the back of his molar where the old break still ached when the weather turned, trying to distract himself from the pounding behind his temples. They said the creation of different pains sometimes helped with fresher ones, so he probed the throbbing tooth with his tongue, the wet muscle soothing the ache only for a moment.
Then there was a crash, and Joel nearly bit off his own tongue in surprise, though he made sure not to show it. Noises began growing sharply after that, men talking louder over one another now. Soon, the posturing and snapping had turned to shouting.
And then, through the din of it all, came a shrieking, angry raised voice. Younger, feminine, and cutting through the rumble of the council men.
"ENOUGH— GET OUT!"
Several voices answered at once.
“Your Highness—”
“Princess, we must—”
“Now wait a minute—”
“GET OUT OF MY HOUSE, YOU SCHEMING LEECHES!” you shrieked, throat cracking on the final word.
Joel shifted his weight, expecting the impressive wooden doors to burst open and them to come running out, that voice scary enough to send most people running. But the noise only grew worse, voices overlapping again as the councilmen scrambled to answer you.
Your Grace this. Princess that. Calm yourself. Let us be reasonable.
Joel pressed his tongue briefly against his molar again.
His head was splitting.
And then—
“GUARD!”
Joel pushed the doors open and stepped inside.
The storm in the room hit him all at once. Voices, movement, the soft scraping of leather shoes across the stone floor as men stood. The council chamber was wide and high-ceilinged, its tall windows looking down across the city that clung to the mountainside below. Joel had sometimes wondered if those windows were meant to show the people gathered here how high above the rest of the world they stood, or perhaps to remind them that the decisions made within these walls were meant for real people and not merely the handful of old men seated around that table.
Joel walked forward steadily, his presence alone enough to quiet the room a measure as the councilmen turned toward him. They were all pale and aging things up close, their fine robes hanging loose over narrow shoulders, some with long white beards, others with thin hair clinging to spotted scalps. Several of them looked angry to see him.
"Get these men out of my sight—" you seethed.
Through the narrow split of his visor, Joel looked upon your figure. You stood hunched over the council table at its far end, shoulders tight with fury, your hands braced hard on either side of the polished mahogany. The sleeves of your pale green gown fell long past your wrists and into perfectly sewn gloves, the delicate fabric drawn smooth over your fingers as they gripped the edge of the table. He thought your nails might carve straight into the finished wood if not for the modest gloves keeping that violent touch hidden.
The men knew better than to question a direct command given to the palace guard. Grumbling among themselves about insult and mistreatment, they shuffled toward the doors in a cluster, their robes brushing the stone as they passed. One by one they filed out into the hall, Joel following close behind them.
“Knight.”
Your voice cut across the chamber just as he reached the threshold.
He stopped.
“Stay a moment. I wish to speak with you.”
Joel paused, glancing back over his steel shoulder before stepping away from the door and returning to the center of the room. Uncertainty sat heavy in his mind, though he kept his posture rigid and proper.
“You may answer me freely,” you said, watching him carefully from the end of the table as you stood straight, “but only if what you say is the truth. Do you understand?”
Joel hesitated.
Knights were not meant to speak freely in royal chambers. They spoke when commanded and little else. But a direct question from The Crown left no room for refusal.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” he said, his voice muffled slightly beneath the metal of his helm.
You studied him for a moment before continuing.
“You see, ser knight, I am beginning to realize,” you said slowly, “that many of the men around me never wished to see me sit this throne. I believe they had hoped I might be sent north and married off to some distant Duke instead of taking my rightful place upon the throne someday.”
Joel said nothing. He remembered the day the princess had been born well enough. The whole city had celebrated it. Bells rang from the towers, wine poured generously through the streets, and bonfires burned long into the night while men shouted blessings for the king’s new daughter.
He had been there in the crowd like anyone else then, younger and half drunk already, with young Sarah perched on his shoulders so she could see above the press of bodies. She had been all smiles and excitement as her hands held onto him, fingers threaded under his chin. They'd watched the court funded celebrations and parades that day as if they'd been meant for her alone.
The memory passed through him, but he pushed it aside as quickly as it came.
"And so," you continued, "I must weed out those who lie and wish my downfall, and I ask you, tasked with whatever purpose you have over me, do you serve me, knight? Or do you serve my father?"
“Your father is dead, Your Majesty.”
He thought maybe he should have bitten his tongue. It had been out of turn, and perhaps too terse to say aloud to a princess, but God be damned his head hurt so badly he could barely keep a hold on his rising annoyance. All he wanted was to flee back into the hallway, or better yet to his bed, though he knew it would be hours yet before he found that feather-filled mattress, and hours more before sleep would ever take him. The thought alone only stoked his ire.
But you were smiling up at him from across the room. A sarcastic sort of grin, maybe, but a smile nonetheless. He thought you looked quite nice with it plastered across your face.
"Ah,” you said softly. “Finally. Someone who speaks truth instead of riddles.”
You stepped forward, away from the table and approached him.
Joel remained perfectly still. Even though you could not see his eyes behind the visor, he lowered his gaze out of respect.
“Yes,” you sighed, stopping before him. “My father is dead.”
Your voice softened slightly as you looked at him from under your lashes.
“And I will tell you something most daughters would not admit aloud, ser. I do not mourn him.”
You glanced briefly toward the council doors, and he looked up at you, surprised by your confession.
“He loved war more than people. Power more than peace. And now I must sit the throne he bled half the world to build.”
You looked back at Joel. If you could see him, you would know he was looking directly into your eyes. The thought made his skin rise in gooseflesh.
“So I will ask you again.”
You stood far closer than propriety allowed.
“Do you serve a dead man… or do you serve me?”
He swallowed dryly, another step and the pretty soft green of your gown would brush the steel of his armor.
He cleared his throat, and did not move an inch. "I serve you, Your Majesty."
Your eyes studied him as if you could see straight through the shining armor, as if you could see how the blood pounding in his head was beginning to surge at your closeness. He had not stood this close to a woman in ages.
"Very well." you said finally. "You are dismissed."
𝓑y the time he finally lowered himself onto his mattress hours later, the silence of the chamber should have been a mercy.
Instead, his headache remained.
His armor lay in pieces beside the narrow bed, neatly arranged upon the dresser by the single window in his chambers. He stared up at the beams overhead, trying to will his mind to shut off. He had always been like this, exhausted and begging for sleep, only to scrape together no more than a few miserable hours once his eyes fell closed. The bed rustled beneath him as he pulled the wool blanket higher over his shoulder, turning for what felt like the thousandth time. The chambers given to the castle knights were modest but comfortable enough, a small room with thick stone walls and a single window that looked down onto the gravel path leading to the back garden. Better than many places he had slept over the years, truth be told.
And still, sleep would not come easily.
He rolled again, pressing his face briefly into the pillow, his skull still throbbing faintly, though it was better now without the helm clanking around his head.
Joel exhaled through his nose and turned onto his back once more.
He wished you had not gotten so close to him today. He thought maybe that was what was wrong with him, that you were imprudent, rude in your closeness, much too bold for your own good. He wondered if you had always been like that with those who served you, crowding them, pressing into their space as if rank and armor meant nothing at all.
Finally, he let out a long, low breath and pushed himself upright.
He pressed his fists into his eyes as he leaned his elbows on his knees, grinding hard enough to burst sparks of color behind his lids. Galaxies. That's what Sarah had once called them when she was little. That she could see Heaven if she rubbed her eyes hard enough.
Joel dragged his hands down his face slowly, rubbing the exhaustion deeper into this thrumming head before letting his arms fall again.
And then he looked up, out into the moonlit garden, and saw the most peculiar thing.
You were there. In your night dress. Pale silk reflecting the full moon above, bathing you in a beautiful spotlight. Your hair flowed behind you, and with one look over your shoulder, Joel knew you were up to no good. Where was your night watch? Had you climbed out your window like a child, sneaking out on your own protection?
Joel rose himself from the bed and grabbed for his armor.
𝓘t was only a few minutes or so later that he was down the narrow steps and out into the back garden, your silhouette already slipping toward the edge of the woods before he could call for you. He worried he'd wake the whole castle if he did.
So, instead, he merely followed.
He could have sworn you were barefoot. Your steps across the grass were so soft they were almost lost in the whisper of the night air, the sort of careful grace that might have been impressive if it had not been undone by everything else you were doing. Every few strides there came the faint sound of a branch catching against your sleeve, or the quick intake of breath when something in the dark surprised you. Once your hand reached out toward a low limb only for the brittle thing to snap in your grip. Joel followed the sounds easily enough, even when the pale color of your dress hid from his view.
He found himself faintly amazed that you had not yet heard him, though the armor was never as quiet as a man hoped it would be. There was always some small complaint of metal when he moved, the faint shift of plates settling against one another as he stepped over the uneven ground. Yet you pressed on ahead of him without so much as glancing back, as though the woods belonged entirely to you and the castle behind you had already been forgotten.
When he reached a fallen log in the path he caught the trunk of a tree to steady himself, swinging one leg over it before realizing the bark was rough against his palm.
He had forgotten his gloves.
His hand stayed there for a moment against the damp wood before he moved on again, watching the pale drift of your gown further ahead as it slipped deeper into the trees.
And just when you'd reached the darkest part of the wood, where no moon could shine through the top canopy, he called out: "Your Majesty—".
Your gasp rented the air as you swiveled on the spot.
“Oh!” you startled, your hand flying to your chest. “It is… one of you.”
“My Lady,” he answered.
“Ah. My knight of truth.” You sighed, recognizing his voice. A small, embarrassed laugh escaped you. “And what would you have of me at this hour?”
Joel turned his head this way and that, faintly bemused by the question.
“Where are you going?” he asked instead of answering, and though knew well enough it was not his place to question a princess, nor any soul above his station, the words left him all the same. Perhaps the woods would keep the trespass between them.
You glanced up at him beneath your lashes, catching his misstep at once.
“I told you, good knight,” you said lightly, raising your chin, “I grow weary of those who lie to me within the walls of my own castle. Tell me the truth—did you overhear of what they wished of me today?”
Joel studied you for a moment. You were the strangest woman he had ever encountered. Noble ladies did not question knights, much less tease them as though they were companions in some private jest, yet you seemed to expect him to answer you all the same.
“I—Your Majesty—”
“You must not call me that, ser knight,” you interrupted. “I am no queen yet.”
“Yes, Your—” He cleared his throat, suddenly unsure how to finish.
You gave him your name.
“Your Grace,” he settled on instead. While your name rose easily enough to his mind, it did not feel like something meant to pass his lips. “I don't think—”
“You may call me that when we stand before others,” you said simply. “When it is only the two of us, you will use my name.”
Joel hesitated a moment, then inclined his head, and brought his hand up to hold the neck of his breastplate in amused wait.
The two of you stood there a moment while the crickets resumed their thin singing in the dark. Joel found himself grateful for the armor then, grateful for the way it hid the direction of his gaze as it wandered briefly down the line of your figure.
“I am going to town,” you said at last, as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world.
Joel spluttered, dropping his hand from its casual placement, "You jest!"
"I most certainly do not."
"Your Grace, you must at least wait until morning."
“Is that an order, ser?”
He paused.
“At least wait until first light,” he said carefully. “It will be safer then. And…” He stopped himself, knowing he ought not press further in case he deeply offended you.
“And?” you prompted.
“And perhaps… not in palace silks,” he finished. “If you mean to go unnoticed.”
You looked down upon your form, "What is wrong with my clothes?"
"Nothing, they're very fine, Your Grace," he hurried to say, and he could hear his voice echoing in the din of his helmet as he tried to correct himself. "Only—if you wish to not be spotted as I had so easily, silk draws the eye. If you wore something more common, we might pass through the town without notice. So you may see it in its true form.”
"So it is a we, now?" you teased.
"I would insist you must not go alone." he said very seriously.
You considered that for a moment.
“Very well.”
Joel gave a quiet grunt, his shoulders falling in relief.
“You shall take me at first light,” you declared. “We will walk to town together.”
“As you wish, Your Grace.”
You sighed, and the silence stretched too long between you, and finally you gestured faintly toward the castle rising dark above the trees.
“You may escort me back.”
Joel turned and opened his palm, motioning toward the narrow path that wound back up through to the garden.
You passed him as you stepped forward, so close he had to hold his breath.He could not bear to know the scent of you—whatever oils or soaps you might have used, whatever warmth lingered on skin after a bath taken late in the evening. He did not know why the thought troubled him so much, only that it did, and that it would be wiser not to learn it.
Joel followed a pace behind you the rest of the way, saying little more as the path carried the two of you back toward the looming shape of the castle. He was not sure what else to say to you, nor if he should say anything at all. You had asked him questions before as though he were meant to answer them, as though he were something other than a man set to guard your door, and the memory of it sat uneasy in him now. He thought, briefly, of asking what had set you off so, what had driven you from the castle and into the woods alone in the middle of the night, but the thought soured on his tongue before it could escape his lips. It was not his place. It would never be his place. In the end, he kept his silence, holding to it as a rule long learned and rarely broken.
When you reached the base of the stairs, you paused there, gathering the skirts of your night dress in one hand while the other lifted slightly for balance, though there was nothing for you to take hold of to steady you.
Without thinking, Joel reached out and took your hand.
It was such a simple thing, accompanying a woman such as yourself up a set of stairs, and yet… there was something immediately jarring to him. Your hand was so soft, so delicate and supple in his calloused and scarred palm. Your skin was unmarked by blade or labor, as though it had never known anything harsher than silk gowns and water warmed for you. His hold swallowed your fingers as he guided you up the stairs, standing beside the stone pathway up to your chambers.
And he watched as you looked down at your hand in his, surprise written across your face, for neither of you wore gloves.
“Sleep well, princess,” he said quietly , and you looked back up toward the steel of his helm, and he could have sworn, just for a moment, that you had found his gaze somewhere behind the narrow slit of the visor.
He let go and made his leave, scarcely aware of the passing sconces lighting his way, nor the turns he took to find his bed. His skin prickled as though brushed by nettles, and he flexed his hand to rid himself of the feeling, but failed.
𝓙oel had a terrible suspicion he might be in over his head.
His head, which, by God’s mercy, had finally ceased its throbbing.
By the time he stood in the courtyard, the sun had only just begun to crest over the distant hills, its light still pale and cold where it touched the stone. The castle was quieter at that hour, the usual movement of servants not yet in full swing. Only the stable boys were at work, a few housekeepers beginning their morning cooking that would go uneaten by the lady of the house. But the air still held that brief, suspended stillness before the day truly began.
He had thought, perhaps, that you would not come. That you might have changed your mind come morning. It would have made sense, and he would have understood if it had only been some passing craving of the night, your senses returned to you after a few hours’ rest.
But then, without warning, his attention was drawn to the edge of the courtyard.
You were making your way down the side steps into the garden, your gown no longer pale and clinging as it had been the night before, but changed now for something simpler. Still, it was finer than anything worn beyond those walls. It sat upon you too well, drawn in at your waist and looser at the hips, carefully made in a way that would draw the eye regardless of your intent. Though, he wondered if it was really the dress at all that was the problem.
And your hands were covered by gloves now, hiding whatever softness hid beneath. A more casual glove, leather and made for riding, he supposed, something a princess like you would be doing on a casual day out of her room.
You must've sensed him there, for when you looked up it was more out of instinct or habit than regard, but when your gaze fell onto him, he was surprised to see a smile spread across your face. You came toward him with measured steps, quieter now, tempered where you had been bold the night before, and yet there remained something in your expression—a glint?—as though the two of you shared some small, unspoken joke.
"My Lady," he greeted, and he was smiling, though glad you couldn't tell as his helmet covered everything from view.
“And how do you think I look today, ser?” you asked, dipping into a small curtsy.
He nodded once, clearing his throat. “You look… well.”
You gave a soft scoff, something amused in it. “You are not a man of many words, are you?”
He tilted his helmed head down at you, uncertain what answer you expected of him. You would have no shortage of men eager to praise you, he thought, men of better birth and smoother tongues, and whatever he might say would hardly measure beside them.
“How far is it into town?” you asked, turning as you began to walk.
"Not far, Your Grace," he said, gesturing to the path before them. "Only a half an hour's walk."
Your shoes, now leather laced and practical to protect your soles, found the gravel easily as you fell into step beside him.
He was aware of the space between you in a way he had not been before, aware of how easily you seemed to ignore it, how little regard you held for the careful boundaries others kept. He maintained it all the same as the two of you made your way toward the gates.
The guards straightened when you approached, though not quickly enough to hide the surprise that flickered across their faces. Joel gave the word before either of them could speak, and the gates were drawn open without question, the heavy wood groaning as it gave way.
Beyond it, the path sloped downward toward the town.
The morning had begun in earnest there. He could see the smoke curling from chimneys, the smell of bread and ash carried faintly on the air, and the slow stir of people already at their work spread through the narrow streets. It was not crowded yet, not the way it would be by midday, but there were enough bodies moving through it that a stranger might pass without much notice.
You stepped ahead of him without hesitation, and he let you lead the way. After all, he was very curious about what made you want to come to such a place. He was glad you had not expected him to speak to you as you meandered through the town thirty minutes later. Even dressed as you were, there was no mistaking you. It was not the gown, as he'd thought earlier, but the way you held yourself, how you clasped your hands gently at your navel and held your head high, as if balancing a pile of books atop it. You were not hunched over like the women selling her fish monger husband's catch as she picked the bones out of the filets, nor letting your hands drift over soft cloth as the younger women did. Many people glanced your way, a double take from one man, a woman letting her jaw fall open. Did they recognize you? Did they know who was in their midst? Joel thought he probably was no help, a knight in your wake, a hand on his sword as you walked in front of him. Though you did not seem to mind.
If anything, you seemed to lean into the surroundings, the town you would soon rule, slowing here and there to look at things that would be commonplace for others. You leaned down to inspect a cart of apples, still dusted with the fresh earth of morning harvest. You said good morning to a woman hanging linens from a line strung between two narrow buildings, watching them all as though each were something worth seeing. He wondered for a moment what his world looked like through your eyes. Or rather, the world he knew before the war.
He knew you'd been to town before, but never this part. Because he'd seen you at the tourneys seated beside your father, composed into something polite, but distant. You had been beautiful then, yes, any man with eyes could've seen you as such, but there had been nothing in your appearances that asked for more than a glance at your beauty. He thought you must be dull, fed on a spoon made of silver all your life.
He knew now that he'd been wrong. He knew it from that moment in the council room.
You came upon a small baker’s stall which was modest, though he had arranged it with care, rows of small pastries set out diligently, their tops glossed with cream or honey, fruit peeking through split seams of dough. The morning rays of sunlight glistening on the sticky glaze, making them shine indulgently next to the more fairly priced breads he sold.
“Good morning, sir,” you said, your voice bright as you gestured toward a cluster of the cream-topped pastries. “Might I ask what these are?”
The baker, a round man with flour still dusted along his sleeves, straightened a touch at the attention. “Sweet cakes, miss. Fruit within, icing on top. A rare treat, if I may say.”
Joel stood just behind your shoulder, saying nothing, though his gaze lingered over the display with a narrowing he could not quite help. Too much sugar for his tastes.
You nodded, already reaching for your coin.
“I will take one, please," you said as sweet as the sugary bakes.
Without meaning to, Joel clicked his teeth softly at the sight of it all, the sound slipping out under his breath before he could stop himself, and you turned toward him at once, catching it despite the busy noise of the street.
“Oh?” you said, and there was a note there now, curious, a little amused. “Have you a better thought, good knight? Or do you find fault with my choosing?”
He held still a moment, then shifted his weight, aware all at once of how close you stood, of how easily you had marked him. “You would break your fast on sugar alone, My Lady?”
You smiled at that, not offended in the least, if anything a touch more entertained. “And what would you have me take instead?”
He sighed, shaking his head.
“Go on,” you pressed lightly, tilting your head. “You have already judged me for it. You may as well finish the thought.”
He exhaled through his nose, faintly annoyed with himself for being pulled into it at all. “Gingerbread —if I wanted something sweet,” he said at last.
You turned back at once, as though that settled it entirely. “Then we shall have one of those as well.”
“No,” he started, sharper than he meant, “that is not—”
“Tis but thanks,” you said, easy as anything, waving him off as you pressed coin into the baker’s waiting hand. “For your guidance.”
He quieted the protest that sat on his lips as the baker passed the goods across the table, wrapping them in a scrap of paper binding.
You accepted both, then turned, holding the gingerbread out toward him without hesitation.
He did not take it.
You waited a beat, then another, your brows drawing just slightly. “What is it?”
“I cannot eat with this on,” he said, lifting a hand vaguely toward the helm.
“Then remove it.”
He nearly choked on the air he drew in. “My Lady—”
"Do not call me that," you said, flickering your eyes around, "you are terrible at following orders, like a stubborn old dog, you are."
He felt something like heat climb the back of his neck at that, irritation or something near it. “It's not so simple—”
“You are to call me by my name,” you went on, as though he had not spoken at all, as though the matter were already decided. "Say it now, so I know your memory is intact."
He whispered it. There was something that felt heavy on the tongue even as quiet as he said it. It sounded as if it echoed in the steel of his helmet. And yet you brightened at once, as though it was worthy of praise.
“Better,” you said, pleased. “Now take the gingerbread I have so kindly purchased for you, and eat.”
He looked at you a long moment through the narrow slit of his helm, measuring, perhaps, or simply trying to understand what manner of woman spoke so freely to a man she scarcely knew, or rather, what sort of princess wandered a market and bartered sweets like a common girl.
Bossy little thing, he thought, not without a trace of reluctant amusement.
Still, he took the cookie from you, and noticed how you did not look away as his opposite hand came to the front of his helmet.
“Come, then,” you said, lifting your own pastry. “We ought to share in it, should we not?”
Before he could answer, you tapped your sweet cream tart lightly against the edge of his gingerbread, the soft icing smearing against the darker surface, and took a bite with quiet satisfaction.
He hesitated only a moment longer before shifting the helm just enough to free his mouth, the movement careful and practiced over many hours within in the metal shell, revealing no more than necessary. He brought the gingerbread up and bit into it, the hearty spice hitting first, and then the sweetness of the cream from your tart that stuck to the side following after in a way he was surprised to enjoy.
He became aware, then, of your gaze fixed upon him, your eyes glued to the line of his jaw where it had been briefly revealed, catching what little they could before he settled the helm back into place as he chewed. He wondered what you thought about it as your eyes found his bearded face instead of the smooth, shaved skin that most men bore. It was not something he should be weighing—what you thought of him at all, that is— and he set his mind straight again as the moment passed.
You watched him for a heartbeat longer, something seemingly pleased in your expression, before you turned away as though nothing at all had passed between you, already stepping back into the current of the market.
Joel stayed close behind you for the next hour or so as you slowly ate away at the pastry in your hand, as if you meant to stretch it for as long as it would last, each bite taken with the same quiet attention, your steps wandering without aim through the streets while he remained fixed at your back, his gaze moving far less freely than yours ever did.
As you watched the people in their daily lives—a woman leaning from an upper window to shake out a rug so that dust lifted and drifted down in a fine, chalky cloud, a dog nosing at a heap of refuse in the gutter with ribs showing through its hide— Joel kept his eyes moving from face to face, from doorway to doorway, to the narrow breaks between buildings where a man might slip through unseen, his gloved fingers shifting rested steady at the pommel of his sword. Every now and then, he would reach his hand out to stop a passerby from brushing up against you too strongly, to course correct you before you stepped into a pile of horse manure in the road. Always gentle, brushing touches of his gloved hand against your soft silks at your arm.
And then you stopped so quickly he almost collided with you at the edge of the street where the cobbles beneath your feet gave way to a worn strip of packed dirt, your shoulders turning toward something low along the ground with a kind of quiet certainty that drew his attention just as quickly.
Joel followed the line of your sight and found a boy curled in against the base of a wall where the rough stone was marred with time and neglect. The child's were clothes little more than rags stitched together in patches, the hem of his shirt dress hanging past his knees and darkened with old dirt, his bare feet blackened from the road. He had his hands cupped loosely in his lap, not even holding a proper bowl, his eyes lowered as though he had learned already what it meant to be passed by without notice.
Joel had seen a hundred like him—children turned out into the streets while their families worked elsewhere in the city, sent to gather what coin they could from strangers. Most of their parents worked long hours in the fields, the riverbeds.
You stepped toward the boy then.
“My La—” Joel started, the warning there on his tongue, but you were already gathering your skirt in your hands so you might lower yourself, the fabric brushing the dirt as you knelt before the boy.
“Hello,” you said gently, and the boy’s head lifted, wide blue eyes flickering up at the first voice that had chosen to stop for him.
He said nothing, though his hands closed tighter in his lap, drawing closer to his chest as though unsure what to do with them now that he had been seen.
“Are you hungry?” you asked, your head tilting just slightly as you held out the partially-eaten pastry toward him.
The boy eyed it warily, but eventually, he nodded just the once.
"Where are your parents?" you asked.
His eyes flicked then, quickly moving between you and Joel, then widening at the sight of his steel-clad figure standing just behind you, and still he did not answer. When his gaze returned to you, it did not settle on your face, but on the pastry in your hand.
The boy reached out at last, small fingers darting forward to take what you offered, and then, quicker than Joel could blink, the boy was on his feet and running.
He nearly made a comment of typical beggar children, to not expect much of them, but you were back on your feet within a second and following the child.
"Wait—!" you called.
Joel felt a cold rush of panic strike through him at once as he lurched after you, his gaze catching the swing of your hair and the pull of your dress as you vanished around the stone corner. He made after you immediately, but you were quick footed and the boy even more so. He lost sight of you almost as soon as you whipped around the building.
The sound of his boots hitting the dirt path, the heavy breath within his helm, the sudden panic making his skin break out in a cold sweat— it all forced memories to flood him as fierce as the fear. Strong, cruel memories. It was as if he turned the corner and stepped into another world, into his own worst nightmares that came to him at night. Back to when the city had turned on itself with fear of sickness, people pouring into streets with carts and bundles of whatever they could carry to just get out and away.
His little girl's hand in his, running through the city as the residents feared for their lives and their loved ones, the sickness forcing people to decide to flee or stay, angry people and sicker ones, forming forceful packs around doctor's homes and bakeries and kitchens. Starvation, thirst, fear— it made people insane. He'd let go, or maybe she had. All he knew was her tiny, sweating fingers slid from his and she was lost in the crowd, and he was throwing himself between people, following the top of her little blonde head, until he couldn't see it anymore. She'd gotten caught in the crowd, pulled this way and that, and people shoved past without looking or stopping.
And he hadn't reached her in time when she went down. He didn't see her for what felt like hours but was only a few minutes… until he came upon her—blood blonde now, red, trampled—oh, god, the memories, the memories. Of screams and fear and—
It all pressed in on him as he ran after you, filling his chest until it hurt, dragging in shaky breath, his body moving harder through the alley as he took the next corner without slowing, his shoulder catching stone as he forced himself through. His eyes searched ahead for you and finding nothing but another stretch of passage where you had already disappeared.
But those weren’t the screams he was hearing now, though the fear of losing you in a crowd still stifled the breath in his lungs as he took yet another corner, his body braced for the same sight he had come upon once before.
Because the next corner he turned, his eyes didn’t descend onto a bloody blonde head in the dirt at his feet, but upon you in the center of a courtyard.
And the sound of the voices was not screaming or terrified or hungry, but of joy—laughter.
Children, all huddled around you, blushing and touching your pretty dress as you laughed with them.
As Joel caught his breath at the corner of the courtyard, you looked up at him with a beaming smile, though there was something else there, something he had not quite noticed before, a faint pull beneath it that did not match the brightness of the moment. He couldn't say exactly what it was, only that he saw a sadness behind your eyes, even as you turned back to the children, as though the fleeting glee of it all did not come without cost.
His mind struggled to settle, still caught between what had been and what was in front of him now, the memories clinging where they didn't belong, until the present forced itself back in with the sound of a door opening along the courtyard wall. A woman stepped out to greet you, older, thinning, with a worn apron tied around her narrow frame. The children gathered to her at once and clinging to her skirts with familiarity. She smiled as she took you in, her voice warm.
He caught pieces of the conversation as he approached.
“The coin does come every month, M’Lady, and we are grateful,” the woman assured, though her eyes stayed lowered, her hands wringing together at her waist.
So you’d told her who you were. Or maybe it was not something easily hidden, as he'd known from the start of the morning. Not when your silks were fine, your hair brushed, your skin untouched by labor.
Joel couldn't hear what you said, only that you murmured something gentle to her, your hand resting atop her knuckles. Coaxing, reassuring.
“It's just…" she hesitated, her eyes glancing between her hands and your face before she went on with a sigh, "Sometimes it is stretched thin before it even reaches the children. On rent for the house, for the water, ere we may even fetch loaves from the baker,” she said, her voice dipping with it, “There are many days we can scarcely get enough to feed them all. Often we are turning children away, for we cannot house nor feed them with what we are given.”
There was still a gratefulness in it as she went on, careful in her telling, as though she feared you might take even that from them. But you listened as though each word settled within you, your attention fixed on her in such a way Joel had not seen you give a single one of the men in the council chamber.
By the time he reached your side, his breathing had settled completely, only to catch again when your hand wrapped itself around his steel arm, and for a moment he wished he did not wear the armor at all.
He would tell you later how selfish it was to run off like that on him, how irresponsible. Though… he would not tell you how much it had frightened him, nor why, but he hoped you might come to understand that a woman such as you should not be so rash.
But for now, he would walk you back to your tower, your hand still wrapped around his arm, and know he would not stop you from doing it again.
𝓘t was the anniversary of Sarah's death the following day.
Joel had known he would not be able to forget it, not ever. And not when Tommy had come by his narrow barracks that morning to give him a slice of pie from the kitchens. Joel did not ask how he had gotten it, nor did he offer any thanks. He could not bear to blow out the little candle set atop it either. Tommy knew too, knew better after all, so he only set the dish down on Joel’s side table and let the man be.
"Happy birthday, brother," he said gently before shutting the door behind him.
𝓗is post that day was uneventful, and Joel was grateful for it. You had been kept in meetings with your closest secretary, a man with a beard that fell well past his chest, and the council chamber doors had remained shut for hours on end, your voice only ever reaching him in low murmurs through the wood. By the time his shift was over and the next guard came to take his place, he had not seen you once.
Joel could not bear to stand sober one moment longer.
He made for the town a few hours later.
No armor now, as it drew too much notice in the streets, though he felt the lack of it more keenly than he had in some time, his shoulders set without its weight, his hands left empty where steel might have steadied them. Most of The Guild knew his story, or enough of it, and he had no mind to spend the night among them either.
By dusk the stone lanes had quieted their usual clammer of life. Lantern light pooled on iron hooks, yeast and hearth smoke thickening the air while families huddled in their homes. Joel kept his head down as he moved through it all, not just for fear of being recognized or known, but for lack of wanting to be seen at all.
By the time he reached the tavern, night had settled in full and the place was crowded, the door swinging open and shut in turns as folk pushed through it, the inside warm with closeness of bodies, voices raised over one another, the scrape of stools and benches against the floor, the smell of ale and roasted meat and sweat worked deep into the room itself. A boy moved between the tables with a platter of trenchers stacked with coarse bread and slices of salt pork. Another man tore into a heel of cheese with his hands while coin clinked against the bar.
Joel pressed his tongue into his back molar again, making his jaw throb.
He didn't linger at the door, but made his way through the crowd and for the counter. As he sat on a free stool at the end, he set his coin down and took the ale as it was given in return without word, the tankard still damp where it had been rinsed, foam spilling over the rim as he lifted it to his lips. He drank it down in long swigs, hardly stopping for breath.
All he had done all day was be left to his thoughts, and they had not left him in kind. He planned to drink until they were gone from him.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, dragging the foam from his lip, and as his hand fell away, his gaze lifted without thought, catching on a shape to his right that had not been there a moment before, or had been and he had not seen it. A hooded figure sat at the bar beside him.
This was not so unheard of, most of all after sundown, when families turned in and the street changed hands to those with coin to spend and reason to hide.
Joel lifted a hand to the barmaid for another ale, holding it there a moment, two, waiting for her to look his way, but she did not, slipping past him again and again with her tray tilted against her hip. She was laughing raucously at something one of the men shouted while she set down the emptied pints. Finally, with her cheeks pink and smile wide, she made her way back at last, her pace slowing as she reached him.
“Hungry for somethin’, dear?” she asked.
“Ale,” he said, pushing more coin across the wood.
“You sure? Ought to put somethin’ on your stomach.”
“Make it two ales, then,” he grumbled.
He did not miss the way the cloaked figure beside him nearly leapt out of their seat, nor the pair of eyes that peered out from beneath the hood’s hem.
He clenched his jaw hard as he turned to stare into that gaze.
The barmaid only looked between him and the figure, her hand still wrapped round the handles of the pints before took them to be refilled. She soon was back, setting them down with a dull knock against the counter. They sloshed as they hit the wood, and Joel watched her from the corner of his eye as she asked the figure a question.
"Anythin' for ya?"
They shook their head quickly before the barmaid turned away.
Only when he reached for the first ale did his eyes flit away, his hand closing around the tankard. He drank deep, set the empty pint back down, and took hold of his third pint at once, his head beginning to feel lighter now, his shoulders easing by an inch beneath his tunic.
Finally.
He tipped the ale back and swallowed hard, and when he set it down again with the heart of his palm, the seat beside him had emptied.
His feet almost slipping underneath him and his head full of that fuzzy cotton lightness, he rose from his stool and headed for the door.
As he breached the threshold and saw the tip of the cloak whipping around the corner, he moved quickly and caught it in his fist, hauling the figure back into his chest. He could smell lavender, and something else—clean and fresh like spring's first breath after a harsh winter.
"Who do I have to fucking throttle for the fact you're all alone here, My Lady?"
You twisted in his arms and pushed him back, throwing yourself away. The hood atop your head fell as your spine hit the stone wall, only the light of a sliver of moon reflecting in your eyes—your pretty eyes. He was crowding you in an instant. Your gaze flashed up at him with more temper than fear, and you twisted under him with sharp little huffs of breath until he drove into you harder, his pelvis knocking your left hipbone against the wall, your thigh caught between his legs and held there.
“Unhand me, you brute,” you hissed, voice low and conspiratorial.
But Joel could already see, if only his mind's eye, whichever bastard had let you slip by—with a face all black and blue beneath his fists, because this had happened once before and that had already been once too many. Whoever had let you slip out of the keep again wanted their teeth scattered in the dirt by his hand.
“Who have you been sneaking past, Your Majesty?”
“I told you to stop calling me that.”
“And I told you not to go into town alone.”
Your chin tipped up another inch. “You knew me at once, did you?”
He looked down at you, his hand still bunched in your cloak, the other braced beside your head against the wall. “You nearly jumped out of your skin when I spoke.”
“You startled me.”
“Did I?”
“Yes.”
“That must be why you were staring holes through the side of my face.”
Your mouth pressed tight, though he could see the answer in it before you gave it. A note of amusement made your lips curl, and it made his head even fuzzier.
“You are not so difficult to know, Ser." you said, false confidence making your voice clear, "You are my knight of Truth. I know your voice by now. I know your bearded face as well.”
His grip shifted at that, for he knew for a fact you had not seen more than a prickle of his beard the day prior. His knuckles brushed your shoulder beneath the cloak. “Now who tells lies?”
You gave him a look then, one that ought to have been cutting and yet lingered too long to do the work of it. “Would you have me say I mistook you for some other ill-tempered ox in the dark?”
Joel let out a breath through his nose. “Ill-tempered.”
“You have me cornered in an alley.”
“If I had not stopped you, I could not be sure you'd—.” he stopped himself. His tongue was made loose by ale. "You cannot be out in the dark alone, Your Grace."
“I am not alone, I am in an alley with you.”
His mouth twitched before he could stop it. There was scarcely any room between you now. The stone held you at the back and he held you at the front, and all at once the anger had begun to fray at the edges, turning into something less fit for shouting. It sat low in his belly, and had his blood boiling for entirely other reasons. He could feel your breath touch his mouth when you spoke again when he remained silent.
“You forget yourself.”
The words should have struck him. In his right mind, he'd pull away now. He'd never get this close to begin with. Instead the words landed between the two of you with that same false temper, because your eyes had changed as you said it, and your body gave a small shift against his that did nothing at all to get free. Rather, your back slid down the wall a few inches so you could sit yourself perfectly on his knee.
Joel leaned in close enough that the tip of his nose nearly brushed yours. “That would be easier if you looked half so offended as you sound.”
That silenced you for a beat as your fingers, which had been caught between your bodies, found the front of his tunic and closed.
“I am telling you,” you whispered, though your chin lifted, "that your manner is vile.”
“Aye,” he said, looking at your mouth now.
He heard the catch of your breath and hated that he knew he'd harvest that sweet sound in his mind for safe keeping. Hated more that the ale in his blood had made him bold enough to keep you there and stupid enough to enjoy it. Distantly, he felt your warm hand where it stayed twisted in his tunic pull him infinitesimally closer. His thumb had slipped beneath the edge of your cloak and found the warmer cloth beneath, the finer weave fit for a woman like you, and that alone felt like too much. It reminded him: a knight did not lay hands on his princess in some narrow alley behind a tavern. A knight did not crowd her with his mouth half parted and his head gone warm with drink. If anyone had seen, he would have been dragged to the square by dawn and hanged for it.
Then a tavern door slammed somewhere beyond the mouth of the alley, followed by the spill of drunken voices and rough laughter, and his thoughts snapped like a castle bolt locked back into place.
He uncurled his hand from your cloak, let your weight slip from his knee as he straightened his leg, and stood back from you, shoulders drawing square again beneath his garb.
"I must see you back to your chambers now, My Lady."
He ignored the way your body slumped at the loss of him, the way the heat in your eyes guttered when the night air moved between you.
“All I came for was one night of freedom,” you said softly, your gaze dropping. It was near worse, that softer voice of yours. Worse than the wit, worse than the quick little barbs you liked to set between the two of you.
“So did I,” he said, “and yet.”
Your eyes lifted back to him then, taking in his face with a look so openly it made him shiver. As though you knew there would not be another time for this. To see him plain, uncovered—no helm, no steel, no dark visor to hide behind. Only the man himself, rough and graying and a little drunk. He set his face back into something blank and gave you nothing he did not mean to.
"And yet," you echoed.
Your gaze continued to wander over him as you said it, from his eyes to the old scar that cut across the bridge of his nose, down to his beard gone silver in places now, then up again to the thick disarray of his hair where his hands had been pushed through one too many times that night. He wanted you to stop looking. Wanted it because he did not know what sat on his face when you looked at him so. Wanted it because some part of him feared he did not want it to end.
“Why do we not make the most of this night, then?” you asked, and when his eyes found yours again, that spark of amusement had returned.
"I think not." he said plainly.
“Why?" You stepped nearer as you said it, the edge of your leather shoe toeing the front of his boot. "Would you have me wither away in my room like the rest of them? Am I not allowed one night’s freedom in my own kingdom? Am I not allowed to steal a kiss from a handsome man in some dark alley?”
Joel ground down on his jaw until his teeth creaked. Yes, it was a compliment. Yes, it made his blood flame again, his cheeks redden, his groin tighten with even the fleeting thought of your lips on his. But—
“A princess does not kiss knights,” he said plainly, his voice flat, hiding his thoughts. His eyes squeezed shut a moment before he looked back at you from under his brow. “A princess kisses lords. Marries princes—such will be the way of things for you.”
Your expression darkened in an instant.
“And here I thought, all this while,” you said, drawing yourself up straight, stock still now, your voice cold, “that you were a knight of truth. Yet I see you lie like the rest of them.”
Joel's eyes narrowed, not understanding.
“I asked you the other night whether you heard what those men asked of me in council. You did not answer. I took that silence for ignorance.” Your mouth sharpened with every word. “Yet here you stand, proving you knew well enough. They mean to sell me off. They say I cannot rule because I am a woman. That I must have a man at my side to take The Crown.”
Your words were venom now, the poison filling your mouth, spitting like a snake.
“I trusted you to—”
“You should not trust anyone, My Lady,” he cut in seriously. “Not in that keep. Not among men. Especially not where your future is concerned.”
Your eyes flashed.
“And it is not my fault,” he went on, “that I will not take you up on this mad offer of yours. It is not on me to steal your first kiss in a reeking alley with ale on my breath. I am only a knight, and you, you are—”
“I am a woman,” you snapped. “A woman asking a man to kiss her, to make this night bearable, for God’s sake!”
“The only thing happening tonight is that you are going back to your chambers,” he replied through gritted teeth. “Which is a kinder end than what might have befallen you had you sat beside any other man in that tavern.”
You glared at him.
He glared back.
And yet.
Still the heat in him did not ease. It ran under his skin, restless, mean, his blood beating hard with it. Want sat in him like a fever. As did anger. And something worse, something dangerously like grief.
“I am to take The Crown,” you said, voice plain and authoritative suddenly. Your shoulders squared beneath the cloak. The alley seemed to narrow around you, stone and shadow and the thin wash of moonlight caught along the trim at your throat.
“I shall rule this kingdom,” you went on, “and I am giving you an order. For you to disobey would be a stain upon your honor, your code, the very first law your Guild ever taught you. Do you understand, ser?”
Joel felt then like some damned hound brought to heel. Standing there before you with his hands empty, waiting for your word. He hated that you were right, that obedience had been hammered into him so long ago it lived in his bones now, deeper than drink, deeper than want.
"Tell me your name."
"Joel."
"Tell me your title, your entire name."
"Joel Miller." he swallowed against the knot in his throat, straightening to his full height, "Ser Joel of the Dawn, My Lady."
"Joel Miller." you said.
The air around the two of you held very still suddenly. The sound of his name in your mouth, not his title, the name bestowed upon him with the king's dying breath, but the name his mother gave him. The name of his father. His mind felt thick with the unknown, the ale making it fuzzier, but a sudden clarity to him as he watched your tongue swipe out to wet your bottom lip.
He suddenly had the wild thought that whatever words left your lips would set the course for everything after. That there was still, even now, a ledge beneath his feet. One he was not ready to step off from.
Then you looked at him and said, quiet as a prayer and twice as perilous—
“I order you to kiss me, Joel Miller.”
He heard your breath stop when he wet his own lips without thought. What in God’s name was he meant to do with that? Refuse a direct order from the very person he had sworn his obedience to, his life to, when he had bent the knee and sworn his life to The Crown itself? And here you were, standing before him, with all the force of it.
So, he did as he was bid—though his mind screamed for him to cease all movement—and leaned forward.
He did not touch you. One hand braced against the wall beside your head, sore already from the stone biting into the meat of his palm, the other held in a tight fist at his side. He bent his face down to yours, but did not close his eyes. If this was to be done, and done only once, then he would keep all of it. Every flicker in your gaze. Every small movement. Every catch in your breath.
The touch of his lips to yours was light enough to scarce be called a kiss at all, more ghost than man, feather-light. And the second his mouth met yours, he was drawing back again.
"If there is nothing else, Your Grace." he murmured, his voice low and rough as if the screaming in his head had been real, "We must be getting back."
You sighed then, and for a moment you looked terribly young in your disappointment, almost childish with your eyes lowered so plainly and your heart worn there for him to see. It made him curse himself all the more bitterly, because there was nothing childish in what he felt at the sight of it.
"No," you said, "there is nothing else."
𝓙oel’s head was hurting again.
He truly needed to lay off the ale, even on nights like the last, when all he wanted was to blur the world away. He was not sure whether his misery came from drink or lack of sleep, of which he had barely gotten any once he had seen you back to your chambers. He had held your hand up the same way as the night before, the only words exchanged between the two of you was a promise to not kill the night watch for his carelessness. He had dismissed the man all the same and taken his place for a few hours, standing there until he heard your snoring through the door and saw the first wash of morning creep across the hallway window.
And now he stood outside the council chamber doors once again, stifling yawns inside his helm.
You were late today, though the chamber was hardly quiet for it, voices rising over one another beyond the doors while the sound of trenchers, cups, and serving platters carried through the wood. Whatever had been laid out for breaking fast, it was enough for a crowd, and the room had the full swell of it, men talking over one another in easy spirits while chairs scraped and laughter broke out now and again between the louder voices.
Joel wondered if you'd been sleeping off the same humiliation he had spent the night trying to fight off. He felt stupid, ashamed—most of all, cowardly. Yet even with all of that souring his gut, he knew he had done right by the end, even if he was far too brazen to begin with. He was a lowly knight, and no man such as him had any business kissing a woman of your station in some back alley, no matter that you had stolen out of your tower and asked it of him.
As his thoughts meandered, he finally heard echoing footsteps down the corridor.
You were leading a small knot of council men, a foul look set upon your face. The gown you wore was a deep blue, rich even in the dim corridor, with a trim of pearls resting low around your neck. It suited you, and Joel could not force his gaze away. It made the anger in your face look sharper somehow, your eyes near red with it, your mouth set hard as you swept toward the doors.
You didn't even look at him.
He thought, perhaps wildly, that he still preferred your anger to your disappointment. But when you reached the council chamber doors and laid your hand to the iron ring, you paused. Then, at last, you looked up at him.
The smile you gave him was sweet enough to curdle milk.
“Come, I wish for you to join me inside today.”
And then you turned at once and fixed the two pallid men behind you with that same look.
“You are dismissed.”
“But—”
“My Lady—”
“Dis. Missed,” you seethed, and opened the doors, and Joel didn’t even allow a look back at the men before he followed inside.
Inside, the room felt as though it had burst wide open before his very eyes. What he had taken for the din of dishes and the breaking of fast turned out to be visitors, and many of them, near all gentleman callers by the look of it. Lords and princes alike with shining gold plates at their cuffs, deep rich cloth laid over doublets and surcoats, velvet sleeves, jeweled belts, chains of office resting against clean and unmarked skin. Every head in the room turned at your entrance. Smiles lifted their faces at once, a few men bowing, one or two bold enough to wink. Joel’s hand tightened round the pommel of his sword as he took his place along the side of the chamber, where he had, unfortunately, the clearest view of every man there setting himself to fawn over you.
He was in for an hour of hell.
A light touch at your shoulder. A hand at your back. A lingering kiss to your knuckles. Joel felt his blood heat by the minute, his helm growing hot and claustrophobic around him. Steel turning cage instead of shelter. He stood inside it trapped now, clad in iron to hide from the room, meant to watch and say nothing.
And he knew that you knew.
You kept flitting your eyes over your shoulder if a man laughed at your joke. You'd smile when one kissed your knuckles only to wipe it against your gown as they stood, another flick of your eyes to him in the corner. Every look told him plainly that this was no accident. You had forced him in here to stand witness to it all. To watch you smile at other men. To watch other men touch you. Perhaps to see what sort of creature it made of him. To perhaps teach him a lesson to never refuse you. His lips would sometimes tingle with the memory of the night before. But he did not give in.
He let the hour drag over him and bore the brunt of his vexation without moving as the sun climbed higher through the windows until it settled on his left shoulder and baked the steel there hot enough to sizzle. He kept his mind on that pain of the heat inside his helm instead. A new pain for an old one. Better that than dwell over the other one inside him, the one with no wound to show for it and no name besides.
It was not until the very end of the hour, when the lords and dukes and whoever else had begun bowing their heads in farewell and offering up their final words, that Joel had finally had enough.
“This has been a wondrous way to break my fast," a man was saying at your side. "I fear every breakfast hereafter shall pale beside it."
Tall and lean, he was handsome if Joel didn't want to snap his neck, and younger than him by enough to make him feel mean. The man was polished from head to heel, his doublet a deep burgundy stitched through with gold thread, a short mantle pinned at one shoulder with a jeweled brooch, rings glinting when he lifted his hand to touch the small of your back.
“Oh, but you lie, good sir,” you said back politely. “I know for a fact the gardens at Darbeshire are far fairer company than I. If I were made to break my fast whilst looking over those roses, I do not think I should wish to be anywhere else. But I do thank you for visiting.”
"Ah, but you are far lovelier to look upon than those flowers."
You gave him a tightly lipped grin, but there was no color in your cheeks and your smile hardly reached your eyes. Joel could not help the quick and ugly swell of satisfaction that filled him.
“Tell me,” the man said, stepping into you as you turned to see him toward the doors, “when I may look upon you again.”
“Oh,” you said, and Joel could have sworn your eyes flicked to him one final time, “I fear my days are not my own just now. I will need to speak to my council for any other visits—"
“Then I shall petition for one hour only,” the man said. “One walk. One turn through the gallery. One look, if you are cruel enough to deny me more.”
You gave a breath of a laugh for courtesy’s sake and kept moving towards the grand doors, though the smile on your face had begun to wear thin.
“You are too generous in your praise, My Lord.”
“I am sparing in it, truth be told. Were I honest, I should shame myself with the excess.”
That had you glancing aside at last, less charmed now and more like cornered, and still the fool pressed on, following close with all his bright confidence and gleaming teeth.
“At least grant me some token to carry away,” he said, stopping you from reaching the exit. “A ribbon from your sleeve. A pearl from your ear. Some small mercy for a man already half beset with the thought of leaving you here alone.”
“My Lord, I think you greatly overstate the matter.”
“I do not.” He smiled, and there was something in it Joel disliked at once, too pleased with itself, too certain. “You have made a ruin of me in a single morning.”
Whether it was your politeness or there was little left in you to suffer the prattling fool, Joel could not yet tell. But your patience had plainly frayed, and not in the way it had with him the night before. Your body had already turned away from the prince, or lord, or whatever shining title he wore— Joel cared for none of it. What he cared for was the way the man reached out with two spindly fingers to drift the back of them against the snug fabric of blue silk at your waist, just under your bust, admiringly so.
Joel was at your side before the next words could even leave your mouth.
"Sir—I think—"
Joel's hand closed round the man’s wrist and removed it from you in one hard motion. The prince stumbled back a half step, more from outrage than force, his face changing at once.
“You dare lay hands on me, knave?!”
“Your hour is done here,” Joel said, his voice rough with disuse, made rougher still by the helm that echoed.
The man looked him up and down. Where he might've been handsome from far away, he was more pallid and mousey up close. Joel wondered if he could feel his fiery gaze through the visor, as he made no move to come any closer to you.
"Do—" he scoffed again, mouth agape like some sort of guppy—"do you know who stands before you? I am the Duke of York, I am—"
"A man who has outstayed his welcome. I will see you out."
The duke stared up at Joel, "You forget your place, knight."
Joel did not move. You were strangely silent beside him.
"You are here to watch a door," the duke went on anyway, "not snatch at your betters like some kennel dog!”
Joel’s jaw tightened, “Then your betters ought to know when a lady has bid them enough.”
The duke’s eyes flashed. “I was speaking to Her Grace.”
“And now you are not,” your voice came suddenly.
That gave the duke pause. He turned to you, perhaps expecting a soft apology and simpering, but you had none for him.
“My Lord,” you said, your voice cool now, all sweetness spent, stepping forward, “I have thanked you for coming, I have bid you farewell. But I begin to think your ears are for ornament only. Must I say it a third time before you hear me?”
The prince barked a laugh, though there was no mirth in it. Where his face was befallen with surprise before, it soured now entirely. He looked between you and Joel for a moment with a curdled smile.
"Indeed?”“ His gaze felt oily as he looked upon you with something ugly. “You are not some merchant’s daughter to play the coy maid with me. You are a princess, and I had thought to indulge you and your blandness, seeing as you have so little to offer a man besides a crown and beauty.”
“Excuse me?” you said, sharp as a lash.
He turned toward you fully now, still flushed with his own offense. “What? Will you set your hound upon me because I admired you too well?”
“I will do as I please in my own court,” you said, your voice low now, which was always worse. “And you forget yourself far more than my knight ever has.”
Joel's stomach did a funny little swoop at that.
The prince’s mouth went thin. For a moment he said nothing, only stared at you with that same affronted disbelief men so often seemed to wear when told no by a woman. Then whatever sense had kept his tongue bridled failed him.
“Had your father still breath in him, this silliness would be done by nightfall,” he said pompously, seething and turning blotchy red as he loomed closer. “He’d have had you handed over to me without fuss, wedded in the chapel and beneath me in bed by dark, sparing the realm of your tiresome —"
He did not finish the sentence, because Joel's metal fist made contact with his perfectly straight nose.
The duke fell to the floor at once, knocked out cold upon the council room stone. Joel heard your gasp of surprise, and looked to you at once.
Your eyes were wide upon the duke, and then up at him.
"Apologies, Your Grace," Joel said as he shook the force of the blow from his gloved hand, "His tongue ran faster than my patience would allow."
For a moment you only stared at him wide eyed.
The room had suddenly become so still Joel could hear the faint crack and hiss of one of the hearth fires at the far wall over only his pounding heart. He wasn't sure if you would rage at him, throw him from the room for knocking out your suitor. But as he watched, something changed in your face. He saw it first in your eyes, the way the shock in them gave way to a brighter, near disbelieving glimmer. Then your brows pulled together, not in anger but in the strain of holding something back. Your hands stayed clasped over your mouth, though no gasp escaped now.
He saw the crinkling of your eyes, a light sparking in them, and you began to laugh. It slipped pasted your clasped hands, your shoulders shaking with undeniable mirth.
And suddenly, Joel found that he was laughing too. It broke from him in a sort of hiccuping cough at first, something his body had nearly forgotten how to do. He bowed his head once, though his helm hid his expression anyway. But lifted it once again to watch the warmth in your face, alive and gleeful as you looked upon him.
You drew a breath, trying to master yourself, though a last giggle still betrayed you as you dropped your hand.
“What an absolute pompous ass,” you said.
Joel’s mouth twitched.
You looked down at the sprawled duke with open disdain now, all sweetness gone as the moment passed. Joel bent down to lift the man and take him to the infirmary.
“Leave him there.”
He paused. “My Lady?”
“I shall take my noon rest,” you said, smoothing one hand down the front of your gown, though your eyes were still bright with laughter. “Will you stand guard at my door, ser Joel?"
He stood slowly.
"If you wish it, M'Lady."
“Very good. Let us take our leave,” you said simply, "and we will leave him to wake to his humiliation where he lies. I'm sure he will take his leave with as little grandeur as he deserves.”
Joel nodded, and escorted you out.
𝓞utside your door for the rest of the day, Joel let the hours pass him by without much notice of the comings and goings. Yes, he watched dutifully as always when one of your ladies came by, a new book in hand for you, it seemed, keeping you well entertained through the day. As the sun began to lower, a few servant boys came up with hot water in buckets, one of them red in the face with the strain of carrying it careful up the steep stair. But the traffic thinned as evening wore on, the hallway settling into long stretches of quiet broken only by footsteps far below.
His mind wandered more than he cared to admit. Back to that morning, to the princes and their soft clean hands, the jewels that flashed in the golden sunlight that came through the room as they drank and ate the morning away. He had stood firm and watched while they fawned over you, kissed your knuckles, laid hands to your shoulder or the small of your back when they'd lean in to speak to you.
He would not dare try to name the feeling that rose in him at the thought. Particularly not when it came to that duke of where-the-fuck who laid hands and filthy words upon you. His knuckles were still sore, and he glanced down at them as if he could see through the steel plated gauntlet, flexing and fisting his fingers. It was dangerous to strike a man of such stature, he knew that, though he had only thought of it after. His blood and his body were meant to serve his princess. He did not care what other title stood in the way of your safety.
He realized, after a moment, that he had hardly thought of his daughter the past half day. He had meant to drink himself stupid the night before, to rid himself of the memories and the guilt and another turn of the sun for him but not for his own girl. He had wanted to be wake up to a splitting head and a rolling stomach because he deserved no less. Wanted to dwell in the pain of it all like he did every year since. But instead... he suddenly was glad he hadn't drank more, and found he liked the memories of the alley now. Of you there in the dark, with your false confidence ordering him about like a dog meant to heel. He did not like what the memories did to him, however. The way his blood seemed to leave his head and settle low in his gut and loins. It would not do. He told himself that over and over, like knocking his own skull with a mallet. He must rid himself of such visions, of the memory of your featherlight touch where he had barely kissed you.
He felt stupid. That was the word for it. Stupid and past his years. He was old enough to know better. To know what came of letting himself be pulled around by a woman’s eyes, no matter that woman wore a crown’s future on her head. Old enough to know the distance between a knight and a princess was not something crossed in taverns or alleys or hallways outside her bedchamber. Yet there he stood, same as he had stood all day, held in place as much by his own thoughts as by duty.
A servant came to set the torches burning, one by one, and the stone walls took on that evening color they always did, gold near the flames, brown in the corners, black where the ceiling beams cut across overhead. Somewhere below, voices had started again. Supper, likely. Men off duty and cups being set down. He heard a dog barking once in the yard. Joel listened without really hearing any of it.
When the steps came on the stair at last, steady and heavy with armor, he looked up.
Joel did not move when the other knight reached the top of the landing. He only watched them come broad in the torchlight, helm on, hand resting easy at the pommel of his sword as though this were any other turn of the watch.
“It is late,” the man said, voice muffled beneath the steel. “You may go.”
Joel stayed where he was.
“She has slipped her chambers twice now,” he said, voice becoming more rough hewn, more frustrated. “Twice in two nights. Did you know?”
The other knight slowed.
Joel stepped forward then, not enough to crowd him, yet enough to make plain the matter would not be waved off. “And unless you are witless, that means she did not do it without negligence. Was a door left unguarded, a passage left unwatched? Or a man on duty with his head up his own ass? Which was it?”
The knight stiffened at once. “You should mind your tongue, brother.”
“You should mind your post.”
But as Joel spat the words, realization crept upon him, or, rather, recognition.
"…Tommy?"
The knight lifted his visor, and Joel saw at once the blue-green of his brother’s eyes.
“Tommy,” he said again, this time with a long breath.
“Joel?”
Joel pushed up his own visor then, enough for his brother to see him plain enough. Not only a brother of the guard before him, but his own brother in blood.
"It's been too long, hasn't it?" Tommy said, and Joel could see the crinkling around his brother's eyes, a smile widening beneath the steel covering.
“Aye. Overlong indeed,” Joel said, and let his visor fall shut again with a clang. “Had I known this was the sort of watchman you’d make, I would have taught you better long ago.”
"You forget it is I who have been a knight longer than you, brother." Tommy only chuckled genially. “But I shall do better this night. There is no need to worry. I shall see to it my rounds are passed with each hour from here to the stair and back again—”
Joel shook his head, a creaking of steel with the motion, “No. Go down to the garden stair and begin your watch there. I shall remain here and guard this door.”
Tommy paused. “Have you not stood here all day?”
“Aye.”
“Then you have need of sleep, brother. I shall send another in my stead to—”
“No need.”
Tommy’s helm tilted with disbelief. Joel could picture the look beneath it easily enough. He had known that look since Tommy and him were only boys, seeing straight through his stubbornness.
“You need rest, Joel,” Tommy said with a sigh. “Most of all after yesterday—”
“Have a good night, Tommy,” Joel cut in. “I shall see you in the morn when we break fast.”
Tommy was quiet for a moment, then said, “Very well. I shall go below and send someone up with your supper. I doubt you have eaten a bite, knowing how you mark the day.”
Joel rolled his eyes, though Tommy could not see it.
“Fine,” he said.
Tommy nodded once. “Good night, brother.”
“Good night.”
𝓐fter his meat pie and potato stew, Joel had begun to feel the full weight of the day.
The castle had gone quiet in only the way it did deep into the night, the fires burning low in the torches, the doors long shut of the nurses and cooks and servants fast asleep in their chambers. There were no footsteps in the corridor now, only the crickets outside the window kept him company through the long hours.
His eyes threatened to droop now and then, the steady set of his guard beginning to slacken as his body swayed before he caught himself. His legs were sore. His back ached. At least the pain in his head had eased with food and water, leaving him only with the deep drag of tiredness settling into his bones.
You had been so quiet the rest of the evening, the entire day if he thought of it. He wondered if you had your nose between the pages of that book your lady-in-waiting had brought. Or maybe you were so tired from the previous night and finally were getting your rest. Perhaps you just did not want to see anyone. Joel would understand that best.
That was why, when he heard the sound the first time, he thought he had imagined it.
It was so faint—he couldn't have said for certain whether it had come from within your chambers or some dreamlike place between wakefulness and sleep. He lifted his head from where it had just begun to dip again, his entire body stilling as he listened.
But then, nothing. Only the crickets keeping him company beyond the window, and the soft crackle of torchfire along the wall.
Joel frowned, looking out into the dark stretch of stone corridor, but there was nothing there.
And just as he began to dismiss it as some trick of his tired mind, he heard it again.
No, that had most certainly come from your chambers. And it was soft but unmistakable, forcing the drowsiness from him at once.
And then, you were calling his name. As if pained, as if you needed something and you were so weak you couldn't bare to yell it or even call to him.
"Joel, please."
His head filled at once with terrible possibilities. Had you been hurt? Had someone come in the night and set upon you in your sleep? But how would they have got past your guard? Had Tommy been struck down and left crumpled at the garden door while some intruder made his way inside?
Joel felt the last of his tiredness leave him in a rush. He pushed through the door and took the winding staircase two steps at a time, his hand skidding once against the stone wall as he climbed, already expecting to find some dark figure at your window or slipping through the garden door below—
But he did not.
Instead he found the candles by your bed still burning low, their light pooled soft and gold across the room.
Your chamber was richer than anything below. It smelled of lavender, fresh clean linen and pressed oils. A great bed stood at the center of it, raised on a carved frame dark as old walnut, the curtains tied back in pale drapes that spilled from the canopy like silk. Fine linen hung in layers round the posts, gathered and draped with a care no soldier’s room had ever known. The coverlets were cream colored and worked over with little stitched flowers and trimmed edges, the pillows heaped high enough to swallow a body whole. A lamp burned on the table beside it, throwing light over a rug patterned dark at the foot of the bed, over the washstand in the corner, over fabric that had been thrown to the floor in a heap. It was as messy and as elegant only a woman’s room could be.
And you were laid in the middle of it upon the heaps of down pillows and duvet.
You weren't wounded like the nightmare his mind casted upon him. You were only sunken into the bed coverings, settled heavy with your face turned towards him as he entered. There was nothing of alarm in your expression—no fear, no pain he could see. Only a soft, faraway look of someone not wholly in the room with him.
“Oh,” you said gently, a small smile tugging like a string tied at the corner your mouth. “I must have fallen asleep. This is a dream, is it not?”
Your hands were hidden in your lap beneath layers of your gown, still in that deep blue from earlier. It lay dark against the pale linen, rumpled now from rest and restlessness, sleeves pushed up, pearl necklace and gloves gone and strewn over your bedside table. Your face looked loose with rest, lashes lowering, the hard edge of politeness he had watched you wear all morning nowhere to be found.
“My knight of truth,” you sighed, then caught your lip lightly between your teeth. “Come closer.”
Joel didn't know what to do. So he stayed frozen in the doorway.
You didn't look hurt, you looked…serene. Soft and pleased, even, with that hooded gaze fixed upon him.
He should not be here.
The thought rang through his head loud as church bells in the square. He should not be in your bedchamber. Not at this hour, not at any hour.
You let out a soft, simpering sigh when he did not move. Your eyes opened a little wider then, blinking awake, your teeth still worrying your lower lip.
“Mmm,” you hummed, and only then did Joel see the shift of your arm where it lay hidden beneath the folds of blue in your lap. “Then perhaps I am not dreaming,” you said, your voice thick with sleep. “You listen much better in my dreams.”
Joel almost had half a mind to laugh.
He climbed the last step and came fully into the room.
"Take off the helmet, ser," you said a little breathless, "and come closer."
Joel only listened to one of those orders, the less dangerous of the two, and stepped closer to you.
One step.
Then another.
He had come halfway to the bed when he saw you properly and turned his back at once with a sharp breath.
“Your Grace—”
You let out an petulant scoff of breath, and he heard the duvet move as if you'd kicked your legs like a child.
"You are such a terrible listener!" you whined.
"Please, My Lady, I should leave you to your—"
"Turn around, Joel Miller. And come stand at my bed." you said. Fully awake. An order not to be disobeyed.
He stood rigid, staring instead at the portrait hung beside the doorway. Yourself, painted fine and bright in an ornate frame, hair dressed perfect, those same pretty eyes fixed on him from canvas and bed alike. His blood was hot and thrumming in his veins, shooting up his neck in a deep flush. His fingers fisted, the steel of his gauntlet creaking with the strain.
Fuck.
“Turn around,” you said again, stronger now, your voice carrying all the weight of The Crown.
He turned.
And he saw you. You, with your dress turned up and hiked over your hips and stomach so that your legs were spread out, your hands not only just laying in your lap but between them, one spreading your folds open, the other with a delicate finger playing with your most sensitive flesh.
Joel looked only at your face.
"Good." you smiled. "Now the helmet."
Joel murmured your name, and you only moaned.
He swallowed hard.
“Please,” he said, and his voice came rough, “I cannot be here. What are you doing awake at this hour? You ought to be asleep.”
“I cannot,” you whined. “I could not stop thinking of you striking that idiot this morning. It made me so... you make me so...” You shut your eyes, drawing in a heavy breath, and the sound you made then had Joel fixing his gaze on the bedpost behind you, on the carved wood, on anything but the sight of your hand between your thighs.
“And what of you, knight?” you asked when your eyes reopened. “Do you think of me as I think of you? With your hand on your—”
“Jesus—” he cut in. “No. No, I do not—”
“Joel,” you groaned, throwing your head back so the column of your neck shone in the firelight, a bead of sweat making it glisten, “you are the only man here who does not lie to me. I would rather you did not begin now.”
He was silenced.
“Everyone lies to me,” you went on, breathless now, your fingers still moving as you looked back at him. “They tell me what they think I wish to hear. They flatter me with pretty words. They speak to The Crown and not to me. You are the only one who does not sound tired of me before I have even finished speaking. The only one who does not look at me and see what may be gained. You are the only one who sees me at all. And you make me half mad.”
Joel was breathing hard himself, his thoughts clawing in every direction, trying to fix on anything but the bed before him, the sound of your voice, the shape of your mouth when you said his name.
And he knew at once, a single truth.
He had never taken his place in The Guild for honor or nobility. He had not trained for twenty and one years from boyhood nor for the sake of The Crown, nor for any shining notion of duty. He had joined because there was a deep, empty chasm within him that demanded to be fed, and when his daughter died it had only widened, and widened, and widened, until it seemed it would take the whole of him if he did not give it something. Order. Coldness. Blood. A wall to put his back against. A blade in his hand.
But just now, in this moment, he understood that none of it had filled him the way you had in the last few days of being in your stead. You had stepped up to him so close that day in the chambers, close enough to make him forget himself. You had terrified him with how slippery you were, how easily you slid past every wall set between you and what you wanted. You had silenced him with your wit and your strength. And you had made him an absolute fool in his wanting just last night. He felt lighter than ever before.
That was what made him answer:
“Yes, Your Grace,” he said at last, barely above a whisper. “I do think of you.”
Candlelight flickered over the pale curtains of the bed, over the dark blue of your gown pulled high to the crease of your thighs and over the sheets wrinkled beneath your legs, over your face as you watched him with that dazed, wanting look that would have been easier to bear if there had been any shame in it.
You sighed again, and Joel wondered how you had so much breath in you, giving it up in long, dragging pulls while his own seemed held tight in his throat.
“I will tell you this, Joel Miller,” you said at last, when neither of you gave way. “And it is my final order. Do you understand?”
He nodded.
“An answer, please.”
“Aye, My Lady. I understand.”
“You are to choose your next step of your own accord. I will not force you, nor command anything further of you, Ser Joel of the Dawn.”
Your voice caught a little then, though your eyes never left his.
“But know this, and know it well: I want you, and I want you badly. I am not much accustomed to being denied what I desire, as I think you know by now. Yet I would not force you to me. So the choosing is yours.”
You drew in one last shaky breath, nervousness now clear as day in your eyes as you looked at him from the nest of your bed:
"But I would have you choose now. My hand prunes with how wet you make me. And if you will not have me, I would much rather suffer alone."
Joel’s feet moved of their own accord then, not from any order, nor fear of disobedience. He walked toward the foot of the bed and what he saw there nearly stopped his heart in his chest.
You looked up at him with a smile dimpling your cheek, your hooded eyes soft as they found him. Your breasts spilled high above the tight blue bodice, and below that, you had bared yourself to him with your skirts shoved up over your hips. Your hand laid gently over your core, and he saw how you glistened. It pearled in the hair around it, a beautiful basin of nectar waiting for his taking.
"Is this your decision, Ser Knight?"
His hands rose to his head, to that steel shell that had kept him safe from being seen, from being known too well, and slowly he lifted it off. He held it at his side and looked at you, and God, you were a sight fit to kill a man where he stood.
"Joel."
That made him look up. Your fingers between your sweet lips and his name on the other.
"Your answer," you whispered.
He held out his hand to you, and you replied in silence, lifting your own from between your legs and reaching for him. Before you could touch him, he tore off his gauntlets and cast them aside with a dull clank to the thick blanket upon the floor, then took your hand in his. Hot skin met hot skin. He felt the slickness of you on the pads of your fingers, and it sent a hard shiver through him. He brought your hand to his mouth and closed his lips around your first two fingers, and groaned deeply at the taste.
Soft, supple, tasting of musk and honey and delight. It was like that pastry cream upon his spiced gingerbread so many days ago. And he loved the taste much the same. He suckled them deep, tongue slipping between and licking up every line and dip of your delicate fingers.
“What would you have of me, princess,” he murmured against your fingertips, kissing them once before drawing back, “if I said yes?”
Your eyes were on his mouth as they pressed against your fingers, your breath labored and panting.
"I—" you hiccuped, licking your lips, "I would have you undress. Take off all this—y-your armor—and—and—"
Had he made you so nervous suddenly?
It made his blood surge.
“And?” he asked with low tones.
"I want to watch—" you suddenly went bashful as your eyes found his, then dropped again as your gaze trailed down and down and down until—
"I wish to watch your arousal grow for me."
So he gently let go of your hand, and began to undress in silence.
"So it is…a yes?" you said again.
He had never seen you so unsure before, so nervous in his presence.
"Yes, Your Grace." he finally said. "I will take you as you want, I will kiss you as you had asked. I will do anything you ask."
“Take off this irritating steel first,” you said at once, as if you'd held the words in waiting, long enough that they came out with impatience. “It pains me that you hide such beauty beneath it. You are the most handsome man I have ever seen, and I have only ever seen a third of you.”
Joel felt his lips twitch.
"I've never seen that before either." you said.
"What?" he asked, unlatching his breast and arm plates.
"Your smile."
Suddenly you were sitting up, hand lifted between the space between you, hovering over his cheek. When he did not stop you, you let the pads of your fingers drift lightly along his cheekbone. It felt foreign, strange, but not unwelcome. Warm. Soft, gentle. Your eyes watched him, bright and eager, and it set a small stir in his chest. His mind dulled as you traced the line of his nose, down over the curve of his top lip, the bottom one, then down to his wiry chin. He caught your wrist when your hand began to wander down his throat, cradled it in his palm, and pressed a kiss to the center.
"If I do this, if we do this…." he said very seriously. You had to know. "There is no coming back from it. Do you understand?"
You nodded.
"Make it clear in your head—you will no longer be a virgin for your husband one day, and you will always be mine."
You bit your lip, "I understand, Joel."
He leaned down, and finally, finally, kissed you.
Heat.
It was as if his body was made of it, blinding, kindled only by your touch.
You made a small sound at the force of it, his mouth finding yours with such certainty that it shocked a noise from him too— a deep, hungry groan. His tongue pressed at the seam of your lips, and you opened for him so easily, so sweetly, that he had to pull back almost immediately and press his forehead to yours just to keep hold of himself.
"Fuck," he muttered against your mouth before planting a sweeter, chaste kiss to it.
He watched as you licked your lips, breathing in every exhale of his.
You carded your hands through his hair, and God, it felt so fucking good. Touch, want, your fingers working through his hair, those little sounds leaving you for him and no one else. It had been so long that the hunger he felt it made him nauseous.
He pulled away then and began stripping off the rest of his armor with more haste than care, setting each piece down as quietly as he could for fear the night watch below might hear the fall of it. You had pushed yourself up onto your knees in the bed to watch him, your eyes bright with an eagerness that made his pulse kick harder the more of himself he uncovered.
By the time he was down to his tunic and linen trousers, you gave him a look that said plainly it was not enough.
"These too."
"Bossy little minx," he said, shaking his head, "Patience is a virtue, didn't your council ever tell you?"
"They tried." you smiled.
He chuckled, and pulled his shirt over his head, and your hands were immediately upon him with avidity. Nimble, light touches that made him flush in goosebumps. They traced down over the wiry hair that trailed beneath his linen pants, your fingers setting his skin in a line of fire as you hooked in the waistband and began pushing them down.
His member was only half hard, as he had tried so hard to cast his mind from you at all that he had to control himself.
You sank back against the pillows then, unable, it seemed, to stop looking at him. He stood at the end of the bed, broad against all the pale linen and carved wood and soft drapery, and for a moment he felt almost ashamed of the roughness of himself in a room so clean and fine.
“You are...” you said, then shook your head a little. “The most beautiful thing I have ever seen, Joel Miller.”
He didn't realize he still had it in him to blush like some teenage boy. His cock swelled and twitched when you squirmed before him. Your smile widened, as did your eyes as you watched it twitch for you.
"I am not the one who is worthy of such praise, Your Grace," he said, following you down into bed, "I have never in all my years—and years I have, more than anything—seen something as stunning as you."
Your finger caught between your teeth, nervousness again, it made his cock jump in excitement again, surging with need, and his lips pulled up in a smile. You grinned up at him as your other hand reached around his shoulders when he finally reached you.
"You are ridiculous," you giggled.
He looked at you with disbelief, "Ah, but it's not just that, is it?" he said roughly, kissing your lips softly, before planting another on your chin, and then down your jaw, and then on your clavicle. He kissed where your breasts nearly spilled above your neckline.
"It is not your beauty that has me in your bed right now, Your Grace," he said.
"Please say my name when you are kissing my flesh, Joel. That or something sweet, something you'd bestow upon a lover."
A lover.
Joel paused his kissing, stealing his breath.
"I'm—I'm sorry—" you began, your hand reaching for his hair, as if trying to soothe. You pushed the dark hair that tickled his forehead back, scratching your nails through his scalp, "I know we are not…that you don't want…"
"Make no mistake, baby, I do want." he said hoarsely. "It's all I've ever felt around you."
Your hand stayed in his hair as if you knew there was something else. A hesitation on his tongue.
"But?" you urged.
"But…the last time I loved anything…it…I… I can't…"
"It's alright, Joel, just for tonight, let's pretend." you said softly, your smile still pulling your lips like thread, though it was sadder now, he could see it. "I'm a big girl. I can handle what comes tomorrow."
He lifted his head and looked at you for a long moment.
Then he gave the smallest nod. “Aye,” he said softly. “I think you can.”
His lips went back to your soft skin at once, to the warm slope of your breasts, and his hands slid between you and the bedspread to draw you fully into him while he worked at the ties of your bodice.
You hummed pleasantly, still watching him, always watching him. Finally, when your bodice came undone, you were quick to pull the rest of it away, and soon you were bare to him. Joel suddenly realized the only person who had seen you in such a way your entire life was probably your mother as a babe.
You were stunning. Curves made for his hands and supple skin for the taking. You squirmed a little in the bed beneath him as he looked upon your figure, breasts heavy enough to make his mouth water when he finally bent to take one into his mouth.
You gasped when his lips closed around the nipple, and his hips pressed into you with need. His cock was aching now, and he realized you had not truly been able to watch him harden for you, but he was in another frame of mind now, so taken by his wanting that he moaned when your back arched into him, kissing between the valley of your breasts before taking the other into his mouth. He suckled it hard, then gentler, then let the edge of his teeth drag lightly over the pebbled flesh.
“Oh,” was all you could say as his hand palmed the other breast in time with his mouth. Your legs wrapped gently around him, and he could feel your wet center begging for his cock to enter you, but he would wait, be good and patient if only for you, to get you ready. For now, he let his member slide between the soft, hot folds, both of you moaning at the feeling.
His lips left you with a soft pop as he kissed down your ribs, to your navel, his tongue tracing around it until it dipped into the skin, just tasting every inch he could find. Your hand stayed in his hair until you could no longer reach, and then he was lifting your legs over his shoulders.
"What do you know about bedding, baby?"
You hummed, hips squirming.
“A little.”
“Oh?” he asked, looking up at you through his lashes. And God, if it was not the finest sight. Your breasts rising and falling with every breath, your soft belly moving with the undulation of your hips.
“Mmm,” you hummed again, dreamlike. “My lady-in-waiting told me of her first time once. My mother only said it may hurt.”
Joel nodded, kissing the top of your mound, a thicket of pretty hair meeting his lips, a pearl of your arousal sticking to his mustache, and he licked it off.
"Some find the…initial entrance a bit uncomfortable, I will not lie to you. But it passes, as long as I am gentle."
"Will you be gentle with me, Joel?" you asked. And when his eyes met yours, he was surprised to see a spark of challenge in them.
“If you wish—” he said, kissing the line where your thigh met your center. Your skin rose in gooseflesh beneath his mouth.
"And if I don't want you to be gentle?"
He didn't answer that.
“—But this,” he said between kisses, his mouth close enough now that the scent of you had his head light and cotton-made, “this should feel good. You will tell me if it does not. Do you understand?”
You nodded. “I do.”
"You are so beautiful, baby," he said softly, and kissed the pearl that was your clit at the top of your center. Sweet, honey musk filled his mouth at the touch, his tongue laving at the bud. He heard how your breath caught in your lungs, and you laid flat on your back, giving yourself over to the sensation.
"Tastes like those god damn pastries you like so much," he growled between long, fat licks, "so fucking sweet."
He heard a thick dispelling of breath from you that might've been a laugh had he not had you under his tongue, and your legs fell open even wider for him as he suckled your clit into his mouth.
"Oh—" you breathed, "that feel so—so—"
Joel groaned at the way your body answered him. He grew more intent, more certain with his tongue, listening to every sound you made, every catch in your breath, every shift of your hips beneath his mouth. And he replied in earnest with his wet muscle of his tongue, tasting and eating and taking. Your moans only climbed higher, and with them something possessive and ugly stirred in him again. He wondered, a little maddened, whether you had ever felt anything like this before. Whether your own hand had ever brought you here the way he was doing now. The thought made him near sick with jealousy, that you might ever lie in this bed again without him and try to find your way back to this feeling alone. That someone else, a husband perhaps…would…
And when his tongue prodded into your entrance that now flooded with slick and wetness made from sweet nectar, his nose nudging your clit, your back bowed in a flash, your hands in fists as you clenched the bedsheets, and he felt your cunt pulse against his mouth as you claimed your orgasm.
A loud, mewling noise left your open mouth as he let your hips shift up and down his mouth, tongue flat as you rode out the wave of ecstasy.
When you had settled and your hips began to soften and ease, he kissed your bud a few more times before you were twitching from sensitivity, and he began to climb over you.
"And how are you feeling, Your Grace?"
"What did I say about my name?"
Joel smiled down at you, a little dazed, before he moved to your side and pulled you back against his chest. You smelled so lovely, your hair a bouquet of scent, as if you'd been in the garden—lavender and lilacs, sprigs of rosemary all filled his nose as he buried it into your hair for a moment. Like spring and warmth and newness.
He pressed a kiss to your ear, and you let out a soft, pleased sigh as he whispered your name into the shell of your ear.
"I feel wonderful," you said dreamily, your arm hooking over your shoulder so your fingers could go back to his hair, playing with the nape of his neck as you looked over at him.
You kissed him softly, plump lips swollen, and his hands began to roam of their own accord and own mind, over your chest to fondle you, down to your belly and below to dip his fingers in your weeping core, pulling you against him.
"You feel…" you said, a little nervous again, yet pushing your bum back into him anyway, "big."
Joel nodded, kissing your lips again, "Yes, but you will take it."
He felt you shiver beneath him.
“And I know you will take it well,” he added, his mouth brushing yours with every word, “only if you are certain you want it.”
"Yes," your hands tightened in his hair, "I want you, more than anything I've ever…"
He didn't let you finish, the sentence, the words of want, of need. He was too afraid of what they would do to him. So he kissed you hard, tongues rolling and sliding against one another, and he adjusted his hips so that he could angle himself against you. The tip of his cock circled your clit, making you whimper beneath him, until he was breaching your tight entrance. It turned his brain to mush so fast he had to take a moment to return to himself, panting hot breath on your mouth.
"Joel—!" you squeaked, and he only kissed you harder, distracting. But he saw how your brow knitted together, how your jaw went slack as his lips found purchase.
"It's alright, baby," he cooed, "that's all, just a little, look at me now, look."
And you opened your eyes, black pupils overtaking that pretty color of your irises, arousal glossing over your features, but there was an uncertainty clouding them, pulling your brows close.
"Just you and me." he said softly, "Gonna go real slow, okay?"
You nodded. "Hold me."
He did as he was bid—wrapping his arms tightly around you, letting his hips push another inch or so inside—and your jaw unhinged, eyes bulging a little.
His arms wound around you so tight he thought he might steal the air from your lungs.
"Deep breath in, baby, real deep. Yeah, that's it," he whispered against your skin and he could hear the scrape of his own beard against the smooth skin of your cheek, could feel your ribcage expanding with air as you inhaled deeply.
"And out," he sighed, as if demonstrating.
And as your breath left you, he pushed in the remaining eight inches of himself, stretching your tight cunt until it wrapped around him in slick, pulsing heat. He watched every change in your face, heard every sound that hitched in your throat.
Your neck bent back into the pillow, your jaw wide enough to unhinge from your skull, and he kissed your skin sweetly, quickly, breathing hard.
He had to remind himself to stay still. Your velvet walls, the wet heat you made for him, only for him, always for him, it made him insane. His brain was overcome with it, with the need to fill you with himself.
He hadn't had…he hadn't been with anyone in so long. And for it to be you. You, stunning beauty and quick wit and heavy crown looming over your head. You, who wanted him just as much despite the circumstance.
He had to remind himself to be good, polite. Because that broken chasm in him was slowly starting to knit itself together inside of him, though it begged for more now. It hungered for something more from you, to take—no, not take, but to give. And he'd give you everything.
"Fuck, baby," he groaned, cock swelling and twitching inside of you. "I—"
"Move," you whispered, hand tightening in his hair again, "Please,"
"Are you certain?" he breathed heavily, chest pricking with sweat against your soft back, "We should take it slow—"
"Please, please move, Joel," you whined, eyes fluttering closed, tongue poking out to lick your dried lips as you began to babble. "I feel so full, so… oh, this is everything. I feel you in my stomach, so so full— I feel you everywhere."
Joel kissed the crest of your shoulder before pulling out only an inch or so, and watched as your eyes rolled to the back of your head.
"Oh my fucking god—"
He nearly laughed at your filthy mouth. He'd never heard you say more than a quick insult, let alone a curse.
"I want more—harder—more more moremoremoremore—"
The feeling was too great. Your cunt was holding onto him in a vice like grip, sucking his cock in greedily, and his mind was lost to it.
"I'm going to take you now," he growled into your neck, and before he could even finish the sentence, you were nodding.
He flipped you onto your stomach with rough hands, and mounted you, though he stayed lain across your back so his hips moved freely. He began pulling almost all the way out slowly, until you were whining and kicking your feet for more—
And then he began to move.
Hips swinging forward and back, fucking you in earnest, the bed creaked and slammed against the wall, your moans filling the chamber and his ears. His mind was gone now, completely gone to this feeling—your weeping cunt made for taking him, and taking him so god damn well. Joel thought everything made sense now. Why you'd challenged him, why you'd driven him insane when you'd snuck out, why he'd cornered you in the alley like a brute—it was all leading to this. Him, fucking you, and you, taking it so beautifully. He'd never had anything like it.
"You take it so well for a girl who's never seen cock before, Your Grace," he groaned into your ear, wrapping his arms around your torso so there would be no inch of skin not discovered by him.
Your mouth hung open, breath spilling out, your hands holding onto where his arms held you. He watched as a bit of spit caught at the pillow as you looked over your shoulder at him with a smile. "Only yours, Joel Miller. And yours is the only one I wish to take for—"
He kissed you hard, cutting you off, deepening the angle of his thrusts to swallow the rest of it, his tongue forcing past your lips, both of you breaking into the kiss with sounds of pleasure.
"This little cunt feels so perfect, baby." he panted against your mouth, words slipping between kisses. “It is mine now. No matter who you marry. No matter who you bear children for.”
There it was. The manic beast that laid dormant yet hungry all the same. Possessive and desperate. The black pit of him, the darkest side of him now coming out. Selfish and mean and needier than anything he'd ever known. He was sure it would terrify you, the way his lips snarled with the demand.
"Yours." you whispered in response against his mouth.
“No—” he tried, the word catching as he pulled back a fraction, fighting it.
"Yes," you hissed, and as he began to pull away you held him there again, arm swiping out between you and the bed to fist into his hair once more. His thrusts were becoming sloppier by the minute. He was losing control. Of this, of himself, of whatever this suddenly was becoming.
Your mouth hung open, but through your moans, through the breaking of your breath, you said, "I am yours, Joel Miller. And you are mine."
The light of morning had begun to slip in through your chamber window, catching along his shoulder, laying pale yellow and blue over the bed.
“And I wish for you to finish inside me,” you went on, softer now, but no less certain. “So I may bear what is yours. So we shall marry. I will have it no other way.” Your eyes stayed fixed on his. “I am to be Queen of this realm. And you are my man. You are everything. There is no part of you left to solitude. Nor I."
He tried to silence you again, pressing his mouth to yours, but you would not let him. You pulled away—lips only just brushing, holding him fast and made him hear you.
His cock was swelling insurmountably at your words.
He thought his words of possession would scare you. But it was your words...
They terrified him.
And they also made him feel fucking insane.
"Give me everything, Joel."
His face fell onto your shoulder as his hips drove faster into you, your keep tightening and fluttering against him, as if your words had been spoken from where the two of you were joined. He felt anchored to you in an entirely new way, losing complete control over what little he thought he had.
"Ohhhh!" you mewled, fist loosening in his hair as you began to tighten and constrict his cock now.
“Come with me,” he groaned against your shoulder, voice rough and near pleading now. “Come on—let me feel you—I'll give you everything—everything you wish for.”
Your head tipped back, your body arching beneath him, and he felt it the moment you went, the way you clenched around him that pulled a harsh, broken moan from his chest as it dragged him right after you. His back went taut, his mouth opening against your skin as everything in him gave at once, his arms tightening hard around you as he lost himself in the way your bodies met, his spend emptying into you while you both shook through the ecstasy together.
For a while, there was nothing.
Slick skin against slick skin, hot breath and heavy inhales, the two of you intertwined entirely anew.
You were the first to move, to turn your head enough to kiss his nose where it laid against the top of your shoulder.
He shifted then, beginning to lift himself from you, but your hands tightened, holding him.
"Stay." you murmured.
He obeyed, because in truth, there was nothing else he wanted more.
“’Tis morning,” he said after a moment, voice low, still rough. “I should not linger long. Your lady-in—”
“My lady-in-waiting knows how much I have wanted this,” you said, cutting him off gently. “And she will not come until I call for her.”
Joel let out a quiet breath and settled back over you, his weight returning without resistance this time.
“I like feeling you like this,” you sighed, your eyes slipping closed. “Over me. The weight of you is… comforting.”
Joel smiled a bit at that, and brought you closer.
The morning had begun to stir outside your window. First with the low calls of birdsong, distant at first until the sun grew stronger. Its rays filled your bed chamber, stretching across his back, through the curtains of your bed posts, laying gold across your skin and his alike.
Your breathing was so slow and even beneath him he thought you might have fallen asleep.
He stayed there, laid over you, his face turned into the gentle curve of your neck, his arms still wrapped around you. He did not move an inch in fear he might break whatever spell was upon the two of you. And for the first time in a very long time, the deep abyss that lived inside of him held no ache, no need, no nothing.
He was content.
“I meant what I said, Joel,” you said quietly after a while, your eyes still closed, breathing still even. It didn't scare him this time, it didn't make him want to pull away or kiss you silent.
"I know."
𝒜𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇
𝓗e knew he was late, and not by a little bit either. His chest fluttered with the anticipation of it, something he couldn't quite put a name to as he made his way through the castle corridors. His steps felt light against the stone. He had no metal helm to hide behind nor the armor plates to keep his expression hidden as he faced every passing glance and morning greeting.
"Morning, ser."
"Good morrow, Ser Joel."
A bow of a head, a smile, a wave. It all was something he was getting used to, or…at least trying to.
Finally ascending the stairs to the second floor, he took them two at a time, breath heavier now, whether from strain or the nerves making his heart thunder in his chest, he wasn't sure. He came upon the great chamber doors, their iron handles staring up at him. Voices carried through the wood— lighter, bubbling, and excited.
He pushed them open without announcement.
"Ah, there he is."
Your voice found him at once. Gentle and amused, it carried easily above the low hum of conversation.
“Good morning,” he said, just as soft, moving around your chair, letting his hand trail along your shoulder, down the line of your arm before taking his place beside you. "Apologies for the delay."
He looked around the table with a light, polite smile of greeting (he had been practicing it for some time), the room feeling vastly different than it ever had before.
To his left sat Miriam from the orphanage, her thin hands folded neat atop a ledger, kind eyes sharp as she took in the conversation at the table. Beside her, Lucia the barmaid, hair tied back, sleeves rolled, already mid run-down of town gossip with someone across from her—Rose, the fishmonger’s wife, still smelling faintly of salt even here. Beside her was Harriet, who raised cattle at the bottom of the hill, broad shouldered and kind, her voice was low but carried when she spoke. Next to her, Elin, the baker's widow. Marjorie from the weaver's row, and Old Nan at the far end who knew every birth and burial in the valley better than any record ever kept.
All women.
Every single one of them. Not a Lord or Duke or Prince in sight. Nor were there balding, pallid men who waggled their all-knowing boney fingers at you either.
Joel leaned back slightly in his chair, glancing once more around the table, taking it in. This was his place now, beside you. No longer standing stiffly in the corner with his eyes on every exit—though, he could admit he still caught his eyes glancing around, making sure, an old habit he wasn't eager to break. Some days it felt otherworldly to sit at your council.
Without thinking, his hand found yours beneath the table, rough fingers curling loosely around your softer ones, grounding himself in the only part of it that felt entirely familiar. He turned the ring on your finger absently.
Beside him, you sat at the head of the table with your chin propped lightly against your free hand, listening, asking where needed, dismissing where you saw fit. Not a physical crown upon your head, not a single piece of ceremony about you—and still, there was no mistaking what you were.
What you had become.
Your eyes drifted to him when he squeezed your fingers, a coy little smile playing your lips. Painted in ruby, for the celebration of harvest.
"And the stores—" Harriet said, rolling her eyes, but not in annoyance, but of something else. Bemusement, perhaps.
"What of them?" you interjected, concern drawing a line between your brows.
“Full, Your Grace," she answered, smiling wider at you. “More than full. We shall carry well into winter, if rot does not take to it."
“See that it does not,” you said with a small nod, and pointed to Miriam gently to write your thoughts. “We can store the excess here in the castle. There is room enough, and the lower chambers will keep it dry.”
Joel’s thumb moved once over the back of your hand, though he could not say why he had done it at all.
“Your Grace,” Lucia called, leaning forward a touch, “do you not think we ought to mark such a season as this? The townsfolk…they are eager to celebrate you and your husband. What you have brought them, in place of your father before you.” She glanced around the table. “We have not known times like these in…a long while, would you not say, ladies?”
There was a murmur of agreement around the table.
Joel was still getting used to that too—husband—a title he could hardly believe you had chosen to give him. And yet there was something in him that knew, just as he had warned you that first night in your bed, that there was no going back from whatever this had become. He had spoken then of some future husband, some man meant for you, while all the while that part of him, the one that had been sewn whole again, had already begun to hunger to be that man himself.
It had felt near a miracle when you asked him. He had thought you were teasing him at first. But you had not been.
You had married him in the garden, before only your most trusted councilwomen, Tommy at his side. It had been a fine fall day, the leaves crisp beneath your feet, the sun low and golden against his back as he stood in the finest cloak he had ever worn. And afterward, when the feast had begun in the great hall—full of townsfolk and distant kin and all the noise that came with such things—you had both slipped away from it, laughing through the corridors, back to your chambers, to be as you had always meant to be—together.
“And what would you have of it?” you asked, eyes on his, shaking him from his memories.
The room followed your look.
Joel felt the weight of your stare, though it did not strike him the way it once would have. He could have passed it off, given them something simple and let the attention fall away from him as he often did, but he had never been much good at soft answers, not where you were concerned.
“Give them something they’ve not seen,” he said, his voice carrying plain across the table. “A feast, aye, but more than that. Let them feel it’s changed.”
He did not look away from you when he answered. “Like they’re not merely surviving anymore, but living.”
You watched him through the quiet moment as they took in his words, your smile tightening into something knowing. He suddenly wished he could kiss you now.
"I think we ought to have something truly special to celebrate." you added, leaning towards him, temping him further.
He answered it with one of his own smiles. “Oh?”
You nodded, "I think we shall name your coronation day. A feast, a celebration of harvest in your name, Joel."
He felt the heat rise in his face, sudden, unwelcome. “That is not—” he began, shaking his head. “We do not need—no one wants—”
“Oh, the town would love it!” Lucia burst out.
“The children,” Miriam added, near breathless, “they would speak of nothing else. A man of The Guild, raised from nothing—” she shook her head, smiling, “it would mean everything to them.”
There was a tumult of excitement across the mahogany table at that, and Joel's face was aflame with it, your eyes dancing in the sunlight as they stayed on him.
“What do you think?” you murmured.
He made a sound low in his throat, perhaps sounding like something between a protest and a surrender, but did not argue.
"Joel." you tilted your head, wanting something more than just his practiced silence.
“Ser Joel of the Dawn…” You let your hand fall from your chin and took his so it laid properly over the table now, both of yours closing around his, soft against the rough of him. “To be crowned King of this kingdom, beside me.”
He was silent.
“Let us celebrate you,” you whispered, your hands giving his a small, insistent squeeze.
Joel let his gaze move once around the table, over the wide eyes and eager faces of the women you had handpicked for your council, the people you had chosen to help you shape this kingdom, and there he was among them, beside them. Beside you.
At last his gaze came back to you, to your eager eyes and soft skin, to your braided hair and ruby mouth, and he felt it plain as breath in his chest that there would never be another woman he would wish to stand beside. He would do whatever you asked of him. There was no true reason left to hesitate, save perhaps that he liked the way you looked at him when you were waiting, the way you still made him nervous, the way you asked him—again and again—to be braver than he had ever been. Braver than he had been in his armor, braver than he had been at your father’s side, braver than he had been on the day he first stepped into this very chamber and found his life turning toward you. You had asked him to be the man you needed, and there had never been a world in which he would deny you.
So, with all the courage he had left to give, he nodded, and said:
regni rerumque oblite tuarum? - Aeneid by Virgil
(Mercury to Aeneas: you forget your kingdom and destiny?)
|| MDNI 18+ smut, angst, fluff, oh my! secret relationship, marcus is not married, so much latin but I have a study guide beneath the cut for you, hurt/comfort, arguments, man handling, kissing, praise, dirty talk, riding, f!receiving oral, pinv, marcus is a large man, creampie, breeding kink, no y/n, no daddy kink, domestic dirty talk lol ||
a/n I: Mercury is one of the Roman gods and is known for delivering divine messages between worlds. I took Latin in highschool so my knowledge is finally being used but still I am dependent on google for many things so please forgive any inaccuracies!
a/n II: this is my submission for @pedroscurls's ppcu dialogue challenge. my dialogue was "you can't, or you won't?" tysm!! x
wc: 6.5k
roman vocab (oh, dr c if you could see me now)
domine: lord, master, a title meant for respect
nuntia: messenger, female
mea cara: my beloved
Kalends of Iunius: first of June
filia mercurii: daughter of mercury
Augusti: plurual of Augustus, which was the title of emporers
fututores: fuckers
vir meus: my husband
It is far too hot to be traveling.
Although it is nearly evening, sweat runs down the bare column of your neck, stinging where the sun pressed for hours against your topmost vertebrae before falling down the length of your spine.
It does not matter. You know this plainly. It does not matter if the tender flesh between your toes rubs raw against dry leather, nor if your shoulders burn beneath Sol’s temper on this early spring day, his bright chariot riding closer than it should as it dragged the sun too near to the earth. Perhaps the God has taken offense to the season prior—winter was harsh, spring slow yet eager to bloom, fields finally thin with green, but mostly thick and swampy with mud and muck. Perhaps it is punishment for some forgotten slight. The gods have long memories, after all.
It makes little difference. As Sol shows no mercy to the road, the Augusti show none to the general who must ride it.
At last you see it in the distance.
At last.
You take in cream colored linen tents, risen from earth like ant hills, dirtied with mud and blood from many months of rain and storms and fighting. They stand raised by wooden poles as their horses graze nearby in half made paddocks where the grass has already been turned to mud by hooves and soldiers’ boots.
It takes some time to find him.
He is not seated within some grand pavilion at the heart of the encampment. There are no guards planted stiffly at any of the entrances, no noise of revelry spilling out into the early evening air. No drunken laughter rolling between the tents, no clatter of cups or men grown loud and foolish on too much wine.
Instead there is the quieter life about the camp.
You hear the light clatter of dishes somewhere within the rows of tents as soldiers settle down for evening rations. There is a slow rasp of iron on stone as one draws their blade along a whetstone. You see a few with wrapped linen and gauze around wounds. Some around an arm or a leg, one covering a bloodied eye. Here and there small cookfires burn low, men crouched beside them writing letters in the fading light of day, heads bent over wax tablets or scraps of parchment that you will carry back across the empire.
You draw your tote closer to your side as you pass and a few of them look up.
Curiosity follows you down the narrow lane between the tents. It is not often someone like you walks through a legionary camp. And the of a woman besides. You know it is more skin than most of them have seen in months, perhaps longer. You halfheartedly assess your own clothing, obscenely aware of how short your tunic is, how much skin you are showing, originally only to keep yourself cool but now seems egregiously unsafe. Your shoulders and arms, supple but reddened by the road, catch their eyes as you move. You quicken your pace.
A soldier’s encampment is not known for gentleness, nor patience, and certainly not for manners.
The tent you seek blends in with the others, set just behind the line of command tents where the officers take their counsel. Larger than the rest, though not ostentatious, its linen walls are marked with the same dust and weather as every other shelter in the camp. A vexillum has been driven into the earth beside it, a square Roman battle flag bearing the general’s insignia that stirs lazily in the warm breeze.
You step inside with little ceremony to see three men standing around a wooden table, the dim interior lit by oil lamps that flicker at your intrusion.
To his left—a soldier, hardened, wearing a cuirass across his chest and a hand resting near his hilt of his gladius. Habit, surely, would not allow it far from reach.
To his right, a young officer or clerk, ink-stained fingers clutching a wax tablet, a stylus poised in the air where he had been taking down orders.
And in the middle, the man you seek. Taller and broader than either of those beside him, dark curls fallen loose across a battle-worn brow. He fills the space entirely as your eyes find him before you can force them elsewhere.
All three of them look up the moment you enter.
“Domine,” you greet, bowing your head. “I bring word.”
The general, immense in his stillness, studies you in silence. You can't see it, but you can feel the slow weight of his gaze travel from your swollen feet to your sunburnt cheekbones and the frazzled crown of braids atop your head.
“Leave us,” he commands.
The men do not question him. They wouldn't dare. The faint stir of air from their passing brushes your skin as they slip past you and out of the tent into the evening.
You keep your head bent out of respect, avoiding his eye, and your hand is clenching the leather strap of your bag hard as you wait for his next command.
"The city sends nuntia into war now? In the state we are in?" he asks, though you're not entirely sure if you're meant to answer.
He exhales through his nose and drops the small stone marker he had been holding between his fingers. Several more lie scattered across the campaign map spread over the table, marking roads, river crossings, and the positions of men.
"Come." he commands, and you dare not disobey.
You move around the table and stop before him. Slowly you lift your chin, first to his chest, then to his face. You take in the unshaven line of his strong jaw, the aquiline nose carved hard against the last of the sunlight bathing the tent, oil lamps already lit around you. There are cuts on his face, and you count them while you wait for his next order. Some of them are earned over the long, grinding months of war, others fresh enough that the skin around them is angry red.
But you do not look in his eyes.
You see the movement before you feel him— a shift of his shoulder as you keep your gaze averted, and a quiet breath leaves him as he steps closer. Then the rough pads of his fingers find your face. He catches your chin between his thumb and forefinger and lifts, carefully forcing your gaze up to meet his.
The moment your eyes find his, you feel a thick lump rise in your throat. They are dark as honey left too long in the sun, warm and brown and far gentler than a man like him ought to possess as they look down upon you.
"You should not be here," he whispers.
Your shoulders fall, a deep lungful leaving your chest that you didn't realize you'd been holding. "Domine—"
“You should not be here,” he says again, firmer now, the voice of a formidable general growling out his demands, even when the words are meant only for you. His brows draw together as he looks down at you, the line of his jaw tightening. “We stand on the brink of another attack and I cannot—”
He stops himself, shaking his head once as if the rest of the thought is not meant to be spoken, and drops his hand from your face. Your skin still burns where his fingers had rested, the ghost of his touch seared there even as it disappears.
“I bring word, Domine,” you tell him again, steady despite the painful tightness gathering in your throat. “That is all.”
"That is all." he echoes in disbelief, a scoff forced from his lips. “If that is all, why not wait until I return to Roman soil? Why come here, where I am commanded to bring war to people who do not deserve it? Why must you come here, where I am unable to keep you safe?”
"It cannot wait, Domine—"
“Please,” he says, cutting you off. His voice softens, though the frustration still sits in it. “Do not call me that, mea cara.”
Your lips press tightly together, the muscles of your face drawing taut, and he turns away from you then, dragging a rough hand across his own face, thick fingers scarred and hardened from long years spent beside Mars himself.
You hesitate.
But at last you reach into your leather satchel, and even you cannot ignore how badly your hand trembles as you retrieve the scroll sealed shut with violent red wax.
“This order comes from the twin Augusti,” you say at last, though it is more of a croak, and you hold it out to him behind his back.
The general turns only slightly, glancing toward you over the breadth of his shoulder, and it is only then you realize he is still wearing portions of his armor. The plates gleam faintly in the dimming room, light warming the already golden cast of his skin.
"Read it to me."
You lick your dried lips. You're not sure you have such courage.
But in the end, you obey, and break the seal.
The wax cracks beneath your thumb, loud in the quiet of the tent, and you unroll the parchment with careful hands, forcing your voice steady as you begin to read.
“By command of the divine Augusti, guardians of Rome and fathers of the empire,” you begin, the formal language already turning bitter on your tongue, “let it be known that Marcus Acacius, General of Rome, who has long served the will of the empire with sword and discipline, is hereby ordered to secure the continuance of his bloodline for the strength and stability of the state.”
The words feel heavier the further you go.
“The Senate and the Augusti alike have deemed it necessary that the house of Acacius not fall barren. Therefore the general is commanded to take lawful wife before the Kalends of Iunius, and to produce an heir worthy of Rome.”
You swallow.
“The names of suitable brides of noble Roman houses have been prepared and await the general’s choosing upon his return to the capital.”
Your finger grow weak, your voice even weaker, shaky now, as the parchment shakes in your hands, and you barely can make out the last words.
“This decree is issued in the interest of Rome, whose strength rests not only upon conquest, but upon the endurance of those who carry her name forward.”
His head hangs heavy as he stares down at the campaign table before him. He has turned, and both of his hands come to rest upon it as though he must brace himself there, his gaze fixed upon the map spread beneath his palms, the small stones marking the positions of his men staring back at him with indifference.
“They send me across the empire to spill blood for them,” he mutters finally, the bitterness in his voice low and restrained. “And now they would have me breed for them as well.”
He lifts one of the stones between his fingers, turning it slowly before letting it fall back onto the board with a dull clatter.
“And they sent you to carry this message to me.”
“I was ordered to.”
“Yes,” he replies quietly, his eyes still fixed upon the map. “You always are.”
You shift your weight as you set down the letter on his table. The leather of your sandals creaks softly against the packed earth as you gather the last of your courage.
"One of the women picked for you is the daughter of Senator Gracchus and she…" you clear your throat, "I hear she is blessed by Venus in her looks. She would make a good wife."
Somewhere during your speaking he has crossed the space between you.
He stands before you now like a shadow fallen over the room, his broad shoulders and unruly hair cutting the light from the oil lamps until you feel swallowed by his presence.
His hands find your hips as if it had not been weeks since your last meeting, but as easily as though they had never forgotten the place they belong. And though there is a faint, infuriating grin upon his mouth, his touch is warm and welcome through the thin fabric of your tunic, resting against the leather cord at your waist as he draws you nearer by a fraction.
You were used to this: the rough country of his hands, wide and cracked and certain upon your waist. This, you see, was commonplace for the two of you. You would come to deliver his letters to his expansive villa—usually orders of the next country to march upon or plans for a day of leave—and he would shoo away his servants so he could take you into his hands and bend you over the nearest lectus to fuck you utterly spent. He would feed you Rome's best wine and cheese, take you a time or two more, and send you back on your way with his reply.
But this was nothing like those times. The memories only burn as you think of them now.
“Gracchus,” he repeats, the faintest curl of amusement pulling at the corner of his mouth. “That miserable old slug.”
Your hands come up at once against his chest, pushing lightly at the hard plates of armor.
“Domine, don't—”
“And this daughter of his,” he continues, paying no mind to your protest as his thumbs press idly against your hip bones, “she is very beautiful, you say?"
“Yes,” you answer stiffly, still trying to push him away. “That is what I hear.”
He studies you with dark eyes moving slowly over your face as though the answer to his riddle rests somewhere upon it.
“I see,” he murmurs, leaning down into you.
Your palms press harder against his armor.
“Stop this jest,” you insist, your voice tightening despite your effort to remain composed. “You must treat the matter with the gravity it demands. They require an answer.”
His smile widens enough to show his teeth.
“Why…” he asks quietly, his lips moving though his words are scarcely above a whisper, “should I trouble myself with the spoiled daughter of a Senator…”
His fingers tighten in your tunic, drawing you even nearer still until there is scarcely any space left between you. His hips press flush against yours, his warmth insistent through the fabric and plated steel keeping you apart.
“…when I already have the most beautiful woman standing in my tent?”
"Enough of this, do not be so insolent." you finally shove him away, and he lets you go. His hands fall, but his gaze does not.
"I have no need for one of their hand picked maidens, cara, for you are the only woman I desire." His voice is low again, "So take my hand, my name, take everything I am and be my wife."
Your hand flies up to strike him before you have time to think of his proposition. The smack of your palm meeting his face cracks in the stillness of the quiet.
And yet, he is unmoved by this.
His eyes do not widen, his body does not flinch. But you see the infinitesimal clench of his jaw, the line of his brow deepening like a crack in the earth as his smile vanishes.
You move to strike again, but he catches you, his large, meaty palm wrapping around your wrist. He has the grip of a man who has spent half his life with a sword in it, which now swallows the delicate bones of your joint instead of the metal of a handle.
You fight in his grip, but he does not let go. It flits across your mind that he could easily break your bones, if he wished. He would have the right to it, for the way you struck him.
"Unhand me, Domine—" you seethe.
"Say my name."
You wrench again at his grasp, but his hand holds fast, immovable as iron. The thick knot in your throat burns hotter with every passing second, swelling until it chokes the words before they can leave you.
"Say my name, cara—"
"Unhand me!" You hiss. "I cannot marry you and you know it well!"
Your resistance only brings you closer, his hand dragging you forward as if inviting you into some sort of silly dance, your breasts now pressed hard against the armor that is gilded across his torso. The metal is warm from the heat of his body beneath it, and he leans down over you then, baring his teeth slightly with each syllable he forces out.
"Cant or won't?"
There is an aching, seething silence that stretches. Your ire burns as hot as coals behind your eyes as they narrow up at him. You hate him, you must. You must tell yourself this again and again, because the truth would be unbearable when the day comes that he is to wed to another.
“Have you lost your damned mind, Domine?” you snap, anger flashing hotter than the tears threatening behind your eyes. “You dishonor yourself speaking such madness—raging like a rabid hound.”
His other hand slides to wrap around your waist and down onto your lower back, pressing gently into your tail bone so your hips flush against his, and you can only just feel his growing member beneath the thick cotton tunic he wears.
“Madness?” he repeats, his voice low and dangerous now.
When you refuse to answer, he simply looks at you as though you are the one who has lost sense.
"I am to take a wife of my choosing," he says, each word slow and carefully chosen, "to lay my seed so our Divine Emperors may sleep easily knowing my blood will carry on their vanities—"
His jaw shifts, and he drops your hand to pull a piece of your hair that has fallen from the braid, curling it around his thick finger, “—and yet when I offer my hand to the one woman who knows me better than my own soldiers, the one who has shared my bed and my counsels…she strikes me."
Your face, you realize suddenly, is damp. And he sees it at once.
Something in him softens then, and the look he gives you holds both tenderness and hunger, the two mingling together like honey stirred into warm tea.
He leans closer, brushing his lips once against the corner of your eye where the tear has gathered.
“Why do you weep, mea cara?” he murmurs, the words warm against your skin before his mouth touches your temple, then the edge of your cheek. “Why do you fight me so?”
“I—”
Your breath shudders as you try to gather the words that refuse to come.
“Marcus,” you sigh at last, the name slipping from you despite yourself as you close your eyes. “I am no one.”
His mouth stills against your cheek.
“You are everything," he answers quietly, and you can feel his breath against the shell of your ear.
You shake your head at once, desperate, your hands pressing against his chest again though the strength has gone from them.
“No,” you insist, the word breaking. “You are a general of Rome. Marrying me would gain you nothing. It would not strengthen your house, it would not please the Senate, it would not satisfy the Augusti—”
“I do not care for any of that.”
“But you must,” you whisper, the tears coming faster now despite your effort to stop them. “I will not allow you to throw away your destiny for the sake of someone like me.”
He draws back just enough to look at you, his brow knitting as though the thought itself offends him.
"Someone like you," he repeats softly, licking the pearl of a tear from the top of his lip.
Your voice shakes so badly you hardly believe he can understand you, "I carry orders for Rome, I am nothing but a messenger of the Gods will, they speak through The Twins and so you must take it seriously—"
"My patience is at an end with them."
“You must not speak so,” you whisper sharply, your glossy eyes darting toward the walls of the tent.
The general takes both of your hands in his then, lifting them beneath his chin like something precious, and presses a kiss to your knuckles.
“I know who you are, my love,” he murmurs. “You are blessed with Mercury’s favor. For years you have come to me with the will of Gods and Emperors alike. You bring me their messages… and you bring me yourself.”
His thumbs move slowly across the backs of your hands.
“And I would have that forever. I would have you forever, mea cara.”
“But Rome—your armies—you could never—”
“Then we shall leave it behind,” he says quietly. "I will gladly send my men back to their families where they belong, rather than ripping apart the ones we conquer."
You stare at him.
“You wish to leave?”
“Yes, mea cara,” he answers, his voice low but steady now, the idea clearly not new to him. “Let Rome keep her wars and their decrees. Let the Senate drown in its own blood. We will go where the hand of the Augusti does not reach.”
Your heart stutters painfully.
“Marcus…”
“There are lands yet untouched by them,” he continues, his gaze never leaving yours. “We could live quietly. A farm, perhaps. A stretch of earth and sky that belongs to no emperor.”
You shake your head even as the image threatens to take root inside you.
“You cannot mean that.”
“It is the only thing I have meant in years.”
“Marcus, if anyone heard you speak so—”
“Let them hear. I tire of the will of those fututores, swaddled in their perfume and silk—”
“Marcus!” you hiss, clapping both hands over his mouth before the words can grow more dangerous.
He only smiles against your palms, the warmth of it startling you, and presses a soft kiss to the heart of your palm, the wiry hair of his mustache tickling you.
“Is that a yes, my love?” he says, muffled.
“You truly have gone mad.” you whisper, leaning your forehead against the back of your hand where it still rests on his mouth.
And when he it away, you straighten, allowing him to guide both of your hands to his own will, placing them at the back of his neck while his fall once more to your hips, adjusting you until you are perfectly flush against him again, where you belong.
“An answer is all I desire, filia Mercurii.”
Your breath falters.
“Yes, Marcus.”
And suddenly he is kissing you, and it is as if heat sparks across your lips, Jupiter's lightning striking through you and pulling a gasp from your throat in his hold. He tastes of salt and musk and wine. Groaning deeply, the sound rough with want, his hands slide lower to the lush weight of your bum as he draws you closer still. Your back bends against the heavy press of him as he pushes into you, the strength of his body undeniable. There is no question of how fiercely this man wants you, how deeply he needs you, how long he has yearned for you. You can hear it in his moans, can feel it in the weight of his grasp.
He is turning the two of you quickly, the meat of his hands gripping you hard enough that you hope to find the crescent marks of his fingers there later. His tongue pushes past your lips, tasting at your mouth, licking behind your teeth before drawing your top lip between his in a slow, hungry pull. You think, for a moment, that you taste something else there beneath the heat of it— a loneliness that has left a hollow ache settled into him during these long months away from home. And you kiss him back with equal hunger, your tongue pressing into his mouth like a salve, as though you might soothe that wound with it.
But then, outside the tent you hear the roar of men laughing, voices carrying easily through the warm evening air, and suddenly you remember you are not alone in his villa this time.
“Oh, Marcus, not here, please, not—”
“I don’t give a damn,” he growls. “I will take you how I want, where I want, for the rest of my life.”
Something in the tone of his voice sends heat racing through your body, a flush blooming low in your belly that makes your breath catch. Your knees buckle at the ferocity of his need, wetness pooling between them for it.
He lifts you onto the table with startling ease, spreading your legs so he can step between them. Leaning over you, he sweeps the table clear in a single impatient motion, scattering the carved stone markers of battle across the tent floor as they clatter and slide into the shadows. He lays you back against the wood, grinning at the sight of you as his hand fists the tunic covering your body.
He pushes it roughly upward, baring you to himself, the fabric bunching under your neck haphazardly.
“There is nothing like this,” he murmurs, his voice lower now. “Nothing like seeing you as the Gods made you.”
His eyes move slowly over your figure, drinking you in.
“You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”
“You speak such foolishness, Marcus,” you swoon, stretching your arms above your head as you watch him unburden the armor from his chest and let it clatter to the floor before folding himself over you.
“I would sooner have my tongue cut than ever speak a lie of you,” he says softly before his mouth closes over your breast, taking the nipple between his lips as a low groan escapes him at the heat of your skin.
"You are so warm, so soft—" he says between your gasps of pleasure—" I have not felt such things in so long, it is like a dream."
You take him in as his long, thick lashes flutter shut. Your hands thread delicately through his hair, nails scraping lightly against his scalp. He whimpers at your touch, mouth unlatching from one breast only to nuzzle the other, kissing and licking at your supple skin.
He is the fierce, violent commander of Rome’s legions—but that is only sometimes. For most of the moments you have spent with him, in his villa in the city, he is this: gentle, kind, passionate, and utterly confident in his want. As though this is the truest version of himself, the man beneath the armor, without the smoke and mirror of war that paints him as a brutal leader.
His tongue laves at your pert nipple, now pebbled and tender from his attention. His hands, thick and wide, span the narrowest part of your waist, his thumbs nearly touching over your navel he is so much larger than you. He draws you closer, shifting you to the edge of the table so his eager cock slots between the lips of your core.
You let out a soft whine at the barrier of his tunic between you.
“Patience,” he breathes, though it is not without the roughness of restraint. The heat of his mouth ghosts over your skin as he kisses your clavicle, then slowly up the column of your throat and along the line of your jaw. “Let me enjoy this. It has been too long.”
“And what if I say take me now and enjoy the smaller pleasures later?” you murmur, your fingers curling into the hair at the back of his head. “I wish to feel you inside me.”
A low sound escapes him at that, half laugh and half groan.
“My needy woman,” he says against your skin. “It is like music to my ears. But if I were to give you everything you wished the moment you asked for it, you would be as spoiled as those who grow pale behind palace walls.”
Your brow lifts faintly at that.
“Marcus Acacius,” you whisper, breath brushing his ear, “you speak as though you are not the one who has ruined me.”
A rough sound escapes him at that.
“That is because it is you who has ruined me, cara,” he groans, his teeth catching lightly at the line of your jaw before he presses a hard thrust of his hips against your swollen center, drawing an involuntary arch from your back. “If I were to take you as I wish, this would not last nearly as long as I would like.”
"Don't care," you murmured, your hands fisting into his hair harder now, making him wince and groan at once. His eyes flicker up to yours at that, dark and bright with something dangerously pleased.
"Promise me you'll stay the night, then? Let me eat your sweet cunt for dinner, and again for breakfast and midday."
You smile widely at that, "And you say it is me who is spoiled,"
"Promise it."
"I swear, Marcus." you say, planting a chaste kiss to his lips. "I will stay as long as you wish. Now please, for the love of Jupiter and all the gods—fuck me."
He leans back, and you are forced to drop your hands from his hair as he straightens, though you drag them slowly down his chest, your fingertips brushing the linen of his tunic. The fabric clings where your arousal has stained it, darkened over the tenting of his throbbing cock beneath. He lifts the hem and tucks it beneath his chin, and finally you see him fully—scars crossing the broad plane of his chest, the softness of his belly, the dark trail of hair that gathers beneath his navel and travels downward to frame his bobbing member, flushed deep red with want.
For a moment he simply looks, breathing deeply. He seems distracted by the sight of you, the way you glisten beneath the lanterlight of the tent. A heat of humilation blooms across your cheeks as his gaze lingers on the slick folds of you spread before him.
And then he is bending suddenly, forgetting himself and diving for you.
His mouth opens, greedy and unrestrained, as he kisses you there. His lips part wide against you, wet and hungry as he eats at you. You hear a rough groan spill from his throat as his hands close around the meat of your thighs, gripping hard to still the undulating roll of your hips.
It is obscene to watch.
Your wet cunt sliding against his wet tongue, the sounds he makes as he tastes you. Your soft sighs and breathless little cries only seem to make him more ravenous, his tongue cupping your sex as though it were a basin meant to hold the nectar gathering there. Up and down, then down and up again, he works at you with relentless hunger before his nose presses against your clit and the slick muscle of his tongue pushes inside you.
And then your back is bending, nearly lifting you from the table as he fucks you with his tongue. The pressure builds too quickly to bear, your body tightening before it breaks, and you gush over his face with a cry, trembling beneath his mouth as he purrs with pleasure.
When the tension finally leaves your limbs and your body goes soft and boneless, he is already moving you again. He handles you easily, turning and shifting you where he wants you, those big hands working with a single vision in mind.
"You will ride me." he demands.
You know that tone of voice. The sweet, sensual man who kissed you moments ago has stepped aside, and something harder has taken his place. The beast of him. The commander who draws blood from his enemies, who takes what he wants without hesitation, who fucks with the certainty of a man used to victory.
You barely have time to catch your breath before he lifts you from the table, one thick arm wrapping around your torso while the other hooks your thigh high around his hip. Your body drags against him as he moves, and you feel the heavy bob of his cock between your soaked folds. The sensation pulls a needy sound from your throat and you grind down instinctively, searching for more of him, pressing harder and harder. You feel his mouth on your neck just as his teeth close on your artery, biting you into submission. You cry out for him, but you only feel his cock twitching in response.
By the time he drops into the lounging chaise behind him, he is guiding you down with him, forcing your hips to widen to settle around the breadth of his lap.
“I want to watch you,” he says, voice thick, his eyes gone black with hunger. “Get this off.” His hands make quick work of your tunic, finally pulling it the rest of the way from your body.
The moment your arms come down again you are reaching for him in return, tugging impatiently at the linen still clinging to his shoulders. You push the fabric from him, eager to feel the heat of his skin beneath your palms. He groans when you lean forward, your arms slipping around his neck as your mouth finds his again. You taste yourself on his tongue, musk of sweat and sweet honey of arousal, and your hips move without thought. They slide against the thick length of him, wetting the shaft of his cock as you grind your clit against him. The heavy weight of his sac tightens in anticipation, brushing against your cunt as roll against him again and again. Your tongue slips deeper into his mouth as you pull at his with greedy little sucks.
He has quite enough of your teasing as his hand catches your face, pushing you upright with a deep growl of impatience. The other guides himself between your legs, angling his cock until the blunt head presses firmly at your entrance.
You both gasp at the first push—the stretch always too much at first. Always intoxicating. Like Cupid himself has driven some poisoned arrow through your heart, turning your thoughts to useless haze as your body opens for him.
“There she is,” Marcus breathes, his lips parted around a rough gasp. “What a good girl you are. That’s it… slow, cara. Nice and slow.”
You slide down onto him inch by inch, your eyes rolling back as a long, helpless moan spills from your throat. His hand comes quickly over your mouth—you know you are being far too loud—but how can you help it? He is thick and perfect inside you, your velvet walls drawing him in greedily until you are seated fully atop him, your wet cunt sealed around his cock, slicking the dark thicket of hair at his base.
"Oh—Domine—" you sigh, muffled behind his hand.
“Marcus,” he corrects softly, breath shuddering through him. “My love. Only Marcus to you.”
“But you are my everything,” you gasp, nimble fingers coming up to circle his wrist. His hand is so big it spreads over the entirety of the lower half of your face. “My lord, my master, my—my husband—”
“Yes,” he groans, his eyes burning into you. “Say it again.”
“Domin—”
“No.” His voice drops to a growl. The hand that covers your mouth slides down to grip your jaw, forcing you to look at him as he jostles you slightly.
“H-husband?”
He thrusts his hips upward sharply, the movement stealing the breath from your lungs.
“Say it again.”
“Vir meus,” you moan.
“Yes—yes, that’s it,” he groans, his head falling back against the chaise, mouth agape and his breath short. “That’s it, girl. Ride my cock. Tell me you are mine.”
Your head falls back as he thrusts higher into you, the motion forcing a broken cry from your throat as you chant it over and over. Vir meus, vir meus, vir meus. You can no longer hold yourself upright as his hand falls, and you brace yourself over him, planting your knees on either side of his hips as you begin to lift and drop over him, suddenly drunk on the poison of Cupid and your own rising pleasure. He does not seem to care about your volume anymore. The sounds leave you unbottled and wild, helpless. Like some creature in heat. His hands grip the flesh of your hips harder once again, guiding the rhythm, forcing your body to ride and fall at his pace.
“Shall I give the Augusti what they want?” he pants against your ear, licking the shell of it. “Breed my sweet little wife and fill her with my seed?”
The thought had never crossed your mind before. The two of you had always been careful in your previous meetings, always finishing elsewhere—your mouth, your breasts—but…now…
"Promise we will never go back to Rome again," you beg against his throat between moans, rocking your hips slower now. "Promise me we will have a home by the ocean, where we will watch the sun rise and set with no cares of the twins, only us—only our family—and I will bear your children, as many as you wish."
“I promise, mea cara,” he groans, his hands tightening on you. “Oh—fuck—to see you round with my child, I’m—I’m going to—”
“Give me your seed,” you breathe. “Vir meus.”
You feel his body seize beneath you, struck through with the crash of pleasure. His mouth falls open on a broken breath as you tighten around him, both of you gasping against one another while your body clenches down, drawing him deeper still. The feeling of his spend filling you in thick warmth pulls a cry from your throat, the sensation cresting through you like a breaking wave until you are both trembling breathlessly together.
You sag over him, sweaty chest against sweaty chest, and hands stay on you, but they change, sliding from the rough hold of your hips to settle at the small of your back, keeping you against him as the two of you come down slowly from the height of your orgasms. You feel his chest lift hard beneath yours as he drags in deep lungfuls, your breath matching in tandem, hearts beating together until they settle.
You and Marcus leave that night.
He gives his orders quietly to the only two men he trusts to carry them. The legion will return home. No more men will die at his command. Word will travel back to Rome, where senators continue their shouting and scheming without the spilling the blood of any more soldiers.
But by the time those messages arrive, you are already gone.
Joel Miller is back home running his family’s ranch, the work coming back to him easily even as the house fills with the memories of what happened thirty years ago.
He hires a young farm hand, expecting nothing more than help around the barn. Instead, he finds someone just as lost as he is.
|| MDNI 18+ angst, smut, intimacy, rancher!joel, cowboy!joel, retiredpornstar!joel, horsegirl!reader, western vibes, ranch life, grief, romance, lil bit of flirting, tommy miller cameo, BIG FEELINGS, confessions, drinking, no animal death, nurturing joel miller, estranged family, kissing! yay!, guilt and longing, reader is having a hard time and is a bit of a crybaby, this is an intense chapter please proceed with caution, happy ending!, using humor to deflect, like not great humor and bad jokes so dont come at me its not meant to be funny, pinv, he talks you thru it, insecure!reader, f!receiving oral, lil bit of dirty talk , missionary, riding, lotus for like a sec, lots of pet names this chapter ||
wc: 17k
Inspirations & References: Good Will Hunting (1997), Flicka (2006)
trigger warnings beneath the cut
***TW: pregnancy complications, graphic medical scene, detailed medical procedures, blood, birth, traumatic birth, bodily fluids, if you are squeamish this might not be the best for you, y'all are learnin more about horses than ya probs wanted to know, did you know I went to school for equine science? now ya know and you sure can tell in this chapter. mentions of miscarriage, abortion, traumatic birth and pregnancy!!!!!! if any of these are a sensitive topic for you please do not read***
What a fucking asshole.
Your face burned hot as you climbed the stairs two at a time, shoving the apartment door open harder than necessary and letting it slam behind you. Your hands were shaking, whether from adrenaline or humiliation you didn’t care to sort out— you went straight for the drawers, yanking it open and pulling out crap in uneven handfuls. You didn’t even fold anything. You everything into your backpack along with your anger.
What a dick.
Cornering you in the shed, knowing you'd be there. Was he watching you all this time? And then to breathe down your throat about taking care of you, about how you wouldn't talk to him.
You dragged your boots off and tossed them onto the floor, dirt flying over the hardwood and carpet. You took your laptop again, snapping it shut from where it had the half written email to your advisor— and shoved that in your bag too.
You didn't need this. This place. You'd only been here a week! A week! You could leave tonight and nothing would fall apart. He had Jesse and Tess to help out. The thought of her had your stomach piling into your throat, images of him and her together and moaning and sweaty. He could take care of this place himself.
Your hand paused at the zipper of your bag.
You were not responsible for this—for him.
If he wanted someone who didn’t tremble, who didn’t overthink, who didn’t get flustered by the weight of his history, he could go find it somewhere else. He had before. There were tapes to prove it. Women who knew what they were doing, who knew exactly what to say. Who didn't cower at his closeness.
Whatever.
You could get a ride with Jesse into town. He’d understand. Joel wouldn't ask questions with Jesse there. And you’d find something else, maybe a room over some cafe or bar downtown. Or maybe shared place with strangers. It didn’t matter. Anything was better than standing there feeling like some foolish little girl who didn’t know how to handle a man with a past.
But you knew one thing for sure—you wouldn't be leaving without giving him your piece of mind. He wanted you to talk? You'd talk. Fuck him. Fuck his dismissive tone and his cornering and his soft words.
He didn’t get to decide how this ended. He didn’t get to shut you down and send you away like you were a problem to be managed.
You left your backpack down at the last step outside as you marched outside, dirty converse smacking and sliding against the steps. The sky was deepening into purple as the last light bled out over the pasture, but you weren't looking at the open fields behind the barn. You weren't looking at the extra truck in the driveway. You were bee-lined for that stupid house.
You crossed the gravel in hard, uneven strides, stones kicking out beneath your soles, breath still hot in your chest, and you were halfway up the porch steps before a sound rented the air, cutting through your ire.
You froze, one hand hovering near the porch railing, the anger that had been propelling you forward snagging on something else entirely as voices inside rose loud enough to spill into the night around you, through the wooden walls of the house.
Joel's voice, definitely. But a second one you didn't recognize. Definitely not Jesse's. But another man, a similar twang to his cutting remarks you could half hear.
You looked back at the truck in the driveway, the one that didn't belong: a heavy black Ford 150, gleaming in the twilight, facing the house.
Joel had a visitor.
Joel
He'd been in a piss poor mood since the shed.
Truth was, it had probably started before that. Back in the truck with you. You had been so open with him, so honest in a way he wasn’t used to, looking at him like you saw straight through the parts he kept buttoned up. You’d spoken about him like he was just a man who did what he had to for his daughter. A man who had lost something and was still standing. He hadn’t known what to do with that. He didn’t deserve your soft voice or the way your eyes had filled up over something that had nothing to do with you. He didn’t deserve your empathy. You were just a girl—a woman working on his farm. Still, younger. Brighter and untouched by the kind of years he’d stacked up.
He never meant for it to become this.
But then you’d kissed him.
It had been quick and hesitant and yet real enough to knock the air from his lungs, and he hadn’t been able to think straight since. He’d replayed it over and over in his head, confused by it. It had been wet with the salt of tears, a soft press of lips, your hand on his chest just to steady yourself. His replays of the incident weren't always PG either, and he had to take many cold showers to keep himself from any temptations involving his hand. That kiss had lit something up in him that he’d worked hard to keep dim. Want. Heat. The kind of need that didn’t fit cleanly into boss and employee, into right and wrong.
He’d spent too much of the next few days inside the house, which had been a mistake. The place still carried his father's voice— in the leather recliner, in the creak of the stairs, in the silence of the closed door that led to master bedroom he refused to sleep in. He stayed in his childhood room instead, posters down, trophies boxed, like he could keep the past contained.
It didn’t matter what you thought of him. That’s what he told himself. You’d only been here a week. You were temporary. Another worker passing through on your way to something better. And yet he found himself listening for your footsteps above the barn at night when he sat in Paloma's stall, just watching her. He liked keeping track of where you were during the day and wanted to ask questions about your life he had no business asking. Instead, he gave you the space you clearly wanted so badly.
And then he'd noticed you, just the other day after giving dewormer to the pasture horses, too much on his mind but he'd stopped short to watch you. You had come from the shed, moving too quick to be anything but guilty, looking over your shoulder but somehow not noticing him coming.
He watched you disappear up the barn steps quickly only to come down shortly after. Riley stored all kinds of things in the shed. Joel kept it organized too. But he knew…he knew that you knew what was in there. You'd had a full blown conversation about it, and you'd seemed so freaked out to even speak of it he hadn't expected…but if you were watching more of them…Well, that could only mean…
By the third time he caught you going in and out of the little yellow shed, he had to make a plan.
The idea of you still taking the time to watch his old films upstairs in the dark had his gut coiling tight, but not with anxiety anymore. Well, there was some of that. The wriggling bewilderment of wondering what you thought, if you'd judged the way the scripts were written to make him talk to women like that.
So, he made a plan to confront you. This was a matter of respect and boundaries, after all. You were watching him at his most vulnerable—naked and sweating, even if most of the scenes seemed more exciting than they really were.
He knew it was childish, waiting out for you that night. But there was no other way. So he'd confronted you, a whole script of what he wanted to say— a breach of privacy, that it was unbecoming of you, but…
He'd felt his temper wane the moment he'd seen you step inside the orange light of the shed. All thoughts of reprimands gone. He wanted to be controlled and firm, but the way you were trembling and nervous, like a rabbit caught in a wolf's den, he couldn't do it.
And then, even more foolishly, he'd nearly kissed you then and there. He'd seen every sign that you'd want it—dilated pupils, quickening breath. Your pulse beat so loud against the tips of his fingers as he traced your soft skin.
But you wouldn't say the word. So he stopped.
And now, on top of the awful days and piss poor mood, he had something else to make it even worse.
Tommy fucking Miller.
Dinner was nothing but forks and knives scraping plates, chewing, the low clink of glass. Conversation never rose above the surface.
How's Sarah?
Good. How's work?
Good.
That was about it, past the muttered compliment from his little brother about the steak. But Joel knew something was coming before Tommy even leaned back in the chair, spreading his legs, one hand settling on his knee as if bracing himself.
“Can’t believe you’re back here after all this time,” Tommy said once the beer bottles were empty and the dishes sat finished clean.
"Yeah," Joel grunted, sipping the last dregs of his bottle. "Me neither."
Tommy huffed out a laugh that didn’t carry any humor. “Always figured you’d die before you stepped foot back in this house.”
Joel’s jaw ticked. “Didn’t have much choice.”
“There's always a choice.”
Joel looked slowly up at him, his brow heavy over his gaze.
“I’m just sayin’,” Tommy shrugged, but his shoulders were tight. “You left soon as you could. Didn't seem like you were eager to get back here.”
“You seem to remember that night differently than I do, little brother.” Joel’s voice stayed even, but something underneath it sharpened. “Oughta' get yer head checked.”
Tommy shifted in his seat. “All I remember is I had a one way ticket outta here with a scholarship to Texas A&M that I had to let go of to be here with Pops.”
"I tried, Tommy." Joel squeezed his eyes shut, "You know I did."
Tommy choked out a laugh, "Yeah, county fair every year really counts as tryin' in your book, huh—?"
"Jesus, boy— why are you even here?" Joel cut off.
He and his brother glared at one another across the room, the question heavy between them on the hard wood lacquered table. Joel wish he'd get to the point, why he'd even come all this way. It couldn't have been this, to berate him, to make him feel more guilty than he already did. Could it?
"You remind me of him, ya know," Tommy finally said.
Joel stood up, his chair screeching the hardwood beneath his boots. "I know you didn't just say that shit to me."
Tommy didn't back down, both of their tempers rising to each other's bait. "Look at you— startin' to raise your voice about things that don't matter, tryna keep this place afloat when you know it's gonna run you into the ground just like it did to him. To me. Abandonin' yer family up north."
Joel rounded the table fast enough that the sound of his boots bounced off the walls, his fist coming down beside the plates hard enough to rattle them. His finger jabbed in the air towards Tommy's face before he could stop himself. He knew it wasn't right, it wasn't fair. They were both carrying versions of the same man in different ways, answering to a voice that wasn't alive anymore. That kind of thing should've pulled them closer, should've made it easier to understand each other. And yet—
"I came back here because I wanted to make somethin' right of it. And you—you got your wish, Tommy. Nice little wife and kid up in cozy Austin. All you had to do was be here two more years. And then you got to get away and have a god damn life. But I came back cause it was the right thing to do. Don't act like it's so easy. Like it's fuckin' rainbows and sunshine here."
"All our life all you wanted was to take over the farm, his legacy." Tommy growled back, looking into his brother's eyes. "You suddenly have a change of heart?"
"Yeah. Thirty fuckin' years ago, I did." Joel scoffed with a snarl. "You sure gotta' funny way of showin' up here outta the blue just to rile me up. But you know what I think, Tommy?"
"Oh, this oughta be good," Tommy rolled his eyes, shifting his feet in annoyance.
"I think—"
But then both of them stopped.
The second porch stair gave its familiar creak. It was never a loud sound, even after the first and second time it broke, but it was like a warning bell of their childhood. They would have about five seconds before the door would open and the presence of their father would change the entire mood of the house.
Both of their heads snapped at break neck speed toward the front door. The fight still hummed between them, but something had replaced it. Something older and wired into their very bones.
Joel let out a rough breath and straightened. “Probably Jesse needin’ to get home.”
Opening it, he was surprised to find you standing there.
"Hi." you said softly, wringing your hands together.
Joel glanced back at Tommy and then stepped aside without a word, giving you room to enter. You moved in carefully, eyes flicking around the room before landing on the other Miller at the table.
“This is my new barn help,” Joel said, voice even but tight. “This here’s Tommy.”
He didn’t look at either of you. He had to get his temper in line first, squash the fight of adrenaline in his bloodstream before he could be hospitable. His hand came up to scratch through his beard roughly and a bit distracted. He caught the way your eyes followed the movement before glancing back at his guest.
You plastered on a polite smile and reached out when Tommy stood, and he took your hand with easy warmth.
"Howdy, darlin', pleasure to meet ya." Tommy said, "you must be the one givin' my brother all this hard time."
You blanched, and Joel had to clamp his jaw to keep from snapping at him. Tommy had always had that way about him, that easy grin and teasing lilt that made women lean in without thinking. He could turn it on without effort. But it had been too tense between you and him these past few days, and you took his brother's poking as interrogation.
“I’m only teasin’ ya, sweetheart,” Tommy chuckled, giving your hand an extra shake before letting go. “He must be really messin’ with ya to make your face turn that shade.”
“Sorry,” you said with a small, nervous laugh, your shoulders lowering a fraction. “I'm so used to talking to the horses now, hardly get a word in with this one," you joked, shoving your thumb over your shoulder before glancing back with a smile on your face, "What are you guys up to?”
Joel nearly smiled back. It almost felt normal between you two with just that one teasing remark. Like it did in the beginning—could it have been only last week when you were teasing him like that at the fenceline?
"Bout to have some dessert, I believe." Tommy smiled like a cheshire at his brother.
Joel grunted and headed for the kitchen. He could hear the low murmur of your voices behind him, the soft giggle that slipped out of you at something Tommy said, and it made him feel like he was a teenager again. Left out while his brother flirted with any of the girls that came to ride their new prospects.
Joel took the cheesecake from the fridge that he was saving for you—for whenever you decided it was safe again to have dinner here—and began cutting a few slices. He set one down in front of you without comment, slid another across to Tommy, who caught the plate mid-slide across the wood table, licking frosting from his thumb like he hadn’t just been ready to swing a fist ten minutes ago.
“Wine, darlin’?” Tommy asked.
"Oh, um, sure. Yeah."
Joel moved around the table, grabbing the opened bottle that waited corked at the mahogany hutch in the corner. and poured you a glass without asking how much.
He told himself to let it go. Told himself this was better, this was normal. You walking into the middle of it had kept either of them from doing something stupid. But as he watched you lean toward Tommy, answering him easily, smiling in a way you hadn’t smiled at Joel in days, the temper he’d tried so hard to bury didn’t fade.
Over the next hour or so, Tommy settled into his rickety wooden chair like he'd never left it. All the years between Austin and this dining room were nothing more than a long weekend away. He talked easily to you, one story about that damn dog that threw him into the second step easily slipped into another about Joel falling off his colt the first time he tried to ride him. His brother had one elbow hooked over the back of the chair, boot kicked out under the table, his hand around another bottle of beer as he spoke.
"He swore up and down he could do it," Tommy said, grinning at you, "Wouldn't listen to nobody— not even a second in, Fender was throwin' 'em in the mud."
Joel rolled his eyes and took a slow drink of wine. “You forget to mention I was twelve.”
"Old enough to know a colt ain't gonna take kindly to someone on its back right away," Tommy shot back, a smug grin pulling a dimple in his chin as he sipped his beer.
You laughed, and it wasn’t forced this time. It rang sweet and warm through the kitchen, and Joel felt it in his chest before he could stop himself. But you weren’t just watching Tommy. Every time he exaggerated a detail, every time he puffed his voice up to make Joel sound smaller or meaner or dumber than he’d ever been, your eyes flicked back to him like you were checking the record, studying him. Measuring what was true.
Tommy didn’t seem to notice. He kept talking, filling the house with himself the way he always had, taking up space without asking for it. Even sitting down he felt taller, louder, the center of gravity in any room he walked into. He asked you questions about the farm, about how you were liking it here, about whether his brother was workin’ you too hard.
“You can tell me,” Tommy said lightly, tipping his glass toward you. “I’ll knock some sense into him.”
Joel felt his jaw tighten again, waiting for the answer.
You smiled into your wine before looking up. “I'd say he's been more than fair.”
Tommy hummed, skeptical. “That so?”
You nodded, then glanced at Joel again, something quieter passing between you that Tommy wasn’t privy to. “He's good at taking care of everyone.”
Joel looked down at the wooden grain of the table, suddenly aware of the way his shoulders had eased without him meaning to. He hadn’t realized he’d been braced.
Tommy leaned forward on his forearms. “So you plannin’ on stickin’ around, or you just passin’ through?”
It was casual, but Joel heard the weight of it. He didn’t look at you this time. He kept his eyes on the table, fingers curling loosely around his glass.
“I don’t know yet,” you said after a pause. “Still figurin’ it out.”
Tommy studied you for a second, then smirked. “Well, if you stay, you’ll have to get used to him broodin’ around like he’s got the weight of Texas on his back. He’s been like that since he was eight.”
Joel scoffed. “You ain’t exactly sunshine, Tommy.”
“Yeah, but at least I'm charmin' about it.”
You laughed again, and this time when Joel looked up, you were already looking at him. Not at Tommy. At him. Your mouth curved just slightly like you were in on something private, like you understood more than the story being told.
By the time the wine bottle was finished off and Tommy had picked at some more snacks to sober himself up for the ride home, his brother was rising from the table with a heavy sigh.
“I should get goin’. Wanna make it back before Maria heads into work in the mornin’.”
You rose too, brushing your hands down your jeans before offering one to him. “It was really nice to meet you.”
“You too, sweetheart.” Tommy took your hand easily, giving it a warm squeeze. Joel watched the exchange closely, reminding himself it was only manners. Only friendliness. “And if he ever tells you about the time somebody tried to drink Mary’s milk while she was foalin’,” Tommy added, pointing a finger at Joel, “That was him.”
You barked a laugh, head tipping back, and Tommy looked up at his brother, the live wire that hummed hours ago simmered down to an old rusted current.
Joel stepped forward and took Tommy’s hand, gripping it hard before pulling him in just enough to clap a hand against his shoulder. “Drive safe. Tell Benji I said hi.”
"You know I will—kid asks about you all the time. And… about what I said earlier—"
"S'okay, Tommy," Joel shook his head.
Tommy paused, searching his face, then nodded with one more clap to his brother's shoulder, and grabbed his keys off the counter. The screen door slapped shut behind him as he crossed the porch, boots thudding down the steps. He stopped beside his truck and leaned over the open driver’s door, looking back toward the house.
“Don’t let him scare you off,” he called to you with a crooked smile, then glanced at Joel, something serious settling in his expression. “And don’t be a stranger. Spent too long like that. I’d appreciate havin’ my brother back.”
Joel lifted a hand in half a wave, nodding. “Get home safe.”
Tommy hauled himself into the cab, turning over the engine loudly in the dark, headlights sweeping across the yard before the truck rolled down the drive and disappeared past the fence line.
Joel stood there a moment longer than necessary before turning back toward you. You’d come up behind him in the doorway, hands tucked into your back pockets, a quiet breath leaving you.
“So that’s Tommy Miller,” you said.
Joel gave a short nod.
“He’s kind of a cocky son of a bitch, huh?”
Joel unfolded his arms from his chest, a breathless bark of laughter surprising him from his own throat. "That he is." he said, smiling crookedly down at you.
For the first time in days, things felt a little lighter between the two of you. He hoped he could keep it that way.
You were smiling up at him, then glancing out toward the pasture, the driveway, the house, and back to him again. He watched the way your thoughts moved across your face. He wished, so badly, that you would just say whatever was sitting there.
"Joel… " you began, "I think we need to talk—"
"Joel!"
A voice, sharp and insistent and terrified, came from the barn door that was sliding open, wood against wood and metal track. Both of your head snapped toward it.
Jesse was running across the driveway, but Joel didn’t wait for him to reach the porch. He was moving down the steps, pulse climbing, you right behind him.
"What is it?"
"It's Paloma. She's gone into labor."
Joel was already striding toward the barn before Jesse finished the sentence, long steps eating up the gravel between the house and the wide barn doors. He heard the scrape of you and Jesse's boots behind him, nearly jogging to keep pace as he moved past the first row of stalls without so much as glancing inside them, heading straight for her.
He slowed only once he reached Paloma’s door. He stood there a second, watching. She was pawing at the matting, her bedding shoved into uneven piles where she'd kicked it around. Her tail lifted and dropped, a low bullish breath forced from her nose as her body tightened.
“Hey, girl,” he murmured as he stepped carefully inside.
His hands moved over her neck automatically, down the length of her shoulder, along her side. He pressed his palm into the curve of her belly and felt the tightening there, the way her muscles drew hard beneath the skin and then softened again. He walked behind her, checked beneath her tail, watched her for a long moment. Only when he was satisfied did he straighten and move with purpose. His fingers reached for her pale blonde tail, braiding it quickly, his hands working through the strands before taping it tight so it wouldn’t interfere later.
When he stepped back into the aisle, his brain was counting down the hours.
“She’s got some time yet,” he said. “This is only the first stage. Jesse, let me take you home." and then he turned to you, "Call Tess. Stay here, watch her.”
"Me?" you gaped.
He didn’t feel like he had the luxury of indulging that uncertainty, not with the clock already ticking in his head. “Yes, you,” he answered, not unkind but he knew there was a firmness to his tone. “Call me if anything changes. Get her hay out of the stall. Water bucket too.”
You shook your head, and he saw the fear rising under your skin.
"But—but I have no clue—what if something goes wrong? You're gonna be almost an hour away!" you exclaimed.
He dragged a hand through his hair, jaw tight, and stepped closer so he didn’t have to raise his voice.
“If she starts rollin’, you keep her from casting herself. If you see red instead of clear when her water breaks, you call Tess right away.”
The word red seemed to have stricken you.
“And if she starts pushing?”
“Then you stay out of her way. Let her lie down. Don’t crowd her.” He leaned his head down to catch your eyes before they started spiraling. “You’ve been watching her all week. You know her.”
“I don’t want to be alone if something—”
You cut yourself off, swallowing around something in your throat as you looked away from him into her stall again.
Joel heard it anyway.
“You won’t be,” he said, steady, his hands falling to your shoulders. His hands nearly swallowed the caps of them, his touch felt too rough, too big for something like this. "Listen, look at me, hun." you finally did, "Call Tess and get her here. I’ll be back. Everythin's gonna be fine. She's just nervous because its her first go of it. You gotta stay calm for her, keep your voice steady. I will be back.”
Paloma groaned again, tail lifting, muscles trembling along her flank.
Your eyes searched his face, big and scared and unsure. But he watched as your brows knitted, a look of determination washing it all away.
“Okay.”
He held your gaze another second, searching your face for something—what, he wasn't sure. What the hell were you going to talk to him about tonight? He needed to push that thought away for now, tuck it somewhere behind in his mind. His eyes flickered around between yours, then lower. He had to drop his hands from your shoulders, to refocus his head right now.
“Jesse. C’mon.”
At the barn door with his farm hand behind him, he paused and looked back down the aisle.
You were already turned toward Paloma again.
“Call me,” he said once more.
You nodded.
You
Outside the stall, you sat watching the pale yellow horse with your back pressed uncomfortably against the wood. Your knees were pulled tight to your chest, your phone held to your ear as the dull ring echoed again and again.
Paloma shifted, heavy and restless, hooves scuffing where she had shoved most of her bedding aside and was now pawing at the rubber mat beneath. Her tail lifted and dropped every few seconds. You watched for something different, something that would tell you it had truly begun. She lowered herself slowly, rolled onto her side, then almost immediately struggled back to her feet, skin shivering over muscle beginning to dapple with sweat.
Your throat worked as you swallowed down the tightness there. You kept watching. Watching. Watching.
This was all normal. You thought it was, at least. Joel said she'd be restless, up and down, sweating. You'd even googled it quickly to make sure. But still, you were on edge.
You thought of your backpack still sitting at the bottom of the stairs to the apartment. The way you had almost left and demanded a ride home. You had been ready to confront him, to finally say what had been building up. But then you’d overheard him arguing with his brother, the way they circled each other, saying almost what they meant but never fully. It had made you pause. It made you see how lonely Joel Miller really was. But none of that mattered right now.
Paloma let out a low, strained groan.
The ringing stopped.
"You've reached Tess Servopolous. Leave me a message and—"
You hung up.
Dialed again.
"Hey. Everything okay?"
You sagged with relief at the sound of a real voice on the line. “Yeah, I think so—I—I tried calling Tess but she’s not answering.”
"You called her personal?" Joel said on the other line.
You nodded before remembering he couldn’t see you. “Yeah.”
He sighed, the engine in the background loud and impatient as it ate up the road.
“You drop off Jesse yet?” you asked.
“Yeah, I’m on my way back and—oh, hang on—Tess is callin’ me. I’ll call ya back, hun.”
“Okay,” you said, maybe a little too quietly.
The pet name hit you wrong and right at the same time. Your chin trembled, throat thickening before you could contain the tremble in your voice. You hung up and forced a deep breath into your lungs, gripping your phone between both hands as you watched Paloma.
She stood again, legs spread wider now, tail lifted and held.
And then you saw—
A bulge.
Your eyes widened as you looked closer—it looked as though maybe her water was finally breaking. You couldn't make out the color, what it looked like. You pushed yourself up onto your knees, squinting through the light of the stall.
But no, it wasn't clear. Not the pale, translucent sac you saw from googling photos of what to expect, it wasn't thin enough to see a hoof through.
It was dark.
A deep, violent red, glossy and thick, pressing outward with the next contraction.
Your stomach dropped so hard you felt dizzy.
“No,” you breathed.
Paloma strained, a guttural sound tearing out of her as the red membrane pushed farther out, stretched tight and misshapen.
Fuck.
You scrambled for your phone just as it buzzed in your grip.
“Hey,” Joel said, casually. “Tess is on with me. Her damn car broke down so I gotta get her—" he paused, "What’s goin on?”
You didn’t look away from Paloma. “It’s not clear.”
“What?”
“The placenta!” you said, your voice shaking now. “It’s not clear, Joel. It’s red. It’s—it’s dark red.”
“That a red bag?” Tess’s voice cut in, suddenly close, suddenly focused.
“I think so,” you said. “I don’t see feet. I don’t see anything, oh god.”
Joel cursed.
“Okay,” Tess said immediately. There was no softness to her voice. “Listen to me carefully.”
Paloma groaned again and dropped hard onto the stall floor. The red membrane protruded farther, thick and wrong against the pale of her coat.
“You don’t got time,” Tess continued. “That placenta’s already separated. The foal ain’t gonna get any oxygen soon if we wait any longer.”
Your vision tunneled.
“What do I do?”
“You need to open it. Right now.”
You stared at it, horrified. “Open it?”
“Get gloves on. You should be able to open it with just your hands. You’re gonna listen to everything I say, you hear me?” Then, sharper: “Joel, what’s your ETA?”
Joel's voice was strained, blending with the growl of his engine as you heard him slam the gas, "Ten minutes."
"Make it five," she demanded, "Kid, you still with me? Got your gloves?"
“Yes!” you squeaked, already running. You tore into the tack room, yanked a pair of rubber gloves from the box, shoved them on with shaking hands, nearly tripping as you rushed back.
You dropped the phone into the bedding and hit speaker.
“I’m here, girl,” you murmured to the horse, even though your pulse was roaring in your ears. You tried to even your breathing, to slow your heart. Your fingers brushed along her hindquarters first, slow, steady, letting her know you were there. “I’m here.”
You lowered yourself behind her.
The membrane pulsed with the next contraction, swollen and obscene and so very wrong.
You reached for it.
It was warm beneath your gloved fingers, thicker than you expected, resistant in a way that made your stomach twist. Paloma’s body clenched again and you froze, heart hammering so hard you thought you might black out.
“Do it between her contractions. You'll feel her tighten up.” Tess urged through the phone. “When she relaxes, tear it.”
Paloma exhaled, her body loosening slightly.
"Okay, I'm doing it now." you said. You dug your fingers into the wet sac, and pulled hard. It split open, wet and bloody, dark fluid spilling over your hands, your jeans, and into the bedding of the stall. It was hot and shocking, and you gasped, but didn't pull back.
"Okay, you're gonna need to reach in and tell me what you feel. You might have to really get in there, girl. Hope you're not squeamish."
You slid your hand in, past the knuckle, past the wrist, feeling nothing. Your forearm went in deeper, feeling resistance as her muscles trembled around you.
"I feel—"
Nothing, you felt nothing. Just scorching heat and her muscles contracting around you.
But then, there it was.
"I feel one! I feel a leg, I think!"
"How many?"
You lightly gripped your fingers around what felt like a long slender leg , "One—I feel one hoof."
There was silence except for the loud engine of Joel's truck.
"Tess—!?" Joel growled.
“Shit. Alright.” Tess said, quickly. “You’re gonna have to push the foal slightly back in and find the other. The baby might be stuck with its head bent the wrong way. You need to get in and move 'em around right so you have a head and two legs facing you. You listenin'?”
Paloma let out another strained cry and your free hand pressed hard against her leg, trying to soothe her.
“I hear you,” you said, even though your whole body was shaking.
You reached deeper. Your elbow disappeared into the mare, shoulder pressing into her hindquarters as you reached blindly around the small body inside, feeling for another leg, a head, anything.
Paloma convulsed around you again, pinching down around you, her muscles clenching so hard your arm was going numb.
You gasped, cheek against her flank as you tried to keep your footing in the blood-slick bedding beneath you.
"I can't—shit—" you gasped, "she's clamping down, Tess, I can't—"
"It's okay, she's probably goin' into shock. You gotta stay calm girl. Breathe."
Stay calm.
Meanwhile your jeans were soaked, your hands were slick and numb, the floor beneath you was turning dark and red, sticking to everything. There was more blood than you were ever expecting.
Paloma let out a sound you'd never heard from her before. It shocked your spine straight, your brain to whiten. It was as close to a scream you'd ever heard a horse make.
"Joel?" you said, you didn't even mean to.
"I'm here, baby." he answered instantly, but his voice sounded so far away, so distant.
"I think—I don't know—she's—she's stopped pushing, she's stopped—nothing—oh my god, Paloma? PALOMA?" you tried to shake her where your hand rested on her leg, pinching and pushing her to shake her out of her stupor.
“Kid, you need to get up and check her gums,” Tess said, "get your hand out and go check her now."
You pulled your arm free, scrambling forward around her, slipping, almost falling as you grabbed Paloma’s jaw and lifted her lip.
“Oh my god,” you breathed. “They’re nearly white.”
“Alright,” Tess said, and she was trying to stay even, but you could hear it now. The edge. “She’s in shock. You don’t have time to wait for a contraction. You need to pull when I tell you.”
“I’m not— I don't think I can, I'm not strong enough,” you sobbed. It was humiliating and honest and you didn’t care. This could be a hundred pound foal you'd be yanking from the poor mare.
"You have to be." Tess snapped. "Pull yourself together and get back to her flank."
You could still hear Paloma's breathing, rapid and shallow, her sides fluttering instead of expanding. She was alive. You had to act fast.
But blood and fluid was pooling beneath her tail.
You shoved your arm back inside her, this time without hesitation, without delicacy, without thinking about what you were touching or how it felt.
You found the second leg.
"I'm in." you told Tess.
Your hand slipped.
You gripped harder.
“Okay,” Tess said, voice tight. “When I say pull, you pull with everything you’ve got. Down and back. That baby needs you, girl."
That baby needs you.
Your vision blurred.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered, to Paloma, to the unseen foal, to Joel, to yourself. “I’m so sorry.”
"Pull!"
Joel
He hadn't turned the truck off when he saw Tess's car. He didn’t fully stop either, just jammed his foot into the brake long enough for her to wrench the passenger door open and climb in with her phone still pressed tight to her ear, already speaking to you in that firm tone that she used when there wasn’t room for panic even if it was clawing at her throat. The second her door slammed shut he was back on the gas, the engine never dipping, the truck lunging forward hard enough that dirt and gravel snapped against the undercarriage.
She barely looked at him as she kept the phone to her ear.
“I’m gonna hang up now., baby." he said over the groan of the engine, "Tess is with me. I’m here. I’m still here.”
The word kept slipping out without thought, pulled from somewhere deeper than pride or caution. Baby. He didn’t care until the line went dead and the cab filled only with the loud protests of the engine and Tess’s voice speaking into her own phone.
He had one hand on the wheel and the other braced hard against the top of it, leaning forward like it would get him there faster. The road unspooled ahead of him in thin ribbons of yellow light. He barely registered the turns he took, the dips, the fences. His body felt in tune with the sounds of your crying through Tess's speaker.
He should've been there, should've stayed. The hell was wrong with him? Leaving you there to fend for yourself with Paloma? Of course something was bound to go wrong. He thought he had time. There was always time, wasn't there? To fix things, to come back.
He was so good at leaving. Tommy was right. He was so practiced on stepping out just when it mattered most and telling himself it was for the better. He had made a life out of convincing himself he wasn't abandoning his only brother, his father, regardless of how everything went down.
He hadn't been able to hold onto a relationship to save his life, his heart. His job made it weird, made everything difficult. He'd never gotten used to having anything intimate with women and attaching anything to it. So he always left.
But he prided himself on sticking with his daughter for her entire life, for doing unthinkable things to pay his bills and keep food on her table, for soccer practice and summer camps and vacations. But now—now that she had her own life and her own two feet on the ground making her own way—he'd abandoned her too. To come back here to this haunted place.
And now, his final crime, abandoning you and Paloma at the farm.
Tess was talking to you, walking you through birthing the foal from Paloma's spent body. That too was a mark on him. First year back to the farm and a mare who was bound to die on his watch. An orphaned foal. He wasn't sure he'd be able to carry on if that was the case. All he could do was pray to a God he wasn't even sure existed anymore.
He could hear your wrecked sobbing still, words garbled into Tess's ear as she spoke straight to the point with you—no coddling, only business. He wished he was with you, to keep you away from this part. The gore of bringing life into the world, the way horses don't always have the same will to live that we wanted them to.
The arch of Miller Stables finally appeared through the trees, one hanging light bright in the dark. The long winding driveway stretched ahead like punishment as he pressed his foot all the way down and the truck roared, gravel spraying as he took the curve too fast and corrected it without slowing. Tess gripped the dash, knuckles white, speaking into her phone, her voice suddenly urgent.
He barely felt the stop when he hit the brakes outside the barn. He didn’t remember killing the engine. He only knew he was out of the truck, air tearing at his lungs as he ran.
Paloma's stall door was wide open, and inside was a sight only hell should know. The wet smell of metal and the heat of sweat filled his nose as he took in the scene.
And your face.
Oh, god.
Eyes swollen, cheeks wet, your mouth pulled wide as you tried to drag in air. Blood coated your hands, your jeans, your forearms. It soaked the straw beneath you. The foal’s small legs protruded from Paloma, the head resting limp in your lap, the body only halfway into the world.
For a moment he couldn’t move. The image lodged in him, permanent. He'd see it for years after, burned in his retina when he thought back on this night.
Tess pushed past him, dropping beside you, hands covering yours, voice low and steady as she spoke to you. She checked the foal with quick, efficient motions, lifting a lip, pulling back an eyelid, murmuring that you had done exactly what she told you to do.
You did great, kid. it's okay. I've got it from here.
Joel knelt on the threshold.
"Come here," he croaked. His voice wasn't his own, full of grit and rough with desperation.
Your breath hitched when you heard him.
“Come here,” he tried again, kneeling in the doorway, one hand held out to you, open and steady despite the tremor in it. “Tess has it. It’s alright. Come here, baby. Please. Let’s get you inside.”
You didn’t move at first. You were locked in a sort of trance, hands still wrapped around those tiny legs like letting go would undo everything you had fought for.
Tess glanced up at him then, something tight in her expression but he couldn't help but catch the glimmer of determination in her gaze.
“Get her out of here, Tex,” she said quietly.
He nodded once, swallowing against the dryness in his throat, but he still didn’t move further into the stall. His hand stayed out, hovering between you, not wanting to startle you, not wanting to pull too hard.
“Sweetheart,” he tried again, even quieter now, forcing softness to cover his fear. “Look at me.”
Your eyes flickered toward him.
“There you are,” he breathed, like he’d found you in a storm. “You did so good, hun. It's alright. Tess has her now. Come here. Let me take care of you.”
Your eyes seemed to register the world around you finally, a hiccuping cry as you stared at him, and all he could do was nod. He was trying to not let the thickening of his throat show. How he could barely stand to see you like this. He wanted to look away so badly, to not see what he'd done to you. But he couldn't.
"Please." was his last word.
You finally moved. Fingers loosening, your body testing whether it was safe to let go. Tess's hands slid in to replace yours without a second of hesitation. You looked down at your hands like you didn't recognize them.
Then you pushed yourself back on your heels. Your knees wobbled, your weight shifting unsteadily as you tried to stand, your hand slipping into the bedding and catching yourself on the way up. Joel stood too, a mirror of you, both hands out.
Your hand braced on the side of the wall as you took a few small steps towards him, blood and fluid staining where your fingers dragged. He was crossing the distance in seconds. You didn't resist when he reached you.
Your hands came up blindly, searching, and when they found the front of his shirt, you clutched at it like a buoy sent out at sea. He wrapped both arms around you instantly, pulling you into his chest, not caring about the blood soaking into his shirt, not caring about anything except the way your body felt fragile and shaking against his.
“I’ve got you,” he said into your hair, voice low and thick, his lips pressing against the top of your head. “I've got you, baby girl."
He felt you sag into him, finally, all the strength you had used to keep yourself from falling apart the last hour, suddenly heavy in his arms. He held you in the stall door for a long moment, watching Tess move, pulling the foal out and assessing it.
He turned and took you away.
Over the kitchen sink, there was only warm amber light and the sound of running water.
It filled the silence between you. The steady rush, the change in pitch when it struck porcelain, the dull splash as it ran over your hands and down the drain. Clear at first. Then pink. Then briefly red again before fading back to clear.
Joel stood close enough to feel the heat of you but not close enough to crowd you. The rag in his hand had gone heavy and warm, saturated, and he kept wringing it out beneath the tap before bringing it back to your skin. His fingers worked carefully over your knuckles, over the fine bones of your wrist, up the length of your forearm. He pressed harder where the blood had dried into the creases, softer where your skin looked raw from scrubbing.
You were so quiet he didn’t trust himself to break it.
Your eyes stayed fixed on the dark window above the sink, not really seeing the glass, not really seeing the yard beyond it. Just staring out into the night like you expected something to emerge from it. Like any minute Paloma might step into view, foal at her side, everything resolved and whole.
He kept his eyes on your hands.
He had failed you.
The thought settled in him without argument.
He had left. He had measured the time, the distance, and told himself it was safe. He had assumed first stage would stretch on long enough for him to get back, assumed the ranch would behave for him just because it had in the past. He had come back to this place telling himself he could carry it, that he knew what he was doing, that he wasn’t his father and he wasn’t a boy anymore.
And yet the first real test of it, the first birth under his care, and you had been the one kneeling in blood while he was miles away.
The rag moved over your elbow, catching on a stubborn patch. He shifted closer to the light, pushing your sleeve up carefully, exposing more of your arm so he could see what he was doing.
The house around you was dark, the new moon leaving everything beyond the kitchen swallowed in shadow. The only warmth came from the lamp over the sink and the heat of the water running over his skin.
He wished he could promise you things. That it would never happen again, he would never leave you again. That you never had to speak to him again if you did not wish to. He wished he could promise that Paloma would be fine, that her baby would live after minutes without oxygen.
But promises, he knew, were easy to make, and harder to keep.
The water running filled his ears. He wrung the rag out again. It was clearer now.
“I…was pregnant once.”
Joel froze.
For a moment he thought he had misheard you. Thought the rush of water had distorted something else. His hand hovered midair, rag dripping onto the basin.
He hadn’t said anything, had he? He hadn’t pressed or asked anything of you. He had been trying so hard not to push or crowd you, not to demand more from you tonight than you had already given. He had thought silence might feel safer. That quiet hands and steady water might be enough.
He swallowed, carefully, and forced his hand to move again. He brought the rag back to your skin slowly, easing it over the dried blood at your elbow, pushing your sleeve up with quiet fingers.
You took a deep, steadying breath, and he felt as if it filled his own lungs with air too.
"But I…I lost the baby." you said, chin wobbling.
He felt his grip tighten despite himself, cloth pressed into your arm, but he forced himself to soften, his thumb smoothing over the place he pressed.
Your eyes were still fixed out the dark window. "I'm supposed to be on a backpacking trip right now with my best friend and I can't even talk to her. I can't do anything. I'm supposed to be in school and I failed the entire semester."
He hadn't even realized you were in school. He barely asked questions about why you'd been needing a job, why you'd been displaced. He only knew what you told him, and even then it had only been a few words. He should've asked more questions, should've gotten to know you more instead of all this hiding.
"S'that…why…?" he didn't know how to ask such questions, didn't know if you wanted him to. Maybe you just needed someplace to finally let all this go, let it circle the drain and ring clear like the water.
You let out a shaky sigh, your eyes coming back down to where your hands met, watching his closely.
“My parents wanted me to keep it,” you continued. “Even though I was still in school. I don't think I understood … I grew up thinking there wasn’t another way, and even though by then I knew more about the world, the options… it didn't cross my mind that they were for me.”
He nodded. It sounded too familiar. A mirror, somehow. Not quite identical, but how a reflection shows the opposite a person. A different story, but still somehow the same.
“But then,” you said, and your voice faltered for the first time, “something went wrong during the second trimester. I had finally… I don't know, wrapped my head around it. I had plans for cribs and names and what she’d look like.”
She.
He looked up at you then.
You didn’t meet his eyes.
“I woke up to blood in my bed,” you said, gaze still memorizing his hands over your skin. “And that…was…it.”
He could tell it took everything from you to say the words aloud. Every breath seemed to cost you, every formed syllable and truth of what had happened.
“She?” Joel asked softly.
You nodded once.
“Yeah," There was a softness in your mouth, a sad grin starting to pull into your cheek, your gaze softening. "I always thought it would be a girl. Had a name picked out already.”
He smiled a little too, a mirror, reflection, the same sadness in either of you, but different somehow.
"What was her name?" he then asked.
For a second he thought he’d misstepped. You drew in a quiet breath and shut your eyes, and he felt it in his own chest like he’d pressed somewhere tender without meaning to. His thumb gentled against your skin even though there was nothing left to wipe off, the rag now forgotten in a heap at the bottom the sink.
When your eyes opened again, they were glassy, but your smile widened anyway, fragile and wet with holding back the tears.
"Ellie."
Joel sighed out a long breath, and held your skin there for a moment, letting her name take up the space, to be real, to let you hold onto the vision of your bouncing baby girl in your arms, even all these years later.
"That's a real pretty name, darlin'." he said finally, letting his hands fall from you when he realized how long he'd been standing so close.
He could've sworn you leaned in further, chasing that touch, but your hands only landed on the counter for support.
Your hair was a mess, still damp at the edges from where his fingers had pinched out the violence of blood. Your skin was warm and sticky where your tears had dried. But your breathing had evened out, though there was still something tight beneath it. You looked exhausted and wrecked and yet impossibly beautiful all at once.
It reminded him of the first day you’d shown up with that plastic bin and your backpack slung over one shoulder, eyes uncertain and lost like you were waiting for the ground to give out beneath you. He’d watched that look soften over the days, watched confidence settle into your posture, watched you find your footing here.
And then tonight had dragged something older back to the surface.
You straightened slowly, collecting yourself, and when you looked up at him there was something different there now. Lighter, yet guarded.
"Your turn."
He huffed, a little surprised, it could barely be called a laugh. But you were smiling a little crookedly at him now, teasing.
"My turn?"
"Tell me your secret."
He swallowed hard, his smile vanishing. The shift in you was abrupt enough to make him feel off balance. One second you were standing in a memory that bled, the next you were tossing the weight back to him like it was a game.
“Or don’t,” you added quickly, shrugging.
He rubbed a hand over his face, feeling the heat there. “Why don’t we get you changed and showered,” he said, voice rougher than he meant it to be. “Then I’ll tell you anything you wanna know.”
“Oh, right,” you said lightly, “men only respond to naked wet women in their house.”
He knew the joke was just lightness you were forcing, just your walls getting built back up. He knew that play like the back of his hand. For a moment, he only stared at you, trying his best not to be thrown by it. The way you could pivot so quickly from something fragile and grief ridden to playfulness.
The switch of your humor was giving him whiplash. He felt dizzied by it, confused.
“Come on,” he said finally, pointing toward the stairs, dragging his other palm over his brow to hide the color rising into his cheeks. “Upstairs.”
“Yes, sir.”
You
The shower in Joel’s house did more than wash the blood from your skin and rinse away the thick, metallic feeling that clung to you. When you stepped under the spray and let it beat against your shoulders, the heat slowly untangled the memory from your body. And when you reached for the soap, you realized you would step out of it smelling like him. Something in your heart constricted at the thought.
He was a simple man. That much was clear. His private world, reduced to a narrow plastic shelf in the shower, held a bar of Irish Spring and a bottle that claimed to be shampoo, conditioner, body wash, moisturizer, and eight other things in one.
But it gave you something to focus on, as ordinary and uncomplicated as it was. You traced the tiny print on the back of the bottle, reading every word twice just to keep your mind from drifting. You kept your eyes open, had to keep reading, because if you let your thoughts wander, you were back in your bed last year.
Sticky, wet, smelling of iron and rust. And tonight had pulled it up from wherever it had been buried. The helplessness of watching something slip away from you no matter how hard you tried, Paloma giving up…it was all too much. How could you and a horse have so much in common? Both of you had bodies that did not cooperate when it mattered most, that turned against the very thing they were meant to carry.
And then there was Joel, who had gone through it, raised a little girl and loved her with everything. Enough to bend his whole life around her. He had made choices, used his body in order to keep food on the table and keep her life as normal as possible.
You felt as if you'd been punishing him for it all along.
When you finally ran out of words to read on the back of the bottle, you put it down and turned off the scalding water, stepping out to grab a towel. You looked down at your clothes, a heap of bloody ruined fabric. You hadn't thought to grab your own. But you didn't think you could go back out there now. You didn't want to know, didn't want to see Tess's face when she told you neither of them had made it.
So you stepped out into the hallway, towel clutched to your chest as you padded around the dark landing, wood creaking under your footsteps.
"Joel?" you called softly.
No answer. Hm…
You padded down the hall, hands hesitating to reach out at every door. No light bled from beneath any of them. Maybe he'd gone back out to the barn, to check on the horses for bed as if nothing had changed from their usual routine.
You reached the largest bedroom at the end of the landing and pushed the door open slowly.
You paused.
It felt like stepping into a memory you weren't supposed to see. It was ghostly still and untouched, clear sheets covered everything, tucked around what must've been a dresser, a bedside table, a desk and a large king bed in the center. Dust lingered in the air in the shafts of light from the ceiling fan above.
You looked around, trying to make sense of it. It felt as if you'd stepped into a different, forgotten decade. Old, wooden furniture, antique yet simple. The bed still had a quilt underneath the plastic wrap, you could just make out the red and white patches. Above it hung a landscape painting of the land. The pasture and the mountains beyond it. You recognized them immediately, the exact line of ridge that framed the horizon when you stood out back by the fence.
And you knew, with a sudden, abrupt certainty, that you should not be in here.
As you turned to leave, you nearly collided into a wall.
Joel was there, filling the doorway, one hand rested on the knob. He had changed his shirt, his jeans. But he hadn't stepped inside, remaining in the hallway.
"Joel, I'm so sorry." you gasped, "I thought this was your roo—"
"C'mon."
He didn't raise his voice, but there was a tightness to him. A stone cold look on his face as his eyes flitted around the space.
You slipped past him, your knuckles that clutched the towel into place brushing against his chest as you did. He didn't make room or step back, and you felt the heat of him flooding your skin as you made your way down the hall.
He followed behind you until you heard the sound of another door opening.
“Here.”
The difference was immediate. There was life here, though the furniture felt smaller, nearly boyish. A chest sat at the end of the queen bed, covered in stickers of band logos, faded lucky horseshoes and bumper stickers from different rodeos. A lamp leaned slightly to one side on the nightstand.
"Is this…?"
"My room," the words left him in a sort of long exhale, "yeah."
You turned toward him, questions rising, but he was already holding out a folded stack of clothes. His eyes stayed somewhere above your shoulder, not quite meeting yours.
“Thanks,” you said, taking them carefully. The fabric was soft, worn in the way only something handled often becomes. “These are… yours?”
He nodded once. “Apartment’s locked.”
Your gaze dropped when he gestured. Your backpack rested against the dresser, set there neatly.
“Found your bag,” he said, and something about the stiffness in his voice told you he had an idea of why it was there in the first place.
"Thanks." you said again, though the word felt like it lost its weight.
Silence stretched, neither of you looking each other in the eye. You could feel him choosing what not to say. Your damp hair clung to your shoulders, droplets sliding cold down your spine as the room cooled around you.
"I'll…just…" he started, then shifted his weight towards the door, "yeah."
He left the sentence unfinished and stepped out, giving you privacy without looking back.
You changed quickly, pulling his clothes over your still-warm skin, the cotton soft and worn in ways that felt almost intimate. They swallowed you, long sleeves falling past your wrists, the waistband of his sweatpants hanging loose at your hips. You threw the towel over the chair without thinking and opened the door again.
He was still there in the hallway, chin braced in his hand, brows drawn tight in thought. When the bedroom light spilled across him, he straightened, like he’d been caught in something.
“Joel,” you started, stepping back into the room to give him space to follow, “I just… I wanted to say I’m sorry. About… going into that…room, I guess. I'm sorry. I don’t even know.”
He came inside slowly and shut the door behind him. He was so quiet all of the sudden. It had you on edge.
"Sit." he said, pointing at the bed.
You did as he bid.
He paced once in front of you, hand dragging through his beard, then down the back of his neck. You could see the war happening in him. The instinct to shut down. The same instinct to deflect you had in the kitchen.
Eventually he sat beside you, not touching, elbows braced on his knees.
“You wanted my secret.”
Oh.
“Only if you want to tell me,” you said quietly.
He nodded once, then shook his head like he regretted it, then nodded again as if forcing himself forward.
"When I found out my…when Jess was pregnant…" he began. It seemed very difficult for him— to say this. To bring back the past as you did.
"I knew what my pops would think." he went on, he wasn't looking at you. His bedside lamp threw him in soft gold, reflecting in his heavy eyes.
"I was seventeen and panicked and…" his jaw flexed, bracing himself, "I asked her to get an abortion."
Your chest tightened, though there was no judgment only understanding. Seventeen. High school, living with the smell of fear and possibility and futures that hadn’t even formed yet.
Suddenly his words were spilling out very fast as he went on, as if trying to make up for the bomb he'd dropped, "I had no clue what I was doin. I had a whole life ahead of me, of bull ridin' and rodeos, horses to train. It wasn't in my plan. We were in school when she... I couldn't…I wasn't…ready."
His voice was tightening, whether from disuse of never saying the words before or having to bare himself fully to you now.
“She refused. And I’m glad she did. God, believe me, I'm am glad she did.” he shook his head, and then put his face in his hands, leaning his elbows on his knees. You'd never seen him like this. You'd seen him naked, sweaty, in the most vulnerable state you thought on film. But…you'd never realized how much more exposed this felt. You'd never seen…this.
“But my dad didn’t understand. I knew he wouldn’t. But he had to know.” His jaw tightened as if he were chewing on something bitter. “I expected the belt. Hell, I expected a black eye. I expected him to call me every name in the book. I just… I didn’t expect him to throw me out.”
Your hand found his back without you thinking about it, fingers smoothing over the broad curve of his shoulders. He was warm beneath your palm, solid, but you could feel the tension sitting there, humming beneath his skin.
“I was eighteen when Sarah was born,” he continued, and his voice softened when he said her name. “And Jess… she decided she didn’t want any of it anymore. Didn’t want me or the kid. We’d gotten married. I thought that meant…” He swallowed. “But then it was just me and the baby.”
You watched his hands instead of his face because they told the truth faster. His fingers were locked together so tightly his knuckles had gone pale.
He lifted his eyes to you then, and there was something naked in them that made your chest ache.
“I know you must think…” his voice faltered, “That I’m… that I chose that job because I wanted it. I didn’t. I didn’t have any options. I was livin’ on ramen and beans. Sarah couldn’t keep growin’ up on food stamps and whatever I could scrape together.” His throat worked. “Tess gave me a way out. It wasn’t some ego boost. But it paid.”
He shook his head once, frustrated with himself.
“I’d already failed my dad. Failed Tommy. I wasn’t gonna fail her too.”
“None of that is your fault, Joel,” you said.
“Listen,” he cut in gently but firmly, shaking his head. “I ain’t askin’ you to…hell, I don't know. I’m sayin’ I’m sorry you had to find out like that, that I scared you. And tonight…” He stopped there, the hesitation heavier than any raised voice. “You were gonna leave, weren’t you?”
You could only stare into his hazel eyes until he was tearing them away from you again, staring at the wood grain of the floor.
“I saw the bag,” he continued quietly. “I knew… well, because I’ve done it enough times myself.”
You felt heat crawl up your neck. Shame and grief and something else you couldn’t quite figure out.
“I ain’t good at this part,” he admitted, “The talkin’. The feelin’s. I say the wrong thing and make everythin' worse.”
“Joel,” you whispered, stopping the motion of your hand on his back so he’d feel the pause. “Look at me.”
It took him a second, but he did.
You had to pull together your courage, because you knew you'd only get one chance to say this.
“It’s not your fault your father was too proud to stand by you,” you said carefully.
"I know—" he frowned.
"No, you don't." you said sternly, "It’s not your fault he didn’t know how to love you the way you needed. It’s not your fault Jess left. And it’s not your fault you were forced into a decision to take a job that kept your daughter fed and healthy."
He looked like you'd smacked him across the face with your words. Your hand came up gently, finally feeling what that beard was like in the palm of your hand. Scratchy, thick.
“You are a good man, Joel Miller,” you whispered. “And I’m sorry that everyone, including myself, made you feel like you weren’t.”
He closed his eyes, and to your surprise, leaned into your hand.
"I was scared." you said even lower, "scared that….that I had feelings and I'd never…"
Be brave, be brave be brave.
“I was scared,” you confessed again, quieter now. "That I’d never measure up to the women you’ve been with. When you were in that world… it just seemed so easy. For them, for you.”
His eyes opened again, studying you carefully.
"What were you so afraid of?"
You mouth frowned. Hadn't you said it? Hadn't you just admitted to him? You didn't know what else to say.
“You have to see what you do to me,” he went on, slowly. “When I was workin’… it was separate. It was physical. It didn’t…it never…” His hand came up, covering yours where it stayed cupping his jaw, “I never felt anythin’ for them.”
You felt your pulse start to climb.
“But with you…” He exhaled through his nose, almost frustrated by the admission, his thumb brushing over your knuckles. “Since the day you walked up to my truck with that bin and that backpack, I haven’t been able to separate work and…and what I want.”
He brought your hand down into his lap, tracing the life line of your palm.
"I don't know what it is. What you do to me. S'different than anythin'…anythin' I've ever…"
"I think I know." you murmured, "because I feel it too."
A faint smile pulled at his mouth, but it didn’t last.
“But I can’t…I won't…ask that of you. I can't keep you here,” he said quietly. “This place… it’s empty. It’s still my dad’s in ways.” His jaw tightened. “I haven’t stepped foot in the arena since I got back. I grab a lunge rope and my hands start shakin’. I walk past that room and my chest locks up. I don’t know how to live here yet.”
You shook your head, "We can make it right. Make it beautiful again. Make it yours, not his."
"But--school?" he asked. "Your life? I can't take that--"
“I didn’t know what I was doing,” you admitted. “It was a degree I picked because it sounded right, even though I couldn't stand it. But this place, Joel…it feels right. I feel stronger here than I have in ages.” Your voice trembled, but you didn’t stop. “I want to stay. But only if you stay.”
The memory of the shed was coming back to you, he was so close again, the memory of it flooding your senses. The smell of Irish Spring, the scent of his sweat and how the yellow light of the bedside table cast his hazel eyes to turn to honey.
Your eyes are tellin' me one thing, but you won't say it.
"I want you, Joel."
And suddenly he was leaning in, his hand dropping your palm and coming up to your face.
And this time, when you kissed, it wasn't a light brushing of lips. It wasn't hesitant or wet with tears. It was warm, full and eager. You breathed each other in for a long moment as his lips melded to yours, the soft prickle of his mustache against your nose.
You couldn't help the way your hand traveled up his arm, his thick, veined arm, squeezing the corded muscle there beneath his sleeve. His hand not cupping your face came up to settle against your waist, squeezing you back, a nonverbal confirmation of everything that had led to this. Avoidance, fear, cowardice. Only to finally be where you'd wanted all along.
"Say it again," he whispered against your lips as he sucked in a breath.
"I want you," you breathed, "of course I want—"
He was kissing you again, harder now, pushing you back onto the bed, and both your hands came up to lock around his neck. You kept him close as he maneuvered your bodies until he was laying over you, one hand firm at your waist and the other still soothing along your cheek.
"Again."
You smiled, you couldn't help it. Was it really so strange to him? To be wanted like this?
"I want you," you breathed into his open mouth as your legs parted, welcoming him closer, letting his hips settle between them and oh—
Fuck, he was hard already. And bigger than anything you'd ever...
A low sound rolled up out of him then, half hum, half growl, vibrating deep in his chest where it pressed against yours.
"You're so pretty, sweetheart," he murmured, his mouth drifting down from your lips to your jaw, then to the warm shell of your ear before trailing slowly along your neck. "Prettiest thing a man like me has seen in a long time."
"Man like you, huh?"
He smiled into the next kiss he planted on your neck, and hummed in amusement.
"Tell me," you said, your eyes drifting up to the ceiling as his beard rasped along the column of your throat, the scratch of it making your stomach flutter.
Hm? he hummed again, distracted, mouth still wandering.
"Tell me you want me too."
His teeth caught your skin, a quick nip that pulled a startled gasp from you.
"Silly girl," he murmured softly, voice thick with something like indulgence. "Course I wantcha. Can't you feel how badly I've been wantin' ya?"
He rolled his hips forward then, pressing harder into your waiting lap, and the slow drag of him against you made a helpless little sound slip from your throat.
"Yeah," he muttered against your neck, voice rough and baritone. "Been wantin' you since I laid my damn eyes on you."
You sucked in a breath.
Because for some reason, for some godforsaken reason, that was when your traitorous brain decided to remind you of everything that had happened since you met him.
The videos you'd watched.
Those tiny little pornstars climbing over him like they belonged there, bodies moving easy and practiced as they worked him just right, knowing exactly how to pull those sweet, grunting sounds from him that you had buried your fingers inside yourself imagining. The way he looked with them, big and sure and confident, the way he seemed to know exactly what to do with every inch of them. And here you were. A nobody, with a body less than perfect. In sweatpants and his sweatshirt, no sexy lingerie or makeup done, laying in his bed and—
"Hey."
You saw his eyes before you realized he'd spoken, still hazel, still clear, not swallowed yet by the dark haze of arousal.
You blinked, pulled back into the room, and lifted a hand to your forehead, covering your eyes.
"Sorry."
"Where'd you go just now?" he asked quietly.
His hand reached up and gently pulled yours away from your face, brushing your damp hair back as his gaze moved slowly across your features, searching.
"Nothing," you murmured quickly. "I'm fine."
Before he could answer, you cupped his face in both hands and pulled him down again, pressing your mouth to his. Your fingers slid into the hair at the back of his neck, urging him closer, trying to drag the moment back where it had been just a second ago.
He kissed you back, but you had your eyes stayed open, watching him. And after a moment, you realized his eyes were open too, his brows tightening over his gaze.
Your stomach twisted. Shit, you were ruining this. Of course you were.
His hand came up then, large and warm against your jaw, and he gently pushed your face back just enough to look at you. His gaze moved over your lips, your eyes, then back again, thoughtful, before he leaned down and pressed a quick, chaste kiss to them before saying:
"Tell me what's goin' on in that pretty head."
You sighed, the sound heavier than you meant it to be, and let your head fall back against his pillow. Your eyes drifted everywhere but him, tracing the ceiling, the corner of the room, the soft spill of light across the wall.
"It's just…" you started, then stopped.
Your fingers dropped and twisted into the sheet beside you.
"You're a…" you gestured vaguely toward him, heat creeping up your neck. "And I'm not. I'm just…"
The words stalled out in your throat.
Joel didn't move away from you. If anything, he settled more solidly where he was, one forearm braced beside your head as he watched you wrestle with it.
"A what?" he asked.
You huffed out a quiet breath.
"You know," you muttered. "You do this for a living."
For a moment, he didn't say anything, but a light sigh was released from his nose as his thumb traced your jaw as he watched you, deep in thought.
"I used to. And makin' a livin' like that…it was never anythin' real. You gotta know that." he said, shaking his head, "None of them made me feel as crazy as you do. I've been losin' my mind tryna get you to talk to me this past week."
You worried your bottom lip, but finally looked up at him, trying to read his expression.
"It was only a job, baby." he whispered. His thumb came up and gently tugged your lip free from where it was caught between your teeth.
"If you want, we can take a break. Sit here and talk about it some more." His voice softened even more. "But I promise you, nothin' I ever did for that job came close to how badly I wanna do this right now."
Your eyes flickered between his, his pretty eyes, his crow's feet and thick brows, the line that deepened between his brows of worry.
"It's you in my bed right now," he continued, shifting his hips slightly against you like he couldn't quite stop himself. "You who's got me feelin' like a damn teenager again."
His mouth curved faintly. "And you're gonna sit here and tell me you ain't the one who belongs here?"
He shook his head slowly, soft disbelief written all over his face.
"Sweetheart," he murmured, brushing his thumb across your cheek.
"You got no idea. Let me show you. Let me take care of you."
Let me take care of you.
Your hands came back up to his hair, tracing the hairline there, down to the protruding cheekbone, how could he feel such things with so much certainty? All this want, a desperation for this. But you knew, because you'd been feeling it too. For him. It was the part of how you fit into it all which made you uncertain.
But now…hearing him talk like that…
"Okay."
His eyes softened a bit at that, "Yeah?" he breathed.
"Yeah," you nodded, hands threading further into his hair.
"Okay," he mimicked, quieter this time.
One of his hands slid from your face down your back, broad palm warm as it moved over you, settling at your waist before slipping under the hem of your sweatshirt. His skin was rough against yours, calloused and steady, and the touch made your stomach flip. "Gonna take this off, alright?"
You nodded.
"Got no idea," he murmured under his breath, shaking his head faintly.
He leaned down to steal a quick kiss from your mouth as he did it, the movement easy, almost absentminded, like he couldn't quite stop touching you. Then he was lifting the sweatshirt up and over you, the fabric dragging warm across your ribs before it disappeared somewhere behind him.
A low rumble rolled out of him when he pulled back enough to look at you. Your chest, bare to the cool evening air now, heaved in heavy breaths, and then you felt his lips on your hip a second later, warm and sudden against your skin, the rough brush of his beard making you jolt. When you looked down, he was watching your breasts as they rose and fell with the motion of your lungs.
"And these?" he whispered, kissing past the hem of his borrowed pants.
"Okay," you said again, gnawing your lip, your hands always touching him without meaning to. In his hair, scratching through his beard, drifting across the broad plane of his shoulder.
He looked up at you as he placed another light kiss to your pelvis.
"Love seein' you in my clothes," he whispered. "But my god if it ain't better seein' em off of ya."
"Cornball," you chastised with a smile. He returned it, eyes crinkling at the corners as he looked up at you. Then he sat back and tugged the borrowed pants down your legs one at a time, peeling them away until you were bare to the room, to his gaze. You noticed, suddenly, you could no longer see the hazel in them anymore.
"Not fair," you kicked at him as the pants came off, "take these off—" you nudged the hem of his shirt, then toed at belt holding up his jeans, trying to push them off too.
He grabbed your ankle, and pulled you down the mattress, hard so the back of your thigh was up against the denim of his lap. If you would've looked down, you could've seen your slick darkening against the zipper that hid his bulge.
"Bossy girls don't get what they want," he said, a slow grin spreading across his face.
And for a second you got a glimpse of The Texxxas Wrangler there. Cocky, knowing, confident.
You tried to kick at him again, but his grip on your ankle tightened, and he leaned down and bit the sole of your foot.
You yelped, and he held your leg open, "you're not lettin' me enjoy this, naughty girl."
Then his gaze dropped again, attention settling between your legs in a way that made heat rush straight to your face.
"Fuck," he breathed under his breath, shifting down and guiding your legs up over his shoulders. "Should'a known a pretty girl would have a pretty pussy like this."
He moaned a little just looking at it.
You could feel how wet you were, how it made your folds shine as he blew gently across your sensitive skin, pursing his lips and making you whine dramatically. Your legs hooked over his back, pulling him in.
"Be good," he scolded lightly, kissing just to the left of your slick, trembling center.
You huffed, but kept quiet.
He kissed again, then to the other side, and closer and closer, and your hips began to move, desperate for more. His thick beard scraped against you, prickling and thick against your sensitive skin.
His lips, soft and warm and wet, finally, finally pursed and kissed your throbbing nub.
"Ohhh…" you sighed in relief, letting your body become putty in his hands, which were sliding around your hips to keep you steady as his tongue dipped out, a bowl collecting nectar as he licked up and down, like he'd finally gotten a taste of ambrosia after years in a desert.
He moaned and groaned as he ate at you. There was no other word for it. He was a man starved far too long. And now you understood why none of those girls' moans had sounded so annoyingly pornographic. Because now you were here, in his arms, making mewling noises you couldn't control as his tongue pushed into you, his teeth scraping just barely over your clit when he pulled it into his mouth, tongue flattening against it.
Your hand was buried deep in his hair, legs locked around him, hips moving to thier own accord.
"Tha's it," he panted, tongue out, letting you push and pull up against him, "tha's it, baby, c'mon now, use my mouth and come on my face, yeah,"
Oh, fuck.
His hands dug into the flesh of your hips, holding you there, guiding the slow roll of your body as you pressed down against him. The rough scrape of his beard, the wet heat of his mouth, the way he seemed to know exactly how to keep you right on that edge—it all built and built until the tension snapped. With one last nudge of that wet muscle of his tongue, you broke apart above him, hips trembling as pleasure spilled through you while he kept you steady, coming against his face.
Your head was thrown back, mouth open as you dragged in deep mouthfuls of air, your body rocking against him until the motion softened, slowing to a gentle sway before you finally settled, loose and liquid in his bed. He smiled up at you, kissing the inside of your thigh before crawling over you.
He slid his shirt off easily, tossing it somewhere onto the floor. Your legs stayed wrapped around him, though now they locked around his hips now as he shifted between them.
"That was —" he huffed a little bemused chuckle, "god damn perfect,"
You couldn't help grinning back at him, a little drunk on the rush still flooding your body. A soft, simpering sigh slipped out of you as you watched him unbuckle his belt and push out of his pants.
But then the world came rushing back when you looked down and saw him free his throbbing cock. It didn't jut up and out like ones you'd seen before, but hung heavily between you, veined and thick and angry red.
"Oh—"
"S'okay," he cooed, letting it rest against your belly as he leaned forward to kiss you. You could taste yourself on his lips, honey and musk and the sweet tang of arousal. "Gonna take it nice and slow."
You nodded into the kiss, letting him deepen it, your mouth opening for him as his tongue pushed in, nice and slow and indulgent. You let him take his time there, the kiss turning messy and hungry, little sounds slipping from both of you between breaths, his deep, rough curses and your low hums of pleasure.
You felt his hands moving below, adjusting the angle of your bodies until he could press himself just against your folds. Your brows pinched slightly, and maybe he felt the tension in you, because all he did was rock his hips so the underside of his cock slid along your soaked folds.
"How's that, honey? Huh?" he cooed.
"So good," you breathed against his mouth, humming softly as the veins along his shaft dragged against your clit, the friction making your hips start to move on their own, ankles tightening around his lower back. "M-more, please."
He smiled into the next kiss, "Okay, baby, gonna give you a little more, anythin' you want."
He nudged the head of himself against your weeping entrance, and all you could feel was heat, like your body had caught fire and his had with it.
"Deep breath for me, angel," he whispered, one hand sliding into your hair, settling at the nape of your neck with a steady grip that kept you anchored with him. Your hands curled around his shoulders as he kissed you again, catching your bottom lip lightly between his teeth so you'd focus.
You drew in a breath, and he licked just inside your teeth, tasting you again as he slowly began to push in.
Both of you gasped.
Breaking from the kiss only by a fraction, you didn't pull away so much as hovered there, mouths open, breathing hard. Every shaky inhale you took pulled straight from his mouth, and every breath he exhaled warmed your lips in return. Your noses brushed, foreheads nearly touching, the two of you gasping there together at the feeling of it, the stretch of him, the heat of you, sharing the same thin pocket of air.
And then his head fell in the crook of your neck as he pushed in another inch, making you keen.
"Joel, oh—oh god."
"I know," he whispered, the words breaking through a groan like a crack in his throat. "I know, baby, slow, slow, slow—"
You weren't sure if he was talking to you or to himself then, the way he kept repeating it, easing in another inch and moaning even louder.
"God—" he breathed, his forehead dipped harder against your neck. "Your pussy feels so fuckin'—holy—"
You brought your legs higher around his waist, opening for him, lifting to take more of that stretch.
"More, Joel, more," you urged.
It was like being split down the center. Physically, yes, your body barely able to take the obsene stretch of him. But also… it felt like your life had been split in half. Because there was suddenly a before this moment, and an after. Where the road split, where your heart line split off and became new and whole.
Because there would never be anything like this.
"Joel, please, I need—"
He pushed in further, cursing on every inch he settled into you.
Your hand slid deeper into his hair, fingers tightening there, and you heard him hiss in a breath as his arms wrapped around you, pulling you tight, locking your bodies together in a vice like grip.
And then—suddenly—he was flipping you.
Your eyes swam with the motion as he shifted, flipping your position and bringing you upright into his lap, your legs still wrapped around him.
Your head fell back, mouth open as you settled fully around the heft of his cock. The thicket of hair at his base brushed your clit, rough and welcome.
"Lemme see you," he whispered, kissing the underside of your chin. "Wanna see your face when I fuck you."
You whined, rocking your hips.
"Look at me, little lady,"
You did as you were bid.
He shook his head, "You're fuckin' perfect, you know that?"
You moaned, a little breathless now, noticing the sheen of sweat starting to gather along his hairline.
"You're—" he rocked his hips again, pushing a little deeper, his voice catching mid-sentence. "Jesus… you feel so good, baby, pussy was made for me."
"Yours," you breathed. "M-made for you, Joel."
A rough groan tore out of him at that.
"Yeah?" he breathed, eyes locked on your face as he moved beneath you again, rocking his hips into you. "My cock's just for you too, baby. Only for my best girl."
Your hands tightened in his hair.
"Fuck," he breathed, voice dropping lower, rougher. "Takin' it so good… c'mon now… I can feel how bad she loves it."
You rocked your hips with his, desperate for more of him, the motion drawing another low groan from his chest.
"Want more, Joel," you whispered, voice breathless but stubborn. "You won't break me, I promise, please, show me—I want it all."
He groaned desperately at that, "Careful what you wish for, baby, fuck—"
His arms, already wrapped around you, tightened so you were slick body against slick body, his wirey chest hair scraping your sensitive nipples where they laid up between his chest and chin, your stomach flipping at the feeling of being so close. There was nothing but breath between you then.
He felt deeper than before now as he held you down against him, thick-banded arms made for hauling hay and handling horses now keeping you tight against his chest. His breath had gone short and rough, every sound leaving his throat lower, more unhinged than anything you'd ever heard from him before.
You’d watched him on those tapes, heard the grunts and soft curses, but nothing like this. This was different. Animal, almost, in the way he dragged in breath and cursed against your skin.
His lips came up against your ear as he thrusted up into you.
"Can ya hear how greedy your little pussy is for me, baby?"
Your nails dug deeper into his shoulders.
"She's been cryin' for me all this time, hasn't she? Just wanted a little taste. That right?"
You nodded quickly, breath breaking apart in your throat. "Yes, fuck, yes, Joel, please don't stop—"
"Ain't stoppin' til she comes all over my cock—"
"Fuck, fuck" you hiccuped, whining, "—I've never—I don't know if I can—"
"S'alright, darlin'. I got you. C'mon, lemme show ya."
He leaned away, letting himself lay back then, your skin suddenly cold to the air and his hands loosening but holding roughly to your hips.
"Play with yourself, lemme see, I'll show ya—"
You did it without thinking. You'd do anything he asked. He felt so deep, so right, buried inside you that your brain had momentarily shut off, all wires only directed to him and what he told you.
Your fingers found your clit and you began circling the swollen bud, but you winced, the pressure too sharp, too much all at once. A small whine slipped out of you as your hips rolled restlessly against him.
He pushed your hand away and replaced it with his thumb, wet with spit, and your head fell back again, a soft, helpless sound leaving you.
"Yeahhh," he breathed, teeth showing in a rough grin as he watched you. "Just like that. Ride me, baby. Tha's it… right there, huh? Just needed me to show ya how it's done."
"Oh fuck—fuck, fuck, I—I think I'm—"
"Yes," he rasped, grip tightening on your hips. "Come for me, baby."
Your body seized around him, your spine arching as the feeling tore through you, bright and overwhelming. You reached for him instinctively and he pulled you down tight against him again, thrusting up hard as you rode out the trembling rush of it, white sparks bursting behind your eyes.
He was cursing under his breath now, jaw tight, the sound of it rough and broken as the tension finally snapped in him too, his arms locking around you while he groaned your name against your neck, spilling everything into you.
Your body was still trembling around him even as your breath settled, small aftershocks shivering through your thighs and stomach, your chest pressed tight against his as he held you there. His own breath came hot and uneven against the side of your neck, every inhale dragging through his chest like it had to claw its way out of him.
Soon, he was releasing his tight hold on your body and letting you slide beside him, his wet spent cock laying obscenely against his stomach as it softened, your core sore with the memory of it.
Your body felt loose, almost boneless, heat fading from your skin as the cool air of the room crept back in. The sweat between your shoulders cooled slowly. He leaned down and brought the light blanket over the both of you, groaning in exhaustion. You stayed close, your thigh still draped over his.
And underneath that fading warmth, something else was stirring.
You felt as if your entire self lay bare, as if your heart, only recently stitched back together so tightly, was being pulled open again, stitch by stitch, given room to breathe.
You nestled deeper beside him, burying your nose into the wiry hair of his chest and inhaling.
“Tell me this will never end,” you murmured.
His arm came around your shoulders, wide hand settling over the cup of your shoulder, and his lips found the top of your head, inhaling your similar scent. Irish Spring, arousal, sweat. You were so heavily intertwined you weren't sure where he ended and you began yet.
“It don’t have to,” he said softly.
You pressed closer, hiding deeper against him. He was warm, smelled clean and familiar, something safe your body wanted to believe in. Every hormone in you was humming, coaxing you toward confession, loosening your tongue in that reckless way that came after being held like this.
“Sometimes I…” you faltered, breath shaking, your face turning further into his chest. “I feel like everything I’ve ever wanted just gets taken away somehow. Either because of me or…something.”
Joel paused, you heard the way his breath paused, the way his mouth stopped its lazy kisses in your hair. His hand slipped between your cheek and his chest, fingers easing under your chin.
He tipped your face up.
“What makes you say that, hun?”
His eyes were soft, heavy with sleep and something deeper, his brows drawn together in that familiar line between them. Up close like this he looked warm and solid and achingly kind. Hazel again.
You leaned in and brushed your lips against his, and he welcomed it, pinching your chin a little harder before pulling away again.
“Tell me why you think that about yourself,” he said quietly.
You swallowed.
"Because I went to school and failed. Once I felt like I was ready for my baby, I failed her too. I came here and..." Your throat thickened, voice wobbling. "I failed Paloma and her baby."
He was shaking his head all along.
Joel was shaking his head before you’d even finished.
“No you didn’t, baby. Hey—c’mere.”
Because you were crying again. Tears slipping down your temples into your hair, your breath shuddering in your chest.
“S’gonna be okay,” he murmured, gathering you closer. “School’ll always be there if you wanna go back. And one day I bet you’ll be an amazin’ mama if that’s what you want, alright?”
You noticed the thing he didn’t say.
Because neither of you knew if Paloma was alive, if her foal had lived. Your heart constricted at the thought.
“I should’ve been here tonight. That ain’t on you, okay?” he said, rocking you gently. You pressed your face harder into his neck as his hand smoothed through your hair.
“Everything I’ve ever wanted just gets taken away,” you whispered hoarsely. “Every time something starts to feel good I’m just… waiting for it to get pulled out from under me.”
“I know, trust me I know,” he said finally, voice low.
“I thought I was gonna be here my whole life," he went on. "The ranch, workin’ with my pops. Thought that was how it was meant to go.” His thumb traced slow circles along your arm. “Then life had other ideas.”
You shifted a little, listening.
“If I hadn’t had Sarah, though…” he continued softly. “My whole life would’ve looked different. Who knows what could'a happened, might've left and never come back. Might never’ve met you. I don't wanna know what that version of my life would be like. Sarah's the best thing that ever happened to me. I only know that now, after the fact.”
His lips brushed your hair again.
“Things change, hun. But that don’t mean they’re taken from you. Sometimes they’re just movin’ you somewhere else, right where you're supposed to be. And right now this is where you're supposed to be, in an old man's bed.”
You clung to him as you let out a wet chuckle, and your crying began to subside, his warmth rocking you slowly until the weight of sleep started creeping over you.
Somewhere in that haze you heard him speak again.
“I think I’m gonna go see her.”
Your brain lagged behind the words.
“Sarah?” you murmured.
He nodded, thick beard scraping your hairline.
“I think she would love that.”
After
It was so warm. Your eyes, sleepy and heavy, opened to the soft light stretching pale across the bedroom wall, filtering in through the thin curtains and laying itself gently over your bare skin. You were sprawled across the sheets, limbs loose and heavy in the aftermath of sleep and everything the night had given, the air still carrying the faint scent of Joel and something deeper, something that felt settled now instead of uncertain.
You realized then that you'd woken to the sound of the door opening. You hadn't even realized he'd gotten up, that he'd left the bed at all.
But there he was now, black t shirt stretching across his chest with the smell of coffee drifting in ahead of him. The smell was rich, grounding, tickling your nose to wake. The mattress dipped where your hips curved, and he sat there carefully, like he didn’t want to disturb anything that had been built overnight.
When your eyes opened fully, he was already watching you.
“Hey,” he said softly.
He set the mug down on the side table and reached for you without hesitation, his fingers brushing the hair back from your temple. The pad of his thumb traced slow along your hairline, smoothing it away from your face.
"Mornin'," you said groggily.
“How're you doin’?”
The memories of the night, of before you and him… it came back all at once.
The barn. The blood. Paloma’s body beneath your hands. The terrible stillness of the foal.
Your throat tightened.
You turned your face slightly into the pillow, staring at nothing in particular, and he kept brushing your hair back, slow and steady, like he was trying to soothe something he couldn’t see.
He didn’t rush to fill the silence. He stayed there beside you, so warm and solid as his fingers combed gently through your hair, thumb resting at the base of your skull.
He was still smiling down at you. A soft grin, something gentle and kind in his expression as he watched you, until finally, he said:
“I wanna show you somethin'.”
Your brow furrowed.
“Get dressed,” he said, and there was something in his voice now. Something he was trying not to give away.
You searched his face for a second longer, then pushed yourself up, the sheet slipping from your shoulder. You dressed quickly into the borrowed sweatshirt and sweatpants, your heart beginning to beat harder for reasons you didn’t yet understand.
He took your hand and led you down the stairs, out into the kitchen, and you slid on your sneakers to walk out the front porch steps and toward the barn. The morning air was crisp and clean, the world washed new in the light. Gravel crunched beneath the soles of your shoes as you crossed the yard, your chest tight with a fragile kind of dread.
You stepped inside the barn, expecting the pit in your stomach to dip.
Except, it didn't.
Because there was a smell to the barn now, no longer metallic or wet, but…warm and fresh and alive. The smell of fresh bedding and milky breath.
You looked up at Joel then, searching his face for anything that might explain it. He was already watching you, smiling in a way that was softer than you’d seen in a long time, guiding you forward with a quiet tilt of his chin.
You moved quickly, rounding the corner into the far foaling stall.
And there she was.
Paloma stood on her feet, head bent into a fresh pile of hay, chewing lazily like nothing in the world had nearly taken her from you. Morning light streamed in through the back window and caught along her flank, still a little damp, still marked by the night before.
But alive. Alive and steady and breathing and real.
Beside her, a small, gangly shape wobbled uncertainly on too-long legs.
The sound that left you wasn’t quite a laugh and wasn’t quite a sob. Your hands flew to your mouth to contain it, but it spilled through anyway, the feeling of it all breaking open in your chest at once.
You stepped into the stall slowly this time, like you were afraid the scene might vanish if you moved too fast. The little foal was blonder than its mother, a bright white blaze cutting down its delicate face, striking and soft all at once. Its knobby knees buckled as it nudged at Paloma’s side, impatient and indignant, already demanding the world give it what was wanted.
Your tears ran freely now, unchecked. You lowered your hands and reached out, and the foal turned toward you with wide curiosity, stepping close enough to mouth at the strings of your hoodie. Paloma lifted her head and gave a low nicker, as if to say she remembered you too, before returning calmly to her hay.
“Thought you might wanna meet ’er,” Joel said from the doorway. He leaned there with his arms folded, watching you instead of the horses.
“This is Ellie,” he added.
Everything in you stilled. You turned slowly to look at him, breath caught in your throat, heart stopping. The only thing keeping your two feet on the ground was the little filly stomping around for your attention.
"What?"
He nodded once.
“She’s strong,” he said simply. “Tess said she fought for her damn life. Her and mama both.”
The world felt too bright all at once.
You laughed through your tears and turned back to the horses, the baby's eyes wide and doe like as they looked up at you.
“Hi, Ellie,” you whispered.
"She'll be yours to take care of," he then added, stern, but there was some amusement in it, and when you looked back at him, he was almost uncertain again, "if you choose to stay."
You let the filly drift back to her mother, and you you were suddenly crossing the stall in two big steps and throwing your arms around his neck. He barely had time to unfold his arms from his chest before you were kissing him, smiling so wide it felt like your face might split.
And this time, there wasn't anything holding you back. No more cowardice or uncertainty. Because you finally understood.
Everything, no matter how great or small or terrifying or joyous, had been leading you here all along.
epilogue coming soon! thank you so much for reading!!!
|| smut MDNI 18+, tommy miller x reader, canon compliant (takes place on seattle day 3), WLF!reader, deserter!reader, little bit of mean!tommy, enemies to lovers toleration, excluding some tags that would spoil the plot, pinv, m!receiving oral, gun kink, dirty talk, condescending dirty talk, public (?) sex, sex on the beach 🍹 lots of action and prose of shooting / violence, morally gray reader, reader has hair long enough to put into a ponytail, size kink, you can picture either tommy I dont have much description of him ||
a/n: I love being a little melodramatic. please note if you have not played tlou2 and have only watched the show this will contain spoilers for you. reader does not reflect my feelings on the salt lake crew & abby
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
-Robert Frost, Fire & Ice
"Quiet."
Some people will tell you fear feels like ice water. Like a cold rush from a dam breaking loose, shooting into your bloodstream, halting every thought, staggering you into stillness. A feeling so cold, its as if the makeshift shiv at your throat had already sliced into you, killing you then and there. The cold touch of Death, nothingness, The End.
But not this. This— the fear now, it felt like fire. Like your blood was alive, roaring with the need to think faster, move faster, to construct an escape before your mind could even catch up. Your nerves sparked like struck flint, alive alive alive. It was something your brain only unlocks in dire circumstances—its will to live, even if you couldn’t be sure for how long.
You struggled against his grip. It is a his, a he— it's in the timber of his voice that you can tell. In the thickness of the wiry hair that scrapes beneath your jaw as your chin strained to pull away from the crook of his elbow where he held you tight against him. He had one arm locked around your neck, the other hand gripping that shiv. You'd barely caught a glance at it before he was pressing it to your skin, the cold bite of it at your throat, his mouth close against your ear to silence you.
“Easy now,” he whispered, tightening his hold.
Unfortunately, your legs had been kicking so hard to find balance that you eventually lose your footing, canvas sneakers slipping against the concrete, and you were forced to push back into his lap for any kind of support. It put the balance squarely in his favor—the power into his court.
"Your friends won't be too happy to find ya dead, now, will they?"
You had half a mind to laugh at the absurdity of it.
Below, you could see two figures diving around cars, shouting imperceivable messages to one another as they start weaving their way into the infested parking garage you just managed to crawl out of unscathed.
“Not—” you dragged in a thin breath and bring your hand up to grip his forearm, trying to wrench it down. Your vision started to darken at the edges. “— my friends.”
“That so?” he chuckled.
There was a strain in his voice even through the amusement. A faint cracking through the center of it, like it hadn't been used in a while. Like he hasn’t spoken much at all.
Was he alone out here?
“I’ll—I’ll prove it,” you gasped.
“Likely story—” The shiv presses harder into your throat.
Your heel finally caught against the concrete and you drove yourself backward into him, hard enough to knock him off balance for half a second. The hand holding the shiv shot out behind him to keep him upright, his bicep loosening around your neck just enough for you to wrench free from his hold.
You ran, closing the short distance to where your gun had skidded when he grabbed you. You snatched it up and swung back toward him in one motion, arm locked straight, jaw set, feet planted wide and ready.
He raised his hands slowly, something almost resigned settling into his face, though he was not fully watching you. His eyes kept cutting toward the cement bridge below, where two WLF soldiers were sprinting.
"You know them, then?"
You kept the barrel trained on him.
"Yeah."
"So this was the plan, huh? You guys split up and send a scrawny little thing like you to come pin me down?"
You narrowed your eyes on him. Your mind was moving too fast to think, though your blood had cooled to a composed, grounded pulse in your ears as you looked a the trespasser.
"Give me your rifle."
"Fuck you."
You cocked your gun, pulling back the hammer. It made a sick, confident clicking noise in your hand.
His mouth twisted in frustration and a low, irritated sound pushed out of him as he slid the rifle off his shoulder and lowered it carefully to the ground.
"Slide it over." you ordered.
He shoved it across the concrete with his boot. The metal scraped harsh and loud until it reached your feet.
“Here’s what’s going to happen, trespasser,” you said evenly. “I’m going to prove I’m not with them—” he let out a sharp, disbelieving laugh, but you didn't falter, “—and then you’re going to take me to the aquarium.”
"And why in the hell would I do somethin' like that?"
There was a southern charm to his voice, a rough twang that was almost easy, the kind that might have sounded friendly if he hadn't pressed a blade to your throat a minute earlier. He had a thick beard threaded with aging gray, clear eyes beneath a heavy brow, and a straight nose that had been bent a couple times from what you supposed was a right hook.
“Because I know Seattle—” you said, bending carefully without lowering the gun or breaking eye contact as you scooped up the rifle and slung it over your shoulder. It was well kept, not some scavenged scrap, the wood stock worn smooth from years of use and a matte black scope fitted cleanly along the top
"—and I know where Abby is."
The man's face fell colorless with shock.
You took that split second, that suspended breath of time, to turn, hook the rifle out the window of the walkway overlooking the highway and pressed your eye to the scope just as the two figures darted for the mouth of the parking garage.
You pulled the trigger.
In the same instant, hands grabbed you again, shoving you hard and wrenching at the strap across your back, but you were already tangled in the leather and he couldn't rip it free. You staggered into him, caught in a clumsy hand-to-hand struggle over the rifle, aware now of how tall he was, how broad through the shoulders, solid and heavy, carrying the smell of gunpowder and mint and the stale musk of someone who had been living outdoors for a long while.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doin!?” he growled, hauling you around by the strap as he tried to wrench the rifle back.
“Get off me!” you screeched.
Then another sound tore through the air.
More screaming, but not from you.
Both of you went still, heads snapping toward the ruined, waterlogged highway. Nothing moved there anymore. Your gaze lifted instead toward the parking garage where you had aimed your shot, and you saw.
Your plan was working.
Infected—the couple dozen you'd moved around silently to get away, were awake and furious now, their shrieks echoing through the concrete as gunfire cracked from inside the structure. The two WLF soldiers were trapped in there with them, firing wildly and only stirring them into a worse frenzy.
"We need to get out of here." your words shook with realization.
The man was frozen, looking between you and the parking garage.
"Give me my gun."
"Are you deaf, old man? We need to get out!"
He finally turned to you, meeting your eyes, and he was no longer fighting the strap. “You’ve got yerself a deal, little lady. Give me my gun, and I’ll get you to the aquarium.”
You narrowed your eyes at him, your chest rising and falling in tight pulls of air. The space between you had shrunk when you both stilled. The rifle was the only thing keeping your bodies from colliding— without it, you would’ve been pressed straight into him: into the solid line of his stomach, the heat of him damp with sweat and close enough to feel.
He must've seen your hesitation, because he leveled his gaze at you, and said, unflinchingly:
"I swear."
Stupidly, naively, childishly— you believed him.
You slipped the leather strap from your shoulders and handed the rifle back into his cracked, calloused grip. He leaned it over the edge and pressed his eye to the scope.
He fired, the sound of the gun's power echoing loudly over the concrete around you. He barely flinched into the kickback of the weapon.
Then he fired again.
Then reloaded and did again once more.
“Can’t see shit with all them fuckin’ cars,” he muttered, "shit's bouncin' off the walls—Gotcha!"
You heard a man's voice shouting from the garage then, but couldn't make out the words of pain. But you knew one thing—the voices were closer.
"We need to leave, man." you said warily, forcing the urgency in our voice to steady. “If they make it up those steps, they’ll be right at that door. And then we’re cornered. I know the way down to the boathouse. If you just—”
“Get down!” he barked.
You dropped without thinking, your training snapping into place before a thought even had the chance to form.
A bullet ricocheted off a deserted cart beside you, sparks flashing where you had been standing only a second before.
The man grabbed the back of your collar then and shoved you toward the end of the bridge walkway without a word. His grip was firm, decisive. You knew what he meant. You knew what he wanted.
So you ran.
“HEY!” a voice rang out from the walkway behind you, deep and furious. “¡Estás pinche muerto!”
But you were already moving, lungs burning, sneakers pounding against the concrete as your ally’s heavier footfalls followed close enough that you could feel the vibration of them in your spine.
Inside, the structure opened up—a terminal, wide and echoing and long abandoned, but instead of airport gates, there were faded cruise line banners peeling from the walls, rotting posters promising turquoise water and easy sunsets, a world of polished decks and clean sheets you had never once known. Rows of bolted down chairs became your bunkers, and you slid in behind them, waiting for the Wolves to round the bend from the walkway into the open space.
You saw one of them first. A face you recognized.
You fired.
The recoil jolted up your arm.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
"Deserter!" one of them shouted.
You bit your tongue and fired another shot. You just needed them injured enough to leave.
Beside you, the man had pulled his pistol and was firing steadily now, not wasting movement, not saying a word. His jaw was set, mouth pulled thin, eyes narrowed down the sight of the oncoming pack.
As the two Wolves broke into a sprint toward your position, you didn’t wait. You surged up and ran again, your ally close behind, and just as you reached the next threshold you heard the small, sickening clink of metal hitting carpet.
Your heart jumped high into your throat and your body moved before your mind caught up, legs driving you forward harder out of range as the explosion tore through the space behind you, the blast rattling the walls and punching the air from your lungs.
Dust and gunpowder filled the terminal in a choking wave, thick and acrid, turning the world into shifting gray. The smoke burned your eyes, but it gave you something they weren’t expecting.
Cover.
You used it, veering into the next departure gate and dropping behind another row of chairs deeper into the terminal. Your back hit the seat hard enough to bruise as you turned toward your approaching ally.
“Look,” you panted when he slid in beside you, your voice shaking despite your effort to steady it, “the team I was with—”
“Don’t care,” he cut in, not even looking at you as he checked his weapon. “You wanna get to the aquarium? Aim and shoot. Talk later.”
You looked over at him, watching him for a little longer than necessary. He met your gaze, steady, unblinking, and something passed between you in the damp cold of the empty terminal — understanding, urgency, no room for anything else.
So you nodded.
“Here’s what we’re gonna do,” he whispered as he reloaded his pistol, movements quick, practiced. “You’re gonna head for that garage door, make it look like we both went in, and I’m gonna—”
"—you want us to split up?" you hissed.
He glared at you.
Right. You barely knew him. It didn’t matter if you split up. He could turn around and put a bullet in your back the second you got him to the aquarium. If you didn't kill him first.
"Fine, fine."
"Go!"
You thought there had to be more to it than that, but when you looked up you saw why he wasn’t wasting time spelling it out. The two Wolves were closing the distance fast, vaulting over rows of chairs and dividers, gaining ground. For a second you caught a clearer glimpse of the second one — a woman, braid down her back. You were stunned into frigidity.
Then fingers hooked into the back of your collar again and yanked.
"You suddenly go deaf, girl? Move!"
You pushed up and both of you sprinted for the garage door, committing to the diversion. The metal door slammed down behind you with a heavy crash, and bullets ricocheted off the sheeted surface in sharp, violent pings before everything went still.
There were footsteps on the other side and then you heard the sound of the metal door lifting. You raised your gun in two hands, aiming dead center where they’d step through — but then it stopped, and the door dropped down. You heard whispering instead, the shuffle of boots shifting position.
It was quiet again. The only sound in the room was the quick inhale and exhale of you trying to steady your heart.
You looked around. It was some kind of diner, booths bolted to the floor, counters warped with age. The whole place tilted faintly side to side, like you were standing inside the belly of a ship. A cruise liner built for drinking and pretending the ocean was safe.
Fuck, did your guy seriously ditch you? Why did you trust his plan? The wolves would be in here any second, two against one—
The crack of his rifle split the air like thunder.
A scream followed. Metal slammed somewhere outside. A body stumbled into view ahead, crashing over a stack of bins that blocked the entrance to the double doors on the opposite end of the room, and you finally saw her face as she pitched forward.
Then your ally, the man, he was lifting the garage door beside you and kneeling under to get through, and he grabbed your arm and shoving you toward the far end of the restaurant. Both of you hid behind the bar.
"Hey—I think—I need to tell you—"
"Let's go—"
"—But—"
“The hell did I say?” he snapped under his breath, low and sharp enough that it barely carried, but the bite of it sank like fangs. “Talk later. Now you’re gonna go out that damn door and hide. I’m gonna draw them in and take them at the threshold. If I get stuck you help me. Do you hear me? Or do I need to spell it out for you, soldier?”
Your spine snapped straight.
For a split second you were back on that training floor, Isaac in your face on your second day, barking about the two braincells you had and how "maybe, just maybe, you ought to make them cooperate!". The memory hit hot and humiliating as you stared into the stranger's eyes.
Your heart jumped into your throat.
But all you did was nod.
"Now go."
Outside the open door, the ocean misted against your chapped skin, cold and saline and relentless as it battered the side of the ship ahead of the storm rolling in. You veered right when the dock opened up, and ducked behind a stack of overturned tables, the wood swollen from years of salt and rot.
It didn’t take long for him to slip out after you. He didn’t look your way. He stayed pressed to the doorframe, rifle ready, his shoulders rising slowly as his breath steadied as if in tandem with yours, even far away, just waiting.
Then you saw who he was waiting for.
He moved fast. The door slammed into her with a hollow crack and sent her stumbling, and he drove the butt of his rifle into her temple before she fully found her footing. She reeled but didn’t drop. When he had her pinned against the railing, rifle across her collarbone, you saw her face clearly. And so did he.
It was Abby.
She shoved back hard, palm up to his face to push him back. It was muscle against muscle, fury against fury. Brute strength versus brute strength.
But then there was movement to the other side of the boat. It was someone else running up, a girl who couldn't have been older than 15. And she was on him with a knife. He shouted then, and lost his balance.
You thought you should move, should do something. But you were frozen. What the hell was Abby doing here? And with a Seraphite? Your brain was trying to make things work, but how could Isaac's top scar killer be here? Was she with Manny the entire time and you just hadn't seen her? This man had taken out the entire team. You thought she'd be with Owen at the aquarium— it was why—it was why you were heading there, you… you thought…
The world tilted with the swell of the ship and suddenly your ally was no longer holding Abby against the dock railing. They had shoved and moved so much that now he was leaning back, trying to fight her off until Abby shoved once more and the swollen rotting dock railing broke and he went over.
You gasped, the sound ripped from you. Your palm met your face fast enough to stifle it.
You watched as Abby and the Seraphite spoke to one another, and Abby looked…she looked terrible. Covered in blood, her chest heaving in terrified lungfuls. You wished you could hear what they were saying over the roaring of the waves below and the wind beginning to howl.
Where was Manny? Was he not her back up? Had he gone down inside? Your world was moving violently with the bow of the ship, your brain umable to make things make sense. Nothing made any sense anymore.
Then they were moving again, pointing down toward the lower docks, disappearing without a single notice of you.
You stumbled to the railing and looked over, and saw him, just there.
His body rose and dipped in the violent water, coat dragging him down, head barely breaking the surface between waves.
Was he unconscious?
You hesitated.
You could walk away.
He’d threatened you, held a knife to your throat. He would still kill given the chance.
But you'd been a sort of team back there, covering one another. Making promises and plans. Even though he had the personality of a nasty stray dog, he still protected you.
The ocean crashed hard against the hull.
Fuckkkk….
You vaulted the railing and jumped.
Your shoulders were screaming by the time you reached the shore. Salt burned your lungs and your eyes, and your legs nearly buckled when sand finally caught beneath your shoes.
Your fingers were sore from twisting into his collar, his heels carving trenches behind him as you dragged him higher up the beach. He hadn’t moved once since you’d grabbed him in the water. There wasn't any fight in him or resistance except for the weight of his body against the raging current. His head only lolled to the side, water dripping steadily from his beard.
"Come on," you muttered, more to yourself than him.
You hauled him onto his back once you were far enough from the tide and dropped to your knees beside him. You drove your knuckles hard into his sternum, trying to jolt him awake with pain. No use.
His skin looked wrong, pruned and pale beneath the grime, his mouth slack, water pooling at the corner.
You sucked in a breath and planted your palms flat against his chest, and you pushed down hard.
Again.
Again.
You counted, pressing on rhythm, forcing his heart to respond, wondering in some distant corner of your mind whether you were pushing too hard, cracking the bones beneath. Better a couple broken ribs than death.
"Come on, you motherfucker." you gritted down at him, "at least let me be the one to take you out, not the damn ocean."
You pinched his nose and tipped his chin, descending down onto him. For some reason, at that moment, your stomach made a sort of fluttering squeeze.
But then water burst from his mouth before you could reach him, spluttering and coughing, choking as he rolled to his side. You scrambled back from him as he hacked spit and seawater into the sand, his entire body convulsing.
When he rolled onto his back again, his eyes found you.
You smiled a little sarcastically, "Welcome ba—"
But his hand was shooting out, gripping your sodden ponytail.
He wrenched you around and you hit the sand hard, grit filling your mouth. By the time your vision cleared he was already up, dragging himself to his feet, staggering only for half a second before he steadied. When you looked up, his gun was trained on you.
Water ran down his face and beard, his chest heaving, eyes furious.
“What the fuck is your problem?” you spat, pushing yourself up onto your elbows and spitting sand as he kept the barrel pointed at you.
His chest rose and fell heavily, water droplets dripping from his eyes hard and burning.
“You’ve got about ten seconds,” he said hoarsely, voice scraped raw from salt and rage, “to start explainin’ how you knew.”
"What are you talking about?"
"How the fuck did you know I was lookin' for Abby?" he barked, "I should've known— you knew exactly what I wanted, didn't ya? Meanwhile you were with her the whole time."
"No!" you shook your head, holding up your hand, "Let me explain."
"Ten."
"Wait!"
"Nine."
"Are you fucking serious!?"
"Eight—"
"I WAS A FIREFLY!"
Your voice would’ve echoed off the cliff faces if the surf hadn’t been crashing so loud against the shore.
“Like hell you were—” he growled, but the barrel dipped, if only a fraction.
You raised your hand higher, pushing yourself to sit up on your own. Your other hand, covered in sand, went to your neck and you tugged the chain free.
A dog tag.
It shook in your fingers as you opened your palm for him to see.
“Five years ago, our hospital was attacked,” you said, your hands still lifted in surrender.
"A man came through and killed everyone. Everyone." you whispered. "It was a slaughter."
“I was there,” you went on. “I was one of the nurses. He came in and he killed Jerry. The only one who knew how to make the cure from that little girl.”
He was silent.
"And do you know who Jerry was?" you asked.
The barrel lowered another inch. He still held it ready, but his shoulders had shifted, his eyes no longer fixed straight on you.
"Jerry was Abby's father."
His eyes quickly flashed back to your face.
“The only reason I knew you were looking for her is because I was there again..." you sucked in a brave, deep breath, and said, "At the cabin.”
His lip curled, anger rising hot again. “You—!?”
"I wasn't in the cabin—when you came back—I was out trying to find Abby because she'd run off on her own. I didn't know she had come back until I saw the fire from the molotovs. But after…I saw you. On the floor, passed out. I saw Joel and the girl too."
His mouth tightened, something sharp flickering through his eyes — anger, something heavier under it, something he didn’t want you naming.
“I was only there for my brother,” you said. “He was chasing his ex across states while his girlfriend was pregnant. He was acting like an idiot and I wasn’t letting him drag himself to Wyoming in the middle of winter for her. That’s it. That’s the only reason I was there. And today, I only was there because...because I had left the WLF. Manny and his team were after me. I didn't mean to run into you, but...then I did. And it all made sense.
"And so... that's how I know your name is Tommy Miller.”
He stepped forward and pressed the barrel of the gun to your forehead.
All you could do was glare up at him beneath it, your heart, strangely, a slow and steady pulse in your jugular. This wasn’t fear anymore. You weren’t fighting for your life now. You had laid it all bare for him, everything was out. The truth unhidden.
You could hear his breathing — still ragged, whether from lungs not fully cleared of water or something else, it dragged in and out of him heavy and rough.
Slowly, inch by inch, like you were moving through molasses, you began to lift your hands.
He watched you, glaring down, but he didn’t shift. The gun remained firm against your forehead. Your hands found his knees first, then slid higher, inching up to his thighs, delicate fingers pressing into soaked denim.
“Do you really want to kill the girl who’s your only hope of finding the one you want?”
And ever so careful, you pulled your head away from the pistol.
Tommy’s frown deepened. His upper lip twitched faintly, almost a snarl, as he studied you. You tipped your head back a little farther, so slow it felt unreal — like some drawn-out final scene in a movie where the hero delivers a speech before the last blow. But this wasn’t a movie. This was your life, laid open on the sand.
"You really think I believe you want to help me find her? When your own brother is next on my list?"
Your heart lurched as he said it, but you managed to steady it as your found your center. You would never let him get that far. As long as you were beside him, you could protect your brother.
You leaned in then, letting your tongue dip out, and tasted the tip of the pistol. It was metallic and cold from the ocean, salty and smooth.
“Abby’s strung my brother along for years,” you said quietly. “He’s still in love with her. But she's only ever cared about herself. She’s selfish. She’ll ruin his life more than she already has.”
Your mouth closed over the end of the pistol in a slow kiss, and you saw Tommy swallow thickly. Your hands tightened in his wet, sandy denim as you lifted your gaze to him, dragging your tongue along the side of the metal, never breaking eye contact.
"I take you to her," you said, "--where I know she's headed--" clenching your fingers into his jeans harder, you opened your mouth wide, taking the entire barrel between them and hollowing your cheeks, watching him. The pretty color of his eyes was gone, pupils blown black.
When you pulled back, it came with a soft pop. You licked your lips. "--And you let my brother live."
"Bullshit." Tommy growled, but it was only half confident. Your fingers were up in his lap now, and you could feel his stiffening member beneath the tips of your fingers now.
"He's leaving for Santa Barbara soon, and he wants her to come with him." you kissed and kitten licked up the barrel some more, meanwhile reaching for his button of the denim. He felt big, swollen, mouth watering beneath your touch. "I can't let that happen."
Your tongue left a faint sheen along the metal where you licked up the side.
"No one knew how gruesome she would be that day, Tommy," you whispered, closing your eyes as your lips touched his fingers, which were trembling a little now, "let me save my brother, and you can have Abby."
You unzipped his jeans.
“Yer sick in the head, ain’t ya?” he murmured, voice thick with arousal as he let you work him open, your tongue flicking over his salty fingers where they still hovered near the trigger.
You smiled a little at that as your hand slipped past the teeth of his zipper and into the warmth beneath, pulling him free. He was thick in your palm, velvet soft despite your cold fingers. He hissed as you freed him to the air.
Fuck, you heard him curse. His hand loosened on the gun, lowering it. Your eyes fell to where your hands, both of them now, wrapped around him, two of them still not able to cover the length of him, your pinky scraping against the hair at the base.
"You're so big, Tommy," you murmured, and leaned in to kiss the tip of him just like you had with the pistol.
He groaned loudly at the feeling of your wet mouth on the mushroom head of his cock. So warm and smooth it was like silk in your mouth, pearled with salty arousal that you licked clean.
You let go with a light pop, "Are you going to fuck me with this big cock, Tommy?" you simpered. "I don't know if it'll fit, I can barely take it in my mouth."
You opened your mouth wide, unhinging your jaw, and slid his member onto your tongue, lowering your head until the tip of his cock was kissing your throat.
He groaned loud and ragged at that, his hand no longer holding the gun but now resting at the back of your head.
"Yeah, that's it, take that cock, baby. Still got some left, can't take it all can ya? Too big?"
You met his gaze as tears pricked your vision.
"Actin' all high and mighty with my gun in your mouth, but can't even take a cock, can ya?"
Oh, he was mean.
You tried to take him deeper, brow furrowing with effort, moaning when he twitched against your tongue.
"Come on now, just a bit more, that's it," he said, both hands on your head now as he looked down at you, pushing his cock further into your mouth. Your nose just barely brushed his pubic hair before your throat began to convulse around his intrusion.
He pulled your head off, letting you heave in breaths, and held your hair in one fist, leaning down to take your face in his other.
"Yer all fuckin' talk, ain't ya?" he growled, baring his teeth, "will say anythin' to get me to do what you want. Willin' ta' suck my dick to get me to spare your goddamn brother. That it, baby? Think you can talk me into not killin' ya here and now?"
"Fuck you," you gasped, but his hand was squeezing your cheeks, forcing your lips to pucker.
“I oughta keep fuckin’ that mouth just to shut you up. But I’d rather hear you scream my name.” His grin turned wicked. “Ask for it nicely.”
You glared up at him.
"Can't finish what you started, baby?" he taunted. "Come on now, be a good girl and beg for it."
You couldn't deny that your legs were wobbly where they spread on the sandy beach, that between them was a pool of warm wetness begging to know what he felt like.
"Please."
He tsk'd, a sick click of his tongue against the back of his teeth, and he leaned in and licked the curve of your lips, making your stomach flutter, and you let out an involuntary noise of pleasure at the feeling of the wet muscle along your mouth.
"You can do better than that." he said against them.
"Please fuck me, Tommy."
"Right here on the beach?" he asked in a mock pity, "anyone could see us, darlin'."
"Don't care," you whispered, your brows threading in desperation. You began to rock your hips, searching for anything to help the burn between your legs.
"Look at you, desperate little girl. If only I'd known, I would've fucked you on that bridge instead'a tryna kill ya."
You licked your lips. He watched, and then leaned down, kissing you roughly, holding your face against his as his tongue pushed into your mouth. When he pulled back, he said: "Think you would've like that, huh? Fuckin' a stranger while I was tryna kill those two out there."
You moaned again.
"Yeah, you are a sick little freak." he smiled down at you, "Get on your back."
He let you go, letting your body lay back down on the sand. You immediately began to shimmy off your pants, and he was climbing down on top of you with a seconds notice.
He pulled down your top, freeing your breasts to the cool ocean breeze, and took one in his mouth.
"Oh!" you moaned as his teeth bit down on your pebbled nipple. He moaned into the skin there, his tongue laving over his rough bite.
"Pretty fuckin' tits, Jesus," he murmured as his lips traveled into the valley between them, and took the other one in his mouth, "Could fit the whole thing in my mouth baby, look," he said as he inhaled your breast, the entire globe in his mouth as he sucked and bit.
Your back was arching into him, hands now fisting in his long hair. You pulled it from its ponytail to let it fall around his face before your hands were threading through it again. He moaned as your nails scraped his scalp, like a cat purring in your hands.
"Let me see this desperate lil' pussy, honey, lemme see 'er,"
It was like the more turned on he got, the thicker his accent became, words slurring into one another, and he pulled your underwear down.
"Fuck, okay, hang on, here—"
He shrugged off his backpack, stripped off his soaked jacket, and spread it over the sand beside you.
"Here," he said.
It was oddly romantic. Minutes ago, this man had been holding a gun to your head and now he was lifting you up just enough to scooch you onto his jacket, keeping your naked bum from the sand as he ridded you of your last layers.
"Thank you." you murmured, your finger going to your mouth in a sudden sort of shyness as you pushed together your knees in front of him.
"Don't go thankin' me yet, I ain't gonna be nice."
You let him open your legs then.
"Fuckkk…" he groaned, staring in awe at the center of your legs, which glistened with thick arousal, waiting for him. He saddled up to you, tapping the head of his cock against your sensitive, slick center, making you gasp.
The sudden realization, the contrast of his size to your body beneath him had your skin erupting in goosebumps.
"I—I don't know, Tommy." you whispered, biting down on the finger you had in your mouth. "It's too big—"
Your one hand came down to push against his tummy, keeping him away.
"S'alright," he said with a nod, intertwining your fingers and bringing your hand up to his mouth to kiss your knuckles. He was a juxtaposition in so many ways. Tender and gentle and then rough and mean. He was making your head spin. "We'll make it fit, don't you worry."
He swiped the tip of himself through your slick folds, and then pushed in.
You thought you might've heard a cat yowling in heat on a beach, until you realized it was just you.
Sand shifted beneath you as your back arched. His hand slid up, cradling the bowl of your skull as he leaned over you, eclipsing you completely. Your skin burned where he’d bitten your breasts as they brushed the damp fabric of his shirt pressing over you.
"That's it, that's it—" he said softly, nipping your chin, and then your jaw. His beard scraped your salty skin with every kiss he left along it.
You whined and thrashed a bit at his intrusion, but your legs fell open wider, trying to accommodate his body in the cradle of your lap.
"Ohhh, fuck," he groaned as he finally seated himself entirely in you. You felt split in two, as if your body had been forced in half and you were never going to be the same.
"Oh my god." was all you could say.
And then he moved. He swung his hips back gently, slowly, and you were whining, mewling, scraping your fingers deeper into his hair.
"Oh, oh, I know I know—It's too much huh?" he cooed, "but you wanted it so bad, didn't ya, baby? She seems to like it, can't you hear 'er?"
You let your eyes flutter open as you listened to the sound—waves crashing, his heavy breathing, and then…yes, yes you could hear it. The desperate squelching of your cunt welcoming him, wanting him, drenching his cock in slick as he pushed it back in again, kissing your womb with every thrust.
"Dumb little girl with your big mouth—" he growled, punching his hips against yours, "where's your big girl words now, huh? Talk to me, sugar."
"Feels s-so-sooo—fuck!" you mewled again, your face twisted in pleasure as your body opened for him, and his cock kept hitting that spot that only your fingers knew—one you never had been able to find with a man. Your eyes widened, watching him, his mouth open and no longer cocky.
“Right there?” he demanded.
You nodded quickly.
"Tell me."
"Yes, yes, yes," you chanted, "it feels so good, Tommy, oh god, right there, pleasepleasepleaseplease don't stop—"
“That’s it,” he said, voice rougher now. “Keep goin’. Tell me more.”
“I’m gonna—Tommy—I’m gonna come—”
“Look at me,” he ordered.
You did. His teeth were bared, breath ragged.
“Let me see it when you soak my cock.”
"Please let me—I wanna—oh my god you feel so good."
"Yeah, baby? Your pussy is like heaven honey," he grunted in exertion, "Don't think I could kill you now, gonna have to keep you for myself. Gonna have to take you home with me and fuck this pussy for the rest of my god damn life. Think you might have me ruined."
"No—no—" you shook your head, tightening your fists in his hair, "you're—fuck, you're ruining me. I—please keep fucking me, Tommy, oh god—!"
"Yeah—" he bared his teeth, picking up the pace of his thrusts. He began punching into you, hips against hips hard enough to leave bruises inside your thighs. He took his one hand and gripped your ass, smoothing down your legs to hike your knee over his hip to drive into you deeper. "Take it."
Stars burst in your vision. You could no longer see him, the tightening rope of your belly struck tight and ripped open, your body bowing with it, and he groaned, a gutteral, feral sound ripping from his throat.
“Yeah,” he groaned, voice breaking. “That’s it. Let me feel it. Come all over me sweet girl—”
He froze above you, both of you locked together in that suspended moment, eyes wide as you watched each other unravel.
The waves crashed. The wind tore past. And then you both collapsed back into breath and salt air, still tangled together as he painted your walls with his spend.
Your breath steadied until your inhales were his inhales, your exhales sharing in rhythm. Your legs ached from the stretch of his body, but drew them in anyway, heels dragging up his back until they locked there, keeping him inside you a second longer.
The ocean filled the silence for a long moment, and then it started to rain.
You felt a shift in him, the way he was starting to come back to himself. The tension krept back into his spine, awareness returning.
You loosened your legs, and he pulled back from you.
The loss of his warmth and the cool ocean air around you made you gasp in a breath, your body protesting the emptiness. He avoided your eyes as he stood, pushing his shirt back down his belly where it had ridden up, pushing his spent, wet member back into his jeans.
You closed your legs, and sat up on his jacket, looking for your own clothing.
His silhouette against the darkening water was broad and solid, the last light before the storm came catching along his shoulders. He dragged a hand through his hair, exhaling hard through his nose like he was trying to clear his head.
"I meant what I said," he murmured, though his voice was different now, gentler, even if it was still rough like gravel.
Your stomach flipped, waiting for him to go on.
"About…bringing you back with me." he finally admitted, his eyes finding yours. "I…we have a town that's safe in Jackson."
You swallowed dryly, pulling your underwear back on, slowly getting your own water logged denim back up your legs as you stood. Picking up his sandy jacket, you wiped it off as best you could, holding it in your tired hands.
"If you want." he added when you stayed silent.
"What about my brother?"
Tommy frowned, looking at you. The wind pushed your hair across your mouth. You didn’t look away.
“I gotta finish what I started,” he said finally, eyes drifting past you to the cliffs cut into shadow. “I didn’t come all this way for nothin’.”
You nodded once, and could understood that part of him.
"But… if you come back with me… I won't do anythin'. To him." he shut his eyes, shaking his head a little, as if warring with himself before taking a deep breath.
“It was only ever about her.”
The waves crashed between you, and you held his gaze when they finally opened up to look at you with renewed determination.
Joel Miller is back home running his family’s ranch, the work coming back to him easily even as the house fills with the memories of what happened thirty years ago.
He hires a young farm hand, expecting nothing more than help around the barn. Instead, he finds someone just as lost as he is.
|| chapter tags: angst, tension, longing, everyone is bad with their feelings, very prosey, tw: unintentional skipped meals, soft!joel, nurturing!joel, rancher!joel, tess cameo, more horse things, hard convos, avoidant tendancies in reader, estranged parents, grief, fainting, minor head wounds ||
Inspiration & References: Flawless by Elsie Silver, Flicka (2006), that one moment in Pride & Prejudice (2005)
wc: 11k
You slept terribly.
Last night, you had turned out all the lights and hid in your bedroom under the covers when Joel’s text came through, leaving it unread when he was only asking if you wanted pizza, then double-checking when you didn't reply. You’d stayed hidden beneath the blanket, the soreness between your legs painting everything within you a filthy shade of shame and guilt.
The next morning, you got up extra early and returned the VHS tapes to where they belonged, not bothering to watch any more. God, the sight of them all together turned your stomach turn.
You felt awful for watching his video. Hated yourself for letting your thoughts stray on him like that. You’d ogled him, sure, in the short couple of days you’d known him. He was handsome, after all. He probably made a great porn star. Women must've loved him. You hated yourself even more for wondering how many, picturing him with other people in other rooms.
Your thoughts felt as if they were chasing their own tails until you were dizzy with them.
You rushed to get the horses out before he could come down to check on them, moving on pure urgency, doing your stalls in record time, throwing hay, hopping on Georgie to go check the turned-out herd. It wasn’t until you were halfway down the pasture fence line that you realized Joel’s truck wasn’t in the driveway anymore.
You filled water troughs, counted heads, checked everyone still had their legs and eyes, did everything you were supposed to do, and then some. When you finally came back to the barn, the quiet was both relief and anxiety inducing. You untacked Georgie quickly and turned her back out with her friends before ducking into the feed room, clipboard in hand, trying to ground yourself in organization.
The calendar was a mess. Dental schedules, immunizations, feed deliveries, phone numbers scrawled in the margins. You'd made sure to call the vet for Paloma's checkup, since the calendar noted she was due by the weekend. But as you stared at the rest of the notes, your vision began to blur and haze, the words refusing to resolve into anything useful. You felt your head buzzing as you started a list of things you’d need from the tack store.
Boots. Your canvas sneakers were useless, soaked the second you stepped into mud, no traction in the stirrup and no protection if a horse accidentally stepped on you.
Peppermints. You were almost out, and the horses would riot come bedtime without their nightly treat that you'd spoiled them into expecting.
Grain. Senior, Mare and Foal, mash for Fender soon. All of it piling up in your head faster than you could write it down.
Your pen trembled in your fingers by the time you forgot the three other things you’d meant to add. You couldn't believe how out of it you were over some fucking porn tapes. It's not like people didn't make a good living doing it, and your boss had full autonomy to do whatever the hell he wanted. And it was only human to get turned on watching two people having intercourse, you reasoned with yourself. Whether you knew one of them or not. You tried to shake your head into a more streamline thought, back to the task at hand, but it only made you more dizzy. Your list. What else was there? You were forgetting something—something about grooming supplies or maybe it was a vitamin for Paloma…
"Howdy."
You nearly jumped out of your skin at the sound of the voice from the door, your shaky hands dropping the pen and paper, clammy against your chest as you felt your hammering heart.
In the doorway, to your surprise, wasn't Joel.
"Jesse?"
The guy from the diner, now touching his wide brimmed cowboy hat in greeting, leaned against the door frame with a wide, cocky grin.
“At your service.” he peered around the door into the room. “You’re up and at it early.”
"What—what're you doing here?"
And why were you beginning to feel so light headed?
“Joel picks me up Wednesdays. Diner’s dead, so they never schedule more than one or two of us. I make better money here so I come for the day. But looks like you already did half my work." His smile faltered when he took a better look at you. "Are… you okay?”
"I—um," your heart not slowing even a tick even after the surprise of his entrance caught up to you, and your stomach rolled unpleasantly. "I think I need to sit down."
“Yeah,” he said quickly. “You don’t look good. Come on, just sit here—hey!"
Your eyes narrowed, the room suddenly tilting violently as the edges of your vision went dark.
There was a large, steady warmth cupping the side of your head when you awoke, the pressure firm enough to bring you back to, you but gentle enough that it didn’t hurt.
“There she is,” a deep voice said above you, rough like honey poured over asphalt.
You blinked. The thick wooden beams of the barn ceiling swam into view, crossing and recrossing above you, and then a familiar face slid into focus, hazel eyes fixed on you with something like relief. He wasn’t wearing his hat. His hair stuck at the edge of his face and to his neck, slick with sweat.
“Your hair is so gray,” you said, still half lost in a haze, the words mumbling out without much thought attached.
He let out a soft laugh, breath warm against your face, and the sound did something strange and comforting to your chest, smoothing over a knot you hadn’t realized was there. A second face hovered just behind his shoulder, eyes wide.
And then your memory started coming back to you, and your eyes flew open at the realization.
“Whoa—easy now,” Joel said quickly when you tried to sit up, his body leaning back just enough to give you space. The world rolled around you, head throbbing and your stomach lurching hard enough that you had to wrap your arms around yourself.
"My stomach," you croaked.
"She sick?" Jesse asked from behind Joel, backing up a step.
Joel glanced back at him, then down at you again, his hand still resting warm and solid on your shoulder, thumb pressing just slightly, “Go grab the first aid kit, will ya, kid? She clipped her head on the desk when she went down.”
Jesse nodded and disappeared without another word.
Joel leaned closer again, lowering his head to try and meet your eyes, “What’s goin’ on, darlin'?” he asked quietly. “You feel nauseous?”
You shook your head, even though the motion made everything slosh behind your eyes. Darlin’, oh god. Maybe you would be sick—but not from dread. It was the stupid, fluttering kind of sick, the kind that made your chest tighten and your stomach dip. He watched you closely, you could feel the burn of his studying gaze.
“Have you eaten anythin’?”
You hesitated, then finally looked up at him properly. His worry was unguarded now, right there on his face, softening him in a way that made your throat thicken. He looked nothing like the man in that video, nothing like the image that had haunted you all night. If anything, he looked older in the best way—settled, steady, gentled by time.
You shook your head again, harder this time, partly to answer him and partly to shove the memory of that screen—that woman, his hands on her—as far away as you could manage.
“Course you haven’t,” he sighed, his other hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose, “Cause I didn't stock the fridge. Should'a taken you to the store. I’m sorry, darlin’.”
"S'okay," you murmured. “That’s not your responsibility. You don’t have to take care of me—”
“But it is,” he said, shaking his head immediately, gentle but firm, dropping his hand from his face to look at you again. “And right now, you’re gonna have’ta let me.” His voice softened. “We’re gonna get somethin’ in your stomach, then you’re gonna go lay down upstairs. I’ll handle lunch shift.”
“I’m fine,” you tried again, though even you could hear how weak it sounded.
Jesse came back just then with the tin kit, and Joel popped it open, already reaching for gauze.
“Just let me do this,” he said, not unkindly, as he tipped your chin up carefully, inspecting the cut above your brow now beginning to throb in earnest.
“Seriously—don’t,” you protested, but you didn’t have the strength to stop him, and some small, traitorous part of you didn’t want to.
He huffed a quiet laugh. “You’re more stubborn than you look. Shame you ain’t got the energy to fight me off right now.” His thumb brushed your skin, absurdly gentle.
Jesse snorted softly at that and straightened. “If you’re good here, Mr. Miller, I’ll grab the mower and get started.”
Joel nodded without looking away from you, already dabbing at your cut with careful hands. Jesse lingered a second longer, then disappeared down the aisle, leaving you alone with the quiet, the barn, and the steady warmth of Joel’s attention.
Back upstairs a little while later, Joel had you settled on the couch with a glass of water sweating onto a coaster and a few slices of reheated pizza piled on a paper plate. You told yourself you should enjoy this: the simple, almost domestic strangeness of a handsome man in your living room, taking care of you like this. But there was a heat under your skin that wouldn’t ebb, even as your stomach finally stopped rolling.
It was no longer hunger, but humiliation.
When he helped you up the stairs earlier, one hand hovering at your elbow, careful not to crowd you, your mind had betrayed you completely. The memories kept coming uninvited, intrusive and vivid with the way he’d held the woman’s body beneath him, the sounds of his grunts of pleasure echoing in your head when he was just giving you murmured reassurances. The comparison lodged itself deep, souring everything it touched.
You ate anyway, slowly, forcing each bite down, nodding when he asked if you felt better.
“I’ll come grab you when it’s time to take Jesse home,” Joel said gently, “we’ll run to the store after, alright?”
“Okay,” you said, too quickly.
He hesitated near the doorway, hands hooking into his pockets. “Hey,” he added, casual but curious. “Why’d you ditch me last night?”
Your heart skipped hard.
“Was tired,” you said, eyes fixed firmly on your plate.
He nodded, accepting it easily enough, but his gaze drifted, taking in the room around him. The couch, the coffee table, the shelves along the wall, and something inside you lurched, your stomach threatening to heave up its newest contents. A ridiculous, visceral fear flashed through you, that he might know, that he might smell it on the cushions around you, some trace of your crime still lingering in the air.
"See you later." you said bluntly, clear with your intention.
"Yeah," he breathed out a long sigh, "Get some rest."
You nodded, and when the door closed behind him, you stood abruptly and marched over, clicking the lock into place, your heart in your throat, ashamed, guilty. Wanting.
Joel
When he made his way down the stairs, anger curled hot in his gut. It wasn't at you—you, with your face cut up and your empty stomach— it was at himself. He felt useless. The hell was wrong with him, to forget to stock up your fridge with food to eat? To assume you’d say something if you needed it, when he knew better than that. He’d always prided himself on noticing the small things, on catching what other people missed, and somehow he’d blown right past the biggest one of all. He’d left you in that apartment with nothing but nerves and whatever scraps were left from Mr. Riley, and your body had to pay the price for it.
He rubbed a hand over his face and exhaled through his nose.
And your shoes. Christ. He’d meant to grab a pair of boots yesterday while he was at Bill’s. Bill’s daughter had moved on from ranch life years ago, and Joel had planned to ask if there were any old pairs left behind from her, something solid you could wear until he found you a proper fit. He knew Bill would rant about needing them, about keeping everything because what if this or that, but Joel would’ve taken the earful just to toss your stupid canvas sneakers in the trash. He’d seen you slipping in your stirrups yesterday, mud caked along the soles, no traction, no protection. All it would take was one bad step, one distracted horse, and you’d be laid up for weeks. Out of work, out of the barn. Out of his sight.
He told himself he'd give you space when you moved in. He was respectful, after all. But some part of him wondered if he was just hiding behind politeness.
Maybe he pushed too hard? Or maybe not hard enough.
He didn't know the rules here yet, didn't know where the line was between kindness and intrusion, and every step felt like it could be the wrong one. So when you pulled back last night, he did too. And then this morning too. It was an old habit, retreating when he couldn’t read a room, when he couldn’t quite gauge a person. A recluse spider drawing back into the dark corner it knew best.
By the time he made it down the steps and onto the gravel, his jaw was tight, shoulders drawn in. The anger hadn’t burned off so much as settled, a dull, steady heat under his skin.
The rest of the late morning bled into afternoon in work. Horses on the exerciser, then off again, hosing their legs off while their backs steamed with cooling sweat. He couldn't force himself to look at the arena, though he knew he should be training the yearlings by now instead of letting them get wild on the mountainside. Midday hay got thrown down the line, Fender getting his mash last like always. The old man started sounding rough halfway through it, a wet rattle in his chest that hadn’t been there earlier, and Joel made a mental note to call the vet before it got worse.
The routine helped. Work always did, keeping his hands so busy that sometimes his mind would go blank. Though today it just gave him more time to think.
Late afternoon came around and he was making his way back to the barn after checking the pastures when he saw Tess’s truck in the driveway.
That made him pause.
He stood there a second longer than necessary, his thoughts heavy on his mind, before turning toward the barn. No matter how many times he went through the motions, how often he walked across the gravel into the familiar building, the place still felt wrong sometimes. It didn't seem to matter how long he’d been back. His father’s ranch, his father’s rules, his father’s voice in his head on every decision he made. It made him laugh at the irony of life, how it had bent itself into a circle that dropped him right back where he’d started, trying to do things differently and still finding ways to screw it up.
He found Tess in Paloma’s stall, the mare cross-tied and restless, ears flicking as Tess moved around her with easy confidence. Her sleeves were rolled, her voice gentle and low as she checked over the mare, murmuring reassurances that worked just as well on animals as they did on people.
“Hey, cowboy,” Tess said without looking up. “Your girl called me.”
Your girl.
He let that hang in the air for a moment too long.
“How's she doing?” Joel asked, stepping into the threshold of the stall door.
“Paloma’s fine,” Tess said, not missing a beat, already knowing what he meant. “Just uncomfortable. First pregnancy jitters. Hormones, aches, the whole mess. Baby is doin' well so far." She glanced at him then, really took him in, her mouth tilting. “You look like hell.”
“Feel worse,” he said, honest before he could help it, "Can you check Fender when you're done with her?"
"Already did," she said with a nod, "could hear him wheezin' from my truck. Gonna give you a round of Clenbuterol and Doxycycline, should clear him up in no time."
"Thanks." Joel sighed.
“So ranch life that bad, huh?” she called as she ducked under Paloma’s belly, stethoscope pressed gently to the mare’s side, murmuring a gentle atta girl when she held still.
When he didn’t answer, she straightened, pulling the knobs from her ears, and went on, “Must be pretty weird bein' back.”
He leaned against the stall door and let out another long breath. “That’s one way to put it.”
She smiled at that, the same knowing look she’d always had, like she could see straight through whatever front he bothered putting up. “C’mon, Texas. You were always good at takin’ whatever got thrown at you.”
“Think you got the wrong guy,” he said lightly, a half smile beginning to form across his lips.
She scoffed. “Please.”
He watched her move around the stall, gathering her things and letting the mare off her crossties. Tess had always been like this—comfortable in her body, in her own skin, comfortable taking up space.
"So," he said, mostly to keep thinking too hard about anything, "how's business?"
“The girls are great,” Tess said, quick smile unapologetic smile flashing across her lips.
“I meant the horses,” he said, rolling his eyes, though the grin betrayed him as he folded his arms and leaned his weight into the stall door, looking at her with a smirk.
She laughed as she came up to him, passing by close enough to brush up against him, "Sure you did."
“Don’t start,” he said.
“But you make it just too easy.” She teased, setting her bag down, nudged it aside with her boot and picking up her note pad to write something down. “Vet work is fine, down to just a few ranches, keepin’ it easy so my time is open for the agency— which is busy as hell." she finally answered, "Lots of new faces lately, old ones sticking around longer than they used to. Turns out people work better when they’re not getting screwed over.”
He huffed. “Imagine that.”
"Shame you're retired," she sighed, shaking her head before looking up at him, handing over her receipt for the care. "It's different now. Now that I'm behind the camera, we only make videos for paying customers. Everyone's protected, advocated for."
“I’m good,” he said. “Thanks.”
“Yeah,” she said, looking him over, her green eyes familiar as they warmed to him, “But you always were made for it. The new girls would eat you up. They want step-dad role play and gray hair and dad-bods, Texas.”
He shook his head, smiling at her insistence but not giving in, about to quip something back when movement caught his eye with the sound of soft footsteps at the entrance of the barn. He saw you coming into the aisle, arms wrapped close to your body, eyes wide, but the color had come back into your face, no longer pallid and clammy.
“Hey,” Joel greeted softly. “How’re you feelin’?”
“Good,” you said, quiet, nodding to his visitor. “Hi.”
“This is Tess,” he said. “Our vet. A friend too, when she behaves,” he added when Tess elbowed him. “She was checkin’ on everyone. Tess, this is my new girl. She’s the one who took the apartment upstairs.”
My girl. He kicked himself for it, but neither of you seemed to notice. Tess said her greeting and you stepped into the stall, Paloma lifting her head immediately, nosing at the pocket of your hoodie.
“No snacks today,” you murmured. “You ate all of Joel’s bananas, remember?”
Joel’s mouth curved before he realized it as he watched the way your fingers found the space between the mare's ears, scratching there. He could feel Tess's eyes on him, watching the both of you moving around each other. When you turned back toward them, you didn’t step away from Paloma, and your eyes stayed on the place your palm rested against her cheek.
“She okay?” you asked.
Tess nodded, "Yeah, yeah all good, I was just tellin' Joel here she's just a little restless, with it being her first pregnancy."
You didn’t look up while she spoke. Your fingers traced down the mare's long face, over the soft dip between her eyes, down to the velvet of her nose. She leaned into it, letting out a long heavy sigh.
"You wanna feel the baby?" Joel asked.
Your head snapped up.
He felt his cheeks grow sore as your eyes landed on him again, wide and hopeful. “C’mere,” he said, already moving. When Tess stepped up to go in, he added, quieter, “I’ll show her.”
Tess crossed her arms, a knowing look settling over her face as she watched.
Joel took your hand from where it rested against Paloma’s jaw. Your fingers were warm, a little calloused from work, and he didn’t let himself think about that too long. He guided you along the mare’s side. Paloma lowered her head back to her pile of hay, unbothered.
He laid your hand flat against the curve of her belly, low and round and stretched tight with life. His own hand came down over yours without thinking, covering it, steadying it there.
He felt, more than saw, the way you stilled.
You were close. Close enough that he could feel the heat of you along his arm. He could hear the change in your breathing, the small hitch of it when his palm settled over yours. The barn felt quieter all at once.
And then— "oh!" you gasped when you felt the foal moving. Paloma startled a little bit at that, and you lifted your other hand to soothe her again, her tail swishing in annoyance against Joel's back.
You looked up and saw he was staring, but he couldn't help it. Not when your smile was spreading slower over your face, eyes beaming up at him. It felt real and natural, back to the way you were yesterday. Easy and unguarded with him.
“If you see anythin’ off about her, you don’t hesitate to call, alright?” Tess said, scribbling something down and tearing the paper free. She held it out to you.
Joel stepped back a fraction so you could move, and your hand slid out from under his as you straightened. The loss of it was immediate.
You took the note Tess offered.
"That's my direct cell, not the work phone. I lose that damn thing every other day.”
But it didn't seem like you registered her words, instead, you were staring at Tess's hand, as if studying them. When you looked up at her, then at Joel, the color drained from your face so fast it made his stomach drop.
"What's—?" he began, but there was a booming bark of a voice from the back entrance of the barn, suddenly cutting him off.
“Hey, Tess!”
It was Jesse coming down the aisle, already tugging his gloves off as he went in for a hug. Joel didn’t look at them. He was watching you. Watching the way your eyes dropped back to the horse even after Tess had turned away, gaze fixed on the crinkled paper in your hand, unfocused like you weren’t entirely there anymore.
“Hey, kid,” Tess said. “How are ya?”
“Good,” Jesse said a little breathlessly, releasing her from his embrace. “’Bout to get a ride home from the old man, if he’d care to check his watch.”
"Shit, yeah," Joel cursed, pulling up his hand to look at the wrist watch, and then looked back at you, "Comin'?"
“Hm?” Your eyes flicked up, distant, then slid back into place.
"Gonna hit the store and tack shop before they close. Got a list?"
"Yeah." you said, quiet as a mouse, "sure.”
Joel moved fast, cut through the feed room, wrote Tess a check without thinking too hard about the numbers, tore it free and handed it to her.
"Pleasure doin' business, Texas," she purred, and Joel's gaze snapped to yours as your eyes went bigger than saucers.
"I'll see you soon, Tess. Call if anythin' else is needed for her."
“You know I will,” she called over her shoulder, hips swinging as she walked off.
“Man,” Jesse said, shaking his head, cheeks flushing. “She’s—”
“Shut your mouth,” Joel cut in. “Go, get in the truck. I'll grab what I'm bringin' for fixin'.”
Jesse and you turned towards the driveway while Joel made his way to the shed, but something was bothering him. There’d been something off in your eyes back in the barn, a look he couldn’t quite place, but it had stuck with him now as he made his way behind the building. He was only here to grab the tack he meant to drop off for consignment, the wheelbarrow with the busted wheel he needed parts for, and figured it was easier to bring the whole damn thing with him than risk forgetting again.
The yellow shed sat quiet behind the barn, unchanged. Still, as he stepped inside, a prickle crawled up the back of his neck, the uneasy sense of something not being where it ought to be.
He reached up and yanked the beaded metal cord, the bulb flickering once before the space flooded with light.
That's when he saw your empty bin shoved up on the shelf where it didn’t belong, crammed tight beside the one he’d kept tucked away for years.
His stomach felt like it was rolling when he made it to the shelves in two long strides, and reached out to check on it. He immediately knew something was wrong as he pulled it down into his hands.
The lid was cracked straight down the middle.
He snapped it open, fast, his heart hammering, and the sight of its contents rearranged confirmed what he'd known the second he walked in.
Fuck.
The ride to town was awkward and quiet. Joel had wished Jesse would be his usual self and fill the cab with jokes, with that easy good humor that usually smoothed over the long ride into town, but the air felt too sour for it today, and it seemed like Jesse could tell.
You sat in the center of the bench, squished between the two bodies, Joel trying to edge himself toward the driver’s side door, chin resting on his fist while the other hand stayed wrapped around the steering wheel. His mind wouldn’t shut up. It felt close to torture, the kind that came from being trapped with your own thoughts. Part of him wanted to know what you knew—what you’d seen, if you'd seen, whether you’d watched any of it at all. The worst, most self-loathing part of him wondered what you’d thought. About it. About him.
He finally dropped Jesse off, watching him hop out the truck and asking about his next shift at the farm, then both of you were left in silence as you watched him jog up to his apartment entrance without a backward glance. Somehow, the cab felt smaller, even as you slid away, your body warmth leaving his side. Just you and him now.
The tack store was quick and easy, blurring past. You grabbed things from your list, he grabbed things needed for repair and sold over the bridles and spurs for consignment. You got proper gloves and boots, a lead rope you liked. He watched you looking through all the different colors, testing them in your hands. Only a few words were spoken between the two of you, the rest of the trip was full of heavy silence. Joel thought he might go insane if he had to wait another minute to ask you. But he also didn't want to know—never wanted to know.
The grocery store was worse. Too bright inside with too many people. He pushed the cart while you walked ahead of him, sometimes beside him, brushing close. He kept catching himself trying to catch your face, to read something there and coming up empty. He told you to get whatever you wanted, and even when you'd pause to pick something up, debating, and setting it back down on its shelf, he'd grab it to throw into the cart anyway.
By the time the truck was loaded up with bags and his fixed wheelbarrow, his shoulders ached as if he'd been carrying weight all afternoon. He got back in the truck, taking a long time to put his seatbelt on while you sat stock still on the opposite side of the bench. He thought maybe he should say something then, before the engine would drown out any semblance of quiet. Though maybe that would be okay, to push off the inevitable until you were both on neutral ground, to run away when you needed to. But Jesus, he wasn't sure he could take any more of this quiet between you. He'd barely known you for a few days but this already felt wrong. Like a little rabbit stuck in his truck, eager to get out the other side.
"So…" he began. Fuck he really was out of his depth here.
He wouldn't look at you yet, he was fumbling with his keys in his hands, looking down at them in his lap.
“So… how you feelin’ now?” he asked instead.
"Better," you said, then cleared your throat, "feelin' mostly better."
“Good,” he nodded, risked a quick glance over, and caught the line of your profile lit by the first wash of sunset through the window. “Good.”
With that, he sighed, and started the engine.
The car ride stretched on in an excruciating silent thirty minutes before the familiar mountain range finally coming into view—those low hills that framed his land like bookends, the moon rising pale between them in the twilight sky. Joel couldn't take it any longer. He had to be brave. He couldn't believe he had to tell himself—a fifty two year old man—to be brave, to gather the courage to talk to you. He reached out and turned the radio off as before he could talk himself out of it, and when he slowed at the stop sign, he cut the engine altogether.
He'd had enough of sitting in this awful silence.
“Joel?” you asked, your voice sounding strange in the cab, like his name hadn’t been used in a while. You turned toward him, panic flickering across your face. “What're you doing?”
His hands gripped the steering wheel, hearing the crack of leather in his palms, twisting them around as he looked out into the darkening night. The cab felt too intimate now, and he wondered if it was a mistake to force this now. But he had to. He had to.
“I…know,” he said quietly, though it felt a little silly. But it was the only way he could think to start. There weren’t any right words, no version of this that didn’t sound stupid or worse. He couldn’t stand another twenty minutes of pretending nothing was wrong. And he couldn’t stand the idea of pulling into the driveway and watching you disappear upstairs without giving him a chance to explain himself.
“You… know?” you echoed, softer now, your gaze dropping to your lap.
“Yeah.” He let out a breath. “I know that you know about…me.”
Your head snapped up.
"How?"
“The bin,” he said plainly.
Your mouth tightened, teeth worrying at the inside of your lip, hands twisting together.
“And,” he added, after a beat, “I’m guessin’ by the way you froze earlier… you know about Tess too.”
Your lips pressed into a thin line. You nodded once.
“Was it the nail polish?” he asked before he could stop himself.
The night around the both of you felt impossibly still, the truck ticking as it cooled, sitting at the fork in the road—left toward home, right into miles of nothing.
You nodded again.
He huffed out a quiet laugh before he could stop it, his hand releasing the steering wheel to come up to his beard, fingers dragging through it. “She used to get in loads of trouble for that. That electric blue color. Directors hated it. Said it made her too… cool. Didn’t fit what they wanted.”
“She called you Texas,” you said quietly.
His eyes flicked to yours, then back to the windshield. “Yeah.”
"Was that…?" you sighed, squeezing your eyes shut, shoving your fists into your sockets, rubbing them, and groaning softly, "I don't even know what to ask, what to think—"
"You don't gotta," Joel rushed to say, "I"m sorry you even found out, you weren't supposed to."
You opened your palms and let your face fall into it, covering your eyes from his gaze.
"I understand if this…well, is a deal breaker for you." he added.
You shook your head immediately, dropping your hands, letting him see your face when he was brave enough to look. “No. No, it’s not.”
Something in his chest eased just a fraction.
“It’s just… weird,” you said finally.
He'd heard that word too many times today for his liking.
He let out a dry breath. “Yeah. Weird’s about right.”
You were quiet for a moment, then asked, “How did you… end up doing that?”
He took a deep breath. This was the part he wanted, wasn't it? To explain himself?
So why was it so difficult?
“When my pops kicked me out when I was eighteen…” he thought to begin where the story started so many years ago was the easiest. "I didn't have anywhere to go. My girlfriend was pregnant. We did the courthouse thing ‘cause we thought that’s what you were supposed to do. Mostly we just worried about how we’d make rent, how to keep the lights on.”
“I’m sorry,” you said softly.
He shook his head. “It is what it is.”
He swallowed and kept going. “Well we found a crappy place to stay for a while. I worked any job I could find. Was construction for a while, in town. In Austin too. S'where I met Tess—in Austin, I mean--after my ex left. It was just me and Sarah by then. I had no idea what the hell I was doing.” He paused, making himself chuckle at the thought: “Still don’t, half the time.”
You stayed quiet, listening.
“She saw me at the fair one summer. I’d taken Tommy, tryna get him of the ranch for a weekend. And Sarah, even if she was too young to remember. Tess was workin’ behind the scenes, checkin’ horses before they showed, as part of her undergrad internship or somethin' 'er other. Told me I was good lookin', said she could get a job for me if I was interested. I think she did it to get through school." His jaw tightened. “You gotta understand--I was desperate, hun.”
He didn't even realize he'd used the pet name til it was out of his mouth.
“And it paid,” you said, understanding, coazing him along.
“Yeah,” he nodded. “Paid better than anything I’d ever done. I mean, i was able to take my kid on vacations. Sign her up for sports when she was old enough. The producers started pairin’ us together—Tess 'n I. People liked us, so we played a lotta couples. Those did the best, usually.”
“Were you ever… together?” you asked.
Joel shook his head adamantly, "No, we tried, once, in the beginning. But it was just weird. We were better keepin' it work. But she really helped me through some shit, that woman. As a friend."
You were looking out the window, and Joel felt oddly grateful you weren’t watching him as he went on. The words were tumbling out faster than he could think them through, and he knew if he caught your eye again he’d freeze up, tongue-tied by his own nerves.
“She’s got her own agency now. Takes care of her girls. Does things right.” A pause. “I’m proud of her.”
"Did Sarah ever know?"
He sighed. “She wasn’t meant to. But kids find things. High school was rough, so we moved her schools. She handled it better than I did.” His voice dipped. “I hate that I put that on her.”
“That’s not on you,” you said. “Kids can be cruel. You did what you had to.”
Silence settled again, different this time.
“You’re a good dad,” you said at last. “Not everyone would do what you did. Put their kid first, I mean, no matter what.”
Joel didn’t say anything to that. He just stared out at the road and turned the ignition back on, easing the truck forward. Suddenly he didn't want to talk at all, didn't want to hear anymore of your praise or reassurances. He wasn't sure he could take it. He turned left.
Twenty minutes of measured quiet later, he was pulling into the gravel driveway, the silence heavy but less so than it was before things were laid bare, though Joel still felt his stomach lurching with all the questions he still had and never asked. Gravel crunched beneath the tires as the barn came into view, the apartment light glowing above it, and even then the quiet felt different than it had earlier, though it was no longer pressing in on him from all sides.
"I…my parents…" you said when he turned off the engine for good.
You were looking up at the barn apartment, and he hoped, he prayed, you wouldn't run away yet.
“They turned their back on me,” you said finally. “When I was going through a really hard time. And…I don’t know how to forgive something like that.”
That was when he looked over.
"It must've been so hard." you said, voice thick and quiet, “For you to do everything right by your father only for him to kick you out when out the second your life didn’t look the way he planned it. To have to raise a baby all alone.”
The tears came before you seemed to notice them, slipping down your cheeks unchecked, and Joel’s brow pulled tight as he watched them fall, his chest aching with the useless urge to fix something he couldn’t reach with words. He didn’t want you worrying about him, didn’t want this turning back on him somehow, but there was something in the way you said it. Like it wasn't pity. Recognition maybe?
"We're the same, in that way, I think," you sniffled, wiping your cheek with the back of your sleeve, "Growing up, you think your parents are the world, that they can do no wrong. That they'll have your back. And then when the worst happens, you find out who they really are."
You swallowed, eyes still fixed somewhere past the windshield.
“Some people get parents who help them figure it out,” you went on, your voice starting to splinter. “Who tell them they’ve got choices. Who don’t make it about pride, or appearances, or what the neighbors might think. But you and I… we didn’t. We just… got told what we were supposed to do. And if it fell apart anyway, that was our fault.”
Your chin was wobbling violent now, when you turned to look at him to whisper: "I would've never done that to a child."
And that was when Joel felt that familiar, tightening hesitation rising up in his chest, the instinct to stay still, to give space, to not assume. He pushed it down anyway and shifted toward you, reaching out to pull you in against him.
You broke then, the sounds leaving you rough and uncontrollable as your head fell into his chest, hand clutching at the front of his shirt. You cried hard, shoulders hitching, breath punching out of you, and he held you there without speaking. His one arm solid around you, his other palm flat against the plane of your back, gently rubbing up and down where you curled into him.
“S’alright,” he murmured eventually. “You don’t gotta worry about me. I’m okay.”
“It’s just—” you hiccuped, your fingers twisting tighter into the front of his shirt. “It’s awful. I’m so sorry, Joel.”
“Hey,” he said quietly, tightening his hold just a fraction. “Don’t be sorry.”
He hesitated, the words catching somewhere between his chest and his throat. He wasn't sure how to do this part, how to comfort without feeling like he was overstepping. He already felt like this was treading over lines that were getting more and more blurred.
“I’m sorry you went through that too,” he said finally, softer now, careful with each word. “That your folks weren’t there when you needed ’em.” His thumb shifted slowly against your back, “C’mon now. S’okay, baby. Don’t cry like that. You’re breakin’ my heart.”
Your sobs didn't stop all at once, but they changed into broken, smaller sounds, hitched breaths and sniffling exhales. Your body sagged into him like something had finally given way, and he held you there, unmoving, just letting you take the time.
After a minute, your grip loosened, and you pulled back just enough to look at him, though he kept his hands gently around you.
You were so close he could see where your lashes had clumped wetly together by tears, the shine in your eyes from the porch light spilling across your face. Your skin was hot, lips swollen from crying. And yet there was something so beautiful about you, so damn close to him he could feel the heat of your breath on his mouth.
But then you were leaning in.
It was so careful, just a small brush of your lips against his, your hand still clutching his chest where your tears had dampened his shirt. His body went rigid, heat rushing up under his skin. He stayed very still, his eyes widening a fraction at the idea of you ever wanting anything like this. He couldn't do anything but open his mouth in surprise, a small gasp of breath held in his throat as he felt your wet lips against his.
But then you were pulling away, quickly, and his hands fell from your body as your eyes widened.
“I—I’m sorry—I shouldn’t—oh god—” you gasped, your palm flying to your mouth.
Before he could say your name, before he could even reach for you again, you were shoving the truck door open, boots hitting gravel, and running up the stairs two at a time.
You
You avoided Joel for days.
Though, in fairness, he was avoiding you too. Or you thought he was. Maybe you were just better at timing it. You’d get down early for your morning shift, hopping on Georgie to head out into the pasture as soon as you could. By the time you saw him moving around the barn, you were already heading back upstairs to the safety of your apartment. Days passed like that, orbiting one another without having to cross paths. You caught glimpses of him out of the corner of your eye, and when he had to ask you something, it lasted no more than thirty seconds, both of you already in motion—him stepping away, you halfway up the stairs—anything to keep from standing still together.
But you had a secret.
You told yourself you were embarrassed and avoiding him because you couldn’t stand the thought of him remembering the way you’d cried, the way you’d leaned into him. You couldn’t stomach the idea of pity settling in his eyes. You, the girl who couldn’t keep her life in order, who fainted in his barn and then kissed him later that night, tears in your eyes, over emotional on your best days.
You told yourself you were sparing both of you the discomfort.
But that wasn’t the whole of it.
There was something else in the back of your mind through the day, something that made your stomach swoop and your throat tighten when you thought about the fact you might see him that day. If you'd see him that day. When you might cross paths.
You'd gone back to the shed.
Slipping in when you were sure he was out past the fence line in town, your hand would lift the lid just enough to sneak into to take one, trading it for another. Always careful. Always putting them back the way you found them. You couldn’t have explained it if someone forced you to. If you’d had to answer plainly, you would’ve said the simplest thing: you just couldn’t stop.
It was the human condition, after all. To be curious. To want.
And Joel Miller made it very easy to want.
You watched videos from twenty, thirty years ago. Sometimes no more than ten years ago. His hair would grow out, then get cropped again, beard getting fuller, the gray starting to come in around his forties. His body shifted with time, muscle thickening through his shoulders and chest, weight settling softer through his middle. But his eyes stayed the same. His voice, too. That low, steady roughness that made your skin prickle even through a screen.
And his body…it was as if hewn from earth, arms thick as banded tree limbs, his middle dense with muscle softened by a layer of warm, living weight. His shoulders were so broad and wide. And his… oh god, his cock. You watched the way he opened women up around him, the way they keened and cried his name, heads tipped back, hands fisting in his hair like they were holding on for dear life. But it was the way he held them that undid you. Sometimes rough, yes—but never careless. There was a steadiness to it. A hand braced at a hip, fingers firm at the back of a neck, his mouth lowering to the shell of an ear, murmuring something filthy and low that the camera couldn't pick up. And you’d be there, drenched in blue light from the television, three fingers buried inside yourself, hips rocking helplessly, trying to imagine what he would feel like, what he might say…if it were you beneath him instead. If you would've just stayed in the truck, what might've happened.
So, because you were a coward who didn't stay and find out for yourself, this was what you had instead, and you hated yourself for it.
But… there was the ranch too.
You could admit that you found yourself enjoying the work. It was hard, physical, relentless work. Horses didn’t care if you felt like sleeping in, and they surely didn’t wait for you to sort out your feelings. There were stalls to muck, water troughs to scrub, grain to measure out just right. Lives depended on you. It felt good to be needed in such a simple, inarguable way.
Out on the back of your favorite mare, the land stretched open and quiet, rolling farther than your eye could see. It made everything else in your life seem small and narrow by comparison. The mornings came slow and golden, a cool mist hanging low over the pastures as you checked the herd. Some days you stayed there longer than necessary, just watching them. How peaceful they were.
It gave you a lot of time to think.
And when you thought about it, about all of this—the horses, the barn, the wide open land and the man who owned it—it made you feel unsettled in a way that stuck long after you dismounted. Because Joel belonged to it in a way that made you feel like you belonged too, or like you were slipping into it all without really having to try. He moved through the barn like he’d been poured into it years ago. Which, he had, when you thought about it. And no matter how he felt about his father and the non grief he thought it was, there was something about the way he carried himself across the property that was more history more than resentment. You wondered if he stood out in the pasture and felt the same pull you did, if he ever felt small in comparison to it all.
There was something unfinished here for him, something that had pulled him back whether he’d wanted it or not.
Some nights, lying in bed above the horses' low rustling, you'd stare at the ceiling and try to remember who you were supposed to be before this. A student, a daughter. Someone with a plan that didn't involve mucking stalls and stealing glances at the back of your boss's shoulders.
Shouldn’t you be drafting a SAP appeal? Explaining to some financial aid committee why your grades slipped, why you fell below the credit threshold, why you deserved another shot at the scholarships you let slip through your fingers? Shouldn’t you be re-filing your FAFSA, digging up tax returns, emailing advisors about readmission deadlines and course loads?
Instead, you were living another person's life, on the back of a horse, thinking about The Texxxas Wrangler. About whether this place would swallow you whole if you let it.
“You know,” Jesse said one afternoon while the two of you ate lunch sitting on bales in the hay barn, dust drifting lazily in the sunlight that came in through the big open air, “for someone who came from stuffy show jumpers, you’re not half bad at the western thing.”
You were grateful on the days Jesse was at the farm. He filled the silences with chatter, and that seemed to help. He was funny, too, always going on about town gossip he'd overheard at the diner. He talked about customers who gave him trouble, repeating their complaints back in exaggerated voices until you couldn’t help but laugh. He had a crush on a girl named Dina who worked at the coffee shop in town. He told you all about her, how she spelled his name wrong on purpose, how she rolled her eyes when he asked for extra caramel. He didn’t admit it was love, but he talked about her it might be.
When the two of you drove around in the Gator to throw hay, he would bump his shoulder into yours too hard on the bumpy path when you refused to laugh at one of his jokes, his mock offense enough to make you smile. He noticed things, but he never watched you too closely, not in the way Joel did. If he ever sensed something off in you, he let it pass without comment.
It made the hours easier.
“Gee, thanks, Jesse,” you teased back around a mouthful of sandwich.
“I’m serious,” he went on, nudging his boot against yours. “You fit in here. Even if you flinch every time someone mentions the boss.”
You blinked, pausing mid chew.
“What do you mean?”
He laughed and covered his mouth, pointing at you with the hand that held his sandwich aloft. “Yep, just like that."
You rolled your eyes and kicked him in the ankle. "I do not flinch."
He made a sort of non committal uh huh, as he swallowed a bite of his sandwich, and all went quiet again.
You both started gathering foil and napkins, standing to head back down, but Jesse stopped halfway to at the end of the rows of bales. He let out a long breath and looked out toward the house, then down at his boots like he was trying to gather something written along the leather toe.
"I don't really know how to say this," Jesse sighed.
"Oh no." you teased.
He cracked a quick smile. “Shut up. I just mean… I might get in trouble for sayin’ it.”
You sat back down on a hay bale.
“The boss seems… different,” Jesse said, hesitant.
You waited while he worked it out, wiping crumbs from his mouth and pressing his thumb against his lip as he thought.
“I haven’t been here long,” he went on, “and I know Joel can be kind of a prickly asshole sometimes, but that’s mostly… armor, I guess? When he came here, last year after his dad died, he barely went in that house. You know that?”
You looked toward the rancher across the driveway.
“He’d sleep up here,” Jesse continued anyway, gesturing around the hay bales. “I'd find him up here in the mornings when Riley got me from town. He'd crash wherever he could. Riley even let him take the couch in your apartment for a while before he moved out. My mom used to tell me about it too. She worked at the Tipsy Bison for forever. Knew every cowboy's business whether they wanted her to or not.” He huffed a quiet laugh. “She said Miller Senior was a real piece of work. Especially for kickin’ Joel out like that. He was just a kid, a good son at that. And then Joel just… came back after all this time? Took it all on. The land, the house, the mess of it. I can't even imagine."
The air was very still, very quiet, as you sat and waited.
“He acts like he’s got it handled,” Jesse went on, eyes still on the house. “Like none of it gets to him. But…You can see it some days. It does. He gets real… I don't know…”
You swallowed.
“I don’t think he’s an asshole,” you said softly, looking down at your hands.
“I know,” Jesse said. “That’s kind of my point.”
You looked over at him.
“He’s easier,” Jesse said, shrugging one shoulder. “Since you got here. He laughs at my stupid jokes. He actually eats dinner and sleeps in that house. He doesn’t snap at me every five minutes.” He hesitated, then forced himself to finish it. “You’re good for him. I think he needs somebody who doesn’t treat him like he’s that same kid from thirty years ago. That he's not just his father's son.”
“I’m just workin’, Jesse,” you said, maybe a little defensive, a little bemused. “It’s not—”
“I know,” he cut in gently. “I’m not sayin’ you gotta fix him or anything like that. I just wanted ya to know that. And when he tries to push you away like he does with everything else…”
You were afraid to tell him the truth. That Joel hadn’t been pushing you at all. If anyone had been stepping back, running away, cutting conversations short the moment they started to drift past horses and chores and into anything that felt even a little personal, it had been you. Because of—what? Your cowardice? Your pride? Because you found out how he made a living as a single dad and suddenly it threw off everything you'd thought about him?
It made you feel stupid. Like a little girl with a crush. You had just started to like being around him, like being here on the ranch, and starting to notice all his eccentricities. He had a way with the horses, a softness to him when he spoke to them about their day. You liked watching him in his element with them, how he always scratched just the right spot on their chest or along the crest of their mane.
You had let yourself think maybe there was something there, something in the way he looked at you, too.
And finding his secret had thrown a wrench into all of it. Because you were an insecure inexperienced nobody. And he was…a legit pornstar. A man who had been watched, desired, paid to be seen in all his glory. And you couldn't picture yourself in the scenes with him, as much as you fantasized about it.
So yeah, you had pulled away. Pretended it was about dignity and about not mixing work with feelings. But really, it felt more like you were punishing him for his past.
“Don’t let him scare you off,” Jesse added, leaning into your shoulder, coaxing you out of your spiral.
Your eyes shifted back into focus, looking back at him, and you reached over to flick the brim of his Stetson hat up with your finger, making him grin. “I ain't scared of cowboys, Jesse.”
“You're startin' to sound like us too,” he said, crouching down into the bales with a crooked smile.
“But hey—” you called, and when he paused, you sighed, a real smile on your lips. “Thanks. For telling me all that.”
He tipped his hat once and disappeared down.
The afternoon shift gave you something to hold onto. You started picking the stalls, your pitchfork biting into damp bedding methodically. It was meditational, really. One stall at a time, your mind wandering aimlessly through your thoughts as you went about each one, refilling waters, giving Fender his mash. Checking Paloma's belly and giving her a banana from the feed room.
You were going to return the tapes tonight. Enough of this—enough stealing them one by one to watch the man you worked for be as vulnerable as anyone could be, on your screen. You would stop going into that shed. You'd stopped sitting on your couch with your fingers between your legs like a teenager finding a magazine stash under the mattress.
You dumped the wheelbarrow, rinsed it, and left it against the wall.
You were not that girl.
So you moved onto the water troughs in the close pastures and round pen, dragging the hose across packed dirt, watching the water church cloudy before settling clear with new determination. You saddled up, fingers working the leather with more confidence than they had your first day. You mounted on Georgie and rode the fence line in slowly, scanning for loose boards and wires, listening for anything off.
The herd was fine, again with all eyes and legs in tact, no fussing or drama today.
It would be easier if he was being a prickly asshole, you thought along the way.
If Joel had snapped at you, laughed at you. if he acted anything like a man who'd performed in porn because of his well endowed body, his handsome face. Instead, he was calm and steady, gentle. Caring and patient. He stepped back when you stepped back.
It made it worse that all of this was because of your own behavior, not his.
You thought about the women in those tapes, the way they moved like they belonged in their own skin, the way they handled him without hesitation or insecurity. The way Tess was as confident in real life as she was in the video made twenty years ago. It made your stomach turn even as you looked out at the rolling hills. You had barely figured yourself out, and he had lived whole other lifetimes before you even graduated high school. You imagined standing in front of him and admitting you wanted him and felt your face burn at the thought of him seeing through you in seconds, seeing how inexperienced you were, how easily flustered.
Your grip tightened on your reins, and Georgie could feel your uncertainty. You patted her neck gently, assuring her all was well as you pushed her forward through the gates of the pasture.
This was all supposed to be just work—temporary. A place to land while you figured out the next move. Your schooling, your career. Whatever the hell that was going to be. You really had never been sure. You told yourself tonight you'd email your school advisor who you'd been ignoring. You'd call your school loan officer to settle up whatever was needed.
You would not derail your life for some cowboy.
The wind shifted across the pasture, lifting your hair at the nape of your neck, and for a second you let yourself imagine what it would look like to leave. Pack up the apartment and hand him the key. You'd thank him for the opportunity and get a cab back to town and sign a lease somewhere small and forget this ever happened.
But even as you pictured it, your chest tightened.
Because it had only been a week, and already the place felt larger than you. Already you could see how easily someone could disappear into it. Joel had. He’d come back to bury his father and ended up inheriting everything that man left behind. The land, the horses, the work. The silence.
What if one day, all that and his unnamed grief finally got to him? He seemed to be avoiding it best he could—hell, he'd barely wanted to talk about his family that night in his truck. He definitely didn't want to when you poked and prodded over the dinner table the first night. What if one day he woke up and realized he never wanted any of this in the first place? Would you stay if he left? If Joel was no longer part of it?
You already knew your answer.
The sun was low and golden in the orange and purple sky later on, your skin smelling of high hell and horses by the time you made it back upstairs. Your muscles were less achy than they had been at the start of all this, your body growing accustomed and eager for the work.
You’d grabbed the last tape and made your way back downstairs, turning it over in your hands as you walked: Everything is Bigger in Texas, Including the Wrangler. You smiled a little at the memory of it. He’d played some celebrity bull rider, paired with a tiny little brunette who had no business being under five feet tall. He’d looked colossal next to her, bulging muscles the size of her head, hands swallowing her waist whole.
You sighed, imagining what it would be like to reach up and take one of his hats off his head yourself, to press it down over your hair while he watched.
You know the rule, baby? Joel, ten years younger, had said to the tiny actress, voice low and amused. 'Bout cowboy hats?
No, Texas, what’s the rule? she’d purred back.
You wear the hat, you ride the cowboy, baby, he’d said before pulling her into him.
Sure, it was a little corny. But God, he’d made it look good.
Heat had crept up your neck just remembering it, your grip tightening around the plastic case as the yellow shed came into view, drenched in orange light from the setting sun.
This was the last one. The last time. You would put it back, close the lid, and walk away from all of it for good.
Your skin was still warm when you pulled open the shed door, but then, as sudden as a bucket of ice, your face drained of color.
Because Joel was standing there.
“Evenin’.”
He said it as he glanced up at you only for a moment, and then looked back down at what he held in his grip. He was toying with it a VHS in his hands, the bin open at his feet, the lid leaning crooked against the wall. The way he held it made it clear this wasn’t curiosity. He’d been standing there a while.
You didn’t think you could force your mouth to work.
“Is this how it’s gonna be now?” he asked.
The gentleness was gone from his voice, flattened out into something hard and stern. “Ignorin’ me. Avoidin’ me at every turn. Only to come in here every damn day and help yourself to my things?”
“I—”
He tossed the tape down onto the pile, the plastic cracking loud in the small space, and you flinched before you could stop yourself.
“This ain’t me,” he said, shaking his head once like he was trying to shake the whole thing off. “These—this was work. That’s it. It ain’t who I am. You understand that?”
You nodded too fast, then stepped inside anyway, the door still open behind you, pushing yourself back against the opposite wall to create distance.
“I know,” you said, finally finding your voice. “I know that.”
“Do you?” His eyes lifted then, his brow heavy over his eyes. “’Cause you been lookin’ at me like I’m somebody else.”
The shed felt smaller than it ever had before.
“I wasn’t—”
“You think I wouldn't notice?” he went on, taking one big step forward, not aggressive but not giving you space either. “You been disappearin’ every time I walk in a room. Cut me off mid sentence like I said somethin’ wrong.”
You couldn't do anything but breathe in the smell of his aftershave, the smell of sweat and horses on his skin. He was so close. Oh god.
He dragged a hand through his hair, frustrated. “If you got a problem with me, say it.”
You swallowed. “I don’t have a problem with you.”
“Then what is it?”
He took another step, and you realized there wasn’t much wall left behind you.
"I don't…I don't know…" your mind was a scramble—your body struck still as if caught with a spotlight on it, lungs trying to not pull into too much air to show how afraid you were. Of being seen, of admitting to it all.
"Yer shakin'," he whispered as he stepped forward again. He pulled the tape from your hand gently, and you watched as he softened, looking at your face, then down at the tape, a cold smile flitting his features as he let out an unamused chuckle, his shoulders dropping.
"This one was corny as hell," he muttered to himself, then threw it on the pile.
He saw the way you flinched again at the plastic hitting plastic, and leaned his hand up against the wall beside you. You felt caged, squeezing your eyes shut before your heart might leap from your chest. You were almost certain he could hear it, see it, trying to escape you. Wishing death upon itself.
He leaned closer, one finger slipping beneath your chin to tilt your face up, and the breath left your lungs in a startled gasp.
Your eyes flashed open as he said: “I'm sorry,” his voice was so soft, all breath, as he went on, “Don't be nervous.”
Your mouth held open in a gasp, and he was so fucking close now. His breath was warm, but his pretty hazel eyes—they were so sad, so worried. You could see every line of crows feet at his eyes, could make out every gray sprig of his dark beard where his lips hid underneath. His hand moved up, touching the cut on your brow that had begun to heal, but would leave a scar.
"Talk to me." he whispered, his voice dropping in octave, like his throat was full of gravel.
Your stomach fluttered, your insides feeling like they were tying together like some balloon bending artist was in there shaping it around.
"I'm not—you don't make me—nervous." you gulped.
“You sure?” he murmured, the rough pad of his finger never leaving your skin, even as it traced down along your cheekbone, then pushing your hair back behind your ear. His touch slid from your neck to the slope of your shoulder, down your arm, leaving goosebumps in its wake.
“Tell me what’s goin’ on.” his voice was edged with strain, as if it pained him to wait for your answer. His eyes were on your mouth now. "Let me take care of whatever this is. Of you."
Your eyes drifted to his mouth, too, despite yourself, and you could feel your body beginning to betray you as you outlined the plump, pink outline of his lips with your gaze. Heat pooled low in your belly, knees softening where you stood rigid. You could just imagine what they'd feel like against the conch of your ear, whispering filthy things in the same low octave he was using now. But your brain would not let you picture it without also picturing those women—their confidence, their experience, the ease with which they moved around him. You felt childish in comparison, inexperienced, unsure of your own body, unsure of what you would even say if he asked.
Joel watched the cogs in your brain moving, watched the conflict play across your face.
“Your body’s sayin’ one thing,” he said, and you could feel the breath of every syllable against your face as he spoke. “Your eyes say another. I see it. But you won’t tell me.”
You couldn't move—couldn't inch away as his head tilted, his mouth opening as if he was going to—
He shook his head then, pulling away. “Forget it. Get back to work.”
“Joel—” you croaked, the Texas evening air suddenly frigid around you.
"Go on," he thrusted his fingers in the air, dismissing you.
Joel Miller is back home running his family’s ranch, the work coming back to him easily even as the house fills with the memories of what happened thirty years ago.
He hires a young farm hand, expecting nothing more than help around the barn. Instead, he finds someone just as lost as he is.
|| chapter tags: MDNI 18+ angst, light smut, masturbation, western vibes, estranged family, mentions of grief, mentions of abusive parents (joel's, tho reader's aren't great either), horses / ranch vibes, older man x younger woman, rancher!joel, expornstar!joel, flirting, swearing, drinking, eating, soft!joel, domestic!joel miller ||
author's note: eeee she's here!!! forever and ever grateful for my friends for letting me yap on for ages about this, for helping me with parts that snagged. thank you @pearlessance for reading her and picking me up off the ground when I wasn't sure about it. I cherish you forever. and jamie, if you're seeing this, thanks for the poem :)
wc: 10k
Inspiration & References: Flicka (2006)
Life is short and the world
is at least half terrible, and for every kind
stranger, there is one who would break you,
though I keep this from my children. I am trying
to sell them the world. Any decent realtor,
walking you through a real shithole, chirps on
about good bones: This place could be beautiful,
right? You could make this place beautiful.
Good Bones, by Maggie Smith.
There's a creak to the front steps that has a nasty habit of yanking Joel back to the past better than any smell or fickle trick of memory ever could.
He remembers when Tommy cracked it, falling face first off the dog’s back when he was three, the step catching his chin before the ground could. That mean old mutt—Joel hadn’t been there that day to tell his little brother not to bother the damn thing. Instead, he'd been out in the pasture with their father, learning about grass and fence lines in the blistering heat, pretending he was absorbing any spec of it while sweat soaked through his shirt. He loved the ranch, he did, but back then all he’d wanted was to be on the back of a horse, moving fast and free across open land. Not standing in the sun while his father talked him through pasture rotation and repairs. The senior Miller was hellbent on teaching his son how to keep the farm running, not just how to enjoy it.
Tommy left a nice break in the wood, but only the house got fixed. His little brother still carried the scar.
The step took another hit years later, when his father bolted out the door when one of the horses came in with its hind leg torn open on the fence. Joel remembers how much blood there was. He could show you the spot it happened, the blood stained into the wood. His father ran so hard down the stairs not bothering to put on his barn boots, so his slipper went straight through the second step and caused a nasty twist in his ankle, but he hadn't stopped. The Miller man limped out into the field anyway to save the gelding. It was a miracle the horse lived. Horses were like that—always finding ways to hurt themselves, somehow surviving it. That, or dying from the smallest inconvenience. His dad called them stupid for it, but Joel thought they knew something he didn’t.
And then he remembers when the step had its final say—its last injury, permanent in the wood— cracked through the middle so bad it whines for repair every time it meets the bottom of a boot.
It was the night Joel had told his father Jess was pregnant.
He remembers how quiet it was at first, how the slide of forks and knives came to an abrupt halt, how the record player in the corner had timed its self to stop the John Denver vinyl just then too. His father had stood and lunged for him, dragging his son by the collar through the house until Joel was being thrown out the front door. He'd tried to catch himself, reached blindly for the railing, but his heart was beating too fast and his blood felt too loud in his ears for him to think straight. He slipped, weight gone wrong all at once as he went down hard on the porch steps. His elbow took the worst of it, punching into the bottom board with a sharp crack that echoed out into the night.
He'd laid there for a long moment, staring up at the underside of the porch roof, unable to look his father in the eye.
The door shut with a loud slam, and that was that.
He was on his own.
You
"So, like, what about tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow?"
She had to be joking.
"You can't just ask me to move out tomorrow, Brit, where would I go?" you said. Your voice had begun to shake, it felt odd even in your own ears: thin and nearly desperate.
"Call your friend Abby! I'm sure she's—"
"She's on a European backpacking trip—"
"I'm sure your mom and dad would—"
She seemed to find her mistake there, and stopped short. All you could do was look at her as a sour curdle of betrayal settled between you.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “But I really need you to move out. Brad’s coming tomorrow and we want to finally live together. And starting this next chapter of our relationship just doesn’t make sense with a roommate.”
You had half a mind to laugh. Brad, who she'd been dating for six months, moving in. Kicking you out. But you couldn't quite get yourself to even smile at the insanity of how impulsive your roommate could be. She'd been like this ever since you moved in together your sophomore year of college. Your throat was closing up quickly, so you stood up from the couch, legs a little shaky, and walked toward your bedroom without saying anything else.
Inside, there wasn't much. At least, nothing that belonged to you. Most of the things here belonged to Brit or were bought secondhand when you'd first moved in last year. Since then, the room had slowly become yours, though maybe you always knew this day would come. It was why there weren't posters on the walls, why you didn't even get a rug even though the floor was freezing in the early mornings.
You pulled your backpack from the closet and started packing on autopilot. Fuck this— you weren't gonna let yourself mope here for another day before having to leave. Your laptop went in first, then the chargers that were all tangled up beside your bed. You shoved your notebooks next and your lumpy makeup bag. There was a folder too, stuffed with old syllabi and warning letters and forms you hadn’t looked at yet. You knew what they said, more or less.
You hesitated over them for a moment though, then pushed them down deeper, continuing the checklist in your head. Wallet, sunglasses, lip balm. Toiletries.
The clothes from your drawers and hangers all got shoved in the one plastic bin that you pulled out from under your bed with the rest of your crap.
You walked out into the bathroom and swiped your things from the vanity to shove in your backpack too. The adrenaline of it all was flowing in your blood, making it easy to just go go go. Toothbrush, tampons, deodorant—and for security, and extra roll of her Charmin's Ultra. You never knew when you'd be strapped.
You couldn't help but let the anxious thoughts of next steps begin to crowd your mind, wondering where you could go. You didn't even have a fucking car.
Out in the living room, Brit was leaning back on the couch, her phone in her lap as she texted away as if nothing was amiss.
“Here.” You tossed your house key onto the coffee table.
She called your name as you turned for the front door, but you could hardly bother to face her. There was a lump forming thicker in your throat now as the door came closer and closer, your life of unknown just on the other side of it. You worried if you looked back at your roommate again, you might do something humiliating. Like beg to stay.
She called your name a little harsher now, and finally you stopped.
“Your mail." she said. "And…I'm sorry.”
You glanced over just enough to see her arm extended toward you. You couldn't look at her face, just her manicured fingers holding out the envelopes.
One from your school.
A hospital bill.
Another from your credit card.
And a postcard from Abby with a green mountainside somewhere in the south of France.
You snatched the mail from Brit and made for the door, slamming it behind you.
You didn't really know where you were going when you started walking, just that your apartment was close enough to downtown and standing still felt useless. Your phone buzzed in your hand as you moved, probably Brit, but you keep walking. The bin you carried dug into your hip and you were dying to sit down and think through a plan. But you refused to sit on the curb. You'd at least check your bank account. Maybe you could get something to eat.
At a stop light, you set your bin down and pulled out your phone. Opening the banking app, your thumb was braced for disappointment.
The numbers were just as bad as you expected.
Your checking account had been thinner and thinner these past few days, but at least getting kicked out in the middle of the month meant you still had a chunk from saving for rent. Your actual savings had been a joke since you left home years ago. Your credit card balance sat in that ugly in between of minimum payments barely making a dent and the waning emails had started feeling more serious. You swiped into your email as you thought of it, subject lines of warnings and low balances and automated reminders about missed payments.
You closed the app and nearly threw your phone into oncoming traffic. But instead, pulled out your wallet. Okay, you still had some cash from babysitting your neighbor's little assholes last weekend.
So you picked up your backpack and your bin and kept walking, this time, towards a destination.
Randy's Diner came into view and soon you were walking inside a little clumsily, fitting yourself and your belongings through the glass door before sliding into a booth. You sighed with relief of finally having a place to land for a a little while when the waiter came and took your order of a milkshake and fries. Cheap, greasy, something to make life a little better for a second. The guy who took your order hardly took a second glance at your belongings around you, and you were grateful for it.
Lining up your things on the table just to give yourself something to do, you tried to think about a plan. You had a phone that still worked, a wallet with some spare cash. The stack of mail Brit had handed you on the way out.
While you waited for your order, you went back to scrolling.
Indeed, ZipRecruiter, Craiglist—though maybe you should've known better than to try that last one.
Everything wanted a degree. Everything wanted reliable transportation. Everything wanted experience you didn’t have or credentials you’d never finished earning. You bookmarked a few anyway, even applied to one or two jobs that paid barely above minimum wage. You'd figured out the transportation after. Your student work at the university had officially run its course, so you had to start somewhere. Your thumb kept moving, muscle memory at this point, even as your chest started to feel tight.
Your fries arrived first—hot and salty and perfect—though your appetite had waned as your future became more and more bleak. You wondered how long they'd let you stay in here. If you ate one fry at a time, took a sip of milkshake every five minutes, maybe they could last you a couple hours without buying anything else.
In the middle of your thought process, the waiter came back with your milkshake, setting it down in front of you, chocolate dripping slowly down the side of the glass. You saw him looking over your shoulder at your phone screen before you could hide it from view, and he looked back up at you.
“You lookin' for work?”
You hesitated, laying your phone face down in your lap, but nodded. There wasn't any point in pretending.
He leaned his hip against the booth opposite from you for a second, his kind face and dark eyes gentle as they took you in.
"We've got a bulletin board by the entrance, people are always tacking stuff up there. Babysitting, dog walking, odd jobs. It's not much, but… yeah. I could see if my boss is hiring too."
"Thank you," you said, and you meant it, and gave you a small smile as he walked to his next table.
You ate your fries slowly, though the milkshake didn't stand a chance of lasting you a few hours. The creamy cold sweetness felt good down your thickening throat, the salt of the fries a perfect pairing. If anything, it was making you feel a little better. Though for how long, you couldn't be sure. You tried to stay off your phone, saving the phone battery for as long as possible.
You thought about how fast everything had unraveled. Not just today, but over the last year. How it all happened so quickly and in small, miniature disasters. And then a missed assignment, a few classes skipped, a failed class and then two. And then your scholarship slipped through your fingers. You had parents who thought they loved you in theory, but you weren't sure you could get past the things that had happened. You thought of the money you used to have, options you used to assume would always be there.
You'd gone from being a student at a top rated school to sipping a marble milkshake in a diner with your life stuffed into a single bin and backpack before you knew it.
You wondered, briefly, if you should’ve just stayed with them. If you should’ve swallowed their words, their expectations and kept your head down, let them buy you a car and pay your rent. You imagined yourself back in that house, walking on eggshells, smiling through it, letting them dictate your life in exchange for comfort.
Your stomach tightened at the thought.
Even now, sitting here with your backpack at your feet and everything you owned stacked beside you, you knew you couldn’t have done that. You’d rather be broke and displaced than small and silent with your family who reminded you everyday of what went wrong.
That didn’t make this any easier.
When you eventually flagged down the waiter for the check, he shook his head.
"It's on me," he said, "I've been where you are. It ain't easy."
You started to protest, but he only shook his head harder, a smile widening his lips. "Seriously, it's cool. Don't even worry."
You sighed, giving in. "Okay, well…I appreciate it."
He nodded, rapping his knuckles on the table, and turned away.
Eventually you realized there wasn’t much point in sitting there anymore, watching strangers pass by through the window while your empty plate sat cold. You needed to figure out where you were sleeping. That part couldn’t wait.
You pulled your phone back out and started searching, thumb moving slower now. Women’s shelters, emergency housing, cheap motels within walking distance. Some of the reviews mentioned bed bugs and stolen belongings. You stared at one listing for a long minute, doing the math in your head, wondering how bad it really was, if it was worth it.
You weren't sure. But you had to start somewhere.
Collecting your bin and throwing your backpack over your shoulder, you thanked your waiter again and made for the door, but paused.
The bulletin in the entryway was tacked full of business cards of local real estate agents, lawyers, and We Buy Houses with Cash crap, but there were a few job postings. One in particular caught your eye.
ISO — ranch help. 50 horses. Stall cleaning, general barn maintenance. Must be able to lift heavy weight and have experience with horses. Work for room and board available.
You leaned in closer, reading it again. Room and board. Horses. A ranch.
Memories suddenly flooded your minds eye. It was like remembering a past life, what was your past life. Afternoons after school spent throwing on riding boots and climbing into the saddle while the other kids did team sports like soccer or softball. Your summers were spent on sprawling farms where your parents dropped you with a suitcase and a credit card to spend every hour of daylight brushing coats and braiding manes and begging the counselors to let you stay in the barn after dinner. Weekend mornings started earlier than the rest of the world, your hair perfectly tucked under your helmet, stiflingly stiff show coats and tan breeches pressing tight against your skin while your mother sipped coffee on the sidelines. Visions of ribbons and trophies and the smell of hay and horses filled your head, all still there, tucked away somewhere inside you. A second skin you’d worn once upon a time.
You pulled out your phone and dialed the number on the card.
The voice on the other end was low, baritone, and breathy.
"Hello?"
"Um—" you hesitated, not sure where to start, the diner suddenly felt very quiet, like everyone could hear your conversation. "I saw your job posting on the bulletin at Randy's, for room and board?"
"You got experience with horses?"
"Yes."
There was a pause, and you swore you could hear the grin on the man's face as he finally went on, "You gonna tell me what kinda experience or gonna make me guess?"
“Oh—sorry,” you rushed, fumbling over your words. “I grew up riding, you know, lessons and summer camps. I did show jumping and hunters. An-and barn chores too.”
He exhaled slowly, like he was already recalibrating whatever picture he’d formed in his head.
“Okay,” he said. “I’m gonna be straight with you. This ain’t that kinda place. We breed quarter horses, raise em' and train for barrel racin' and other western discipline. The work you gotta do ain't like them hoity-toity English lessons. I need someone for cleanin', feedin', haulin' water, early mornings. Ain’t polished, ain’t fancy, and it—”
"That's fine," you answered quickly, "Really, I just um, I really need the place to stay, and the job. I don't mind the work."
There was another pause, longer this time. You squeezed your eyes shut and prayed to whatever god there might be that he was going to accept.
“Well," he sighed, "I sure as hell need the help. You callin’ from Randy’s right now?”
"Yes, sir."
"You got a car to come out here?"
"No, sir."
There was another pause, but this one was rented by the sound of keys jangling in the background, a creaking of a screen door opening and snapping shut.
"I'm on my way. Stay put. Tell Jesse I'll be there for ya soon."
Jesse?
Before you could ask, the line went dead.
45 minutes and a free cup of coffee later with your waiter—who, it turned out, really was named Jesse—a loud, rattling exhaust rolled down the center of the street and parked crookedly in front of the diner doors.
"That'd be your cue," Jesse said with a wink, taking your empty cup from your hands.
You turned toward the noise: an old red Ford idling rough at the curb, coughing like an old man with a bad lung. You gathered your bin and slung your backpack higher on your shoulder, starting toward it.
There was a man in the driver’s seat with dark, graying hair under a Stetson hat, shading a thick brow that threaded over his eyes. You couldn’t quite see the color at first, only the way they caught the sunlight bouncing off the street as he leaned back with his cheek resting against his knuckles, scanning the sidewalk for whoever he was supposed to be meeting. When his gaze landed on you, you felt it like a rush of warmth, just a quick glance down and back up again, taking inventory.
He climbed out of the truck right away and reached for your bin before you could stop him. Up close, he was broad and tall, solid through the shoulders and chest, everything about the way he took up the space unmistakably masculine.
“Howdy,” he said. “You the girl I was talkin’ to?”
“Yes, sir," you replied, adding a quiet thanks as he lifted the bin from your hands.
“Go on, get in. I’ll grab the rest.”
"The…rest, sir?"
He paused, his hand sliding your backpack off your shoulder without asking. “The rest of your things.”
You shrugged, glancing toward the truck bed where your plastic bin already sat, the snaps barely holding it together.
“This is it.”
He cocked his head a bit at that, a clicked his teeth. But it didn't take him long to throw your backpack on the bench seat and grab a hold of his driver's side door. "Well. Come on then."
You nodded, moving around the front of the truck and hopping in beside him.
He was playing some old Johnny Cash song on the radio, so low you barely heard the strumming guitar riffs over the truck shuddering as he pulled out of the lot.
“So, like… no background check or references?” you called over the loud engine.
When you looked over at him, you suddenly realized how handsome he was. Hazel, his eyes were hazel. A hundred different shades of green and brown and blue all muddied together. And he was smiling, a wide grin stretching over his face as his hand came up to scratch at his thick beard.
"Should I be worried?" he replied. He had a classic Texas twang to his voice too, you had a hard time thinking to be clever over his charm.
You shrugged, "Just…you didn't even think to ask about my criminal record or anything. Must be desperate."
He laughed a little, and his smile was so nice, he wasn't anything like the old rancher you expected to be picking you up. Your shoulders loosened a bit at the easiness he brought.
"Why? You gonna show up on America's Most Wanted if I turn on the TV?"
"Ya never know," you said, mirroring his wide grin.
Out on the open road, you drove for a while with the music turned back up, talking dulled down to quiet. Mostly because there was no use trying to have any conversation over the grumbling of the old Ford. You wondered how old the dang thing could be, if it had been in his family or if he was one of those old car junkies. Time passed easily, open fields of corn and produce filling the landscape more than anything else. The land opened wide and patient beneath the sky, and the road seemed to stretch on and on under his headlights as the sky slowly softening toward evening. When he reached over to turn the radio quieter, you felt him glance over.
"So gotta couple things to tell ya about," the man said, "'fore we get there n' all."
You nodded, "Okay," folding your hands in your lap.
"Ain't much out here," he began, "If you need somethin', we keep a list in the house for when I go grocery shoppin', which is about every two to three weeks if I can manage it. Any kinda fun you think you might wanna have, bars and clubbin'—your social life, that is—"
"Don't really have one, so—"
“— you’ll need to let me know ahead of time,” he said, rolling right over your interruption, “and I’ll take you and pick you up. Ain’t no cabs comin’ all the way out here. Closest place we got is The Tipsy Bison, and that’s mostly bikers passin’ through and a few stragglers from nearby farms.”
You laughed quietly. “The Tipsy what now?”
He shook his head, "I'm just tryna let you know that we're way out there, alright? Far from town, from civilization. Some people go a bit stir crazy from it."
You looked out the window, the sunset beginning to drench the sky in a blaze of orange.
"I got nowhere to be so…"
When you glanced back over, you caught him looking at you again with something thoughtful, maybe even worried. But then they softened, and he let out a soft breath, and turned the music back up.
Eventually the ranch came into view, an old rickety sign blowing in the breeze that stated its name proud and rusted:
Miller Farms Quarter Horses.
He pulled the truck right up to the house, porch lights glowing warm against the darkness. It was so dark out here you couldn’t even make out the rolling mountains behind the property, only the moon hanging high above and a scatter of stars, thin clouds drifting slow across the sky. The quiet felt bigger than you were, stretched wide in every direction. You suddenly realized just how far from anything you really were, the moon feeling like the closest to anyone you'd be for a while.
He hopped out of the truck with your bag in tow, grabbing your bin and moving easily with it despite how heavy it had felt in your arms before. Walking around the truck, he came back around with your backpack slung easily over his shoulder, broad frame crowding the car door you opened.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ll show you your place.”
You nodded, nerves humming low in your chest, and followed him across the gravel, trying not to stare at the way his shoulders moved under his simple black tee shirt. He led the way toward the barn, and you saw the old, chipped red paint coming into view as you got closer, then turned left and up a narrow flight of stairs that were barely lit.
“Door gets a bit jammed sometimes,” he said over his shoulder as he made it to the top. “Gotta get used to the way she likes handlin'.”
He set your bin down and dug out his keys, working them into the lock.
“She’s a little nitpicky,” he added, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “But if ya hold her just right and—”
He leaned his shoulder hard into the door, and it opened with a tired creak.
You couldn’t help the small smile that tugged your lips as you passed him to see inside.
The place was sweet, bigger than anything you needed or expected, but already warm with someone else’s living. Carpeted floors led into a furnished living room, a little box TV with a VHS player tucked beneath it, a gray couch and a La-Z-Boy framing the space. A couple of barstools sat at the kitchen counter, a coffee maker waiting quietly in the corner. You walked through slowly, taking it all in, past a full bath and into a small bedroom off to the right, everything already set up like someone had tried to imagine you here.
“Got some sheets n' blanket a few days ago, so everythin' is fresh for ya,” he said, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Wasn’t sure who’d be stayin’, so sorry if they ain't your taste. We can always—”
"What's your name?" you asked suddenly, turning on your heel.
He cleared his throat, "Oh—"
“Usually I try to learn a man’s name before he comes into my house,” you said, half joking, half not.
His shoulders dropped as he smiled, something easing out of him at the tone in your voice. “Joel. Joel Miller.”
He held out his hand, and you took it. His grip was warm and solid, calloused in a way that told you he worked with them every day, and you realized you were staring a little too long at the lines of his face, the crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes, the sunburnt planes of his cheekbones. He was so…big, broader than anyone had any right to be, and suddenly you felt very small standing in front of him with your whole life packed into a single plastic bin and a backpack.
“Listen,” he said, pulling his hand back gently to shove it into his jean pocket before fishing out the little front door key and handing it over. “Why don’t you get settled in, and I’ll introduce you to everyone. Then we’ll have some dinner. I gotta do bed check soon anyway.”
"Dinner?" Everyone?
“Yeah,” he said over his shoulder, heading for the door. “Figure you’ve had a long day. Least I can do. Just holler or come on down when you’re ready.”
You only could force yourself to nod, watching as he pulled the door shut, the descending sounds of his footsteps on the steps, and the beginnings of murmurs and movement below.
You found yourself worrying who he meant by everyone. Other workers, maybe. A wife and kids? You wondered what it would feel like to exist in the margins of someone else’s life like that, sleeping upstairs in the barn while their family moved through the house across the gravel drive. Would you be standing shoulder to shoulder with the farm workers who might barely look at you at all? It was the quiet dismissal you remembered from barn culture when you were younger, the way people could acknowledge your presence without ever really seeing you.
The thoughts started to pile in your chest.
You shook your head, rubbing your palms up and down your face, then turned toward the shower.
Joel
Joel wasn’t entirely sure what he’d gotten himself into.
When he’d put up the ad, he figured he’d find another nice young guy like Jesse, someone with their own truck, their own life, who’d stay upstairs and keep to themselves, come down for chores and head back out again without ever really crossing into his world. Someone easy, someone who didn’t need much from him.
But the first surprise had been your voice.
Sweet and young and threaded through with a desperation he tried not to dwell on. He’d barely questioned your experience or knowledge, even though he knew better.
He still hadn’t asked your name, and that bothered him now.
Where were his manners? He kept meaning to, kept losing the moment, and somehow every time he looked at you it slipped his mind again. He’d felt thrown off from the start, even just watching you walk out of the diner toward his truck, carrying one plastic bin and one backpack, everything you owned balanced between your arms and shoulder. No car or extra baggage, just the clothes on your back and that look on your face like you were trying very hard to not fall apart.
He thought that might’ve been when it really sank in that he was in deep. That he couldn't question you like any old job interview. That he couldn't just leave you there. You were coming with him, and that was that.
He’d left you upstairs to get settled, hoping everything looked alright. He’d had Tess meet him at the department store to help pick things out, because she’d always been good at that sort of thing, even back when Sarah was little and needed things he didn’t understand. She’d helped him keep it neutral while still making it feel livable, neither of them knowing if it’d be a man or a woman moving in, one person or two. It wasn’t much of an apartment, but it was something.
He remembered the old man who used to live up there when Joel was just a kid. Mr. Riley. Gruff old bastard who’d put Joel straight to work the second he had his boots on in the morning, always handing him the worst stalls, the jobs nobody wanted—sorting rotted lumber from the good, shoveling horse shit in the round pen and exerciser, or pulling weeds until his hands cramped. Back then Joel had hated it.
But now, standing back here years later, he figured it’d done him some good. Toughened him up, made everything else feel manageable by comparison.
He was downstairs now, filling water buckets, letting the routine carry him easily and allowing his thoughts to wander. It was his favorite part of the evening, when the horses were tucked into their hay for the night, rustling and content. Fender got his mash and his meds, looking better than he had in a long time, and Joel couldn’t help shaking his head at the old fool. Thirty-five years old, easy. Maybe more. He watched the old stallion as he smeared mash all over his muzzle now, ears flicking toward Joel as he topped off the water in his stall.
Fender had been the first horse he ever broke. Joel had been a gangly teenager, the horse nothing but legs and attitude back then. His father had let him keep him because the poor colt's mama nearly kicked her own baby's head in the day he was born. Some horses were just like that--never meant to be parents--but Joel never held it against them.
He stood and walked to the next stall now, starting the water again, and listened to the steady rhythm of chewing, the filling of water in the plastic buckets, that old feeling of the barn settling around him. He tried to shake the image of you standing there in the parking lot with your whole life packed into plastic.
He told himself he’d done the right thing.
He hoped he had.
"Hey."
Your voice came from the far end of the aisle, quiet but clear enough to pull him from his stupor. He turned quickly, caught off guard, and found you standing there with damp hair darkening the shoulders of your hoodie, pearl drops of water still soaking into the fabric. You’d changed into something comfortable, already looking more at home in a barn than he’d expected. His barn.
“Hi,” he said, and it came out softer than he meant it to.
What the hell had gotten into him.
You were smiling, just a little, and then the gelding beside you shoved his head halfway out his stall, drawn by the faint crinkle of something in your pocket. Before Joel could even open his mouth, half the barn followed suit, noses poking out one after another, ears pricked, a sudden chorus of hopeful snorts and nickers filling the aisle.
“Found these upstairs by the door,” you laughed, pulling out a peppermint, your smile brightening in wattage as you took in the lineup you’d accidentally summoned.
“Best not spoil ’em rotten before you get to know ’em,” Joel told you, though there was no real scolding in it.
He watched as you unwrapped the candy and held it out to the blue roan nearest you, who took it delicately before immediately chomping down like it was heaven on earth. The sound set the rest of them off, heads tossing, hooves kicking their stall walls, everyone suddenly convinced they were being unfairly neglected.
“Oh now you really got ’em goin’,” Joel said, reaching out to pat Fender’s neck when the old horse joined the racket before he stepped closer to you and nodded toward the stall door beside your shoulder.
GOOD MATCH
MAC : GOOD MACHINE X MISS BUCKEYE
BORN 3/15
“This here’s Good Match,” Joel said, pointing to the happy blue roan. “One of Good Machine’s foals.”
You raised your eyebrows at him while your hand was still slick with horse spit.
He smiled. “Fancy horse, is what I’m sayin’. Good genes.”
You wiped your palm on your pants and leaned back toward the young gelding. “I gotta say, it’s been a long time since I remembered horses got weird names like that. We’re just gonna call you Mac, okay?”
You kissed him between the eyes, and Mac promptly decided he’d gotten everything he was going to get out of you and went back to his hay.
Joel walked you down the aisle after that, pointing out stalls as he went, giving you everyone’s story and their barn name, the one they went by instead of their pedigree. His father would’ve slapped him upside the head for it.
Ain’t no good dumbin’ them down to their stable names when introducin’ them to folks, Joel. You take away all our hard work that way.
“We got Mary here,” he said, stopping beside a bay mare, trying to clear his head of his father's reprimand. “She’s retired from her show days, and has a bit of trouble under saddle, though she’s a good girl on the ground. Best mama we got. She'll be goin' to a new home soon. Found a nice family with little girl who will love her.”
You nodded, smiling as the mare took a peppermint.
“Rocky hates his hind end touched,” he continued, already moving on to the bay gelding next to her. “Might get yer head kicked off unless he's sedated. Broke a groom's jaw once when they didn't listen."
"I don't like my hind end touched without permission either, bud," you whispered, touching Rocky's nose as he took a mint.
Joel chuckled a bit at that, and carried on.
“Paloma here goes out alone during the day, then stays in her stall at night like the rest of 'em,” he said, slowing near the larger foaling stall. “She’s due any day now with her first foal, don't want any trouble by puttin' her out with the herd.”
You stopped, stepping closer to the pale blonde mare, taking in her swollen belly, the way she stood with her head low in her hay.
“She don’t care much for sweets,” Joel added, quieter now. “But if you ever got a banana, you’ll be her best friend.”
“That’s so cute,” you murmured, leaning your elbows against her stall window. “Pregnancy cravings are weird, huh, woman?”
Paloma swished her tail in response and went right back to eating.
“The horses in the barn are here for a reason,” he said, turning to you after all the introductions had been made. “Either stall rest or workin’. The rest are out on the east hillside right now. I’ll be changin’ fields tomorrow if you wanna come along.”
You turned toward him, eyes wide, nerves and excitement tangled together as they reflected the barn lights. “Seriously?”
He nodded. “Gotta show you around when the sun’s out.”
You nodded back, fingers lifting to your mouth, biting lightly at the tips before you caught yourself. “Yeah. Yeah, okay. That sounds great.”
“I’ll give you the mornin’ off from stalls,” Joel said. “But come Tuesday, I expect ’em all done first thing, alright?”
“Yes, sir,” you replied softly, hands dropping back to your sides.
He waved it off. “Just Joel’s fine, darlin’.”
Then, after a beat, he tipped his head toward the back of the barn.
“Come on,” he said. “Let me show you the feed and tack rooms, then we’ll eat.”
Joel had missed this—cooking for someone. He realized it halfway into plating your dish, handing it to you, letting you settle in at his dining table.
Sure it was a little awkward, having you in his home where no one had been except for the occasional visit from Sarah in the months he'd been here. The house was so quiet, it made him a little restless, too much space to fill with the echoes of his memories. He kept catching himself listening for things that weren’t there anymore: boots on the stairs, his brother hollering his complaints about getting up early, the baying hound dog losing its mind over a squirrel in the yard. He remembered his father falling asleep on the old recliner in the living room, watching the same reruns on the loudest volume because he couldn’t hear half of what was being said.
But Joel didn't think of any of that now, not when you let out a long sigh of contentment as you ate the dinner he made you. You'd let him talk you into a glass of wine, toasting to a fresh start, though you'd looked at him funny for that. He'd really meant for you, but maybe he meant for himself a little too.
"This was really nice, Joel," you said softly, sipping the last dregs of your wine glass, setting down your knife and fork, "Thank you."
“Ain’t nothin’. Happy to,” he replied, waving off your kindness. He found himself liking the way his name sounded in your mouth. He also noticed he was on his third glass and made a mental note not to pour another.
"It's awfully quiet in here, ya know." you said with another contented sigh. "Where is everyone?"
Joel picked up his own wine glass, toying with the stem for a moment as he looked at you, an indifferent frown forming on his lips, "S'just me."
You looked over at him him then, your gaze lingering, and he felt the burn of being studied, looked at a little too hard. But you had such pretty eyes, he almost…didn't mind it—you, staring at him. He found himself wondering what they'd look like in the morning light tomorrow. It was a curious thought, as he wasn't much of a painter at all, but he wanted to know the different colors it would take to get them just right. And right now they were a little red at the edges, brightened by the wine and warmth of a full stomach.
"Tell me something—about you then." you said, sitting up a little straighter and letting your chin rest on your propped up hands, elbows setting gently on the table as you leaned in, "Something I should know."
"I'm shit at dancin'."
He wasn't sure why he'd said it, but it was the first thing that came to mind.
"And that's something I should know?" you smiled widely, toothily, and he couldn't help but smile back.
"Just in case we ever do make it to The Tipsy Bison—they got square dancin' on Sundays. And don't think you'll ever talk me into it."
“Yes, sir,” you said, lifting two lazy fingers in a mock salute. “In exchange, I’ll tell you I’m a terrible singer.”
"I'll make sure not to walk in on ya in the shower, then."
Fuck, he really shouldn't have said that. He was cursing himself again for the three wine glasses he'd consumed, making his tongue loose. But you humored him with a deep blush, looking away for a moment, into his kitchen, but your face fell slowly, and then all at once.
"Why are you all alone on this big farm, Joel?"
You looked at him again, the warmth of wine still gleaming in your eyes, but they were serious now. Sad, almost.
He sat back, his own smile gone too now. Sighing, he folded his arms across his chest, following where your eyes had looked, over into the kitchen, where a family photo still hung on the wall a little crookedly. One of a man and a woman with their two sons. And an old dog by their side.
"This was my family's farm. My dad's." he started softly, and you only nodded, he could see it from his peripheral, but he didn't look back at you yet, "we uh…we didn't get along too well. Hadn't seen 'em since… well. In a long time." His hand came up without thinking, the sound of his nails through the thicket of his beard soothing to his own ears.
"I had to make my own way for a long, long time. And just last spring I got a call that he'd... And no one was around to take the place. My brother is off livin' his life in Austin now, and I was…." He trailed off, then looked back at you. “I’d been retired for a while. So here I am.”
"You grew up here?" you asked softly, biting your lip a little shyly as you met his gaze.
He nodded.
"And your dad… did he…was he a good man?"
Joel didn't answer that.
"I don't talk to my parents either." you added then, soft as anything, saving him from having to.
His gaze didn’t waver from you.
“They wanted something for me,” you went on slowly, and he could see how carefully you were choosing your words. “Something they were sure was right. And I tried to go along with it.” Your mouth pressed thin for a second. “But it cost me more than they’ll ever understand.”
You shut your eyes briefly, steadying yourself, and when you opened them again there was something firm there.
“And I don't think I'll ever forgive them. Easy as that.”
"I'm sure it ain't easy." Joel murmured, leaning in now, wanting to listen.
You huffed a short breath, a cold smile on your lips, "If it was, I wouldn't be here, would I?" You shook your head, looking down at your nails, "but…I'm glad I am, by the way. To be here. Thank you."
He nodded once, unable to answer yet. There was a strange thing happening, something like a mirror held up to him, and he didn’t like how clearly he could see himself in it. He wondered if he’d been just as fierce about the line between himself and his father when he was your age, or if he’d just left quietly and carried the damage with him. He wondered if he’d ever had the kind of courage it took to sit here like you were now: in the middle of nowhere, with a strange man on a thousand acre farm, all alone with nowhere to be.
“I should probably go to bed now,” you said. “Big day tomorrow, huh?”
Joel felt himself soften, shoulders dropping.
“Somethin’ like that.” He pushed his chair back and stood. “Let me walk you out—no—” He stopped when you reached for your plate, holding a hand out. “Leave that, I’ll get it. Got enough work ahead of ya.” He gave you a small smile.
You returned it and thanked him again quietly, and he walked you back to his front door, opening it for you. He could see your door from here now. Not Mr. Riley’s anymore. Yours. A funny feeling in his stomach dropped low and warm at the thought.
You stood there as if waiting for him. For him to say something, or do something, he wasn't sure. He wondered if you’d had any of the same thoughts about him today, if you’d felt it too—the strange shift in the course, the way something had gone a little sideways the moment you showed up with your life in a plastic bin.
He didn’t know. So he only said:
"Goodnight."
And you were so close. He could nearly count your lashes you were so close. And you were looking up at him, and he tilted his own head to mirror yours, not even meaning to, his eyes scanning your face, taking you in under the porch light.
“Goodnight, Joel,” you said softly, and to his surprise you rose onto your toes, your delicate fingers settling gently on his upper arm for balance as your lips brushed his cheek. “And thank you again…for…yeah, everything.”
“You won’t be thankin’ me by midday tomorrow,” he said, trying to keep his voice steady as you leaned back on your heels. “Go on now. Get some sleep.”
You laced your fingers behind your back and turned, heading down the front steps, the bottom board giving that familiar aching creak as you disappeared into the dark.
You
You rode out with Joel while the morning was still young, the sky wide and washed clean blue, the pastures stretching open in every direction.
The land rose in fell in gentle swells around you, acres of grass catching the early breeze, fence lines cutting through fields that felt endless. The air smelled cleaner out here, fresh, forgiving. As if all your problems were left behind at the barn.
The saddle felt different than the English tack you'd grown up in—heavier, wider, that big western horn with the lariat rope hanging around, a saddlebag of things. Your canvas sneakers felt silly in the stirrups, and Joel had even eyed them a little funny in the barn when he'd helped you onto the horse. It all felt a little clunky, everything reminding you this wasn't a show barn or a perfectly manicured arena anymore, but once you found your balance it came back easy, a muscle memory that felt like it had been waiting for you all along.
Your hips followed the rhythm of the horse beneath you, heels dropping unconsciously into the stirrups and your hands light on the reins. It felt funny how quickly your body remembered something your life had left behind.
That morning, you had tried to find Joel in time to help with stalls, but he was already done and saddling up two horses for you to head out when you came downstairs. He was on Mac and had given you a chestnut mare named Georgie who was all bark and no bite, her ears pinned when the gelding got a little too close, but quick on her feet and a smooth ride up the hillside.
You followed his lead at first, watching how easily he sat upon his steed, his shoulders relaxed, at home out here in the wide open space. You let yourself drift a little, letting your gaze wander over the land, over the herd moving ahead of you, tails swishing lazily as they moved through the pasture, ears flicking back every so often to check where you were.
The morning passed easily as you turned the thirty something horses over into the next pasture, both of you on either end. Joel was a good teacher, clear and concise and forgiving if you meandered out of line. He only spoke when something needed saying, pointing things out you'd need to remember. But mostly you rode in companionable quiet, the sounds of leather creaking beneath you and hooves in the dirt filling the space.
At some point you realized…you felt lighter. Like something had been left behind. That weight you'd been carrying, whether it was physical or metaphorical—it felt forgotten out here. You chest was lighter, you were just…existing. You weirdly felt lucky.
By the time you finished shifting the horses into the eastern hillside, your legs were sore and tired in a good way, and your cheeks were beginning to hurt from smiling without realizing it.
You were dismounted now, horses tied behind you and grazing on the grass by the fence posts, watching the herd enjoy their new plot and Joel checking the wires and wood of the post that needed fixing.
The morning dew was burning off in the sunlight, the air warming fast.
“This place…” you began with a quiet sigh, your face resting atop your hands. Your body was threaded through the fence line, your butt perched on the second plank, feet hooked behind the bottom rail, your head leaned against the top while you watched the horses fan out across their new pasture. “It’s wonderful.”
Joel smiled to himself as he dug around the base of the post to your left.
“How long have you been back for?” you asked when he didn’t answer right away.
He dragged the back of his glove across his forehead, leaving a faint streak of dirt behind. “’Bout a year now.”
“And you just… knew what to do?” you said. “Even after your time away?”
He looked up at you from where he was kneeling, caught you looking down at him.
“My pop’s farmhand was still here when I came back. Couple workers too, just for the transition, busy months.” He leaned his weight into the post, straightening it by hand. “By the end of summer, the farmhand left me to it.”
“Just like that?” you asked. “Everything?”
He grunted as he packed dirt back into the hole. “Workers come and go. That’s how it’s always been. Which is why I needed someone full-time.”
He took the fence post, pulling and pushing it into position, his shirt stretched tight across his chest when he straightened it by hand. His thick muscles shifted under the fabric, forearms roped and dusted with grit as he packed dirt back into the hole. You watched his shoulders flex as he pulled the wire taut, the muscles in his arms bulging with the force of his strength. You had to look away quickly, refocus on the twitching muscles of the horses instead.
"Riley said he'd finally get the retirement he wanted, far from here," he grunted again, lurching the fence post into submission, "I think he said somethin' about the coast of Florida, not sure where he is now. Hope the bastard got to be with his grandkids, though." Joel finished.
"I hope so too." you said quietly.
You watched him out of the corner of your eye as he secured the wire, drove the staples back in, then stood and leaned against the post with a long breath, looking out over the herd with you. One of the horses pinned its ears at another and let out an irritated whinny.
He chuckled.
“So,” he said after a moment, folding his arms over his chest, glancing down at you. “What do you think?”
You tipped your head back to look at him, cheek still resting on your knuckles.
“It’s amazing.”
He nodded, pleased, then turned back toward the pasture.
“What’s your deal then, Joel Miller?” you asked.
It came out a little seriously, but you said it with a smile. When he looked at you, you could tell he was relieved it wasn’t an interrogation.
"Dunno, what is my deal, little lady?"
You dragged your teeth over your bottom lip, considering your words, then shrugged. “I mean… no wife? No kids? A good-lookin’ man like yourself shouldn’t be out here all alone.”
"Good lookin', huh?" he teased, and you rolled your eyes.
You waited though, not giving him an out just yet.
“My daughter’s grown,” he said finally. “Livin’ her own life. She’s up in San Diego. Tryna grow a family.”
Your eyes widened. “You’re gonna be a grandpa?”
His face softened at that.
“Maybe,” he said. “She came to see me when I first got here. Checkin’ in on me. I offered her the apartment for her and her partner, but she didn’t want any of this sorta life. Went back home and…"
"Haven’t seen her since,” he finished quietly.
“You should go visit her,” you said.
He exhaled through his nose. “Yeah. I should.”
You watched him for a beat, then nudged the moment back into lighter territory.
“No wife?” you asked again.
He looked down at you, one brow lifting. “Nope.”
You pretended to think about it, tapping your finger against the back of your hand where it laid. Hmmm…you hummed.
"What?" he asked, mock affronted.
You smiled up at him. “Nothin'. Just a shame, seems like someone would be missing out.”
He snorted. “Careful.”
“Careful what?”
He peered down at you from the corner of his eye, a smile tugging harder into his cheek, his hand coming up to his beard. He did that a lot, you were starting to notice—his fingers dragging through the thick of it, thoughtful—and you wondered what it would feel like if it was your hand there instead.
“Gonna make me act outta line if you keep flirtin’."
“Should I call HR?” you teased.
He let out a low chuckle, shaking his head.
You leaned your chin into your palm, studying him plainly now. “So what, you just scare all your employees off with your rugged charm and unresolved daddy issues?”
He barked out a surprised laugh at that, pointing at you and standing straight. “Oh, you’re trouble. Get on yer horse, young lady. Let's head back."
“Only observant,” you said innocently, untangling your body from the fence to stand beside him, “Come on now. Tell me why someone like you isn't married off with ten kids.”
He shook his head, turning his back on you, making his way over to the blue roan and untying his reins from the post as he called over his shoulder: “You sure like to poke and prod into a man’s life, don’t ya?”
You shrugged as you did the same with your mare. “Just like to know the person I’m gonna be spendin’ most my days with. That’s all.”
“And ten kids?!” he added, catching up to what you'd said, incredulous as he gripped the horn of the saddle and hopped on.
You couldn't tell him the real reason why you thought it.
“Whaaaatever,” you sing-songed when he didn’t give in, still smiling as you slid your foot into the stirrup and hauled yourself up. “Keep your secrets. I’ll find out one way or another.”
He didn't turn back when he nudged his horse forward, but you could've sworn you'd heard him say:
"I'm sure you will."
By late afternoon the barn was swept, chores done and checked off. Joel walked you through the evening routine you’d be handling later on, then headed out to a neighboring ranch for what he called a meeting. He had said something about breeding schedules and future placements and money changing hands. You hadn’t followed most of it, only nodded and smiled and leaned against the truck while he talked, watching the way he moved when he was explaining something, then watched him climb into the cab and pull away down the drive, dust kicking behind the old Ford.
And now, upstairs organizing what little you had, you realized the apartment had grown on you in the hours you’d been here, though you hadn’t spent much of that time inside it. It felt good to have a place that was yours, with the soft snorts of horses drifting up through the floorboards, a few still stalled downstairs while the rest were turned out to pasture. There was something comforting about the quiet noise of them eating, the low rustle of hay to keep you company.
You found the vacuum and supplies to clean the apartment for yourself, even though it already looked like someone had done so before you arrived. You tried to imagine Joel doing it and couldn’t quite make it fit. Maybe he had someone come by. Maybe he just liked things tidy. You caught yourself wondering if he had friends. Or—stupidly—if he had lady friends.
You shook it off and grabbed your emptied plastic bin.
You’d noticed the shed earlier, tucked behind the barn. A little yellow, rickety thing with one dusty window and a porch light over the door. When you’d asked about it, Joel had said it was just storage, told you if you needed to put anything in there he could handle it. But he wasn’t here now, and you didn’t feel like bothering him over something so trivial.
So you headed downstairs, the empty bin bumping lightly against your leg, gravel crunching under your canvas sneakers as you rounded the back of the barn. A few horses lifted their heads at the sound of you, hopeful for an early dinner, but you passed the open aisle doors and kept walking.
The shed sat behind a line of wheelbarrows, unimpressive and quiet. And yet, something about it made your skin prickle. You told yourself it was nothing. Inside probably just stored tack, tools, extra feed bins. Normal ranch stuff. So you made your way carefully around the wheelbarrows, and pulled the door open. Inside was exactly as you expected: dust and old wood and the faint smell of oil and leather. A single bulb hung from the ceiling on a pull cord, which you yanked and light spilled across the space.
Maybe Joel was a bit of a neat freak—things were tidier than you expected. Tool boxes lined the left wall, unused saddles and bridles on the right, all clean and hanging nicely, only age and disuse covering them in a layer of dust.
Ahead of you, long shelves ran the width of the shed, stacked with plastic bins, some clear, some opaque. You slid a few of them aside to make room for yours, careful not to disturb whatever system had been here before you arrived.
You pulled on one of the bins, heavier than you expected, and tried to shift it down to create some space for your own. Instead, the sudden pull sent it slipping out of your hands and off the shelf. It hit the floor with a crash so loud it felt explosive in the small space, plastic slamming concrete, the sound ricocheting through the walls and straight up your spine.
"Shit!" you squeaked, jumping away from the spilled contents.
Under you, the lid had popped loose on impact, causing a crack in the top of it. For a moment, you stood there, weighing the consequences of your actions before stooping down to begin cleaning up your crime. You half expected to hear Joel’s truck crunching back down the drive or his boots outside the shed door to find you guiltily snooping through his things, but the quiet stayed, the stale air of the shed pressing in, and your pulse slowly settled.
It was just a bin of old VHS tapes, and you couldn't help but smile at thinking what an old man, hanging on to old movies like this, like it was still the 90's. It looked as if he'd raided a blockbuster after they'd all closed down, given how many he had. They were all in paper casings—which you would only find odd after the fact—blue and black and most of them written on in sharpie with the titles. Maybe he'd pirated the movies, bought them secondhand. You tried scanning a few titles to see if you recognized any.
Deep Inside Tessa Fox
Wicked & Willing
The Screamer
Special Delivery from the Texxxas Wrangler
Next Door Naughty
When Lust Takes Over
Everything's Bigger in Texas, including The Wrangler
Something in your stomach was wriggling around as your hand kept reaching for different titles throughout the pile, and you noticed how many of them didn't have titles at all—just dates or lettering that stood for a system you didn't quite understand. You sank back on your heels, surrounded by the spread of them, and finally let yourself clock it for what it was.
Vintage pornography.
You snorted quietly to yourself.
What a dirty old perv, you thought with a smile creeping over your face. Who knew an old man would hold onto so much old porn? Was there something that 90s porn had that present day Pornhub couldn't itch for him? You chuckled as you began piling them in neat stacks again back into the box.
And then…well…what was the harm?
You hesitated only for a second before setting a few aside, the titles that caught your eye whether they were so ridiculous you had to know what went on in the corny plot, or ones that had your pulse quickening and traveling south. You'd put them back tomorrow, telling yourself it's not like Joel ever came out to this shed anyway. It felt harmless—silly, even. No one had to know.
You slid the bin back into place, found a spot for your own beside it, and hurried upstairs, tucking the tapes away before heading back down to start your barn shift, giddy with a bit of excitement for your evening plans.
Dinner shift came and went, the inside horses brought in from the near pasture, the far ones checked and watered and counted twice over until everything settled into its evening quiet. By the time you climbed the stairs again, the barn was humming with a low shuffling of content horses beneath you.
You curled up on the gray couch with a blanket pulled over your legs, making your way through a bag of crisps you’d found tucked away downstairs, realizing a little too late that you’d need to tell Joel what you might want from the store. The apartment wasn’t stocked with much beyond ketchup packets and a couple of old beers shoved into the bottom drawer of the fridge, but someone had clearly made sure carbs were easy access downstairs in the feed room, and Joel had texted to say he’d be home within the hour with pizza for both of you.
He was really growing on you. Other than being stupidly good looking, you could tell he was a good man, the kind who took pride in caring for his animals properly, and who seemed to extend that same care to you in return. It was easy to forget about the outside world while you were here.
After you showered, scrubbing away the smell of hay and horse sweat, you slipped into clean clothes and dropped onto the couch as you slid the VHS into the player and pressed play.
The screen was static for a long minute, and then a blurred scene formed in front of your eyes. A slate was held in front of the camera, blocking anything around it, the person holding it shouting "Deep Inside, Scene One, A: Take One. Action."
The slate dropped and the camera panned to a young woman with brown hair and tanned skin wearing daisy duke shorts and a red tied up top, showing off her beautiful body by a pool. The scene was slow, indulgent, her hands moving leisurely up and down herself as she laid back on a lounger. Music began swelling as she pulled her top off, her electric blue manicured fingers slowly pulling the ties apart and revealing her voluptuous chest. And then her hands dropped to her shorts, shimmying them off and leaving only her skimpy thong on.
She stretched and let her hands gracefully touch herself along her belly, up to her plump breasts. What caught you off guard was her neatly trimmed bush, something you hardly ever saw in porn anymore. And she looked like she was enjoying herself, not just performing as her back arched into the sunlight, skin warm and glowing with body oil. This had to be post-eighties, maybe well into the nineties, when production and lighting had gotten better. You sank a little deeper into the couch, the chip bag forgotten, fingers wiped absently on your blanket before they traced the inside of your thigh. Watching her bask in the sun, bare chested and gorgeous in her tiny thong, made it easy to follow the same path.
Soon her hand disappeared beneath the strip of fabric, though you could nearly see everything anyway, the cotton darkening quickly as she soaked it through. She was really enjoying herself. Your fingers slipped past your waistband, teasing over the cotton of your own panties, panting harder to the music as it swelled and she opened her mouth into a silent O, her back bowing as she came apart under her own touch.
As she climaxed, the camera slowly pulled back, drifting farther into her backyard, over the fence, until it settled on the back of a dark-haired man standing there, watching. You couldn’t see his face yet, and you had to give the director credit. It was creative as hell. The camera traced the rippling muscles along his glistening bare back, down to his hips, which rocked subtly until it became clear his pants were lowered and he was touching himself too.
You licked your lips, fingers dipping past your panty line now, circling your wet entrance with the pads of them. The music faded, replaced by the sound of his breathing, a muttered curse, a thick groan pulled from deep in his chest.
Then the scene cut.
What a damn tease.
Static, and then another slate appeared. “Deep Inside, Scene Three B, take two. And… action.”
Now the woman clearly knew she was being watched, and as the slate clapped and dropped, her face grew into a sly smile as she looked off camera, likely over the fence. She spread herself without hesitation, the thong gone now, finger fucking herself in earnest while her breasts heaved in heavy breaths.
“Come and play, Texas,” she cooed, and the camera swung around towards the side gate as it creaked open, and your whole body froze as the camera panned from his body up to his face.
No fucking way.
Absolutely no fucking way.
Watching the man--him--stride across the lawn, his jeans tugged back into place but slung low, his chest bare, dusted with dark hair that ran down into a thick happy trail, your body seemed to react before your head could organize a single thought. Heat was rushing up your spine, so sudden it had your thighs closing and your breath stalling.
His body was younger, leaner, but it wasn't any of that that gave him away.
It was his eyes.
Even softened by the grainy tape, even half turned away from the camera, you knew them instantly. The weight of his gaze, the pretty green that shone in the sun though a thousand other colors muddied them…
Your mouth went dry as you recognized your boss on the screen.
He had stopped just beside the lounge chair now, camera panning down to watch his hand drop to his waistband—casual, practiced, a movement seemingly so familiar to him. The camera lingered there, the woman's face coming into view beside it, licking her lips, and as his hand dug into the confines of his jeans—
Your hand flew from your pants to the remote, fumbling, knocking it against your thigh before you caught it, thumb slamming down hard to pause the tape.
Joel Miller was… he was in porn. And not just some amateur home video porn. This had a camera crew and lighting and boom microphones that you could see between takes. A director calling out direction before the slate struck. No. Joel Miller was a god damn porn star.
Your boss Joel Miller.
Nice, polite, handsome as ever, ranch-owning Joel Miller.
Fuck.
Looking back on it later, you might have called the next choices a threshold moment, the kind you only recognize once you’re already past it. Maybe you could have explained why you pressed play. Why you'd kept going, why you kept watching the younger version of the man you knew pull out his half hard dick from his jeans. Maybe you could have explained why your own hand drifted back between your legs as she unhinged her jaw to accomodate him, the way she seemed to love it, her fingers curling around him and then lower, fondling his balls to draw out a low, guttural sound out of his chest.
You knew you should've stopped it, stopped yourself, stopped the tape. But fuck she was enjoying him so much. It was written all over her face when he fucked her in the next scene. And you…you couldn't help yourself. You stuffed a finger inside your weeping entrance, then two—then three, trying to chase the feeling of how big he looked, how full he stuffed her. The sounds she made were messy and real and not that kind of overdone high pitched scream from modern porn you knew, and she came so hard her eyes rolled back into her head. When she was done he pulled out to paint her chest in white cream, and you were coming hard over your own hand at the beautiful sounds he made from above.
The screen snapped back to static as the VHS auto-ejected, and the hiss of it loud enough to yank you out of your head just in time to see the reflection of headlights flooding your window from below.
Joel Miller fondling you on the way home from your valentines date
ㅤ♡ He looks over at you, one hand steady on the wheel, the other twitching restlessly heavy on his thigh. “Why don’t ya untie that little get-up you got on?” he says, eyes dipping to the way your top ties neatly at the back of your neck.
ㅤ♡ You smile. You know this game. But you take your time, feeling his eyes flicker between you and the road, then back at you again. Before you can reach the knot at your nape, he reaches over, thick fingers working it loose for you. Your skin erupts in goosebumps at the feeling of them, the fabric parting and falls open over your stomach, slowly revealing your breasts in flashes of passing streetlight. Gold light, then dark, then gold again. It's all back roads here. No one’s going to see a thing.
ㅤ♡ He brings his one hand over to your chest, just gently kneading your breast closest to him first, humming in contentment at your soft little sigh.
ㅤ♡ Your legs begin to push together, hips shifting around as you search for friction in the seat. His hand cups your breasts fully now, gripping it enough to jostle in around, and you watch how his pupils dilate in the light of the next street light when he looks back at you, licking his lips.
ㅤ♡ He pinches your nipple when you get to a red light, leaning over to kiss it tenderly while his hand reaches to the other one. His tongue slowly laves at the tightening nipple, making your breath catch in your throat. His eyes close as he leans in, enjoying this, and you can smell the cedar and sandalwood aftershave wafting up as your hand threads into his hair.
ㅤ♡ The light turns green and you have to remind him to drive.
ㅤ♡ He takes his hands away, sitting back up in the drivers seat, and you go to retie your shirt with a little sly smile, excited for what awaits you at home.
Joel Miller is back home running his family’s ranch, the work coming back to him easily even as the house fills with the memories of what happened thirty years ago.
He hires a young farm hand, expecting nothing more than help around the barn. Instead, he finds someone just as lost as he is.
|| MDNI 18+, joel miller x reader, angst, eventual smut, rancher!joel, cowboy!joel, retiredpornstar!joel, horsegirl!reader (kinda), western vibes, estranged family, grief, chosen family, romance, flirting, swearing, lots of talk about horses plz bear w me, nurturing joel miller, sarah lives and is canonically aged up, tension, yearning, older man x younger woman, reader was in uni but (legal) age gap is not specified, mentions of pregnancy & pregnancy complications, some drinking ||
total word count: tbd
a/n: thank you to this anon for sparking my inspiration for this story! it started as an idea to do some fun adult film star joel fanfic and then as I wrote it, it became way more angsty than I was expecting :') hope you enjoy my loves!!
teaser 1
volume I: coming february 22
volume II: coming march 1
volume III: coming march 8
stay up to date with all my posts by following @millermouthupdates & turning on notifications!
|| smut MDNI 18+, m!masturbation, m!receiving oral, teasing, dirty talk, joel has such BDE it's insaneeeeee, playful submission, switching?, praise kink ||
a/n: we're currently snowed in today so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to finish this for you (gonna be so real, I didn't really edit this so please lmk of any mistakes)
wc: 2.5k
"This feels a little silly."
A wicked smile pulled across your face as he said it.
"A bet is a bet, Miller. And you lost." you pointed out from your comfortable position across from him, settling deeper into the couch.
Joel was sitting in his favorite recliner, the one by the window where he could look out on any given morning and watch the town pass by, watch the snow fall, the sun rise and set. He loved to read by the natural light, loved to watch his DVDs from that chair too.
Tonight, he didn't seem to love that chair so much. He sat stiffly now, hands gripping his thighs tightly, keeping his eyes on anything but you. You caught the pink creeping up his neck, staining his cheeks, turning his ears red.
"Just…lay back," you said, gentler now. "Relax, try to just enjoy it. I've wanted to for a long time."
"That so?" he huffed a little laugh, looking up at you for a glimpse, "and how long we talkin'?"
He still did as you bid him, even with a mischievous little smile on his face, and sat back. His legs spread open a little wider, his jeans traitorously in the way of seeing anything of interest.
You brought your pointer finger to your chin in mock deep thought, "Mmm… that New Years Eve Party, couple years ago now, I think."
He nearly choked on his own air, eyes widening, "When—what? I didn't even—we weren't even—"
“So you can imagine,” you cut in smoothly, enjoying this far too much, “how badly I’ve been wanting this.”
You heard him curse under his breath, Christ, woman. It sent a sort of thrill through your chest.
"I'll give you some options to start us off," you explained, licking your lips. You ignored the way he rolled his eyes, the way his mouth tightened like he was bracing himself.
"Shirt on or off?"
"On."
You narrowed your eyes, "Fine."
"Divorced Dad Rock or Fleetwood Mac?"
He looked at you incredulously.
“What?” you said lightly, pointing to the record player in the corner. “Music helps set the mood.”
He sighed, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger.
"Joel, I'm just trying to make you feel more comfortable—"
“I’d be comfortable if you were over here with me,” he muttered, “not sittin’ there watchin’ and interrogatin’ me about the damn background music.”
"Okay, okay, no music then, better to hear you anyway."
“Smartass,” he said, but there was no heat in it. He shifted, then patted his thigh, tentative. “C’mon. Sit with me.”
You hesitated. “But if I— I won’t be able to see, and—”
“Please, baby,” he said, voice suddenly rough and quiet. “My own stipulation. Wanna feel ya. You know I always want ya close.”
Your cheeks warmed, and you got up without another word, crossing the room and settling yourself on the arm of his chair. “Anything for you,” you said softly.
His arm opened up to wrap around your warmth, and he was looking up at you, and god he really was so handsome. The warm light from the crackling fire and the hallway cast the room in golds and ambers, catching in the lines of his face, his hazel eyes darkening as they lingered on you.
“I love you, ya know,” you said softly, cupping his face, the scratch of his beard rough against your palm. “I don’t wanna do anything you really don’t wanna do.”
“I love you too, baby,” he whispered, his eyes flickering down to your lips. “Gimme a kiss.”
You did, of course. How were you to deny him? You leaned down and let your lips press onto his, the tickle of his mustache reaching you first. It was long, slow, quiet and gentle. He sighed, almost like he was releasing all the tension in his body as you hummed into the feeling of him against you. His thumb swept under your shirt, touching bare skin, gently brushing along the feeling of you.
When you pulled back an inch, he followed you without thinking.
“Sure I have to do this all by myself?” he murmured, lips brushing yours with every word.
"A deal is a deal," you whispered.
He sighed again, looking down at his lap, and nodded.
"Okay."
You smiled, a little too excited, holding it in as his hand reached for his belt, the buckle unfastening a little haphazardly with only one hand to use. He kept the other wrapped solid around your hips.
You tucked your legs under you, careful to give him plenty of space. You didn't want to be tempted, even as your thighs pushed together already.
He pushed his jeans down, fumbling until they sat low on his hips, enough room for him to reach inside. The fabric of his briefs was already darkened, damp with arousal, making your stomach flip.
"Just a little kissing is enough for you, Miller?"
He huffed a laugh, but it broke off into a sharp hiss when you reached down anyway, unable to help yourself, helping him push his briefs lower so he could free himself. His cock rested heavy in his hand, half hard, his balls settling against the waistband.
Joel wrapped his thick fist around himself and gave a small tug before looking up at you. Something in his eyes went soft and desperate all at once, hazel turned dark and oak-warm in the firelight.
“You’re so hot, Joel,” you whispered, coaxing and gentle while brushing his hair back from his forehead. “You’re the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.”
"S'not me," he said, a little gruffly, "s'you, I'm the luck one, always have been."
“Yeah?” You lifted a brow. “’Cause right now I find you irresistible.”
He smiled, cheeks still flushed, cock still heavy in his grip until he was lifting that hand toward his mouth. But you caught his wrist, cupping his wide palm between yours, your fingertips soft against his worn knuckles. You leaned in and spit into his hand.
His eyes widened a bit at that, and you couldn't help but notice the little twitch of his cock below.
“Go on,” you murmured, kissing the tips of his fingers.
“Fuck me,” he breathed, already lowering his hand again.
You watched as he wrapped himself up once more, slower, working the head first. His thick, wide palm met his thicker girth that pulsed under his minstrations, veins beginning to stand out along his shaft.
"I love watching you, Joel." you said, reassuring, watching his shoulders settle, "Makes me so wet thinking about—"
"Tell me." he said, his voice cracking the words in half.
"—thinking about your big cock," you went on, "how it fills me up, stretches me so much I sometimes feel like I'm being split in half," you smiled, and his head titled back against the recliner, mouth open, watching the words pour from your mouth.
He cursed under his breath, and your hand came up to his hair, fingers sinking in, petting slow and steady, and he—he was purring from your touch.
Mmmmm, was all you heard, and your eyes danced between the bliss on his face and his hand around his dick, still focused on the head of himself, twitching every time his grip tightened.
"Need more," he said, bringing his hand up.
"What do you say?" you teased.
His grin pulled a dimple in his cheek, "Please, sweetheart."
"What a good boy," you winked. He rolled his eyes, but groaned again as your saliva met his palm.
“Jesus,” he groaned, fist sliding tighter and faster when he began pumping himself again with new urgency. You watched the way his knuckles whitened, the skin taut around him, his rhythm picking up.
"Tell me how it feels, big guy," you whispered. "Please,"
"So fucking good."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"Tell me more," you said in his ear, and you swore you could see goosebumps rise against his neck.
“Wish it was—fuck—wish it was your sweet little pussy, the way she squeezes me, pulls every drop outta me, tightest little—Jesus. Begs for me to come inside, don’t she? God, she does—always wants it, always needs it.”
There he was.
Joel Miller was a quiet man most of the day, stoic to those who didn't know him, but once his blood started pumping—once the dopamine of an impending orgasm came closer and closer, his mouth was downright blasphemous.
"Yes, baby," you whispered, kissing the shell of his ear. "Always love the way you fuck me, the way you take what's yours."
He licked his lips, eyes scattered over the room. “Makes me wanna bend you over that couch right now and say screw your little deal,” he laughed weakly, then his face tightened, eyes fluttering.
"You wish," you reproached, tightening your grip in his hair, and his mouth fell open, lashes fluttering against his cheekbones, and you added: “You have no idea how wet I am for you right now, Joel. This is the best thing I’ve ever seen.”
His cock went angry red in his hand, precome shining at the tip. He paused just long enough to cup his balls, rolling their weight in his palm. His shaft jumped hard, making your mouth water.
You couldn't help it anymore.
Letting go of his hair, you lifted from the arm of the recliner, and his eyes flew open, already missing your warmth.
But then you bent down, nestling yourself between his legs, and wrapped your hand around him. He was blazing hot to the touch, pulsing in your palm, your hand dwarfed by the size of him.
The moan that left him would stay with you for days.
"Oh, sweetheart, fuckkkk meeeee," he whimpered.
"Wanna swallow everything," you whispered, bringing your mouth down to his balls, replacing his hand there, and licking broad strokes, soft and heavy in your mouth. You nuzzled your nose into them, and he shifted a bit, letting your tongue wander under to his perineum, and his eyes rolled to the back of his skull.
"Christ-all-fuckin-Mighty," he groaned.
Soon your mouth was ascending, licking its way up, your handle gentle around the base of his cock, and you took the head of him between your lips, suckling gently on the velvet skin. He was a mess above you: hips thrusting up, fingers blanched white on the armrests, breath ragged.
One hand found your head, shaking as he tried to guide you, and you let him, your hands folding behind your back like you’d given yourself to him entirely.
“Gonna let me get off with your little throat, huh?” he rasped, watching you through hooded eyes. “Let me fuck your mouth ‘til I come, baby?”
You nodded, throat constricting, smiling around him.
His hips began thrusting into you, and your smile fell from your mouth. He was thick, your lips stretched to accommodate him, the salty taste of skin and arousal at the back of your throat was intoxicating. In and out, the tip kissed the back of your throat again and again.
He was panting now, murmuring between thrusts, and you couldn't help it, you were moaning around him.
"Oh fuck, baby, makin' the prettiest sounds with your mouth full of me," he whimpered, eyes still on you. You looked up at him through tear blurred eyes, his cock sliding past your lips, your spit slicking his shaft. His balls slapped your chin. You felt him thicken, swelling in your mouth.
"Fuck fuck fuck," he groaned, "my good little girl takin' my cock so good, I'm gonna come, baby girl, you gonna take all of it like I taught you to, right? Gonna take all my come?"
You nodded fervently, desperate, hands swiftly coming up to grip his thighs like lifelines.
“Yeah—yeah you are,” he growled, wild now, teeth gritted. “Desperate little thing. Watchin’ me jerk off like a fuckin’ perv. Couldn’t wait to get your mouth on me, huh?”
You whimpered as best you could around his thick length, almost delirious, your vision nearly cross-eyed at his words. Drool was sliding from your lips onto your shirt, you knew you looked absolutely obscene, but couldn't care less. You watched, enrapt, as his belly tensed, the thick hair of his happy trail peeking where his shirt had ridden up.
"Goooood girl, oh fuck, yeah, yeah, that's it, can feel your little throat gaggin' on my big dick, baby," his head threw back, and you watched, in awe of this beautiful man, your man, his throat bared, his jugular vein thick and pusling as his cock stiffened and spilled into you. His chest reverberated with a guttural, bullish groan that you'd remember forever.
Your mouth flooded with his spend, though he was pushed back so far in your throat you barely had to taste it at all, swallowing every salty drop he gave you.
You listened to his moans, his whimpered good girl, what a good girl, take it, take it, take it, until he came down from his high. Breathing heavily, he opened his eyes again to look at you.
Your hands came up again, to hold his sensitive shaft gently just so you could continue cleaning his member, licking off the little bit of salty spend that leaked from the corner of your mouth. You kissed the head of him, causing him to suck in air through his teeth in a quick hiss.
"Loved that," you said finally.
Joel could barely hum in response, eyes fluttering, unable to stay open.
You stood on shaky knees, moving toward the kitchen—but his hand shot out, grabbed your wrist, and dragged you back.
"Where d'you think yer goin'?" he slurred as you fell into his lap.
"Was gonna get—"
"Think I'm done with you just yet? Hm?"
"Just wanna take care of my old man, didn't think you had it in ya to—"
His hand cupped your jaw, thumb stroking your lip before he leaned in and kissed you, slow, as he said against your lips: "Don't even try to pretend your pussy isn't cryin' for some attention now,"
You whimpered against his lips, and his hand moved down, holding your throat, just gentle enough while still applying pressure.
"Don't you lie now, sweetheart."
You whimpered, arching into him, your delicate fingers coming up to circle his wrist. “Yes, Joel. I’m—you know I am. I’m soaked. Just lookin’ at you gets me there.”
He hummed again, kissing you so gently in comparison to his strained, dirty words.
He smiled against your lips, pleased. “What a sweet girl, tellin’ the truth.” Then he glanced around the room. “So—upstairs, or right here?”
“You really think you’ve got another round in you?”
He smirked, dragging his other hand flat down your spine. “Might be old, but I’ve got a tongue and fingers that don’t quit.”
"Then you got yourself a deal." you said, kissing his warm lips, "And I think I'll take my prize right here, please."
each vertebra reveals a mystery / pray on my spine, it's a rosary
reader x frankie morales
summary: You pray that God will keep you on the path of righteousness: to guard your heart, discipline your desire, and keep your mind free from wandering. But after a year away, Frankie isn't willing to be apart for much longer.
|| smut MDNI 18+, angst, please heed the warnings it's not a dark fic but it has dark themes, catholic!reader, devout!reader, virgin!reader, innocent!reader, kidnapping, obsessed!frankie! exbf!frankie, love bombing, toxic relationships, catholic guilt!!!!!, forced proximity, proposal, virginity loss, pinv, oral, praiseeeeeee kink, loving smut, religious imagery, canon to triple frontier 2019 except everything works out, frankie is a manipulative love bomber you've been warned (I do not condone, but if anyone was gonna be obsessed w me….anyway), beach smut ||
a/n: this is my submission for @tateypots's naughty or nice writing challenge with the naughty theme for both frankie & grand gesture!
a/n II: I use some spanish in this, what little I know from working with people who are fluent and from colombia. one of the cutest things was when my boss would call his wife 'mor' like short for mi amor, so that is in this fic. also, I must add im the least religious person ever, I didn't even have to go to church as a kid. please excuse any mishaps and mistakes.
references & inspired by: Rosalia's LUX (specifically divinize, magnolias, la yugular, and la perla) / That One Scene in A Walk to Remember
Forehead.
Chest.
Shoulder.
Shoulder.
It’s like memory, like breathing. It lives in you so intimately it barely feels chosen, more reflex than thought, something your body learned before language. It moves through you, closer than anything else, closer than your own blood, than the dark rivers that pulse in your neck, the jugular carrying life itself. Even that is not as near as the Spirit.
You slide into a pew and kneel against the rough wood pressing through your skirt, welcoming the familiar ache of your worship. It echoes the ache of it in your bones. It feels earned, deserved. You let it bloom in your knees and stay there, a small penance.
You want to feel your faith like this, the only physical proof you have of your conviction. It is the choice you make again and again to be good. To feel as if you belong to something higher than your own desire. It keeps your heart pointed upward, not outward. It burns in your knees.
Above you, Christ hangs in His stillness, ribs pulled taut beneath skin, head bowed under the weight of mercy made flesh. His eyes are cast downward, simply watching. He's not accusatory but He still lacks a gentleness. He bears a violent witness. You think of how much blood there must have been. How slow.
Your throat tightens as you close your eyes. You know you have been careless with memory. You know you have lingered where you should not let your thoughts linger, allowed your mind to drift back into a time when things like love and desire clouded your mind. You stop yourself again, now, before your mind's eye takes his shape again.
You reach into your bag and draw out your rosary, the beads cool at first, then warming as they settle into your palms. You wrap them around your fingers, letting the string pull snug until it presses into your skin. You tighten it. The pressure feels good. Corrective. You like the way it demands your attention. It keeps you present, anchored in the here and now instead of drifting back into longing.
You bow your head.
Thank you. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for the path you laid out when I could not see my way through it myself. Thank you for discipline when comfort would have ruined me.
You think of your savior again, His final surrender. You think of how good He was, how He gave everything so you could be forgiven when you wandered into sin. Weakness in the form of nostalgia, desire that insists on resurfacing for a man you nearly gave everything to before he left. The awareness of Christ's eyes on you presses down on the back of your neck, making you feel small. Exposed and unworthy.
Please.
Please keep me faithful, even when my thoughts start to wander. Please guard me and my family from harm, from the things seen and unseen. Keep my heart turned away from what is evil, from sin and predilection. Show me discipline where I am weak, and clarity when I am confused. For now I know that all I want is to be with you, in the kingdom of heaven.
Amen.
After evening Mass, you stop at the doors of St. Anthony’s as the last of the parishioners say their farewells. It's quiet outside now, evening like a blanket of stars over the quietening chapel.
Father Paul takes your hand, thanks you again for your help this weekend, asks after your family with the same gentle attentiveness he always does. You answer quietly, promise to return in the morning for the food pantry, assuring him you’ll bring coffee, and step aside into the night.
You descend the steps and pull your coat tighter around yourself, breath fogging faintly in the cold. The street is mostly empty, the chapel behind you dark now except for a single light near the sacristy. You start toward home, your footsteps the only sound accompanying you in the dark.
Tomorrow will be the food pantry, and how much there always seems to do even when the night gives you the reprieve of silence. You hear the crickets, a lone car passing by once. You'll need to get to church early to set up, make sure all the boxes are in order. Father is always so sweet and you'll stop for his favorite coffee to wake him like you always do.
Your rosary beads knock softly against the zipper of your bag as you walk—a faint, familiar sound that keeps time with your steps. A car passes again, then the street returns to stillness. The quiet settles around you, deep and expansive, and you feel how easily it opens space inside your head.
Sometimes the quiet of night is welcome, but sometimes it allows for too much time to think. About things, about…about times before. About… him.
You tighten your grip on the strap of your bag and begin to pray again, the words rising instinctively, protective, filling you.
Our Father, Who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name.
Whenever you feel your mind straying from you, from good, you say it again. You let the words occupy your mouth, your tongue, the soft hollow behind your teeth.
Thy Kingdom come. Thy Will be done, on earth, as it is in Heaven.
The night feels very still around you, the sidewalk stretched long and empty ahead, your breath a fog in front of you, steadying with the cadence of prayer. You are halfway through the next line when something changes. The sound of the passing car lingers longer than before, tires not moving away. There's an engine idling too close.
Give us this day our daily bread and —
There is the sharp scrape of metal, a sliding door pulled open with no hesitation, and then light explodes across the sidewalk, headlights washing over you so suddenly it steals your vision. You turn instinctively, already stepping backward, heart leaping hard into your throat. A figure moves out of the glare, tall and broad, its outline sharpening too quickly, too near for your mind to catch up.
Your arms pull in tight to your chest, shoulders hunching, fear driving straight down your spine like a nail hammered down. You feel it everywhere at once, white and electric, every nerve lit.
“What do you want?” you hear yourself say, shocked that your voice works at all.
The shape does not slow. Footsteps eat the distance between you, purposeful, unhurried. A hand reaches for you.
Then you remember how to scream.
It tears out of you raw and loud as you kick and thrash, hands striking at anything you can reach. It does nothing. You are lifted easily, hauled up and over a broad shoulder, the world tilting as your stomach lurches violently. Your fists pound against the man's back, but he's so solid, and your blows get absorbed without reaction. His arm clamps around your legs, locking your knees together so your feet can’t swing free.
“Let me go!” you scream, the words breaking apart in your mouth.
Your wishes are granted, but only to be thrown into the dark van, where there are three more men in all black with ski masks waiting. You scream again, but the door slides shut, making you blind to their reaching hands, which clasp around your wrists, a thin harsh plastic wrapping around you. This isn't like the rosary, a calming pressure of worship and devotion, this is a zip tie.
You are still fighting when rough fabric is dragged down over your eyes, smothering and close, stealing what little light remains. Your breath turns frantic inside it, the air hot and stale. They catch your ankles next, cinching them tight, stealing your balance completely, your body reduced to something contained and helpless.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” a voice curses beside you as they struggle to finish restraining you.
“Mind your tongue,” you spit back, the reprimand tearing free before you can stop it. For a fleeting second, anger steadies you, gives you something solid to hold. Hearing the Lord’s name said in vain snaps you back into yourself, into who you are, into what you belong to.
"Haven't changed much, has she, boys?"
There's something about the voices that piques a curiosity in you. If the blood wasn't pounding so loudly in your ears, if your skin wasn't buzzing with adrenaline, maybe you'd have recognized them.
But the voices overlap now, a laugh to your left, a chortle to your right from the front seat, "There's no way this is gonna work if—"
"Shut up," another one of them cuts in.
The buzzing in your ears is too loud to place any of it, drowning out all logical thought and the ability to think. Whatever recognition tries to surface slips away again under the fear.
You curl inward as much as the restraints allow, folding yourself small, clasping your bound hands together. You draw your knees up, pressing your forehead against them, turning inward, then downward, the way you were taught. The way you have always done when the world feels dangerous and out of your control. You begin to pray.
Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name.
The time passes without meaning.
The van, and time, seem to move and stop, then move again. You can feel every turn in your stomach as you pray, every brake against your spine. At some point your throat is hoarse from whispering your orisons, your hands clenched so hard together they lose their feeling. No one else speaks, the silence stretches. You're not sure for how long, whether it's twenty minutes or twenty hours. It feels a bit like forever.
Then there's another sound, distant. A vibration more than noise at first, something you feel through the floor of the van, like the tires beneath are on a fault line. The van is slowing, you're sure of it, and the sound is louder, thick and filling the space. A mechanical thrum that presses against your chest and hums behind your covered eyes.
Your heart stutters when the van door slides open.
No.
No, no no.
Air rushes in hard and cold, whipping across your skin, carrying the sharp bite of fuel and night. It feels violent after the sealed quiet of the van, too much all at once. Someone reaches for you, and you let them. You do not resist this time. Your body moves because it is moved, pliant and strange, as your mind is seized by a sudden, terrible certainty.
“Careful,” a voice says close to your ear as your feet are positioned outside the door and the zip ties are cut from your ankles.
Your feet are positioned at the edge, then lowered, the ground solid beneath you. The zip ties around your ankles are cut away, the release abrupt and disorienting. Hands grip your arms, lifting you upright, keeping you steady. Your wrists remain bound. The blindfold stays in place.
They guide you forward.
The sound swells into a roar that consumes everything. It vibrates through your ribs, your skull, your teeth. You can barely hear your own breathing over it, shallow and uneven inside your chest. You can't see. You can't hear clearly. But you know.
You know that sound.
It brings back memories, flooding you. Your body reacts as your mind swims with them, dread pouring through you, cold and absolute. And threaded through it like a warm current in the turn of two oceans meeting, is something else. Something you refuse to name, that you've prayed to extinguish for the past year. It feels as if the hands at your sides and the sound ahead is submerging you into those memories, like being held under and lifted out again. A baptism.
Your stomach flips and your knees threaten to give out as the person beside you tightens their grip and says something you can't make out over the noise. You stumble forward a bit, guided step by step, until you're being lifted again and strapped into a seat.
And finally, when you're no longer being pinned or guided or restrained by hands, you bow your head and begin to cry in the passenger seat of the helicopter.
You’re only half aware of the trip through the sky.
It’s too dark to make sense of anything, the strip of fabric around your eyes starting to itch, sweat collecting beneath it as you try, uselessly, to peer through the narrow gap it leaves against your cheekbone. There’s nothing to see anyway. Just darkness. No lights or landmarks below, no sense of height or distance. The helicopter vibrates through the bench seat and into your bones, rattling your skin, turning your stomach over and over until you can’t tell if you’re afraid or just sick.
Maybe you’re over the ocean.
The thought comes unbidden, but it sticks, makes sense. Endless black water beneath you, nothing solid for miles. You swallow hard, throat tight, and curl your shoulders in against the cold that seeps through the metal.
Eventually, the vibration changes, the pitch dropping and movement shifting, and the descent throws your belly into your throat with sudden pressure. When you touch down, the rotors kick the air into a frenzy, wind and grit blasting through the open door as it’s wrenched wide. You turn your face away, tucking your chin down, bracing.
"What the fuck did you do to her?"
The shout cuts through the mechanical roar like a blade.
Oh god.
No, no no no.
Some part of you had prayed you were wrong, desperately hoping. Somewhere between the van and the sky, you had begged to be mistaken. You wish you still had your rosary. You don’t know where your bag is. You wish you could have knelt, pressed your forehead to the floor, prayed harder, prayed better.
Hands grab at your wrists, wrenching the ties free, and relief comes quickly but painful, pins and needles racing through your fingers as blood rushes back. The hands move to fumble at your head, and you flinch, jerking away, keeping your eyes squeezed shut as the fabric comes away. If you don’t look, you don’t have to see who it is. Who you know it is. You feel like you knew all along, from the first words uttered in the van. From the broad expanse of the shoulders you were hauled over when they took you.
But then the two broad hands are back to your face even without restraints. Thumbs brush along your temples, gentle, reverent, moving your hair back like he’s done a hundred times before. Your breath stutters. You turn your head away, squeezing your eyes shut so hard your vision sparks, blood pounding so loud in your ears it feels like a scream. The hands leave your face and close gently around your wrists instead, steadying you, lifting you from the seat.
Your feet hit the ground and you gasp.
The earth beneath is…soft. Not the jolt of blacktop or cement you expect. Your shoes sink slightly, the surface shifting under your weight. You open your eyes without meaning to, a curse of human curiosity, and look down.
Sand.
You make sure to advert your eyes again, away from…him, because you can't yet. You need to occupy your vision with something else, anything else. You turn to see the helicopter crouched on the beach just behind you, rotors still churning, the ocean stretched out behind it, black and endless, moonlight breaking across its surface in silver ripples. You raise a hand to shield your eyes as grit lashes past your face.
Then the helicopter lifts.
Someone in the cockpit raises a hand in a quick, casual wave, their face hidden by the glare of the moon, and then it’s gone, rising into the dark until it disappears completely, black against black sky. The wind settles to a gentle breeze as the sound of waves crashing against the shore fill your ears.
You can't turn around. You think maybe you were looking for more in the blanket of stars, looking for someone to come and rescue from what you know was waiting behind you. Praying to God or the archangel Michael to save you from this fate.
A hand touches yours, and you flinch away as if burned. Your hands lift to cover your face, hiding your eyes as you realize no one is coming.
"Look at me, 'mor,"
'Mor. That nickname. Mi amor. My love. And that voice. It throws you back into your minds eye, so hard you have to force your eyes to open so the back of your eyelids won’t paint your vision in memories.
"What have you done, Frankie?"
Frankie
You wouldn't look at him—why wouldn't you look at him?
"'mor, please," he says gently, staring at your back. Your pretty blouse flutters, fabric tugging against your waist, your hair lifting and falling in the sea wind like it used to when you’d walk ahead of him down the street and he’d reach out just to feel it. His fingers twitch uselessly at his sides now at the memory of it. You’re here. You’re actually here. In front of him. Real, alive, beautiful.
If only you'd turn around.
He opens his mouth again, already full of everything he wants to tell you, but he stops when you drop your hands from your face.
The red marks on your wrist glow in the light of the candles he'd set up, the burns angry against your skin, and the sight of them twists something hot and violent in his gut. His jaw locks, his hands curl into tight fists, he thinks he might kill his friends for one fleeting moment. The candlesticks stretch ahead of you in a soft path along the sand, petals scattered out of place from the helicopter, the arch waiting at the edge of the beach like a promise that’s suddenly gone wrong.
He wants to take your hands, kiss the redness away and swear it never happened.
"I told them to be careful," he began, softly, his voice thick with apology, "I didn't know Ben would…and Redfly, I didn't think—"
"Take me home." you whispered.
"Baby—"
"Take. Me. Home." you still wouldn't look at him. But he could see your shoulders shaking.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he says, panic changing his tone. “You wouldn’t answer my calls. You wouldn’t see me. I had to— I had to do something, just to see you.”
"So you kidnapped me."
He shakes his head. This is not what he pictured. He'd pictured you coming off his fellow pilot's helicopter, eyes lighting up like they once did for him and jumping into his arms. He pictured your lips against his, soft and warm and all the memories of before washing away in a beautiful twilight proposal on the beach.
"I fixed everything, 'mor," he insists, and his words start to tumble over one another, "I'm clean, I have money now to take care of you. I bought—" his hands shoot out around him. He wishes you'd just fucking turn around and look at him. "this entire place, baby, it's ours."
"I don't want this." you whisper, "I don't want any of this."
The words are sharp and cruel, even in your sweet voice.
"Look at me, 'mor," he pleads, stepping closer, "por favor,"
"Stop calling me that."
"Please."
You let out a shaky sigh, and finally oblige.
You turn, and god, your face, it's like seeing god. An angel, carved from every dream he'd ever had. All the sleepless nights he'd thought of you over the past year did nothing to compare to you, now, bathed in the moonlight, the wind from the sea blowing your hair around. The cross at your throat flashes silver when you move, and something tightens painfully in his chest at the sight of it, something aching and possessive all tangled together.
"Marry me," he says. His voice is barely loud enough over the water crashing at the shore.
It isn't how he meant to say it. He should’ve taken you to the arch first. Gotten down on one knee. Why did he let it go on this long? Why didn’t he just take your hands and walk you down the candlelit path, show you everything he built for you? He glances at it now, distant and waiting, but his eyes come right back to your face. He can’t look away, he never wants to look away.
"This was supposed to be perfect—I wanted it to be—"
"No."
He freezes, his eyes search your face, your pretty eyes, your sweet plump lips he remembers like the back of his hand, the feeling, the taste. The way they felt that night when you'd…
He shakes his head.
"What?"
“No, Frankie.” Your voice is steadier now, even as tears build in your eyes. “I’m not going to marry you.”
Something like the devil on his shoulder makes him laugh.
“You don’t mean that,” he says. “We—we're always meant to be together, 'mor.”
"I mean it," you snap, your tone sharp and serious, though your voice is shaky and wet. He can't help but think how absolutely adorable you are, even when you're angry with him.
"I don't want to be with you, Frankie."
"You're scared," he cuts in, stepping closer, shaking his head harder, his hands wanting so badly to come up and touch you. He hears your breath hitch, your body leaning away. He pushes down the anger that boils in him.
"You're scared, baby, I know. I know I scared you." he tries to force a calmness over himself, over the situation. Forcing reason. "The guys were never supposed treat you like that, I wanted them to talk to you about coming, about seeing me. They were meant to only pick you up and tell you there was a surprise, I'm sorry. I know you're scared, but that's over now. It's just us."
“I can't,” you say suddenly, brows furrowing, a hand coming up to clutch your cross necklace, and the words hit him sideways. “God has made me realize this is wrong.”
His stomach clenches.
“Don’t,” he pleads. “Don’t do that.”
“I can't be with you,” you continue, tears spilling now, your hands clasped tight. “I’ve prayed about it every day. I’ve prayed so much. This—it isn’t right.”
The only thing he hears is that you thought of him every day. In your most intimate time, between you and Christ.
"So that's it?" he asks, "You and God have decided, huh? Don't I get a say?"
"Frankie, please," you sob, "I don't want to fight you. I don't want to be punished for picking the wrong thing."
"You think I'm the wrong thing." he echoes, flat and wounded.
You don't answer, and it feels like confirmation.
"I got clean for you," he says, louder now, stepping even closer, chests nearly brushing, and your breath stops. You close your eyes tightly.
"I left all that behind—the coke, the partying, the bullshit." you wince at his curse, "I'm sorry, baby. I know." he lifts his hands so they hover over your arms, wanting, so badly, to touch. "I lost my license and my career, but here I am. I fixed it. All of it."
"I never asked—" you shook your head, squeezing your eyes shut before glaring at him glassy eyed, "I told you to not come back."
"I love you," he says, desperate, shaking from fingers to his toes, "I love you so much, I'm trying to show you—I'm ready to give you everything. I have the money, I bought this island for us, I have this ring." he reaches into his pocket, pulling out the box.
You take a step back, "You're scaring me, Francisco."
“I would never hurt you,” he says fiercely. “Never. I would die before I let anything happen to you.”
“You already did,” you say, voice barely there. “You left for Colombia with your friends on a suicide mission. I had to live with the fact that I thought you died.”
He stares at you, chest heaving, the candles flickering wildly behind you, the ocean roaring like it’s listening.
“We're supposed to be happy,” he says, almost to himself. “This was supposed to make you happy. I didn't die, 'mor, I'm back, I'm clean, I can take care of you.”
You shake your head again, helpless. “Take me home.”
The word home hits him like a betrayal again and again.
“We can make this home,” he says, voice shaking as he reaches into his pocket, “We can make a life here. Or anyway, I don't care. Just—just let me show you. Please.”
"Don't—" your voice cracks, "I don't want a reason to be angry at God. Please, Frankie, stop—I've m-moved on."
That stops him cold like he'd just been plunged into the ocean.
There's a silence between you, thick and ringing in his ears. Frankie's hands fall uselessly to his sides with the velvet box clenched tight in his fist.
His chest constricts around his heart, something sour crawling up his throat.
“Who?” he asks.
Your shoulders tense, hesitating just a fraction too long.
“It doesn’t matter,” you say quickly. “That’s not—this isn’t about that.”
“It matters to me,” he snaps, the edge in his voice cutting through the night before he can soften it. He sees you flinch again and it only makes everything inside him feel louder. “Who is he?”
"I don't want to do this. Take me home."
But he's already there, already doing this, his thoughts spinning, green and fevered. Santiago said no one ever saw you with anyone. The days he'd been going insane and sent his friends to check on you at the church, at your house without being seen. Were you lying?
"Tell me the truth."
You look up at him, a glare on your sweet face, "I am. I went on a few dates with a man from church. Stop being mean. I only wanted to—I was trying to not…"
Your face pinched, and you shook your head, as if willing the thoughts away. Your cheeks glistened wet in the moonlight.
"Say it." Frankie demanded, his eyes trying to bend to find your gaze now that you'd looked away again. It was so close—your confession. He was your confessional, you, his little sinner wanting to do right. Always.
You took a few breaths, and Frankie, not for the first time, but maybe more desperately than ever before, prayed that you'd just say it.
"I've been praying…" you breathe out slowly, and tears were rolling down your face as you looked up, "I've been trying anything just to stop thinking of you, Frankie."
He rushes towards you now, velvet box shoved back in his pocket, forgotten, and he's pulling you into him. You squawk in protest, pushing your hands up, but they only fold in between your chests.
"Frankie," you whine, a rush of breath leaving your body as he squeezes you to himself, "stop it, Frankie, please,"
"Did you let that man touch you, baby?" he coos, "tell me you didn't give him what's mine, hermosa, por favor mi amor, amor amor amor," he's kissing your face, babbling away, and his kisses—they're wet. He'd do anything to make you stop crying, he's never wanted to make you sad. It cleaves his chest in two to think he created them.
"I'd never—I'd only ever wanted—but Francisco, I can't—not—"
"Let's get married," he pleads, arms tightening around you, bringing you even closer, "'mor, please, it's what I'm tryna tell you, then you'll never have to worry, you'll never be apart from me," he kisses your face harder, your breasts push up into him, "kiss me back, say yes, 'mor, por favor, ángel mía, hermosa,"
"Frankie," you sob, gripping his shirt. You look up at him, finally, you're taking him in, drinking in his closeness, he can see it. And your eyes, they're glassy, full of something— and then he knows.
And he kisses you.
He doesn’t give you time to second guess him, to recover from the shock of his mouth smothering yours. If anything, you pull him closer, nails biting into his shoulders where you cling to him, dragging him in like instinct has finally won. The moment your resistance softens, though, he takes it as permission, as proof. Silly thing, always fighting him, his sweet angel, trying so hard to be good for your god.
His hand comes up into your hair, threading through the locks to hold you tight, pressing you even closer to him. Your gasp breaks loose as he clenches his fingers harder, as if the breath was knocked from your lungs. He feels it immediately, the give of your wet lips, and something both feral and relieved floods him at once. He leans into you more, plunging his tongue into your waiting mouth, claiming the opening without hesitation. The kiss deepens until it’s nothing but heat and breath and want, until he feels a little unhinged, pouring himself into you like there’s no end to his need.
“Frankie—” you breathe when he finally breaks away, his mouth trailing over your jaw, down the soft curve of your neck.
"—Frankie, we shouldn't—"
“I’ve waited so long for you, ’mor,” he murmurs, his tongue flattening against your pulse. You tilt your head back without meaning to, exposing yourself, and he feels like if he could unhinge his jaw he’d swallow you whole. The red apple of Eden, offered straight into his mouth.
"Not here, Frankie, oh please, I can't—"
"I don't give a fuck," he demands.
You cry out when he tugs your blouse aside, teeth grazing the place where your neck meets your shoulder, biting just enough to make you gasp.
“I just love you so much,” he corrects softly. “Will you marry me, baby? Make me the happiest man alive.”
He says it between kisses as he lowers himself in front of you, hands everywhere, strong and sure as they grip and pull you close. His palms are broad, and you fit into them so perfectly, like he'd never forgotten the map of you, even as your knees threaten to give out.
You're looking down at him, chest heaving, blouse askew.
He's never thought you more beautiful in his life.
He kisses your stomach, lifting the hem of your top so his mouth can touch your hot skin. You shiver as he moans against you, nuzzling into your navel. He wants every sound you make, and you give them to him, soft and breathy, whining little noises as his hands tighten. His hands come down to your ass, groping and spreading even through your skirt.
“I’m gonna fall, Frankie,” you whimper, clutching his shoulders. “This is wrong. We shouldn’t. It’s a sin.”
He groans as he looks up, fists full of you. He must look a little unmoored, half-mad, because your eyes widen, your tongue slipping out to wet your lips. You swallow around the feeling climbing your throat. The moon above you halos your head as he kneels.
“Mi ángel,” he whispers, “I’d never let Lucifer take you. God loves you, but he’ll never save you from me.”
You frown deeply at that.
“Admit it,” he murmurs. “You’ve been angry with him for a long time.”
“No,” you whimper, pushing at him now, but he holds you fast, mouth returning to your stomach.
“You’re angry because you want me just as much as I want you,” he says quietly. “Because he made you fall in love with me. Because you want my cock just as badly as I want your sweet little—”
“Frankie!” you cry out, covering your face.
He raises to his feet, cupping your face over your hands.
“Look at me, ’mor.”
You peek through your fingers. Your eyes are shining again.
“It’s okay,” he murmurs. “Wanting’s natural, baby.”
You shake your head.
“Tell me,” he whispers, “are you wet right now?”
You hide again, like you might disappear, like God himself might be watching.
“If I reached down between your legs,” he murmurs, “would I feel you soaked for me? You remember that night, baby? When you let me touch her?”
Your head dips lower, the tips of your fingers brushing his chest.
“Remember how good it felt, hermosa,” he whispers, arms wrapping around you, holding you close, kissing the crown of your head. “When you let me taste you. How bad you wanted me, but told yourself you couldn’t. Not until we were married. But I let you taste me too, didn’t I?”
“I’m going to hell, Francisco.” you whisper.
“Never,” he says, kissing your head again, squeezing you harder. “You’re too good. Too perfect.”
He pulls your hands down so he can see your face, memorizing you again. Those eyes, they bring all the memories back, burned into him. The day he met you. The day he told you he loved you. The day he left, how you cried. He’ll never forget those eyes.
"I've missed you." he says finally.
“I miss you,” you confess back, a secret carried out to sea. “It hurts just to think about you.”
"I know, 'mor," he says, kissing your top lip so carefully, gently. Your eyes close, lashes fluttering against your cheekbone.
"I love you, Frankie," you say finally.
Finally.
He leans down, wraps his arms around your body, and lifts you against him.
“I love you so much,” he says, carrying you toward the archway, where everything should’ve begun.
And finally, finally, you're smiling down at him. Enough of the secrets, of trying to stay away, of trying to fight this. Finally, he had you.
Your hands move to his hair, petting and pulling, his curls a little unruly from the wind and sweat.
He sets you down gently, only taking his hands away to reach into his pocket again, and gets down on one knee.
"Marry me, 'mor?"
Your hand flies to your mouth as you stare at the ring. Ten carats, blazing in a halo of diamonds. He never cared about the price. It was you the moment he saw it.
“Oh, Frankie,” you breathe, offering him your hand.
“That a yes?”
You nod, laughing through tears. “Yes. Of course.”
He slides the ring onto your finger, already pulling you close again, kissing you like restraint was never part of him. He draws you down to kneel with him on the red rug beneath the arch, candlelight warming your skin, the night pressing close.
He eases you back onto the ground.
"Frankie—" you whisper. "What're you doing?"
"Want you," he moans, "now."
"What? Here? Frankie—" you gasp as your back hits the red rug on the sand, "Not here—anyone can see us—"
"Didn't you hear me, hermosa?" he smiles, "I bought this entire island. For you. It's just us."
You turn your head to look around, left and right, as if testing if he was right, before looking back at him and smiling. Your cross necklace is askew on your chest, bathed in candlelight and the brush of the moon. You're beautiful.
Frankie kisses you again, no longer waiting, pushing his tongue into your mouth. He sits between your legs, your skirt bunching up higher and higher as your knees fall open and let him in.
He doesn’t waste a second before shoving the fabric up around your hips, moaning softly at the feel of your skin under his palms. He kneads you, grips you hard enough to pull a whimper from your throat, the last of your tears still drying on your cheeks, catching silver in the moonlight.
When his hands reach the apex of your thighs, you’re shaking. Trembling. Nervous, but fuck—
"You're wet, mi amor, just like I knew—"
“Don’t make me feel bad,” you whisper.
“Never,” he says immediately, shaking his head. He kisses your chin carefully, before lowering himself again.
You watch him, holding your breath. His eyes stay on yours until he can’t help it anymore, until he’s kneeling between your legs, staring openly at the way your cotton underwear clings to you, darkened where it presses against your folds.
"Ohhh," he breathes. He nudges your skirt even higher, guiding your knees over his shoulders, locking you there. He presses a kiss to your covered mound, slow and sweet, inhaling, and you gasp, your hands flying into his hair.
The sound he makes startles him, slipping out before he realizes it’s his own. His tongue presses flat through the fabric, and he groans again, helpless. Nectar. The nectar of the gods. His own ambrosia. He thinks, with sudden certainty, that he could die here and know heaven could never come close.
“Fuck,” he breathes, mind gone, undone by the feeling of you, by the sounds you make for him. He hooks a finger into the gusset of your panties, tugging them aside just enough, and finally lets his tongue have what it’s been begging for.
Your back arches immediately, a broken moan tearing free into the night. Frankie devours you, eating, licking, taking his fill.
To be fair, dear reader, he had done this before. He remembers it now better than ever. The taste, the smell of your honey invading his memory.
It was Santiago’s birthday. You’d loosened up with a little help from his friends, wine poured generously, laughter spilling from you easier than usual. By the time midnight crept close, you were giggly, flushed, your hands restless in a way they never were when you were being good. Your devout Catholic hands, always folded, always careful. That night they weren’t careful at all.
When the party thinned out and it was just the guys left, you’d slipped away with him, quiet as a secret, into Santiago’s bathroom of all places. You’d tasted like Malbec and something unreal, warm and plush in his arms as he kissed you against the door the second it closed behind you. You’d begged then, he can hear your voice in his memory now, sweet and breathless, asking to be touched like it was a confession you couldn’t keep anymore. And Frankie—God—he hadn’t stood a chance.
With one word, and he was on his knees at the altar of your hips, worshipping you the same way he is now, mouth full, mind gone. Afterward, you’d wanted to try more, curiosity shining in your eyes when you whispered it. He nearly came just hearing you say it. He let you taste him, just a little, guiding you with a steady hand, petting your hair, letting you cradle what god had given him. That was all, though. He’d drawn the line there.
Not because he couldn’t have taken more.
Because he decided he wouldn’t. He couldn't risk the fallout of your penance.
And then a few days later, Santiago had told him and the guys about his plans. To take down Lorea for once and for all. And when Frankie told you he'd said yes, he'd never seen you so angry. Almost as angry as tonight when you'd touched down and finally looked at him.
But he’d known then, the same way he knows now.
You would forgive him.
No matter what he did—whether he stayed up all night coked out of his mind, or came to you with beer on his tongue, slurring his words as he kissed you—you always forgave him. You forgave him the day he told you god wasn’t real, though even now he isn’t sure he meant it. He’d just been angry and hungover. He remembers shaking with the early ache of trying to quit the snow.
All it ever took was reminding you how much he loved you. Telling you he was the only one for you. That his devotion was sacred, set apart, something god himself would have to understand. He liked that part best—the moment your resistance gave way, the instant your certainty cracked and you looked at him like he was both the wound and the cure.
His tongue flattens against your clit now, swollen and pulsing beneath him, and he snaps back into the present as you gush around his mouth, hands locked tight in his hair. He hadn’t even realized he’d been grinding a hollow into the sand, his cock dragging against the ground beneath him, desperate for friction.
Frankie, Frankie, Frankie you chant. He groans, lifting his head to look at you, reaching up to tear your blouse down your chest, freeing your breasts so he can watch them rise and fall as you gulp in the night air. Your nipples pebble instantly in the cool ocean breeze, and he crawls back over you, taking one into his warm, wet mouth. His lips tingle where he’s tasted your orgasm, like a constellation bursting across his tongue. Heaven.
Your hands never leave his hair as he circles his tongue around you, greedy, unwilling to choose just one. He squeezes your breasts together, nuzzling between them, shaking his head, burying himself in the valley of your warmth.
“Hermosa,” he moans, his covered cock grinding up into your wet, open cunt.
“Frankie, please,” you cry after a particularly rough thrust of his hips. He knows his jeans are too rough for you, knows you’re sensitive there, but he wants to see your eyes when he pushes just a little harder.
“You’re so beautiful, ’mor,” he murmurs. “Let me have her. Please. Let me give you everything.”
You pause, watching him, your forehead dappled with cold sweat in your hairline. You're still breathing hard, coming down from your high.
"You're just so perfect, 'mor," he says, "so perfect, it's only going to be you and me, forever. You know that. Me and you. Always. I love you."
"I love you, Frankie," you whisper, "yes, okay, just please—be gentle—please,"
You sound so soft and sweet he could eat you alive, he might, he wants to. His mouth opens wider, taking your breast fully this time, wondering dimly if he could bite hard enough to see your heart, the way it swells for him, the way it hammers faster and faster as he convinces himself he’s giving you everything.
A high buzz fills his ears as he lifts back onto his knees, fumbling with his belt. He frees himself and rests against your hip, forcing himself to pause, to ground his mind back into his body. Your hand is already reaching for him. You say something sweet, something whispered, half-lost to the sound of the waves—something about remembering him, about how he once felt like velvet in your mouth. He wishes you wouldn't say such things, because one more minute he'll combust then and there.
You’re a mess beneath him. Clothes torn and shifted, blouse pulled away, skirt hiked up. Blasphemous. He can’t do it like this.
"Baby," he whispers.
"Yes, Francisco?"
"Let me—let's get these things off of you, I wanna see you—"
You nod, beginning to pull your top over your head.
"Can I see you too, 'mor?" you ask quietly. His heart swells in his chest, his skin warming, finally, finally, finally.
“Of course, mi ángel,” he says, pulling his shirt free. Your hands roam him immediately—hands he’s watched clutch a rosary, fold in prayer, open for the Spirit—now holding him like treasure.
“Ohhh,” you whisper as he slides your skirt down your legs. “You're so warm.”
“I know,” he murmurs, folding over you, arms slipping beneath your body to hold you tight. “I’ve got you. Let me love you. Let me have you.”
"You already do," you say, kissing his nose, kissing the bend of his cupid's bow. You watch him, your eyes, so pretty, god how he ever went a year without them, he's not sure. Your hands cradle his face. “Make love to me, Francisco.”
He guides himself to your weeping entrance, and pushes in.
Your brows shoot up quickly before pulling together. He mimics the look on your face, his brows pulling tight at the feeling of your velvet keep—so tight it's almost resisting his intrusion.
"S'alright," he slurs, drunk on the feeling, "s'gonna feel funny, 'mor, s'okay, s'okay," he chants, kissing your frowning lips.
You whine softly, almost feline as you mewl, discomfort threading through the sound, but your arms fold around his neck, pulling him close. He can’t move, only his hips are free to push in.
"Oh, oh, oh," you whisper, "oh God,"
It's the first time he's ever heard you say the name in vain. He thinks he might go insane for it. He wants to hear it again.
"Fuck," he swears, he can't help it.
"Oh, God, Frankie, oh—"
Yes yes yes.
He pushes deeper. Your pussy grips him like a fist, and his vision flashes white. He can feel the head of his cock brushing your womb, pressing there, claiming it, whispering promises to it only he believes. You pulse around him, fluttering, and he stays still, pressed hip to hip, closer than he’s ever been to you. It's like nothing he's ever felt. This is the kingdom of heaven, he realizes. On this beach. In your tight keep, and god is looking back at him through your eyes.
"¿Cómo te sientes?" he whispers, kissing your open mouth, "Cuéntame."
"So—" you sigh out, a breath held too long, "it's so—"
He kisses your gasping lips again.
"So good, b-but funny—"
He nods, gently urging you on as he holds you.
"Feels, so—like I'm being split in half. So full in my belly. I feel like…like God is…"
Frankie feels a rush of nerves, will you tell him this is a mistake now? Not save him with grace and tell him after?
"This is what God created, this…this feeling, and oh, it's wonderful."
Frankie pulls his cock out as his mouth covers your in urgency, eating your whines, as he begins fucking you—no—how did you put it? Makes love to you. You moan now, louder, unable to hold his kiss, your head is thrown back, and you're gasping, sobbing now in earnest, and he watches you like you’re a vision, fucking you into the sand, into the rug beneath you, your bodies carving a hollow the tide will erase by morning.
"You are so perfect, 'mor," he breathes, skin slapping skin, his cock growing and tightening. He can feel you fluttering around him.
"I've only ever wanted you," he says, "you're the only thing that's ever fucking mattered, my girl, mi amor, I love you,"
"I love you Frankie," and he realizes you're crying again, hands tight around his neck, "I love you so much—oh, I think I'm gonna—oh! Say it again, 'mor, por favor,"
"I love you, I love you, my sweet baby, you're everything, come on my cock, let me feel her, let me feel you, I need it, give it to me." his lips curl and he's baring his teeth, he can't help it, he's so close it's making him animal, "give it to me,"
Your eyes are wide, and he doesn't think it's fear, but maybe awe, because your body is tightening, your pussy latching onto him so hard he's barely able to move, and your back bends, he feels it under his hands. And your breasts, now slick with sweat, push into him and bear your neck to him as you come.
He follows, a raw sound tearing from his chest as he spills into you without hesitation. If it’s god’s will, he’ll give you children, ten more if you ask. The sensation stretches on endlessly, too much, too full, stars bursting behind his eyes as your body holds him.
He thinks he sees God.
Or maybe it’s just the way you look at him in the moonlight as you take everything he gives.
The world eventually comes back to him, the crashing sound of waves filling his ears, steady and eternal. The candles flicker low now, dripping down into the sand. He's breathing hard over you, still inside the circle of your body, but he's quiet, and you're quiet, both of you soaking in the moment. It's like the stillness after prayer, when you don't move, the silence almost holy.
Your chest rises and falls beneath his, uneven, your fingers slack in his hair now, petting lazy shapes against his scalp. He can feel your heartbeat everywhere—against his mouth, his neck, the place where your bodies are still joined.
He presses his forehead to yours.
For a long moment neither of you speak. There’s nothing urgent left to say, everything feels already decided.
"Frankie," you finally whisper.
"Yes?" he murmurs immediately, softly.
You swallow, your hand comes up to his cheek, thumb brushing along his mouth, slow and loving.
"If God…" you swallow again, "if He was watching…do you think He's angry with me?"
The question settles between you, fragile as breath.
Frankie’s chest tightens. He kisses your temple first, then your cheek, the corner of your mouth, gentle where his lips brush.
“No,” he says, low and sure. “No, mi ángel.”
You search his face, still unsure, your eyes still wet with question.
“I just—” Your voice trembles. “I don’t feel ruined. I feel…” You trail off, embarrassed by the honesty of it.
summary: Jackson’s kindergarten teacher sure is sweet. Beloved by the community and gentle with the children, its no far feat for everyone to fall in love with her. Even big, bad, scary Joel Miller.
|| fluff, lil bit of angst cause joel miller is an anxious guy, miss honey coded reader (from the 1996 movie matilda), kindergarten teacher reader, canon compliant, easter eggs from tlou II, tenderness, flirting, yearning, joel is a big boy ||
a/n: let me just apologize cause I really don't know how to write fluff. there's not muchhhh plot here. just like...yearning. and kindergarten things. and yeah. but I had fun with it and it helped me with some writer's block :')
The baby boom in Jackson began about six months after you started to call the settlement home.
It wasn't very surprising. After all, safety had a way of loosening the grip of fear and letting love take root where survival had once ruled the mind. And when love was involved in a world with a lack of contraceptives… well, there were babies.
And oh, did Jackson have babies.
You'd only have to step out of the house to see the streets filled with the new beginnings of life. The air was soon full of coos and soft cries, followed with gentle reassurances passed between mothers and fathers, neighbors leaning in to lend a hand. It brought the town closer than ever before.
Somehow, childless and single, yet old enough to be trusted, you found yourself caring for the little ones while their parents tended to work or if they just needed some rest. At first, it was a baby here and there dropped off at your door for an afternoon. And then as word spread about how good you were with the children, your home began filling with tiny feet and bright eyes. Some parents even joked their children preferred you to them, which made you laugh but left you secretly honored.
Over the years—how fast they go by when watching tiny humans grow—the babies turned to toddlers, who inevitably turned to children. By the time many of them turned three or four, you realized how badly they craved something more. Not because they were unruly, but because their minds were so eager to stretch and wander. They needed a place to learn, to play, to begin imagining larger worlds.
Soon, you were convincing Tommy Miller and his wife Maria to let you use a small building down the road as a school. You painted its walls with sprawling gardens, bees and butterflies and flowers blooming in bright murals on the outside. String lights were strung across beams, and with the help of a young man Jesse and his girlfriend Dina, you raided an elementary school in an abandoned town over the mountain. It had been left and untouched, after all, because who bothered with school supplies when the world ended? Yet you came away with treasures: coloring books and workbooks, crayons by the hundreds, pencils, scissors, paints, paper that hadn't rotted away in the twenty years it had been left. Your little building became a schoolhouse in no time, shelves full of books and crafts and trinkets found along the way. Each item seemed small, but meant everything to you.
And on your birthday, Jesse and Dina had surprised you with an entire chalkboard and a box filled with little white sticks. The moment you laid your eyes on it, you fell into their arms, laughing and weeping all at once.
Today, a warm spring afternoon, you were out in the community garden with the children, all of them crouched among the rows of mulch and sprouting harvest. You'd been teaching them about roots and leaves, how the soil and sun worked together to make things grow, how they love to lean towards the light. You taught them how there was some inexplicable thing about nature that liked to be sung to. Halfway through leading them in a cheerful round of You Are My Sunshine, you noticed Tommy Miller heading your way, a broad grin on his face and someone at his side.
You rose from your kneeling position, dusting the dirt from your palms and smoothing your yellow dress, calling out to the children, "You can pick off one vegetable each—and I do mean one, Joey!"
"Mornin'," Tommy said warmly upon your approach. His smile was so wide his freckle-dusted cheeks were flushed pink, radiating a kindness that always put you at ease.
"Morning, Tommy," you replied, leaning in to greet each other with a kiss on the cheek. You turned back to double check the rows of children—still eighteen heads like giggling blossoms between the thicket of greenery—before turning back to your visitor, a little breathless, "How are you?"
“I’m wonderful, honey, thank you,” he said, hands settling on his hips in his usual easy stance. “Wanted to introduce you to one of our new folks. This here’s my brother, Joel.”
"Hi, Joel," you greeted warmly, offering your hand. He inclined his head, the faintest smile tugging at his mouth as his thick palm closed around yours. He was so warm and gentle, fingers worn with rough calluses and his hand swallowed yours in its grasp. You suddenly caught yourself staring at the silver threading through his dark hair and the broad cut of his shoulders before you let go.
"Joel here's gonna be helpin' with that schoolhouse of yours," Tommy continued once your hands had parted, clapping his hand onto the broad cup of his brother's shoulder, "roof's been in bad shape since the winter. And he's the man to fix it."
"Oh, I'd really appreciate it so much," you replied, eyes brightening, until you hesitated, "I'll still be able to teach, though?" you glanced back at the children as you spoke, counting again, the instinct automatic. Still eighteen.
Joel spoke for the first time then, his voice low and even, pleasantly rough, "Yes, ma'am, shouldn't get in your way too much."
Your eyes flicked to him, startled by the warmth in his tone. “What a shame,” you said softly, catching yourself and smiling, "but I'm glad I'll still be able to teach."
Tommy’s eyes moved between his brother and you, quick and curious.
"Well, we'll let you get back to it," he said, his hand clapping one more time on Joel before giving you one more beaming smile. As his one hand left his brother's shoulder, the other found the small of your back in parting, light and friendly, "You take care now, honey,"
"You too," you returned, a blush reaching your cheeks as your gaze found Joel's once more. His eyes held yours for a fraction longer than polite, so pretty you wondered how many colors you'd have to mix to get the hazel right. And then he nodded his goodbye, and parted with Tommy.
Joel
You see, when Joel was younger—when he had a mortgage to pay and a job to keep and a house to care for—it riddled him with gut-wrenching anxiety. He would ignore it, and could usually keep his head on long enough to get through the day, wishing to hit his head to a pillow and sleep it off, only to be left wide awake at night, begging his eyelids to shut. He would toss and turn, pleading for his brain to shut off, to put away the worry and just let him fucking sleep. It was a specific feeling in his stomach then—he couldn't eat or drink much without it churning painfully in his gut. It got so bad he started taking little while pills to help with the sores in his stomach. That's when the doctor told him he had anxiety.
That's what he was feeling now.
That stomach rolling, wide eyed feeling, staring up at his ceiling.
But this time, it wasn't because he had a baby to feed in a recession or because he had to hold a job he couldn't be sure he had the next day. It wasn't about reminding himself about soccer dues or another part needed for his truck to even get to the job he wasn't sure he'd had.
No, no.
Joel Miller had a fucking crush.
It turned tides in his stomach even as he thought it.
Butterflies, he’d call it, you know, if he was five years old. He fisted his palms into his eyes, willing them to close, to let him fucking sleep. Twenty years into the end of the world and his brain was worried what you’d thought of him today. What that look in your eyes meant as you realized you’d be seeing him a lot more now that the roof to your school was so decayed from winter’s wet blanket the last four months.
The next few days did not make it much easier.
He and Ellie were given the rest of the weekend to settle in, to get their bearings and meet the other folks in town, and if anything the reprieve only made it worse. He kept seeing you—everywhere—in such small, ordinary ways that made it impossible to ignore the flipping in his stomach.
He saw you at the stables, saying hello to the horses and the parents of a young boy, your hand resting on the boy’s shoulder while you listened like nothing else mattered. That next night, he saw you outside the Tipsy Bison with a glass of wine in your hand, your cheeks pink as a man flirted openly with you and you tried to laugh it off as if trying not to hurt his feelings. Joel didn’t feel bold enough to talk to you yet, but every now and then, when he checked back to see if you were still there, you would already be looking at him.
You wore the prettiest things too: a yellow dress one day with little frills at the sleeves, pale pink the next, soft and muddy at the hem as you picked vegetables. Then, Sunday afternoon he saw you on your porch wearing a pretty blue one as you painted, a small bouquet of flowers tucked into your apron pocket.
And the people of Jackson loved you.
Little children brought you treats, the stable boy offering his apple to you, the bartender at the Tipsy Bison not letting you exchange a single thing for your drink. In the market a woman gave you flowers because they matched that blue dress, not allowing your objections to the thoughtful gesture. And when Joel slipped you into conversation that Sunday night at dinner at Tommy and Maria's, his brother was all smiles and pride at what you'd done with that building on the side of town. How the place made it feel like the old days, steadier and alive because of you. And then, almost baffled, Tommy added he couldn’t believe you’d been single, on your own all this time, always tending to the children and never worrying about anyone’s flirtations.
Joel didn't get any sleep that night.
On Monday morning, he was at the kitchen table, sunlight beaming through the window in pale stripes across the worn wood. Ellie sat across from him, kicking her feet with restless irritation as she hunched over her notebook. The only sound in the room was Joel's fork against the porcelain in front of him, and her pen scratching doodles in the lines of the paper.
Joel pushed his eggs around his plate, managing a few bites only because he knew better than to skip eating altogether. His stomach rolled anyway, just like it had been all night.
“Sounds to me like you’re bored,” he said around a bite of egg, swallowing the lump in his throat, forcing his voice to stay easy, normal. “And need a job.”
Ellie snorted, finally glancing up from the notebook, pen held aloft “Where?” she asked, and then pointed the pen at him, threatening. “And don’t tell me farm duty. That sucked so bad I can’t imagine why anyone would ever sign up for that.” She rolled her eyes dramatically, then set the pen aside and reached for a slice of apple, dragging it through the mason jar of peanut butter beside her plate before taking a bite. Mid chew, she added, “And no one will let me train for patrol yet.”
Joel stood and gathered her empty plate with his own, twisting the lid back onto the jar and sliding it out of reach before she could go back for more. She tended to like to stick her entire finger in the jar when she ran out of apple slices.
“Hey!” Ellie protested.
“Get up,” Joel said, jerking his chin toward the door. “You’re comin’ with me.”
“I can’t do manual labor,” she yelled after him, chair scraping loudly as she stood. “I don’t even know how to use a screwdriver!”
“Lucky for you,” he said, throwing on his boots, keeping his back to her so she wouldn’t see the way his jaw was set, “the job I got in mind requires minimal manual labor.”
He paused, glancing over his shoulder. “That is, unless you count havin’ to pick up and carry around forty-somethin’ pounds every so often.”
You
"Ellie here has been needin' a job," Joel explained on the doorstep of your schoolhouse. His eyes wouldn't meet yours the entire time he'd been saying hello, introducing Ellie as he stared at her. She was cute—red haired, freckle faced. And Joel had a soft smile as he looked at her, even though his arms were folded tightly across his chest. You wondered for a moment if the smile was saying something else between them, an inside joke you didn't know, a little smug and teasing as she elbowed him.
"Uh, hi," Ellie said with a polite grin, a little shy.
You smiled back, bright and sincere, "I'm really so grateful to have you," you said as you greeted the kids filing in around you. The schoolhouse was streaked with winter's melt, the sunflowers and bees now faded, "We're learning about the solar system today, so it'll be great to have an extra pair of hands."
You sounded a little exasperated, but really, there couldn't have been a better day for her arrival—paper mache, planets, glue and scissors and paint all in the hands of eighteen of Jackson's five year olds. Planning it had been exciting, especially when you'd found a book on Space Exploration for Dummies. But now, staring down the barrel of the day ahead, you were immensely grateful for the teenager to help out.
As the last child filed inside, Ellie followed, her face brightened and excited, and you turned to close the door and bid her guardian goodbye. As you reached for the handle, you caught one more glance at Joel as he finally looked up at you.
You wondered if it was winter’s last nip of the morning, or if he’d always been so pink in the cheeks, but you could’ve sworn Joel Miller was blushing.
The day carried on, and eighteen miniature solar systems came to life. There were planets strung on yarn and stars splattered with paint on black paper you'd spent all night painting the days before. Glue was dried between small fingers, markers rolled beneath desks, laughter filling the space. Ellie was absolutely radiant as she darted between tables to help the little ones.
"Did you know the moon smells like gun powder?" she'd asked, grinning as the kids gasped, "gun powder's the stuff they use to make weapons work, like when your parents go on patrol. Same stuff. Cool, right?"
"Did you know the first animals in space were fruit flies? Everyone always says monkeys, but nope—flies! They sent them for radiation exposure."
"Did you know the heat sheilds on shuttles are made of sand? No seriously!!"
By the third fact, you'd decided maybe she should've been teaching the lesson herself.
When the day finally wound down, gluey hands washed clean and paints capped, Ellie stood at the sink, carefully working the brushes under running water. She had gone a little quiet once the kids all left for supper, her voice soft when she finally spoke to you as you cleaned up. “Thanks for letting me… you know… help out.”
You smiled, pouring the cloudy rinse water into the basin beside her. “I think that was the best lesson yet. You were amazing.”
Ellie’s grin widened, freckles dancing across her nose, her eyes bright and alive. You shared a quiet, easy moment there, just smiling at each other.
There was a knock on the open door behind you, and a familiar voice called out.
"Ready to head home?"
You and Ellie both turned. Joel stood in the doorway, filling it with his broad frame, his shirt darkened with sweat at the collar and under his arms, hands dirt-smudged, a strip of white gauze wrapped around his left palm.
Ellie dried her hands quickly and grabbed her backpack, slinging it over one shoulder as she walked towards him. But instead of stopping in front of him, she went around, looking sheepishly up at him from outside, “Uh…Kat actually invited me over. We’re gonna hang out.” she shrugged, “Save me some dinner?”
Joel blinked, “I—okay, uh, yeah.”
Ellie’s eyes found you once more, “Thanks again, Miss!”
You waved her off with a small smile, then wiped your hands on your yellow apron, untied it, and draped it over the back of your chair. When you sat on the edge of the desk, the fatigue caught up with you all at once, settling into your bones as the quiet finally took hold. The room was clean now, desks straightened, floors swept, but the day still clung to you—glue under your fingernails, paint in your hair, the usual. There was an exhaustion in your bones, but the good kind, from a day well spent.
Joel stood awkwardly at the door for a moment, picking at the bandage on his left hand, shifting once before clearing his throat, “She tends to run her own schedule, sorry ‘bout that,”
You laughed softly, “She’s wonderful.”
He looked up at that, his eyes finding yours, and god, they really were so pretty. Every color from the forest under a thick, dark brow. He looked at you like he wasn’t expecting the praise, like the compliment hit somewhere tender.
“Yeah. She is,” he murmured, eyes dropping again, the pink returning to his cheeks.
You tilted your head, smiling gently. “She was incredible today. And the kids loved her. I think she taught half the lesson for me.”
“Well,” Joel scratched the back of his neck, bashful, “she’s always loved space, never stops talkin' about it whenever she can.”
“That’s a good thing here,” you said softly. “I could use someone who talks a lot. I’m usually outnumbered by eighteen little voices.”
You both watched each other for a long moment, and you felt like you were cataloging him. Broad shoulders, dark hair, that thick peppered beard and thick bottom lip. You blushed before trying to look away, but then something caught your eye.
“Joel?” you asked gently, your eyes finally realizing that bandage hadn’t been there this morning, “What happened to your hand?”
He seemed startled that you’d noticed, following your gaze down to the bandage as if it had only just occurred to him. “Oh. It’s nothin’,” he said. “Just… been a while since I done much construction. Roof was worse’n I thought. Should throttle Tommy for leavin' you to a rotted decking for so long."
You pushed yourself up from the desk without thinking, concern warming your expression as you stepped closer. “Still,” you said, “it must’ve hurt.”
He shrugged, trying to play it off, but he flushed pink again, “It’s fine. Really.”
But he didn’t pull away when you reached for his arm. You took his bandaged hand carefully, your fingers gentle as you adjusted the loose wrap, neatening it without comment. He went very still beneath your fingers, watching you the whole time, as if he weren’t used to being tended to, as if the simple act of care was something new and overwhelming.
“I’m glad you’re helping with the schoolhouse,” you said quietly after a minute, your fingers resting on the thick of his arm. “We really needed it. Tommy and Maria, I mean… and me.”
His eyes moved between yours, something shy in his smile. “Happy to,” he said. “Really.”
You couldn't stop looking up at him, studying him, watching him watch you. His beard had been trimmed since yesterday, the dark thick hair still threaded with silver, neater than it was, and the thought surprised you with how fond it made you feel.
Joel's expression was changing as you watched him. Your hand still laid on his arm, just delicate and gentle, not even putting pressure. You hadn’t realized how near you’d drifted until you were almost chest to chest, your breath catching a little at the space between you, at how solid he felt, how steady.
He lowered his arms slowly, careful not to startle you, and then his bandaged hand lifted, hesitant, as if he were asking permission with the motion itself. His fingers pinched a streak of blue paint caught in your hair.
"You really are somethin, miss honey," he murmured as he dragged the color from your hair.
"My name's—not—I—"
But you couldn't make the words form. It was your turn to blush and stammer, as his hand tucked the hair away, and he inhaled. You could feel your breath being stolen from him. His smile was shy but widening, maybe amused as he realized you were suddenly as nervous as him.
"What’re you doin’ tonight?” he asked quietly, hope threaded through the question. His voice was so low, so gravelly but soft. You wanted to close your eyes just to hear it like a hymn.
You hummed, a little delirious at the closeness, at the smell of the mint on his breath. You wondered if he'd gotten some from the garden before coming here.
"Nothing." you answered.
You realized then he hadn’t dropped his hand from your ear. He was still holding your face, thumb warm where it brushed your temple.
He hesitated, and you watched his eyes move around the focals of your face, your eyes, your nose, your lips—oh god—and it made your chest feel too small for your heart, made you suddenly aware of your own mouth, the way you were breathing.
And then, gathering his courage, he said: “Dinner?”
You lifted your hand without thinking, circling his wrist where it hovered, a quiet little anchor, and it was like the touch finally caught up with him. His breath hitched, his shoulders softened. This big, broad man suddenly unsure in the sweetest, most disarming way, offering you something fragile and waiting to see if you’d take it.
“I’d like that,” you said, smiling back, a little breathless yourself. “I can bring coffee, if you—”
His entire expression changed in a glimpse. The cautious set of his brows lifted, the corners of his mouth lifting wider, and his eyes sparkled like embers catching light.
“There’s coffee?” he asked, almost boyishly hopeful.
You couldn’t help the way your smile widened in return, your tongue finally finding its way back to you as you wet your lips and remembered how to speak.
“Every once in a while the bakery gets some,” you said softly. “I teach the owner’s kids, so… I usually get first dibs when it comes in.”
He let out a quiet breath that was almost a laugh, and only then seemed to realize his hand was still on your face. He lowered it slowly, careful, and you followed the movement without thinking, your fingers sliding from his wrist down to his hand until you were only holding the tips of each other’s fingers.
“That sounds….” he said, earnest and a little unsteady. “That would be real nice, honey.”
You looked at him for a long moment, both of you smiling in a soft, stunned way that felt too big for words.
“Walk me home?” you asked, quiet and hopeful.
He glanced out at the open door, the evening settling into purples and oranges, then back at you, and his hand slipped further into yours, squeezing it once.
summary: when you learn your wanting is not only your own
|| smut MDNI 18+, no outbreak, idk why but I totally pictured long haired joel in this, neighbor!joel, pervy!reader, mommy issues, parentified child, nonspecific (but legal, made clear she is not a teenager) age gap, pining & yearning, dirty thoughts, tommy cameo, sarah cameo, neighborhood parties, slight voyeuristic tendencies but not in smut, f!masturbation, m!receiving oral, handjob, underwear stealing, fingers in mouth, mouth inspection, pinv, dirty talk, praise kink always, tiniest bit of degradation, little bit of pussy pronouns, joel refers to himself as daddy, daddy issues mentioned (joel is here to fix them), reader has free-use fantasies, creampie ||
references & inspired by: In My Room by Julia Wolf, Fleabag s2, All the Things She Said by t.A.T.u, Crush by Ethel Cain
a/n: if you ever watched s2e4 of fleabag and wished it was joel miller, your prayers have been answered. all my love forever and always to @pearlessance for clappin' eyes on this baby before it was ready
wc: 9k
You weren't really into these things.
Parties, that is. Neighborly ones. Where the whole street would get together and cook out, pretending they hadn't been shoving their noses in each other's business all year long. But it was supposed to be cheerful, joyous. It was Christmas in Texas, after all.
Everyone who had been home for the holidays were there. Most of the kids had off from school and those who had jobs that paid them to spend time off loitered and ate and laughed together. It all felt so… merry. Maybe it was just because you still felt so new that it felt otherworldly. You'd only moved to Austin two years ago when your mother decided LA was no longer 'artistically aligned' with her anymore, and that she swore her music career would really take off here instead. So, you'd picked up and moved with her. You felt some sort of…parentified responsibility over her. She was such a free spirit that often she needed reminding of things: appointments, bills, to eat whole meals and drink water. She was off chatting to a handsome man who was one hundred percent not her age, but old enough to know better. He had a cocky smile, freckles over his nose. You recognized him, though he didn't live in the neighborhood. A family member of one of them, you expected.
The backyard you inhabited was full of woodsmoke in the late afternoon, a hum of chattering gossipers filling your ears like bees. One of the girls, Sarah, who was younger than you, was over by her dad, talking animatedly. You thought maybe she was asking him something. For his car keys or some other. She was younger than you, but you knew she was a sweet kid. You almost wished there were more people your age, but you didn't mind today, not when you were so focused on the one person you'd come to see. Most of the people here all belonged to one another; their lives braided together through the years. You'd never been able to find your place, always on the outskirts or an afterthought. Other than your mother, but she wasn't around much, so you weren't sure that counted.
But there was one person who you'd always kept your eye on. You could say it was the one good thing about still living with your mother. Because outside your bedroom window, sometimes when you were crossing your yard to get to your car, you'd see him. If you peeked out in the morning and saw him drinking his coffee on his porch, you'd make sure to wear your tiniest shorts, your lowest top, anything to get him to look at you. Sometimes he'd shake his head at you, a gruff disappointed look. It only made you want him worse.
Joel Miller.
Today was no different, though you wore a flowing sundress instead of your usual daisy dukes. He was hosting, so you made sure to pull out your best cards. Even if it was winter in Texas, the South allowed for things like this—skimpy things—even if you'd been chilled ever since stepping outside. You could feel your nipples pebbled against the thin cotton of your bustier. You didn't care. You actually hoped he'd notice.
You pulled out your phone and scrolled through your socials, looking at them the way he might if he ever went snooping. You thought you came off sweet, approachable, all those old photos with your friends and the dogs and cats you pet-sat filling your feed, softening the ones of you partying back home in LA. Your Tinder was set all the way up to men in their sixties, though you had never seen him there. You ignored all of the other men, so many left swipes you'd developed a trigger finger. Still, just in case, you made sure a bikini photo sat right at the front, bright and impossible to miss. Just in case.
He was across the yard, beer nearly finished, Sarah having run off, and he was listening to that old cranky asshole who always yelled about dog shit in his yard. You watched as Joel nodded along politely, saying little, his hand wrapped around the neck of the bottle.
God, those hands. Thick and broad and cracked from the sunlight, you could admit you'd thought of them many times. How they'd feel running up your body or holding you down as he fucked you into the mattress or maybe how they'd feel between your legs instead of your vibrator. You would let him do it—grope you, touch you however he wanted. You might even beg him to. You wanted to feel them wrap around your thighs or push up your dress right here to get a look at you. And his arms. Banded with bulging veins, sun toughened and tanned, clearly used for work that wasn't made from inhabiting the gym. A man, through and through, tall and thick and bearded and…
You stood from your lone chair by the corner of the yard and made your way over to the cooler. Your bare feet marched along the concrete, and then into wet grass, fishing for a specific brand before walking right up beside him.
Your chest brushed the corner of his elbow.
"Mr. Miller," you purred, offering the cold unopened bottle.
He turned to look at you, suddenly surprised at your arrival. His eyes scaled down your form, taking in your little dress, your goosebumped skin, and you could've sworn they landed on your breasts for a second too long. You had to bite down a smile. Did he feel guilty for it? Or was his head filling with the same filthy thoughts you shared?
"Howdy," he said, clearing his throat, "how are ya?"
"I'm good," you smiled sweetly, exhaling. "I wanted to thank you for having us, Mr. Miller. I noticed you were out of your drink and…I thought you might want another?"
"Oh," he replied, looking down at his own empty bottle like he'd forgotten about it, "uh, thanks, darlin', that's mighty kind of you."
You handed it to him, and when your fingers brushed, it felt like swallowing the sun. His calluses passed over your soft knuckles, and they were just as rough as you'd imagined. You wished he'd put them all over you here and now. That maybe he'd pull the top of your dress down for everyone to see you weren't wearing a bra, palming at them in front of the entire neighborhood. You might beg him to do that too.
"You're welcome, Mr. Miller," you said with a brighter smile, "is there anything else you need?"
You couldn't help yourself as you looked up at him, doe eyed and innocent—hopeful, even.
He huffed a quiet laugh, looking at you a little longer, "No, no," his eyes dropped again, "I'm all good here, you ain't cold?"
You could've sworn his cheeks went a little pink. Wishful thinking.
"I'm fine," you lied, "maybe I'll step inside for a minute, use the restroom."
Turning around and heading for the house, you let your hips swish a little extra, hoping—praying—he was watching.
Inside the sliding glass door, the hush of the house made your ears buzz, overwhelming and warm against your flesh where his eyes had burned it. It was dimly lit, other than the light of the kitchen where the food sat half-eaten and the Christmas tree cast colorful rays along the walls as the sun began to sink outside. The party continued on without you, laughter and music muffled against the threshold of a closed door.
Ahead, the bathroom door was ajar, but your gaze didn't stay there very long. Instead, it landed on the staircase.
You glanced around one more time, ensuring your solitude. You were alone.
In his house.
You took your chance.
Bare feet padding silently, you were clutching the banister in seconds. Your fingers tightened hard enough to blanch your knuckles, using it to haul yourself up the stairs two at a time, heart hammering like it knew what you were about to do, screaming don't, don't don't!
The landing was quieter once you made it all the way up. It creaked underfoot as the last rays of sun lightened your path ahead. You'd imagined all of this so many times, when you'd see the faint glow of the hall light on in the night, staring across the street as if he'd maybe pass by if you willed it. He had, one time, shirtless, to your mouthwatering joy, though he'd barely been more than a silhouette, closing the blinds, allowing your eyes to soak in as much as you could before they fell and the light went off.
You swore you could smell him now, following the scent of his aftershave, something with cedar and tobacco, the smell of sun on leather as you stayed to it like a hound on a hunt into the largest bedroom on the left.
You didn't dare turn on the light. There was an intimacy of the darkening day, a secret, desecration kept quiet.
The bedroom smelled like him even more, a freshness of laundry and the musk of a man. You wanted, so badly, to roll around in his bed, made so neatly but so plainly. Like any other man, dark blue comforter and gray sheets. A dusty elliptical stood by the window, looking like it was used more as a drying rack than anything for exercise. He didn't need it, you thought. He was built by labor, body hewn from his job, lugging and hauling and building. Man man man.
You breathed in deeply, trying to log everything to memory in the shadow of the sunset that lit the room as you padded around. You smiled when you saw a pair of reading glasses sitting atop the magazine titled: Everything You Need to Know About Creating a Startup. And then, gaze landing on the flannel shirt that laid on a wooden chest, you walked over to the end of the bed, bringing it to your nose without a second thought, inhaling his scent. Musky, sweaty, warm with a faint trace of cologne. You tried to place it, something woodsy and pine with bergamot. You wondered what the brand was, already half-imagining finding it somewhere and buying it for yourself, just so you could sit in your room on lonely nights and spray your pillow like he was there with you. Good God, you really needed to stop this before it—
And as you exhaled, opening your eyes , your gaze landed on something else.
Oh, but there really was no outrunning it, was there? This, yourself, this bottomless ache you’d built a body around. It felt as if lived in you like a second spine, needy and animal, mouthwatering in its persistence as you stared at the half full laundry basket. You shouldn't…But... There was no scrubbing the thought from your tongue, no rinsing it from the back of your teeth or pretending it wasn't what you came for. What you wanted.
Your breath came short, your heartbeat rocketing against your ribs as you dropped the flannel haphazardly, drawn like moth to flame.
You began to sift through the plastic bin, already knowing your treasure lied within. Your stomach bubbled, excitement trickling between your legs so that you were pushing your knees together. Your hand reached in, grabbing onto one piece at a time, bringing them to your nose. There was a white t shirt that smelled like days old sweat, marked where his body had lived in it, the soft cotton holding a ghost of warmth. You breathed into the place his shoulder met his chest, where his skin might've pressed to it, and your throat ached.
And then, fishing in again, your fingers gripped something lighter. You drew out a pair of briefs from the heap, navy or black, you couldn't really tell by the orange light that caught the room as if it was on fire. As if it was alarming the world as to where you were, caught red handed with your finest prize.
You brought the fabric to your nose.
The scent hit you and your thighs pressed harder together, a noise escaping that you only just had realized was your own. A sort of moaning as you inhaled the musk of the fabric, open mouthed. The briefs were definitely worn, not entirely unclean, but perhaps discarded after a long day of work. He smelled like sun and earth after a heavy rain, like the hollow of a throat.
You weren't sure if you were thinking clearly anymore, something like reason in the back of your mind telling you that you were taking much too long, but you couldn't help it. You dipped your tongue out to taste the sweat there, salty, dry. It was as if you'd been starved of this all the time you'd spent watching him over two years, seven hundred days goading him and finally finding your treasure. You sucked in another deep breath again, longer this time, filling your lungs.
A noise downstairs alarmed you suddenly, making your spine nearly jump from your skin, the backdoor opening and closing. You hesitated…you could just…but no, you really shouldn't… You licked your lips, quickly glancing between the door of the bedroom and the garment in your hands, and made your decision.
Eventually you did make it to the bathroom, but you chose to stay to the one upstairs, unable to force yourself to walk down the stairs just yet. It felt a little indulgent, stepping inside just to see more of his world. You saw his tooth brush and a razor, next to the things that were reminiscent of a teenage daughter: mascara, a glittery eyeshadow pot, a friendship beaded bracelet. They barely grazed your awareness as you at on the edge of the counter. Adrenaline was still streaming into your blood, a throb of need between your thighs that hadn't settled since you walked into his room.
Facing away from the mirror, you leaned your head back against the glass, and opened your legs.
You only had a few minutes, and you shouldn't be up here.
But regardless, you lifted your dress, the skirt bunching around your waist, and pressed your feet into the cold porcelain. Finally, your hand descended to your core, already wet and needy.
Fuck, you whispered, pressing a finger over the fabric of his briefs.
Because, yes, you'd put them on.
Just over your thong, letting them press into your core where his balls might've been, where his dick was held snug in the fabric all day. Sure, they were a little big on you, the waistband rolled over twice, but you didn't care. Your dress covered enough, being flowy around the skirt and tight on top, no one would be able to tell.
You pressed your fingers to your covered center again, gently making circles around the valley where your bundle of nerves was, swollen and wanting. Your mouth fell open, jaw unhinging as you let out a quiet whimper.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, two fingers now swiping back and forth over your covered yet sensitive core. Your thighs twitched, heels dangling off the counter’s edge as you started to rub harder right through the briefs, imagining the weight of him grinding into where your hand was, thinking of the rough callouses of his palm on your throat. The bristle of his beard against your jaw as he calls you a bad girl, asking what kind of pervert steals a man’s underwear, what kind of little minx touches herself in his bathroom?
The sensation built until you were being yanked over the edge of your orgasm, silently clenching your teeth around the knuckles of your opposite hand, body seizing through your climax.
Heaving in heavy breaths, your chest rose and fell, your breasts still piqued from the amount of dopamine coursing through your body as you come down from your high.
A little embarrassed, you washed up quickly, and headed downstairs.
Of course, in the kitchen, was Joel.
You were a little surprised to see him alone, and you glanced out the sliding door to see just your mom and the man from before, giggling around a small fire pit in the yard. How long had you been gone?
"Hey!" you said a little too breathy, gleeful almost, hooking your thumb over your shoulder, "Sorry, the downstairs bathroom was taken when I came in, so I hope it's okay—"
Joel shrugged. “Yeah, s'no problem.” Then his eyes settled on you again, longer this time. “You okay?”
“What?” you laughed, stepping toward the food, trying to stay easy and pleasant. “Totally. Party’s great. Honestly, ten outta ten.”
He chuckled. “Oh, I dunno. Sarah just left for the movies, everyone’s kinda trickled out now. Feels like the tail end.” He nudged the rack of meats, only a few left over. “But those ribs Frank brought over—”
“Insane,” you agreed, nodding, and plucked a strawberry from another tray. “But really— you’ve done a great job, Mr. Miller. Especially for your first year hosting.”
He paused with the beer halfway to his mouth, leaning back against the counter and his brows lifted in surprise. “That obvious it's my first?”
You grinned around the strawberry, lips pursed as you bite off the end, the slightly sour juice blooming over your tongue. You couldn't help but drink him in, oxytocin still flowing in your bloodstream from your secret escape to his upstairs, a sort of high for wearing his briefs in his kitchen, unbeknownst to anyone but you. He looked so good in that flannel, the way it was pushed to his elbows to show you his forearms. God, what you wouldn't do to have him bend you over the counter right then and there, to see your crimes, to rip off of the evidence of what you'd done and—
"What?" he said, a chuffing sort of breath escaping him.
“You bought enough food to feed a town." you said, shrugging, though you were smirking as you went on: "That’s rookie behavior, Mr. Miller.”
“Fuck you,” he said, so quiet you nearly missed it, blasphemy on his tongue. He raised his beer to his lips as if to hide the smile pulling across his face. “Callin’ me Mr. Miller like it doesn’t turn you on just to say it.”
Your mouth fell open, the strawberry forgotten between your fingers, waiting on your tongue to be swallowed.
Your brain was a scramble, trying to make sense of the words, if you'd even heard him right. You felt it lagging behind your body, which was already reacting: throat tight, pulse surging, blood scorching up your neck. Could he see you? Could he see what you really were? An obsessive, perverted little thing that was so full of hunger and ripened want, still wet from what you'd done upstairs, wearing the proof of it beneath your sundress. Maybe he could read your mind. The thought was horrific as it passed through you. But then, if he could, he would've run for the hills by now, scared of you. The feelings you had scared you, too.
Joel tipped his head back, lips catching the opening of his beer bottle, and you watched him watching you, his throat flexing around another swallow of liquid. You could've sworn there was a certain glint in his eyes as he stared back. It made your stomach fumble and twist, the berry in your hand suddenly stupid and heavy.
You closed your mouth, then opened it again, dry as anything, unable to form words, when a disturbance rented the room. Turning toward it too quickly, you were grateful for the noise, for anything that could offer an exit from whatever trap you'd gotten caught in.
"Honey! There you are. I think I'm gonna—well, we—" your mother was smiling brightly at the man beside her, "Tommy here said he wanted to show me this great place downtown," she said, her red painted fingernails gripping the man's bicep beneath his Henley, "Apparently it has a great open mic night tonight."
"Okay," you said, clearing your throat, unable to look at anyone now, embarrassed, humiliated in your want, as if everyone could see it.
"Great hang, brother," Tommy called over his shoulder as the two of them walked through the room and out the front door.
"I'll be home late, hon!" your mother added as it closed behind them.
A hush fell over the house again.
Joel was not looking at you now, his gaze dropped, lashes dark against his cheekbones. Outside, the last of the daylight had bled away, leaving only the Christmas lights to paint the room in soft, uneven color, reds and golds slipping over his face and hands. The low underlights that drenched the counters in amber came on, igniting the intimate quiet. It wasn't until you'd heard the engine of the truck outside roar to life and drive away that either of you spoke.
“Can I get you a drink?” Joel asked at last.
You nodded.
“Don’t move.”
You didn’t. You weren't sure you could, your body feeling like it was caught in a bear trap, unwilling to move or else risk a hurt you couldn't repair.
He turned toward the counter, the clink of glass loud in the quiet as he reached up over the fridge for a bottle, poured a few fingers of whiskey into two liquor tumblers. When he held one out to you, you found yourself stepping forward anyway, your body moving before your mind caught up.
Something felt off, and you weren't sure if it was wrong, but like…change. Things were different. You tried to remember a time you felt like this, suddenly small and nervous in front of him. It was so easy to pretend like all your flirting was just fun, just a game you played. To not think of him as a player in it, only something you were trying to attain, the prize you'd win in the end if you were lucky. But seeing him like this, so close, so himself, it felt.... It felt like standing on the edge of something deep and loud and crashing, knowing you could step back, knowing you could fall in, and that neither option felt as simple as before. Turning your back was no longer an option you wanted, the escape you always planned when it became real. And now…alone…in his house. You felt a bit naughty about it all.
It felt like that thing—Schrödinger’s cat— the terrible not knowing of it all. When had you been so obvious? Had you been all along? Didn't you want to be? You wondered whether something was waiting on the other side of this moment at all, or whether it would stay suspended like this forever, neither alive nor dead until someone dared to peer inside.
"I'm…" you swallowed dryly, "I'm sorry, If I…"
He lifted his glass towards you, "To peace,"
You lifted your glass instinctively, your tongue suddenly parched, aching for the golden liquid within. Aching to know. You had to see, you had to know.
"And those who get in the way of it." he finished.
You took the smallest sip, only enough to coat your tongue. And you realized you were shaking.
This was a threshold, you realized. The thing before something. How thresholds change, the more you get accustomed to things. Maybe that's what you had been doing, being accustomed to him never giving in, never saying anything, so you pushed and pushed him. Wearing less and less, even as temperatures dropped in this southern town. This was the threshold of it all.
"Tell me something." you whispered.
Hm? he murmured, a brow raising, his pretty hazel eyes soaked in the amber lighting as they looked at you.
"Anything." you said, even quieter. You would not admit to anything until he said so. You only wanted…if he wanted. And you wanted so, so badly.
He drew in a breath that sounded like it hurt. “If I did what I wanted to do,” he said slowly, “I wouldn’t… my whole life would be fucked—”
You held onto your drink with two hands, fingers clammy against the glass.
“—My daughter is the one thing that matters to me.”
“I understand,” you said softly.
“No,” he replied, almost sharp, but then he softened, gentler, like he was trying not to scare you. “I don’t think you do.”
You watched him. Every small movement felt enormous as he set his glass down, the sound of it touching the counter too loud. His hands spread behind him, hanging onto the edge as if looking over a cliff, his eyes on the floor below. Jump, you thought, jump in with me.
“If you and I… we can’t,” he said, exhaling, his head shaking. “This can’t be anythin'. You understand me? You need to stop.”
“We’re not anything, Mr. Miller,” you said, too quickly, trying to keep your voice steady.
“But fuck me, I want—"
He didn’t finish his sentence, letting out another sore breath.
Your heart felt traitorous in your chest, wishing death upon you, to take this moment from you. It stopped, skipping over beats, your head going dizzy as he confessed his sins.
“I want…I’m tired of pretendin' that—that I don’t notice you. That I don’t think about how your ass looks when you walk across the yard in those stupid little shorts, or the way you look at me like you’re waitin' for somethin'. I know I shouldn't…but god damn, you… you make' it hard to be a good man. And if I give into you, I'll never be able to stop.”
You set down your glass.
“Tell me what to do,” you whispered, because you were empty without it, because you needed him to fill the space with something that would let you breathe again.
He shook his head, eyes squeezed shut for a second before he shook his head again. “I—” He swallowed, lifting his drink and holding it against his chest like a shield, stepping away from the edge of that cliff, “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Please."
A long moment stretched between you, the two of you just staring. He was so pretty. His hair had grown out this year, thick and dark, threaded through with gray, streaked with winter and age, and you found yourself wondering how it would feel under your hands. His beard was thicker now too, rougher, fuller.
You hadn't noticed how long you'd been standing there, frozen in time, that paradox of waiting, not knowing. Dead or alive. Nothing or everything. It felt alive now. You felt alive, more seen than you ever had in all the seven hundred days you had lived here, seven hundred days of watching your neighbor, wanting him, imagining slipping into his world on the nights his daughter was away.
"Kneel."
You felt your heart drop into your stomach. "I—what?"
He only nodded, drinking the dregs of his whiskey before setting down the empty glass again.
You moved toward the center of the kitchen and stopped in front of him. The shadows cut him into contrast, gold along his skin, thick beard dark against it, his eyes unreadable as they swallowed the dark room. You were so close you could smell the whiskey, the musk of him, that cologne he wore.
You knelt before him, as if in prayer at your altar.
Joel sighed above you, a long, held breath, like his lungs were finally giving over every last bit of air they had been hoarding. You felt a little silly, a little wicked. A girl come to confess her sins to God. That she had been perverse, tainted with the sin of want, of lust, of need and desire.
His hand, oh god, his hand, it reached out, touching you, only barely. Thick, rough fingertips ghosting along the side of your face, the highest point of your cheekbone, you didn't dare close your eyes, even when he traced along your brow and down the bridge of your nose. His thumb pressed ever so slightly against the bow of your lips, brushing, testing, then opening them only to let your lip bounce back.
And then he was leaning over, two hands on you then, cupping your face, fingers at the nape of your neck, cradling your skull in his two, big, steady hands. Just as rough as you pictured. He so much bigger than you, dwarfing you, it was overwhelming. And he was leaning forward, oh fuck, he was—he was—
He stepped off the cliff and fell into the crashing water below.
You felt his mustache tickling your nose before his lips pressed against yours, and you couldn't help how you'd frozen in place, eyes widening, inhaling him again, so close. You wanted to taste him, to know if his mouth carried the whiskey you could smell on his breath, if his lips held it too, that forbidden sweetness of Eve’s apple, dangerous and delicious.
He pulled away after only a brushing of his lips on yours.
"Kiss me back," he murmured, brows pulled together.
"Tell me it's not just this one time," you whispered, "promise me."
You weren't sure where the words were coming from, hell, this is all you'd wanted for so long, why were you attaching strings? All you'd ever wanted was to crawl to him, give to him, let him have, for him to take you and use your body to his own depraved needs. But now…now… you didn't know if you could go on, knowing this might be the only time.
His eyes were watching you, the eyes of god, one you'd prayed to for seven hundred days. They flicked between yours, trying to read you.
“I don’t think I can stay away from you anymore,” he said quietly, and you felt the breath of every word against your face. His hand tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear while the other still cupped your cheek.
"Then don't," you said, and this time, you leaned in, catching his mouth on yours, suckling gently on his upper lip, the prickling of his beard scratching where your skin brushed his. Yes, you could taste the whiskey now, the sweet warm flesh of his mouth, You let your hands explore, reaching up, threading your fingers into his hair, and he let out a broken groan. His hands gripped your face harder, though he was really so gentle. You tugged at the length of his hair, long enough now to tickle the back of his neck, and he answered with the same urgency, fingers sliding to the nape of your own, pulling just enough to make you gasp and open to him.
Instead of what you had been greedily hoping for, he pulled back, his mouth mirroring yours, parted and breathless, like he was stopping himself at the very last second.
He held his one hand at the back of your neck, scruffing you, as if you'd been naughty and needed to be contained. Your eyes were dizzy as you realized they'd closed in the heat of the moment, opening them to take him in. His other hand released your cheek, to grip your jaw now, opening you up more.
"Lemme see," he murmured, "I've wanted to see, for so long—open your mouth baby,"
You did as you were bid.
He exhaled, a growling reverberation from his chest, still leaning over you. And then, you tasted something salty and thick. He was sticking two fingers into your mouth, flat to your tongue where your muscle reacted, licking him, wanting, so badly, to close your mouth and suck on them, to show you how good you could be. But you knew better.
"What a good girl," he praised, kneeling in front of you now, eye level, and your thighs pushed together at the sound of the words on his lips, "show me your tongue now, yeah, that's it,"
Your tongue stuck out, resting over your bottom lip, and he pressed his fingers there, just enough to make your breath catch, enough to make your eyes burn with it. Then he loosened his grip on your hair, his palm sliding up to your cheek, holding you there as his fingers continued their slow exploration.
He shifted them slightly, pressing into the softness of your cheek, feeling the warmth of your mouth around them, his other hand still bracketing your face, feeling where his fingers probed against the wet wall of your mouth. A sound slipped from him at the sensation.
This was heaven. You wondered if you'd died today, maybe the house had caught on fire or lightning had struck in a freak storm, because this couldn't be real. Maybe you were asleep, and this was all just a dream, and you'd wake up to slick between your legs again. Because Joel Miller was moaning at the feeling of his own fingers in your mouth, phallic and warm and greedy.
"Always wondered what my cock would feel like in this sweet little mouth," he said, his voice so low and breathy it nearly slipped into a growl, "but you ain't really that sweet, are ya, baby? You play at bein' a good girl, Mr. Miller this, and Mr. Miller that, all the while showing me how pretty your tits look in this dress today, scamperin' around my neighborhood wearin' nothin' for any jackass to see."
The last words were said through gritted teeth, his fingers pushing harder against the side of your mouth, and you felt the heat of shame rise to your cheeks, your eyes watering with the stretch of skin. He soothed you, pulling his fingers out, only to lick them himself before crashing back to your lips, tongues and teeth and hunger and shared sounds of ecstasy.
His tongue, oh, his tongue. It was delicious, a thick, insistent muscle that seemed to know exactly what it wanted from you, plunging past your lips to take and take and take, like it was trying to learn the shape of your mouth by heart. He was eating at you, all heat and breath and urgency, and you could barely tell where one sensation ended and another began. Your hands kept finding him, clutching at fabric, at warmth, at something solid enough to keep you here, even as your thoughts slipped loose, floating somewhere just above the room.
"I wanna see you," you gasped as his mouth descended to your jaw, kissing and licking your fevered skin there. Your voice was thin and rushed and all breath: "Please, I wanna see everything."
"Go on then," he murmured as his hand cupped your face as he dipped your head back to open your neck, baring more to himself so he could bruise your skin with his teeth.
You could hardly focus, eyes threatening to roll back or close, but you couldn't, you needed to see him, needed to see it all. You were trembling, fingers clumsy, heart pounding so hard it felt like it might break from your ribs and pour out onto the floor. Finally, finally, you were pushing the fabric from his broad shoulders and letting it descend.
You looked at him then, and he looked at you. And for a moment, everything was reduced to as it was: two people, a small miracle of being seen. His chest heaved in lungfuls of breath, hypnotic in the rise and fall of it. There was thick hair wirey like storm clouds across his chest. A dark line of hair trailed down his stomach, coarser, darker, disappearing where your eyes could not follow, and the sight of it made something in you ache with a sharp, humiliating want.
Your eyes flicked up again to find his. They were a little wild, a little unmoored, black pupils swallowing all that pretty color you liked, his lips kiss bitten and mustache pearled with some of your spit where you'd licked him.
You stared at each other like that for a long, suspended second, caught in the sight of one another, before both of you broke into the same breathless, crooked smile and moved toward each other all at once.
He picked you up easily, his hands locking around the back of your thighs, letting your knees hike over his hips as he carried you up to the counter. Your arms wrapped around his neck as he groaned softly, setting you down and stood between your knees. His mouth, so soft and wet with want, found yours again, licking deep into you like he'd missed it already, suckling at your bottom lip before biting it gently and pulling back just to watch the look on your face. You realized, then, that he kept his eyes open when he kissed you too, wanting to see, wanting to watch, to memorize just like you.
His hands reached for the straps of your dress then, tugging them down with a kind of surged urgency. His mouth followed, open and wet, kissing along your collarbone, your shoulder, anywhere his hands were, his mouth found next. When he finally pulled the bustier down, baring your chest to the cool air and his hot mouth, he set back just to look, to take you in.
"Knew it," he smiled, and looked at you again, his hands wrapped around your waist so he could be close, so close. You felt so warm despite the goosebumps of arousal pebbling your skin, making your nipples tighten.
"Knew you didn't have a damn thing on under this today," he said, voice thicker and rough, as he nuzzled the underside of your breast with his nose. You whimpered, barely able to stay upright with one hand braced behind you on the counter, the other tangled in his hair again. All you wanted to do was touch, to anchor yourself to the here and now. It made you jealous, envious suddenly. That anyone else had been here before, touching him like this, having what was rightfully yours. What you'd dreamed about for seven hundred days.
His lips finally wrapped around your nipple, and you were unable to contain the noise that escaped your throat, a choked whimper, back archinig into him as his hands lay flat against your spine, pulling you in closer. You were completely wrapped around one another, bodies mirrors of one another, yours bowed to him like an offering as he took and took.
He kissed and moaned and licked into the valley of your breasts, then up again, gently suckling and then not so gentle as he bit down, making you gasp. Your body bent to an entirely new angle, hips rolling against the cool porcelain beneath.
And then, you felt his hands leave your spine and push up your dress, and you remembered.
"Wait!" you gasped, pushing his chest back.
He paused, eyes widening, chest red and heaving still. His hands stayed on you as he looked up at you.
"I wanna—let me—please—" you were scrambling now, looking pitifully half dressed as you slid from the counter, closer now, looking up at him, and turning the both of you as your hands laid gently on his bare arms. You turned him so his back was to the counter again, and slid down to your knees once again.
"Oh, baby, you don't gotta—" he said, voice hoarse as honey on grit, but your hands were already unbuckling his belt.
"It's all I've ever wanted," you said, kissing the denim of his fly before unzipping it.
Your eyes found his, and he looked wrecked. Like he was holding himself together by sheer will. There was a line between his brows, a frown on his face.
Oh, fuck, you heard him whisper when you finally pulled his cock free. No briefs.
"You're just like me, Mr. Miller," you smiled up at him as your hand wrapped around his length. Your fingers couldn't even touch.
He didn't laugh or smile, his hands were blanched as he gripped the counter beside him.
“What, Mr. Miller,” you said sweetly, slowly stroking him, the velvet soft skin of the head, the thickly veined shaft, it was absolutely dreamy in your hand, “are you nervous?”
He shook his head, letting out his long breath as your mouth closed around the head of his cock, "Not nervous, baby, just…don't know—fuck, yeah, little more tongue, angel—not sure if I'm gonna last too long with you like this."
His head tipped back as you took him deeper, your lips stretched wide, his size overwhelming. You couldn’t even graze the thick hair at the base, but you fisted the rest of him with your hand where your mouth couldn’t reach, starting to work him in rhythm.
“Watch me, Mr. Miller,” you whispered when you pulled back, slick on your lips as you used both hands now, your mouth suckling just on the tip. His eyes found you, and there it was: he was going insane now, that unglued look, the desperation, the disbelief. Just like you’d imagined it. You, on your knees, ruining him for anyone else.
"You make me so wet, Mr. Miller." you said, emobolded by it all now.
"Joel—" he choked, "please, it's—oh fuckkk,"
"You have no idea how many times I've wanted to do this, Joel," you said, flattening your tongue to the underside of his cock, licking up to give yourself more slick to slide against with your hands. He tasted like a man, musk and sweat and irish spring. You'd swallow poison if it tasted like him.
Confidence bloomed fully now with him in your grip.
"Today, outside, watching you, all I wanted was to blow you there in front of everyone," you purred, lips wrapping around the head of his cock again, letting your teeth graze him before releasing with a wet pop, your hands still working, fondling his balls a little, "I would've let you take off my dress and fuck me in front of everyone, show them who I belong to, make me scream your name so they'd—"
His fist snapped into your hair, wrenching your head back before your mouth could find him again.
“Yeah?” he growled, and then he was lifting you off the ground like you weighed nothing, turning you sharply and bending you over the counter. “Wanted me to fuck you in front of your own family, that it? My little free-use slut so needy she couldn’t wait, huh? That why you had your legs spread while you sat in your chair every time I looked over? That why you were pushing your tits into me while I was talkin’ to fuckin’ Jerry?”
You could barely breath, let alone think as the air felt pushed out of you.
“Yes,” you managed, voice small, dizzy, but your hands were shaking now. The heat of nervousness again, your eyes wet and wide.
And as his thick hands groped your hips, making you whimper, he pushed your dress over your hips—
—and paused.
Everything was suddenly very still. You couldn't look, couldn't force yourself to take in the way his brain must have been cataloging your underthings. Those briefs. What a reckless, humiliating thing to do. To wear them, to steal them. To slide them over your thong like a secret. Your thoughts were collapsing into themselves now, a black void where language failed, and you felt stripped bare in a way you hadn’t prepared for.
This, again, was a threshold. Where the story splits. Every fantasy you'd had about him, every private, humiliating thing you'd done in his name, all of it suddenly feeling like it was standing here between the two of you.
You felt his hands move to the folded over waistband, inspecting the fabric.
"Whose are these?" he finally asked, quiet. He wasn't angry, you could tell. Maybe a little incredulous, a little…but no, you didn't know for sure.
You dropped your head between your arms, forehead resting against your fists braced on the counter, as if you could disappear into the laminate. Your face burned. Your chest ached with the force of your heartbeat, slamming against your ribs like it wanted out. You couldn't answer.
He leaned over you, his hand going to your face. It was gentle, almost reverent as it slid across your jaw, to take your cheek in his palm. But once he had a hold of your face, his grip tightened as he forced you to look at him over your shoulder. He was so close you could see every line of age, his body so warm as it bent over you, itchy where the hair on his chest pushed into your back.
"Are these mine?" he said, his gaze landing on your lips when he asked.
He squeezed your cheeks, forcing your mouth into a pucker, and he jostled you a bit, making you gasp, your knees buckling.
"Tell me." he growled, "was this what you were doin' upstairs today, you little freak?"
Your heart was pounding so hard you could feel it in your throat. You couldn't tell if he was disgusted or fascinated or something worse, something that made your stomach twist with a kind of awful hope.
“Tell me,” he snarled again, closer now, his mouth nearly brushing yours, his breath hot against your skin. His teeth were bared, voice stripped of patience, demanding your answer.
You squeezed your eyes shut, tears welling there, and he reached down to kiss the corner of your eye where the salty drop began to fall. His lips caught it, before kissing your puckered mouth too.
"Ain't gonna be mad," he whispered right there, against your ear, soothing reassurance. He ground himself behind you, and your eyes flew open at how hard he still was. You cursed yourself, if only you hadn't put the briefs on you'd be able to feel him, really feel him, skin to skin, just as you wanted.
"Yes," you choked out, "Yes, I'm sorr—"
But he was kissing you again, relaxing his grip on your face, letting his tongue find yours again, and you kissed him back desperately, furiously, wanting to taste and know.
"Fuck," he whispered between breaths, kissing you more and more, harder and harder, tongues and teeth and a need you'd never felt before from anyone, "you're a sick little thing, twisted in the head, ain't ya?"
"Yes," you said again, prayer, chant, a hymn, "for you, only for you, please, I'm sorry,"
You were pushing back into him, moaning as you felt his cock jump against your dampened core.
“You’re drenched,” he said. His hand came down to cup you through the fabric, thumb dragging upward along your slit. The friction made you whine. “Did you—?”
"Touched myself in them, earlier, before—I couldn't help myself. You make me insane, Joel," you said kissing against his mouth, slopping and insatiable. Your fingers tangled up to his hair to drag him closer, as if he was the confessional, and you were telling him everything your depraved mind needed to get out before you could be whole again, "and—and blowing you, fuck, just kissing you—it just made me want you worse, makes me so wet to think about you, just fucking thinking about you—"
"Christ, woman," he said, shaking his head, palming your center, making you moan until he was too ravenous, wrenching them down your legs, your thong following, only to your thighs, to gain him access. He was groping you so hard, your hips, the flesh of your ass, "if you'd just—if I'd known, I would've—Jesus,"
"Tell me," you said against his gasping lips, your open mouth inhaling every breath he exhaled, and he inhaled yours as his cock notched against your entrance. It slid easily through your folds, the wet schlick of it making him moan as he lightly kissed your open mouth again.
His forehead pressed against yours as he pushed in, and your eyes began to roll back.
“Look at me,” he growled, forehead pressed to yours. “Look at me. Jesus—this what I was missin’? This wet little pussy, fuckin’ soaked for me?” he exhaled, grinding his forehead against you as you kept your hand fisted tighter in his hair as he stretched you open. You moaned again as he pushed in another inch.
You tried, tried so hard to keep your eyes open. Joel, you moaned, already full and trembling.
"If I'd have known you were upstairs touchin' yourself," he chuckled, a kind of manic, breathless smile on his face, "I would've followed you upstairs, made you do it in front of me," he kissed you on the lips before adjusting his stance, changing his angle so he could begin thrusting in and out, making you cry out. Your hand fell from his hair to cling to the corner of the counter, keeping yourself upright.
“If I’d caught you takin' my clothes,” he went on, “I’d have bent you over and spanked your little thief ass red.”
“Yes,” you sobbed. “Yes, please—”
His thrusts picked up into a hard, ruthless pace. Each one pushed you into the counter’s edge, bruises blooming beneath his fingers where he held you too tightly. But you wanted it, wanted the ache, wanted the shape of him imprinted into your skin.
“Little thief,” he spat. “Touchin’ things that don’t belong to you. Rubbin’ this messy little cunt to the thought of me, weren’t you?”
“I'm sorry!” you shrieked, voice shattering as he fucked you harder, the sound of it echoing loud and obscene through the kitchen.
“Only bad girls steal their daddy’s things,” he rasped, voice thick with lust.
You turned your head, wide eyed and lips parted.
"Oh," he purred, "yeah, that's right, all you needed was a daddy to show you what's right and wrong huh?"
Your chin quivered, a sob crawling up your throat. His body folded over yours tighter, his chest to your back, mouth hot at your ear.
“I know,” he said, thrusting deep and slow. “I know. Don’t worry. I’ll teach you how to be my good girl. Oh—right there, huh? She loves that. Look at me, fuck, yeah, she loves that.”
You nodded your head, but your breath felt frantic, your heart climbing up your throat. The breath of him against you, his closeness, it was overwhelming, everything you wanted. Your legs began to shake, your stomach tumbling towards that cliff edge, it would be too quick, too soon, you didn't want it without him.
"Joel—" you cried out as he kept up his unrelenting thrusts.
“Yeah, baby?” he panted.
“Wanna come with you. Please. Please, Joel—”
“Oh, but you were bad today,” he breathed. “Came without my permission. What makes you think you get to come again, huh?”
"I didn't knowwww," you mewled, squeezing your eyes shut. Your stomach was tightening, hips sezing up.
“Okay,” he soothed, voice gentle again, kissing the side of your neck. “Okay, baby. You wanna come on daddy’s cock now, huh? Go on. Let go. Daddy’s right here.”
“Inside,” you begged. “Please, I’m—I'm on—I have an IUD—I just wanna feel you, wanna feel it leaking out of—"
“Shut up, shutupshutup” he hissed, squeezing his eyes closed. “Don’t say shit like that.”
"Pleaseeee," you moaned as his cock began to swell and twitch inside of you.
But his body was giving in. His forehead slammed into your shoulder, his hand coming up over your mouth as your walls clenched tight around him. You were too far gone to care if he was trying to silence you or just survive the sound of your moaning.
"God, you're—you're squeezin' my cock like a god damn vice. Best pussy I've ever had, baby, so good, you're such a good girl, takin' it so good, okay, alright—fuck I'm gonna—"
You shoved back into him just as your orgasm hit. Your vision sparked, your knees gave out, and you screamed into his palm. It tore through you, sharp and staggering, a sob caught in your throat.
Joel's groans drowned out the sound of your cries as he pushed into you one last time, his entire body seizing, hands gripping your flesh until you thought he might rip you in half. His mouth stayed unhinged against your neck, panting hot breath, cursing and praising filthy nothings in your ear.
He stayed inside of you for a long moment, chest slick with sweat against your back. His hand fell from your mouth to wrap around you as he held you tight against him. You felt every rise and fall of his chest, your breath keeping in time with his, breathing in together, breathing out together. The air was thick and quiet with heat and salt and the musk of him and sex clinging to your skin like smoke after a fire. Neither of you moved.
Inhale.
Exhale.
"Where have you been? All this time." he sighed, pushing his forehead against the crest of your shoulder.
Your throat tightened, eyes falling shut as you smiled—remembering how many afternoons you'd watched him from your window, how often you'd worn your prettiest thong on the off chance a random Tuesday might be the day he gave in. Just in case he decided after doing yard work, or after waving politely across the street. Just in case.
You turned your face, the coarse damp strands of his hair ticklish against your lips.
"I've been here, all along," you whispered, kissing his hairline, "waiting for you."
His eyes found yours, sweat glinting at his brow, the lines of age carved deeper as he lifted his gaze. Hazel again—warm in the amber light, searching and soft. He pressed his mouth to yours like promise, holding it there, inhaling, like finally reaching the shoreline after jumping from the cliff before saying:
summary: You weren't denying that what you had done was wrong, that it was the one taboo your kind had. But you chose it anyway. Chose them. And now, you paid the price for it. (Don’t fall for my poetics, this shit horny as hell)
|| smut MDNI 18+, jackson!joel, jackson!tommy, omegaverse, alpha!joel, alpha!tommy, omega!reader, a/b/o dynamics, no threesome, no incest, taking turns, mating, biting, possessiveness, territorial, pinv, knotting, lumberjack!tommy vibes, grinding, doggy style, topping from the bottom, f!recieving oral, fingering, kisssssinggggg, lil bit of dirty talk, praise kink, breeding kink, reader doesn't have much personality as she's in heat and is just pure instinct to get knocked up ||
wc: 11.5k
a/n: thank you to my love @pearlessance for your tommy expertise and looking over his section to make sure I got him right!! ilysm
Joel
There were two bedrooms.
For a lonely cabin in the woods, it wasn’t half bad. It wasn’t Jackson, that cozy community with its electricity and neighborly kindred spirit, but it was something. It was home. The walls smelled of pine sap and old smoke from the wood stove in the corner, and the floors creaked in a way that reminded Joel of winters where sound traveled differently. It always seemed quieter, slower, full of memories of a time before.
They'd been given the resources they'd needed and still traded regularly with the town, only being a couple miles away since people knew they were useful despite what had happened. Hunting, fishing, hauling. Useful was something a man could still be, even after everything else had been stripped away.
Jackson wouldn't have them back, not after the taboo they'd committed. And of course everyone knew right away. Besides the way word traveled at the speed of light in such a small community, it was also a curse of their kind. Others were able to smell that something had changed, it clung to every breath, to the skin, to clothes. It stuck in the fibers of their very being.
Even out here, miles from the gates, Joel could still feel the weight of that knowing on his back, like the eyes of god that never stopped watching.
Claiming one omega between two alphas wasn't only frowned upon…it was downright blasphemous.
But Joel had made his choice, and so had his brother. They were exiled for it and ended up here, in this small cabin in the woods, where one bed lay bare with only a sheet and a quilted blanket, no pillows or fuss until it was time. When you would shape it into what you needed—a little nest, your safest space.
The other bedroom was for sleeping, though Joel hadn't always welcomed the idea of sharing a bed with his brother while you slept between their two warm bodies. But when they'd tried separating in the beginning, giving you choice of which brother's bed you wanted, it had turned ugly fast. Possessive. Two grown men with their hackles high as you'd make your choice of one bedroom or the other.
So this was the way. One bed for sleeping, one for mating. A truce.
He was making the bed now, the one for mating, knowing any day now you might start your heat and be needing a clean, safe place. The linens were fresh from where they'd hung overnight to dry, cold beneath his touch as he tucked the corners, fabric stiff and flat. His palms worked slowly across the seams, your scent living within them even now, even in the quilt he laid across the mattress. It stirred something in his chest, memories, of you face down, ass up, presenting yourself to him. Memories of your sweet, blissed out face as he knotted you again and again. It made his loins tighten, his jaw clench and unclench, a small smile flitting his features as he hung your clothes up in the closet. Sweaters and jeans that smelled even stronger of you as he brushed his knuckles along the fabric once it hung in neat lines.
Your coat was gone with you into the snow, having asked Tommy to take you with him to check traps. You always wanted to help, wanted to prove you were part of the team, eager to carry your own weight out there instead of sitting by the wood stove while the men worked. Joel never asked you to do anything—he wanted you warm, fed and rested, your hands wrapped around a steaming mug instead of rope or freezing in the snow. But you were stubborn and bright and Tommy had said yes, and that was that.
His brother liked to show you things. How to track, how to tell poisonous berries from friendlies, the way animals could be hunted humanely. Tommy's voice always had a little easy hum in it when he talked to you. About anything. Like a wolf pleased with something soft and gentle and open. He still went back to Jackson for trades, the one people greeted and spoke to, the one they hadn't fully turned their backs on.
When Joel went, folks didn't look him in the eye for long. They gave him what was necessary and no more. He came home with medicine, salt, fruit, freshly baked bread. Tommy came home with that plus a little barrette someone thought you'd like, or a knitted beanie one of your old friends wanted you to have. Sometimes you'd even have letters to exchange, Tommy always bringing home answers in stacks of papers from the people you left behind. Joel felt the jealousy in the titch of his jaw sometimes, sharp and animal, the same way a dog might bristle when another was offered something he was not. But he swallowed it down, would rather bite his own tail off than say it out loud.
He wondered if you missed them—your people. When he'd asked, you'd said you wanted to see everyone once spring came, once the roads thawed and travel wasn't so much of a risk. For now, you were content and happy to be with them in a warm cabin. The life you'd chosen with them had felt right to you. Except… Joel knew that you still believed that this might not be forever. That in time, the people of Jackson might look at the three of you and see more than what you had done.
He wasn't sure that would ever happen with him in the picture. But he wouldn't take that hope away from you, the belief in a future you wanted.
And just as he was walking across the threshold of the second bedroom into the hallway, pulling the door closed behind him, the sound of the front door opening carried into the cabin, letting in a breath of cold air that brought your laughter with it. Low and content, it was a sound that often softened Joel's hardest thoughts, his shoulders dropping a fraction at the image of you now in the doorway, smiling. You were grinning at his brother when the two of you stepped inside, your fingers pulling your gloves from your hand finger by finger, Tommy easing your heavy winter coat from your shoulders. He just watched, watched how the snow darkened the floor by your boots, how you pushed your unruly hair back from where it had hidden under your hat.
When you finally looked up and saw Joel, your expression brightened in wattage, something warm and glittering rising beneath a dazed softness, and you moved towards him without hesitation. Lifting onto your toes, you looped your arms around his neck to greet him.
"Hi," you said, smile wide and toothy, voice carrying a kind of breathless glee.
You smelled like the woods, like the frost of cold breath and iron from the traps.
And you smelled like Tommy.
"Hi, baby," Joel replied, wrapping thick arms around your warm body (he'd traded an entire elk for Jackson's thickest jacket for you). He lifted you from the floor and planted a fat, long kiss on your lips, his scent enveloping you now. He’d gotten used to the overlap of scents: yours, so velvety and vanilla and cashmere; Tommy’s, gunpowder and mint from the sprigs he’d crush and chew; and Joel’s, a musk with the tang and warmth of good whiskey.
"How'd it go?" he called over as he set you back down to your feet, hands lingering at your hips, reluctant to let go.
"As good as it could," Tommy answered from the closed doorway while he tugged off his boots with a low groan, his toes flexing in his socks as he shook the cold from his feet. He pulled the rope of animals tied to his bag up for Joel to see, and Joel gave a short nod of acknowledgement before his eyes returned to you. He took in the way your body relaxed into him, thought your brows were lightly pinched, arms now wrapped around your own belly as you laid your head on his chest.
"Let me make ya some tea, baby," Joel offered, cupping your hands in his, bringing them to his mouth, "you're freezin'," he breathed, huffing warm air into the hollow of his hands where he held your little fingers in his. You hummed dreamily, eyes fluttering shut, welcoming the feeling of him so close.
"I've got it," Tommy said as he meandered into the kitchen with renewed purpose, though his voice came out short. He reached for your favorite mug with the little owl stamped on it, filling it from the canteen of safe water.
"It's fine," Joel said, spine tightening then easing again, "Pass it here, I'll warm it up. Can't make tea with cold water, leaves won't steep right."
"I know how to make a cup of tea," Tommy shot back.
Joel clenched his jaw but swallowed his pride, softening his face as he looked at you once again. Your cheeks were blazed with chill, nose frost bitten and lashes damp where snow had melted. Your eyes, though sleepy, moved between the two of them. You always had such a quiet attention on the two of them, aware of their moods and mannerisms more than they were of their own.
"Come lay down with me," Joel offered softly, his hand settling against the small of his back, guiding rather than pulling. His voice soothing itself out for you, "Tommy can finish up."
You followed him to the couch and eased into it with a long, tired breath, letting him draw you between his legs and over him, laying on your side, your head against the solid rise and fall of his chest. Close. Where you belonged. Your fingers curled around the edge of the wool blanket that Joel wrapped around the two of you, settling into one another as you breathed him in, a thicker, warmer musk beginning to lift from your skin as you pressed yourself closer, as if your body was seeking his heat without thought.
Joel held you there, his arms circled around your waist, hands resting against your ribs while your breathing slowed and drifted, the two of you slipping into something that felt like a contact nap, skin and fabric and warmth layered together while the cabin went quiet around you. He felt every small shift you made, every soft sigh that left your mouth, the heaviness in your body that told him you were giving in to rest after your long trek in the wilderness.
He listened as his brother moved through the kitchen, half aware of every movement: the scrape of the iron kettle, the rattling of tin against wood, and the smell of chamomile and cinnamon rising as his brother added the leaves and sprigs to the now steaming water. Joel watched all of it from the corner of his eye, aware of his brother's presence the way an animal remains aware of another.
You reached out when Tommy brought the mug toward you, your fingers loosening from the blanket so you could take it gently from him, your smile soft and hazy. Tommy smiled back at you and leaned down, his face close, his lips brushing your nose in a gesture that might've been sweet if Joel's body hadn't reacted out of instinct: a rumbling growl starting in his chest and thrumming in his throat in warning.
"Stop," you sighed, not startled, only tired, leaning back into Joel as he shifted upright so you wouldn't spill, your back to his chest now, his weight and warmth hopefully soothing to you.
And when your tea was gone and your eyes finally grew too heavy to fight against, Joel gathered you up in his arms and carried you to the sleeping bed. He settled beside you and drew you in close, the two of you tucking into each other the way you always did, limbs threaded together, breath shared, the room dim and quiet around you.
The day closed its weary eyes around you, dark settling gently over the cabin in a blanket of stars, the world shrinking to the sound of a branch that kept sliding along the roof, the wind in the trees, the quiet of winter. By the time Tommy came in and lay down at your other side, Joel only half noticed the long, tired sigh that left his brother's chest, the weight of an arm finding your body in the dark, all of you gathered there in the quiet, unaware of what was kindling beneath.
Tommy
He woke to heat the next morning. It was heavy, syrupy in a way that made his brain claggy, unable to put thought to anything for a long while, as if a furnace had been opened beside him, embers blasting hot air on a winter morning. He blinked his eyes half open, lids stiff with the thickness of sleep. The first thing he registered was your smell, your hair, your skin. That heady sweetness he always associated with you, the familiar vanilla deepening into something richer, thicker, like molasses warming in the sun, his nostrils flaring as he dragged more of it into his lungs.
He buried his nose into your hair and stayed there, breathing you in, only dimly aware that the blanket had been shoved down toward the foot of the bed in the night, your sleep pants thrown off somewhere with it, both tangled together at your feet. You were curled up into him, bum tucked tight against his lap, your body so small in comparison to his massive breadth, like a river of life in a valley of two mountains. You were so god damn warm in the cradle of his lap, skin blazing against his, legs drawn in and your breath still steady and deep and trusting.
Tommy's arm slid further around your waist without thought, only pure instinct. His nose stayed buried in your hair for a long moment, then lower into the warm hollow of your neck where your scent filled his mouth, making it fill with saliva, making him yearn to open his teeth and lick and wrap his jaw around you. It was sweet and dizzying, his cock twitching where it pressed into your little ass, your soft heat nestled back onto him.
You sighed dreamily, pushing back into him, a small, almost helpless movement, your body seeking his warmth even in sleep. The sound you made…it made Tommy's jaw clench, made him sort of purr to soothe you, pressing into the clutch of your perfectly outlined core with his thick member. He fit so perfectly against you, thicker and harder as he dragged up against you slowly, his breath growing heavier, his hands more insistent as they pulled you in. His minds eye was full of memory of the last time he'd taken you like this, laid out for him on the other bed and stuffed you full.
Across you, Joel slept deep, your arms still wrapped around his middle, face tucked into the crook of his armpit, his chest rising and falling beside your cheek. Even so, you pushed back into Tommy, nestled your perfect little warm center into his lap, hips snug against him. Like it had been made to fit him, the line of his cock through his briefs fit between your soft and puffy crux while your heat closed in on you. You weren't quite ready yet, though it was blooming, softening you, ripening.
He reached to splay a wide hand over your belly, pressing down on your womb, making you whimper as he brought you closer. You garbled something viscous in your dream state, perching your ass even higher, so he could feel it blaze against him, clit pulsing like a heartbeat for him. He could feel how slick you were through your panties, rubbing against the hardness of him until he was really aching, heat meeting heat, your scent turning richer and heavier in the space between breaths.
He understood now, all of it settling into his mind with a certainty he'd come to recognize.
Why you had wanted so badly to join him yesterday, why you'd let him push you up against the trees between checking traps. He'd kissed you so soft and sweet, though you'd been the one to hike your legs around his hips and grind against him, moaning for the world to hear. It had been your little omega whines that had him grabbing a fistful of your coat, turning you around and pushing into the layers that covered your ass, much like he was now. He'd heeded every lupine instinct, to calm you into submission, with his thickening cock between your ass. He told you to not be so greedy, that he'd fuck you proper if you could stay awake long enough that night, but not out in the wilderness where infected could hear your crying. You'd pouted, but obeyed like a good little thing.
Tommy knew what would happen—that by the time you got back, you'd be sleepy and dazed, though he hadn't realized this had been why. A heat beginning to bloom. No wonder he was so close to taking you then and there in the snow. No wonder you were so god damn happy to see Joel, no wonder the men had been at each other's throats over a cup of fucking tea. And yet, even though he knew it would happen, the beast inside of him had wanted to rip his own brother's throat out for taking you, comforting you, kissing you like that. A curse of his kind.
The past twenty four hours had been drawing them towards this… like always.
Every few months it caught them off guard all the same, always creeping in slow and almost patient. Until it wasn't. Until it demanded the three of you heed an instinct as old as time. It was like a hunter circling its prey through tall grass, unseen until it was already upon you, warping the mind, bodies running on smell and heat and need more than logic. Tension would always coil between the three of you, tight and unavoidable and jaw snapping. It always was stupid things too, small things that made them possessive in nature, over their right to claim your sweet ripe cunt when it was ready.
It was how they had lost Jackson, too.
Tommy had already been there when you arrived with your family, skin and bone and unmated, still learning how to belong to a place that was so civilized at the end of the world. He had helped you acclimate, maybe drawn to you in ways he hadn’t yet understood, something quiet and patient in the way he watched you take to the town. You befriended him easily, trusted him slowly. You always said it was because he looked you in the eye when he spoke, because he kept his promises, because he was a good man in a world that had almost forgotten what that meant. He never asked you to trust him outright. He built it with you through that first winter, and then into the bright, trembling promise of spring. It wasn’t lightning or fire. It was brick by brick, laid steady and true.
And when your first heat struck, you came to him and let him take you, as natural as anything, as if the world had always meant for it to happen that way. You had been so soft for him, so open, so perfectly attuned to the bond that settled between you afterward.
And then Joel came back.
He walked into Jackson with Ellie at his side, wearier than he had been the time before, as if the road had carved deeper into him. The air around him felt different. He was unmated too, and he met the onslaught of attention of other omegas with a sourness that kept most of them at arm’s length. But Tommy saw the way you reacted to him, and the way Joel took to you in return. It was as if you had been the only one able to draw the sword from that stone-bound heart, different in the way Ellie had chipped away at it.
And you looked at Joel with a softness Tommy had never seen Joel receive from any woman, from any omega. It confused you, it confused the brothers. But you never hid it, not once did you pretend or lie or cover it up. You would ask Tommy if Joel might join for dinner, if he’d come along on patrol even when he didn’t have to, if he needed anything, if Ellie needed a hand with the garage. You just wanted him near.
Tommy had never been blind to it, he had never been the kind of man to turn his cheek to the way you and his brother looked at one another. It wasn't hungry or wandering, not disloyal. It reminded him of those early days with you, when you'd first learned how to trust and didn't yet know the feeling of being a mate.
Joel fought it longer than either of you.
He stayed closed off, denied your requests of spending so much time with him, as if he knew it was wrong, what a sin it was to be so close to another man's omega. Tommy knew that look on his brother all too well, from the years of surviving together, of the ruptures and sutures between them. The way they'd chosen different roads to meet again, losing each other, coming back to each other. He wouldn't lose his brother again, not to something as good as this. It was hard for all of you to go against your ingrained pack dynamics, that a mated omega could and should ever be interested in another alpha. But you kept reaching for Joel anyway, and Tommy watched silently as his brother started to give in, inch by inch, a man who didn't quite understand the ground he was standing on. His brother was scared, he'd come to realize. Maybe afraid of the sin he would be committing by giving into you, maybe afraid of what Tommy would do or think of him. Joel never cared about anything else. Family always came first, brother loyal to brother, a blood bond nothing could change.
And then your next heat came.
It was the moment everything tipped into truth. You'd cried and cried and cried, wailing that you didn't want to hurt Tommy, that you wanted to be with him, but something was changing in you, like your heart was branching off to make room for Joel in this , that you'd needed both. You refused to be split apart, as if being asked to cut off your own limb.
And Tommy…Tommy somehow heard you. Yes, there was the natural jealousy, of wondering what his brother had that he didn't. He felt the wolf in his lungs snarling at the idea of sharing his mate. But there was something else, beneath it all. A pack, a brother, a history. He thought of all the ways he'd lost Joel before, how long it had taken to mend what had been broken. And you were here, bringing them together in an entirely new way, remaking them in flesh and bone and heart.
Nothing had been lost or stolen, it had only grown and changed shape. And so, giving into it all on one cloudless night, Joel had taken that heat, knotted you, bit into your neck and took you. And you'd cried, but not tears of grief but of relief, of something deep and new finally being allowed to exist.
Tommy came to you the next night, his claim alive and steady and unwavering, and the three of you wove together in a way that could no longer be undone. It did not fracture or break any of you, neither brother ripped into one another's throats, but instead, a pack was created. One that should not exist and yet…did. Bound by something that wouldn't be taken or shred.
But Jackson was not as understanding.
The wind carried the smell of the three of you through the streets, layered thick with thrice the scent from that little house now shared by you, a bond braided between two alphas and one omega, saturated and unmistakable. To the town it was wrong, blasphemous, the scent of it making other alphas restless and sharpened with territory, omegas nervous and withdrawn and betas uneasy and alarmed. There was pacing and low snarling whenever any one of you drew too near, as if the very order of things had cracked and some ancient law had been broken in the marrow of the pack.
Arguments began to flare more often, fists flying and shoulders colliding, alphas clashing with teeth bared and voices raised too close to violence. Patrol schedules had to be changed when tempers snapped at the gates from nothing more than the trace of your scent drifting through, men who had worked side by side for years suddenly standing at each other’s throats. People threatened Joel and Tommy openly, first with warning growls and then with rough hands, cornering and spitting and hurling insults, while unmated alphas started circling you in uneasy orbit, unwilling to touch yet unable to understand how an omega could have more than one mate. Bonds everywhere felt more fragile than they ever had, a social structure that had endured for years now straining beneath the proof of you — because if big bad Joel Miller could claim you while you were already claimed by another, then what was stopping anyone else, and why shouldn’t other alphas do the same?
So the three of you left. Or maybe the town made the choice for you, it didn’t matter in the end. Jackson no longer wanted you, and Tommy couldn’t bear to watch the place he helped build turn cruel around you. Joel grew overprotective and violent to anyone who came close, and was happy to get away, to be alone with you and his brother, though Tommy knew better. He knew he missed Ellie. She came to visit when she could, Dina at her side, the two of them carrying their own kind of forbidden bond—alpha with alpha.
You flipped in your sleep suddenly, jostling Tommy from his memories. He thought he might've fallen back asleep, because Joel was out of bed, though he could hear his bare feet padding around the house turning then to a soled scuffles of boots. The house stunk to high hell now, too many scents mixing together in the wake of your beginning heat. Tommy buried his nose into your hair once more to inhale more of your sweet scent. The gland at his neck pulsed, his cock throbbed. He slid his hand down your back and over your ass where you'd flipped around in his arms, and hiked your leg over his hip. He let you grind on him the way he knew you liked.
"Mornin'," he murmured in your ear.
You hummed, chin tilting to lick at the salt of his beard, where his skin was leathery and thick from years of sunlight. You mouthed openly past his ear, finding that succulent little spongy patch of pheromones, and began to lick at it in earnest. Tommy rumbled a deep, pleasured growl in his chest, pulling you even closer, shunting his cock up against your weeping covered cunt, letting you have your way, if only for a little bit.
"What a good little omega," he purred, "but you know we can't do this here, don't you, baby?"
"Don't care," you garbled, moaning again as you dragged your perfect cunt against the thick outline of his cock. If he wasn’t careful, he’d lose control too fast like this, his body ready to tip into rut before you were anywhere near prepared, especially with Joel still in the house.
And as if summoned by the thought, Joel appeared in the doorway, backpack slung over one shoulder, rifle resting against the other, his revolver tucked into its holster at his side.
“I’ll be back,” he said, jaw set tight.
Tommy’s eyes were half-lidded, lost in the way you kept grinding against him, hardly able to make his brain work outside of the thought of your ripeness, “M’kay,” he muttered.
“There’s stew in the kitchen for 'er,” Joel said, gaze lingering on you. “She ought to eat, then she should go nest.”
Tommy glared up at his brother, "Don't you got somewhere to be, Joel?"
Your lips unlatched from Tommy’s neck, your hips pausing. You lifted your head, feverish and dazed, eyes glassy as they blinked open.
“Joel?”
"Yeah, baby?" he said from the door. Tommy's lip was curling, baring his teeth.
“You’re leaving?” you asked meekly, turning your head toward him.
“Yeah, hun." he said, his arms crossed, "I’m gonna check if that deer herd came back by the ridge, let you settle in with Tommy before I come back, alright?”
“Don’t go" you whined, "… not before—you promised you’d always—” You began to fuss in Tommy’s arms, voice shaking, and both brothers looked at one another. Tommy felt his temper spark, while Joel’s eyes warmed with a small, knowing smile.
“I didn’t forget, baby. You just seemed a little preoccupied,” he chuckled, leaning against the frame.
You shook your head, arm slipping from Tommy’s neck as you reached a hand toward Joel.
This was always the worst part, the hardest part—watching you want both.
Joel hesitated, watching his brother for half a moment, and then moved through the room. He carefully approached the bed, a fist dipping to hold his weight against the mattress, almost forcing your body to turn with it, as he bent down and kissed you goodbye.
What was supposed to be a short little peck, however, grew longer and longer, your hand now gripping at the back of Joel's head as you moaned into him. Tommy saw how your tongue dipped out to trace the seal of Joel's mouth, which he opened for you, unable to contain himself.
Tommy let out a thick, blood curdling snarl as your pussy pulsed against his cock.
Joel finally broke the kiss, a thin strand of spit still connecting your mouths. He pressed one last, heavy peck to your parted lips and grumbled, “Bye, sweetheart. Be good.”
You sighed contentedly, letting him go with one little scratch to his ear, and closed your eyes as he pulled away.
Even as Tommy listened for his brother's receding footsteps, waited for the front door to open and close, for the house to settle into quiet once more, his nose was invaded by his brother's scent. You settled back into his arms with another simpering sigh, pressing your warm body up into him.
But Tommy's temper was already short, reacting to another being so close to what was his, his brain losing its wiring for logic already.
The muscles in his jaw were tight as something low and mean rose from deep in his chest. He was never angry at you, but instinct made him ugly telling him to bare his teeth, to reclaim, to crowd every inch of Joel's scent from the room.
You whimpered softly, your glazed eyes watching the shift in him, your body going tight, a faint, small keening slipping from your throat.
You tipped your head back without hesitation, craning, baring yourself to him. Your pulse fluttering beneath your skin with compulsion, submission offered, acceptance sought. You didn’t say a word, you only yielded, soft and obedient in his lap, as if you knew exactly what part of him you were soothing.
For a long moment he hovered there, breathing hard through his nose, fighting against the urge to snap, teeth lowering to your neck to only press there to your gland, not biting or licking, though he was bullish with his breath against you. You opened your legs around him, letting him grind harder into you, and he took that as enough.
He began to give in, not to the jealousy and protective nature, but the instinct him to soothe his omega. He closed his mouth and it found your chin, your jaw, then down to your neck, a firm press just shy of a bite. You gasped and shuddered in his arms, fingers curling into his shirt, your breasts, soft with hardening nipples pressed up into him. He softened as you softened, now fully kissing along your neck, licking and inhaling you until your scent melded with his.
"Okay, okay," he murmured, quieter now, his heads spreading over your back, your rump, pulling you closer, guiding you, "You're alright, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I've got you."
You keened, body going soft and pliant again, a sweet little mewling for him to take and take, but logic was still a part of him, his rut not fully in charge of his brain yet. He would be a good alpha, he would take care of his own before himself now that his brain was back in his control.
"Let's get you fed first, baby," he said, tutting when you began to whine and squirm again, "you need food in you, and we'll get your room set up, you like your nest, don't you?"
His thumb brushed your cheek as he looked at you fully, mouth pressing softly against yours, both of you humming into the warmth.
"Yes, alpha," you said softly, your voice not entirely your own, but still you. You were still there, also not entirely taken by heat.
"Come on then," he said, sitting you up, "heard there's stew."
By the time you’d been fed and watered, Tommy had taken himself outside to busy his hands with the woodpile while you made your nest. The air was colder out there, crisp, easier to count his breaths, each cold lungful after the next, shocking the heat from his system. He told himself that was why he stayed a while, splitting log after log until his shoulders ached.
And yet, he could hear you through the cabin walls, attuned to every move you made.
There was a bit of shuffling, a drag of blankets and movement, thumping of a mattress as you rearranged and tucked and burrowed, no doubt rubbing your smell all over that second bedroom. Every now and then you'd made a soft keening of pain that hit him so hard he nearly drove the axe clean through the stump instead of the log perched on it. His hands tightened around the handle, knuckles white as the snow beneath him, his world narrowing to that sound alone. And after finishing the pile of wood, he stood silent for a minute, waiting, ears straining to hear your next movement. But you'd gone so quiet, so still, there was nothing.
And then there was a hand on his arm.
He jolted at the touch, nearly jumping out of his skin, his ears trained on the cabin behind him, not realizing your footsteps in the snow had crept up silently as a mouse. You were already beside him, already shivering, and he turned to see your face, fevered, glassy-eyed, your cheeks aflame and your hair a mess from all your rubbing and rutting into the pillows.
“Honey, what in the hell are ya—” he started, already reaching for you, hands finding your arms, trying to pull you close. Your whole body was trembling, your skin like burning ice. You looked miserable.
“You’re taking too long,” you whined, fists clenched under your chin, spine bent against the cold, burning and trembling all at one, body blazing under frozen skin. “I’m hurtin’, Tommy. Please.”
He nodded, okay, okay, he was whispering, pulling you in as he unzipped his coat and wrapped you in it, hoisting your legs around his hips like instinct, like he didn’t even need to think. Your arms clung to him, your face buried in the sherpa of his collar, bare toes pressed against his back under the coat. You rubbed up against his belly, slick already soaking through to his shirt.
"You stink," you murmured, petting his gland behind his ear with the one at your wrist. His eyesight blurred, brain scrambling—he needed you in your bed now before he took you right here in the god damn snow. The softness of your skin, the sweet heady scent you invaded him with, it was giving him a full body ache, setting his cock into overdrive, the knot at the base pulsing with need. His gut was churning for it, his mind monopolized by it.
He pushed the door open with his shoulder and stepped into the heat of the cabin, barely noticing the fire, barely noticing the ache in his arms, every sense tuned to the way your slick had started trailing lower, soaking into the waistband of his jeans, sliding against his skin like a brand.
In the bedroom, your nest had been made up of belongings—his old sweater tucked near the pillows, the one you’d stolen to sleep in before, still faint with his scent. Joel’s shirt was there too, and all three pillows from the bed stacked just so. It looked cozy. It looked like you. Like how your mind must’ve worked in that heat-fog, reaching for comfort, for home, for him.
"Aw, this looks real sweet, honey,” he said as he laid you down gently, easing you into the middle, your back against the pillows, your hair splayed wild, "how are ya feelin', hm?"
"Itchy," you said, crossing your arms around your chest, clutching opposite shoulders, your knees knocked together and rubbing for friction, "warm—s'like…" you were dreamier, a little delirious maybe, eyes searching the ceiling as if searching the sky, "it's like summer inside my belly—it's an ember, like I've swallowed the sun and I'm burning and glowing and ohhh, Tommy,” you whined, hands moving to clutch your womb, "I need you, please please please,"
He was already on top of you, your murmured pleading silenced by his lips on yours, both of you moaning. You opened your legs for him without hesitation: submissive, baring yourself, belly up, giving and wanting so badly for him to take you.
"You make me fuckin' crazy," he rasped, brain gone claggy with this vision of you, "pretty little thing with a sweet little pussy, hm? Gonna let me knot you, honey?"
You were nodding before he even finished, making him chuckle as you clutched at him with little kitten paws, beginning to cry out as he palmed at your covered mound.
“Oh, yeah,” he sighed, leaning down to look, dragging his hand gently between your thighs. You hadn’t put your pants back on. Just those soaked-through panties clinging to your cunt like a second skin. “Yeah, she’s almost ready, baby. Can feel it.”
"Ready now," you whined, petulant as ever, kicking your feet uselessly.
He tutted back, "not quite, let me take a look," he said gently.
You nodded, stuffing your fist into your mouth to keep from crying out as he peeled the last of your layers away, stripping you bare, revealing the heat you’d been hiding. Your legs fell open wider than before, pliant and wet, your body desperate to be touched.
Tommy hummed, low in his chest, something like pleasure or gratitude or hunger. He stripped himself quickly all while keeping his eyes on you. His coat, his undershirt, his jeans. His gaze never left you. Your cunt was flushed and puffy, practically begging, not quite swollen to peak, but near enough to drive him out of his mind. He didn’t even try to slow himself down, dropping between your thighs once he was bare, hooking his hands beneath to yank you closer and licked a slow, greedy stripe through the slick you’d made, catching the taste of you on his tongue like it was the only thing he’d ever need again.
Your moans reached him as if from underwater— warped, distant, warbled with need— and when he glanced up, your head had tipped back, your mouth open, your hands fisting the blankets as you rocked against his mouth. But all he could think about was the way your body was preparing for him, giving him everything he’d need to take you, to knot you, to keep you.
He was obsessed.
He devoured you like you were his last chance at breath, licking and sucking and slurping up every ounce of nectar you made. He buried his mouth deeper, until you were thrashing above him, gasping for more, your voice cracking as you begged him again and again—more, more, Tommy, please, not enough, it’s not enough—
He quieted you with two fingers shoved deep inside, fucking them into you hard and steady, scissoring them open to stretch you, curling until he found that spot, the one that made you seize and cry out like you’d been touched by flame. He watched your body clench and pulse around him as he hooked them tighter, yanking your climax that belonged to him.
He had you turned over in an instant, flattened against the bed, belly to the blanket and cheek buried into the pillows you'd so sweetly made your nest in. His weight pressed over you, his teeth to the back of your neck. There was no part of him left that could be called human, his rut taking over his body, flooding his veins with the need to breed his sweet little omega, your scent invading his head. You cried out, but pushed your little cunt against his heavy cock, spreading your slick against it as he pulled his remaining layers away, bare to you as you were bare to him. Mirrors of greed, of this animal instinct rooted so deep in each other's bones that all logic and civilized manner had gone from the room.
He inhaled your molasses-sweet scent as he pushed your knees wider with his own, pulling your ass up to present to him, and pressed his cock into you without preamble. He began to rumble, a soft little noise to soothe your cries until they turned only to sweet sighs of pleasure, seating himself deep to the knot. The head of his cock was pressed to your cervix, as if your womb suckled him in, pulled him all the way home.
"You can take it, baby, it's alright," he rumbled into your neck, kissing your jaw, "tell me how that is, tell your alpha how you're feelin', sugar,"
You couldn’t form the words. Just a breathless cry, a moan that broke open into a sob, your mouth slack with pleasure, lips parted and wet. Spit started to pool at the corner of your mouth, a glossy trail running down your cheek, and he was there immediately, licking into it, tasting you. Your tongue met his, a kiss sloppy and slow and open.
He began to move, thrusting deep inside, grinding harder, pushing forward into your soft, velvet channel with a need so sharp it bordered on pain as his knot began to thicken. The squelch of your pussy taking him was obscene, feeding his rut-drunk head as it swelled with a hunger that had him baring his teeth at you, biting at your shoulder, almost ready to bite your gland.
"Gonna fill you up," he said, tongue thick and panting, "Gonna breed you real good, baby, give it to me, open up, honey, sweet pretty omega,"
His praise did exactly as he intended. You pushed your ass back into him, presenting, yielding, your cunt softening fully around him as his knot swelled to meet you, his cock held tight, gripped like a clutch with you at its center, sealing the two of you together as he sank his teeth into your neck and broke through, pheromones flooding his mouth at the same time his cock spilled into you, filling you with his come.
He was shaking with how good it was, how you tasted, how delirious the bond and the heat and the release made him. His brain went white and quiet with it, the raw thrill of doing what his body had been made to do, of filling his omega, of giving and taking in the same breath. You moaned as you locked together, your body accepting the seal, and when sensation slowly began to thread its way back into him, he reached under you and pressed his fingers to your clit.
“Come on my knot, sweet thing… come on, there you go… come on alpha’s knot, it’ll be so, so good,” he murmured into your neck, voice shaking with pleasure as he coaxed you through it.
It didn’t take long, what with both of you caught in that same bliss‑heavy state, your cunt tightening and fluttering around him as you came, your body pulsing against his knot while his vision swam and his breath stuttered in your hair, the world narrowing to nothing but the lock of the two of you together.
You
Once, when you were only a few years old, your mother had offered you a spoonful of honey to take with your medicine. You’d been wretchedly sick, unable to stomach a single thing, but somehow the honey stayed down. Thick and golden and too sweet, but you let it slide across your tongue and pretended it made you feel better. Your mother always chastised your sweet tooth. Said you'd never survive the world the way it was now if you kept turning your nose at anything that didn’t taste like sugar. Said you'd starve before you learned to be grateful.
You thought of honey now, feeling like you were made of the golden syrup: slow to move, heavy and warm, your thoughts thick and barely dripping. You thought, maybe when you could walk again, when your brain came back to you, you’d write a letter and ask for goat’s cheese. Goat’s cheese and honey. Oh, that would be something.
You could feel Tommy, the press of his chest to your back, the lock of his knot still thick inside you. He was so warm, the weight of his praise like sugar on the tongue, so soft and endless in your ear, calling you good girl, sweet thing, pretty omega, his. His voice soaked through your skin like syrup, made you pliant, quiet, sunk. You didn’t move, you didn't want to. The biological need to just stay, so open and wet, to let your alpha hold you and knot you for as long as he needed had saturated your mind.
You weren't sure how long it had been—you, spread out, rump up for Tommy, your body was so warm and your mind so quiet, blissful. Tommy's voice had started to fade, or maybe he'd stopped speaking, you weren't entirely sure. His words still floated in your head, and you could feel his lips against your neck, suckling, licking, soothing.
But there was a shift beginning.
Tommy was grinding up into the seal of the two of you, harder now, pushing up against a place already full and locked. His weight shifted forward into you, forcing your back to bend further, a roll of his hips like he was trying to push his cock further into you. The knot tightened and clenched against your slicked entrance in a way that made your breath hitch, your face pinch.
He was growling now. Face still close to your neck, and you whimpered, your brain coming back to you, worried you'd upset your alpha somehow. Had you done something in your haze to make him like this? You were trying so hard to be good, to stay melted and open, but the friction of his knot began to hurt a little, enough to bring you to your senses, opening your eyes.
And then you saw why Tommy was acting so.
Joel was in the doorway.
Joel
The hunt had steadied him for a while, the crack of frost beneath his thick soled boots and the clean bite of winter air along with the rhythm of breath, inhaling cold air to scrape the sweetness of his throat from that morning. It had taken everything in him to not bite his own brother's head off, to keep his mind straight when he bent to kiss you. To not kill his own kin when he'd been growled at.
He brought the deer he'd caught hanging in the cold outside the cabin now, where Tommy would take over the rest of the work, cleaning it by the brook nearby that was still running in the dead of winter. It was a system they built for themselves so no one bled into the other's time with you.
He thought it would be soon enough.
But the moment the cabin came into view over the ridge, the smell of you invaded him. It rose up, wrapped its syrupy weight around him, cloying and sweet. And though it was clouded by another alpha’s claiming scent, he could still smell your velvet richness underneath. By the time he crossed the threshold into inside, it was laying on the back of his tongue, making him pant and drool for it. For you. The parts he'd leashed into obedience were thrashing around his ribcage now, his vision narrowing, rough air dragging into his lungs as he heaved in your scent.
He braced himself against the doorway and tried to breathe like a thinking man.
The house was so warm and alive with you, the smell coming from the bedroom door was not something a man could outrun.
He could see the curve of the bed as he opened the bedroom door, the second bedroom, the one meant for fucking and knotting and taking and then he made out the vision of your nest. A tangled spill of blankets, clothes, linen smothered in your scent. You were there at the center of it, body scorching and glistening with sweat and slick. And your eyes…heavy, gaze unfocused and dazed, your breath hitching as he came nearer.
Tommy was laid over you, shoulders wound tight as his eyes found his brother in the doorway. Joel recognized the aggression of a rut, the way he was being threatened with bare teeth and a low growl from the bed. He felt the same thing rise in him like a tide.
But he swallowed against it, hard, though it didn’t go anywhere. It just settled deeper, coiling low inside him, hot and insistent, begging him to step forward, to close the distance, to drag you out of that sound and into his arms, to do something, anything, that would stop that fragile tremor in your voice as you whimpered against Tommy's rough grinding.
Joel's rut hadn't taken him fully yet. But it was there, glinting like a knife edge in the dark, waiting for one wrong breath to tip him over. As he watched your brow pinch as Tommy's weight shifted and the way your fingers curled against the sheets, Joel thought he might break his own brother's neck in half.
"Get out," Tommy snarled, nothing like his usual voice, this one was thick and mean and teeth-baring as he pushed his hips harder against you, making you wince, “Don’t want her smellin’ like you.”
Joel couldn't help the way his lip pulled over his teeth, but he did his best to tame it, only looking at you, your sweet face turning from bliss to grimace, "You okay, sweetheart?" he asked.
You whimpered, and he thought it could've been in the shape of his name.
Tommy's lips went to your ear, shushing you, cooing at you. Everythin's alright, darlin', Tommy's here, your alpha is here, baby.
Joel’s jaw clenched. The room felt too small, the air too thick, heat clawing up his spine. He rubbed the back of his neck like he could work the fever out of his bones, trying to hold on to the last of his reason. "When you're done, get her in the bath, right?" he couldn't bear to look any longer, watching his brother felt like knives to his own chest, "gonna go heat the water,"
Tommy didn’t answer, but Joel knew he’d heard. He stepped out of the room, crossed the main space, and made himself busy.
Before it would be a bloodbath.
It wasn’t long before Joel heard the murmur of voices again — yours light and sweet, brightening at the edges, while Tommy’s came out low and strained, the sound of a man trying to bring himself back down to earth. A few breaths later you appeared in the bathroom doorway, warm and cheeks aflame, Tommy at your back with his hands resting firm at your hips. Joel’s eyes went there first, fixed on the place where his brother held you, and he knew why it caught him, even if he didn’t want to say it to himself.
“I’m gonna go dress the buck,” Tommy muttered, his voice rough around the words. He bent to press his mouth to your neck, lingering there longer than necessary before letting you go.
You turned into Tommy then, looping your arms around his shoulders, kissing him full and soft, as if you didn’t know what that did to the room. Joel had to look away. His brain felt loose and molten, control stretched thin inside him, and another second of watching might have snapped the rubber band of his mind.
“Love you. I'll be back, alright? Go on, now.” Tommy said against your lips, his hand patting your hip one last time before he looked past you at Joel, offering a steady, warning look.
“I’ve got her,” Joel answered, a low sound in his throat as he stood and took you into his arms. You smiled as you were passed from warm hands to warm hands, letting Joel guide you toward the bath.
“You stink too,” you murmured as you folded into his chest once the door had closed and Tommy's footsteps receded. Joel had stripped down to thin cotton boxers before you'd come in, and he knew you'd be like this—pressing your face into the thick hair across his chest. He welcomed it, holding the back of your head as you smothered yourself in his scent.
"You do too," Joel teased, smelling your hair. He could smell the pheromones, the thickness of gun smoke still smothering your velvet vanilla scent.
“No,” you said, almost sulking, “I smell… I smell so good.” You hummed against him as you began to kiss his chest, open mouthed, your arms wrapped around the solid line of his body. “And now I’m gonna smell even better.”
Joel walked you to the bath, a quiet chuckle in his chest as he pulled you away so he could bring his hand to rest over your belly, feeling it protruding a bit, “All full, hm?”
You nodded with a soft, content sound.
“Gonna need to fix that,” he said, voice going low as his tongue felt thick in his mouth. “Get in. Let me clean you.”
You let him ease you into the tub, hissing at the heat before settling down into the water while Joel moved behind you, pulling your hair back and working it into a neat plait that lay down your back. The two of you stayed there in the quiet, your body loosening as the warmth sank in.
Joel knelt at the side of the tub with a bar of soap in his palm and began to wash you, slow and careful. Your arms, the spaces between your fingers, over your breasts and your belly, washing you of his brother's scent. And then between your legs.
You hummed again and let them fall open as his hand abandoned the bar of soap. He pressed his fingers gently around your swollen folds, slick and come already like honey in the sudsy water.
"Oh, this just won't do, sweetheart," he chided.
You opened your eyes, furrowing your brow at him.
“Look at this mess he left in you,” he said, shaking his head while he pushed two fingers inside. He gloried in the way your mouth parted on a gasp, watching the way your face fell and how well you took his thick fingers as he worked them inside you, scooping the spend from your wet heat in slow, measured motions.
His lips pulled back to show his teeth, hungry, he was fucking starved, his gaze fixed on you while your hands wrapped around his bicep and he pressed further into the tight hold of your body, relentless in his need to have you clean and marked by him and only him.
"That's it," he cooed, kissing your open mouth, licking inside, finally, finally tasting you. You crooned, whimpering as his thumb found your clit, a pearl that had swelled with his touch, "you've been a good girl, haven't you? Gonna be a good little baby for me too?"
You nodded, whining, so desperate for him you'd hitched your knees over the sides of the tub, the water sloshing around as you rocked your hips with his fingers. He scooped out the last of his brother's spend he could reach inside of you, and began fucking you with his fingers in earnest, "How's that, baby?"
"Moreeee!" you cried, nubby nails digging into his skin.
"Greedy," he tsk'd.
You stuck your bottom lip out, "Please."
Joel smiled, something that often felt so foreign in his cheeks, but with you— with you, out here, in the middle of nowhere, and his rut finally burning his mind into thick molten lava at the sound of you begging for him so god damn adorably—it was easy.
He kissed you again, harder, growling low against your cries, blood thick with heat, instincts guiding his every move. His mind was gone. His rut had taken over completely. He stuffed a third finger inside, and you wailed his name.
“Alpha — oh Joel — Joel, Joel, Joel—”
A symphony orchestrated for him alone.
You gushed around his fingers, head thrown back on the lip of the tub as he kissed your jaw, nipped at your chin. And as you trembled through the aftershocks, he withdrew his hand from your slick cunt and hauled you from the water, hands under your arms, lifting you to the floor with a towel that barely made it between you. He pawed at you more than dried you, his hands everywhere. You yelped when he pinched your ass, pushing weakly at his chest and out of his hold.
Something sparked in his chest.
Your smile slowly grew, knowing, mischievous.
"Don't even think about it." Joel growled.
You turned and ran.
Joel’s brain snapped into predator-mode instantly. He knew you loved this part, that was the only reason he let you get as far as you did. You bolted through the door, breath quick and high, weaving around the furniture in the living room. At one point, Joel shoved a chair clean across the room, making you freeze with a startled gasp in the corner.
Naked little thing, chest rising and falling, your back pressed to the wall. Your nipples were peaked, hard and eager, adrenaline only fueling your heat, thrusting Joel into his rut. He thought he might lose what little mind he had left, the shadow of himself completely gone at the sight of you like this: cornered, panting, glistening, wanting.
“Don’t be scared now, little omega. This is what you wanted, wasn’t it?”
You shook your head, eyes widening.
He tilted his head at you like a predator watching a rabbit twitch.
"Yes," you admitted, quiet as a mouse, "yes alpha, I did."
"Tell me why."
You were silent, scared, but he knew better.
“Say it,” he breathed. “Tell me who you belong to.”
"You, alpha, I like when you chase me." you whispered as he came closer and closer. He approached slowly, an animal closing in on prey, and then lunged. His arms slammed to either side of you, caging you against the wall, making you cry out.
“S’okay,” he murmured, inhaling deep, catching the clean scent of your freshly bathed body beneath the reawakening haze of your heat. “Don’t be scared now. I’ve got you. Look at me.” He nuzzled into you, nose finding your jaw, your ear, the little pieces of hair that began to fall from your braid.
You turned your sweet little face toward him, eyes glossy and relieved. He kissed down your neck, across your chest, licking and mouthing at your breasts, giving each nipple attention before continuing lower. His tongue dipped into your navel. His hands were rough on your thighs, groping, massaging, stroking your skin like it soothed his own.
"Oh," he breathed, inhaling you at your core. He laid his nose over your mound as he knelt in front of you, taking his fill of ambrosia.
You smelled so fucking incredible, his mouth watering, opening for you without command, only animal now, as he licked and ate at your slick, wanting cunt. Your cries were so pretty for him, he'd stay there forever, worshiping you, eating you, the only place he wanted to be. He ate and ate and ate, licking, inhaling, his brain on a high nothing would compare to. His chin, his nose, his cheeks were covered in your slick, and he was so greedy, open mouthed and taking more.
And then you were coming again, shaking and trembling and barely able to stand on two feet, and he was scooping you into his arms. He kissed you as he walked, both of you slick and hot, his cock aching. He didn’t give a damn that the second bedroom still smelled faintly like his brother anymore. He was going to fuck you there and make it smell like himself instead. He was going to mate you there. You were his omega. You wanted him.
He laid down on the bed, his back to the pillows and sat you on top.
“Come on now,” he said, voice graveled and thick, tongue heavy in his mouth, gums prickling with the urge to bitebitebite, “Be a good little thing and ride me, honey.”
You rocked your hips against his boxers, the fabric soaked through with your nectar and his dribbling pre arousal, the lips of your core so perfectly shaped around the thickness of him. You scrambled to pull them away, letting his cock bob freely, both of you sighing in relief. You were already wrapping your delicate little hand around it, fingers not even able to touch, and positioned him at your center. He brought his hand down to cover yours, helping you, letting you sit yourself on him. He watched, enrapt by the way you breathed heavily, a gushing, beautiful wash of slick shining against your thighs, darkening the hair around the base of him.
And as you notched the head of him, the thick ridge of it inside of you, Joel knew he was done for. He was no longer Joel, but only an alpha with his perfect little omega. His omega that took him in when he was nothing but a lone wolf, belonging nowhere and to no one. And you'd committed a taboo just to have him, to show him how good life could be.
You cried out as he pushed up into you, and his thick hands gripped your hips, guiding you, rocking you. Skin to skin, cock to cunt.
"Joel—you're so…oh god," you sighed, hands flat on his chest, your eyes twisted, brows furrowing. Neither of you moved except for that gentle rocking, and he could just barely see the bulge of himself in your tummy.
“Yeahhh, still so fuckin’ tight, baby,” he growled, pushing his hand down where he saw your belly protruding. “Made for my cock, huh? Can you feel it? Right there? My brother didn’t even fuck you right—couldn’t’ve. You feel too fuckin’ tight. He get in at all? Bet he didn’t. Bet you were savin’ this sweet little cunt for me.”
“Don’t be mean,” you whined, petulant again. He didn’t want to upset you, you just made him so fucking insane.
“I love you both, you’re my—ohhh fuck—” your voice broke as your brain seemed to melt mid sentence, your body jerking when he thrust up hard, hips grinding deeper. You pawed at his chest, nails dragging through the thick, wiry hair there. “Please, please, knot me, Joel. I need it. Need it so bad I’m burning up inside. It's like a galaxy in my tummy and you're—I’m—oh, oh, please—I love you so much, I love you, I love you…”
His heart may have soared if he wasn't so lost to his instincts. His hand flew to the back of your neck, bringing you down onto him, and he wrapped his arms around you so tightly as he began fucking you in earnest.
“I love you too, baby,” he snarled, lips at your ear. “Love bein’ your alpha. Love fuckin’ you. Gonna knock you up, make you all round and swollen with my pups—fuck fuck fuck.”
You were wailing in his ear as he thrusted mercilessly into you, skin slapping skin as you held onto him. You were crushed to him, your breasts pressing into his chest, bellies sliding against one another.
“My favorite girl,” he panted, “Takin’ my cock so good now. What if it took this time, huh? We wouldn’t even know whose the pups were, would we, baby?”
You hiccuped against him, burying your face in his neck, suckling at his mating gland.
He gasped, as if coming up from drowning at the feeling of your lips, his pheromones filling the air. One of his hands came up from its crushing weight against your back to pet at your hair, his hips still thrusting, but slowing, keeping a steady rhythm as you garbled against his neck, your mouth wrapped around his most sensitive gland.
“That's it,” he whispered into your hair, “That's it. Bite down now, baby. Take your alpha. I'm yours. My sweet little omega. The most perfect girl. Prettiest girl. Only goddamn thing I got left in this world. Bite me, honey. That’s it—ohhh…”
Your teeth closed in on his gland, his blood and pheromones filling your mouth so delightfully Joel was only half aware of your moaning as your cunt squeezed around him for your third orgasm. His cock pulsed deep, thick spurts of come filling you, his knot swelling at once, sealing you both with a brutal ache.
Joel growled into your neck, teeth bared, sinking into the soft place he’d been kissing for days, for weeks, maybe forever. He bit down, hard, marking you, bonding you, everything in him breaking apart and knitting back together around this one truth—you were part of him, and he was part of you.
You mouthed at the wound you'd left, suckling instinctively, still panting through the aftershocks. His hands didn’t stop moving, one arm tight across your back, the other petting your head, soothing and possessive all at once as he kept you pressed to him, knotted and full and trembling.
Joel nuzzled you, feeling his mind coming back to himself piece by piece as he breathed warmly into your skin, his beard rasping gently along your cheek. He felt like he was waking from a fever dream, murmuring sweet nothings in your ear as you both lay there together. He thought he'd never have the words, the thoughts, the right way to tell you how much this all meant to him. But you felt the same, whispering your secrets back as you stayed lock together, floating in the sweet, golden haze of after. Of love, of something holy and like nothing else.
You
It was only a few hours later that Tommy returned, the low creak of the front door stirring you from sleep where you lay in Joel's arms, both of you nestled in the bed he'd carried you to in the sleeping room. Your body was spent, marked, sore in the sweetest ways. He had dressed you in your sleep clothes, and he'd put on his own. Your heat had softened to a lull, a temporary hush between storms. You weren't burning for it anymore, though the embers still kindled in your belly, just under the skin. It wasn't over, and you'd be taken again tomorrow when you woke with a fire again.
But this was the time to breathe, to wake and break bread and be together.
Joel stirred behind you, lifting his head like a wolf catching the scent of his brother, but there was no fight in him now. Only the steady, bone deep understanding of what you were—what all three of you were to each other. You reached for Tommy as he stepped into the room, watched the lines of tension ease from his face as his eyes landed on you. He looked tired, like he’d run miles to come back to you. Maybe he had.
You opened your arms and he came.
There were no words at first, just the shifting of bodies finding each other, the quiet breath of relief when you pressed your cheek to his chest and felt Joel’s hand stay at your hip. You held them both. They held you back.
You knew you'd wake with heat in your belly again tomorrow, your cycle something that wasn't tempered in a day. But that would wait for now. It would let you have this.
You wondered if you'd ever make it back to Jackson. If the world could accept you as you were, But here, in this borrowed house at the edge of the world, you had something no one could name or take.
You let your eyes drift shut again. You were so warm and full, it was easy to slip into sleep like this. You were home.
summary: Ted Garcia has something you want. And you? Well, let's just say, you have something to offer.
|| smut MDNI 18+, ted garcia x reader, assistant!reader (the sheriff's assistant, and you hate it), mentions of masks / covid, pussy inspection, light pussy slapping, lil bit of spanking, power imbalance, power dynamics, this for that, reader uses what god gave her to get a job, pinv, dirty talk, implied age gap, reader has a pet, drug use (recreational, brief), light use of punishment (spanking, gripping, orgasm denial), praise kink!!!, pet names like honey / sweetheart / baby / good girl, I swear to god I might be goin to hell for this she nasty ||
a/n: I know nothing about working as a government employee or for a sheriff, so please don't take this as true to any manner of work in that sort of field. and also if your employer or recruiter ever does this plz report them I do not condone the actions of these characters. ok enjoy!!!
wc: 10k sorry it kinda got away from me!!!
You wondered if Joe would ever shut the fuck up.
He’d just come back to the office and was ranting about Toni from the supermarket forcing his Radical Left Agenda onto him and Fred, apparently ‘screaming’ at them that they needed masks, when you knew perfectly well Toni barely raised his voice at all, wouldn’t even snap at a fly buzzing by.
You kept your head down at your desk, the one furthest from your boss’s, your shoulders curled slightly inward like you could make yourself smaller by will alone, eyes flicking between emails and open tabs without absorbing a word, your body present but your mind already somewhere else, anywhere else. Joe still had you working in-person, like the scab of a human he was. The type of man who treated public health like a threat to his masculinity. Fucker.
Michael and Guy were in there too, shaking their heads while they watched through YouTube videos, scoffing at the mayor’s re-election videos and how the town had gone to hell. You’d stopped trying to argue with them ages ago. You’d needed this job more than you needed to be right, unfortunately.
Just a few more years of this shithole, you told yourself, the mantra worn smooth with repetition. A few more trips around the sun trapped in this backwater office with this bigoted excuse for a sheriff. Maybe, by then…maybe, if Joe retired, or died, or choked on a menthol in his sleep, you could finally make a move. You had ideas and hopes for your small town. A sustainability initiative you’d written up in your own time, a vision for a future that didn’t involve draining the entire aqueduct for SolidGoldMagikarp. If you could just get onto the city planning board, even as an assistant, you could finally start pushing it, making your dreams of sustainability as county commissioner a reality. You dreamed of drafting your own legislation, of turning this city around before the data center would wipe it clean. Something greener, smarter, not some sun bleached, drought ridden dump full of men like Joe fucking Cross.
Better yet, you thought, if Garcia won the next mayoral race, that might open up some board seats in the city planning office. Maybe Joe would get so tired of the man who’d fucked his wife (allegedly, whatever) always stepping over him and succeeding, he’d just pick up his agoraphobic wife and lunatic mother in law and just…leave.
Wouldn’t that be something.
A google alert pinged on your email, taking you from your day dreams of greener pastures with a notification.
Position Opening: Junior Planning Consultant — City of Eddington Office of Public Works
Your pulse kicked into high gear as you glanced over your shoulder first. Joe, Guy, and Michael were still clustered together, now huffing about the small group of BLM protesters down the road like they were a personal inconvenience instead of people, before turning back to your screen.
The Office of Public Works is seeking an entry-level consultant to assist with ongoing urban development initiatives. This position will support research, public engagement, and administrative coordination related to municipal zoning, transportation planning, and community infrastructure. Applicants should demonstrate strong organizational skills, familiarity with local government operations, and a commitment to civic growth.
You blinked at the screen, then reread it.
Oh.
Oh, this was perfect.
And then, your shoulders dropped as you kept reading.
Candidates must provide a letter of recommendation from a senior government official with direct oversight of their current position.
Not likely.
But…but if you somehow managed it, this could be the next step to your future, the next step to getting out of this fucking office and into making real change for your town. The only problem was… Joe would have a god damn field day if you’d ask for a letter of recommendation from him to go work for the local government, because it would mean working with said man who’d fucked his wife all those years ago (allegedly!!!). And to get this job, you’d need his blessing in ink. A glowing, beautiful letter explaining how much you’d worked for the position. Even though you felt like the last woman standing now, the only one left with her head screwed on straight after the deputies who actually made a difference fled to Rio Rancho, and the others were fired in quiet disgrace for excessive force, for misconduct, for things everyone pretended were isolated incidents instead of patterns.
You closed your laptop quickly, shooting up from the swiveling office chair and heading for the door.
Joe looked up. “Where you off to at this hour?”
You straightened your spine, smoothed your face into something pleasant and harmless. “Lunch,” you said, too sweet, already halfway to the door. He checked his watch like he had to think about it while Michael and Guy both gave you a slow once over with their lingering eyes. And once Joe gave a nod, you headed out. Fuckers.
You pulled your mask from your bag, tucking it around your ears and snug over your nose with your shoulders tight, and headed through the spring heat towards the coffee shop two blocks down, the one where the espresso was always burnt but the wi-fi wasn’t half bad. You sat outside by the window after mobile-ordering your latte, and opened up your laptop. For the next hour, you poured your heart into a new resume, fine tuned a cover letter, and searched for your college essays on public engagement and community trust building.
It wasn’t a glowing recommendation letter, but it would have to do for now. And when you were done and the application had been sent, you shut your laptop and headed back to the hellhole to finish out the day pretending it all still mattered.
Three days passed with no response.
You refreshed your inbox until the motion felt automatic, compulsive, like blinking. You checked spam obsessively, looked over the job board again in case the listing had vanished. You even checked LinkedIn, knowing full well hardly anyone in Eddington bothered with it, scrolling through the same stale profiles until your eyes burned.
The longer the silence stretched, the more ridiculous you started to feel for letting yourself hope. That this place—this dusty, underfunded, God-fearing town—would ever take someone like you seriously without a sheriff’s badge or a family name or a church attendance record.
By the fourth day of waiting, the pit in your stomach had settled into something worse than dread—utter resignation.
You weren’t even pretending to work anymore. You were sitting at your desk, thumb jammed into your cheek, staring down at a blurry Facebook upload of Joe’s latest video, filmed from his truck.
"Is it worth it," he was saying with more punch to each word, “to combat a virus that isn’t even here, if it means bein’ at war with your neighbors? And your family? That’s what community is, isn’t it? A family. Because you can ruin a man’s day, or you can do the right thing, and be kind. And you can free his heart.”
Free his heart? Jesus fucking Christ. This was coming from a man who’d once told a room full of veterans that masks were ‘just another way to keep good people afraid’ and who blamed Antifa for every broken window or tagged wall in town, who believed if you wore a mask in office you were one of them.
And of course the comments were full of people calling him a hero. Someone had added a bald eagle emoji. You wanted to throw your phone across the room. You even thought you might vomit.
And above the video, suddenly, was a notification. An email to Joe. Your name had been CC’d automatically, since he never bothered to look at them himself. You saw everything that came through to him these days. Ever since the pandemic started, ever since his wife had taken a turn for the worse, you’d been quietly looped into the communications day in and day out.
From: Ted Garcia
To: Sheriff Joe Cross
Subject: Congratulations
You clicked before you could think better of it.
Joe,
Heard the news. Let’s talk.
– Ted Garcia
Eddington Mayoral Office
235 Las Cruces Rd, Eddington, NM
Paving the Way for a Tech-Forward Future!
You scanned the words again, then again, heart kicking hard into your ribs. Every instinct in you was screaming that what you were about to do was stupid, dangerous, career-ending if anyone found out.
But your fingers were typing before you could think better of it.
See you at 3. Library lot, side entrance. – Joe Cross
You hovered for half a second, breath held tight in your chest, and clicked send.
The spinning loader circled a few times before pinging with bright confirmation: sent!
Whether it was stupid or smart or something far worse, you didn’t know yet. But you did know this: you needed a way out.
One way or another.
The park beside the library wasn’t much of a park at all. Just a strip of dried-up grass and a hot iron bench bolted into the ground, an inscription carved into the backrest honoring the family that founded the town, names worn smooth by years of sun and neglect. You sat there beneath a desert willow, fingers interlocked so tightly your knuckles strained, sweat gathering between your spine and the metal slats pressing into your back. You’d chosen the corner closest to the maintenance shed by the side entrance, half in shadow, tucked just out of view unless someone already knew where to look.
You weren’t sure if he’d come, though…you weren’t sure what you’d say if he did.
But then you heard footsteps, and you jumped towards the sound—not the boots you were used to hearing shuffling around the station or running out the door for a call, but loafers, soft on the sole as they hit the dry, yellow grass at his feet.
He rounded the bend with his hands in his vest pockets, wearing faded jeans and a button up beneath. His hair was tamed, blowing in a welcome breeze, sunglasses and a mask hiding his expression when he stopped short.
He looked around, looking for his intended meeting partner, and looked back at you, because you were staring despite trying to seem very calm and collected. You saw how his brow pinched over the rim of his glasses as he took one more look around him.
“You’re not Joe.” he said uneasily as he approached.
He didn’t sit quite yet, and you watched him, hands still tight in your lap, “Nope.”
There was a strained silence.
“I saw your email,” you said then, “I was the one who responded. I work at the station,” your voice was starting to get higher, your words tumbling out, “just the office stuff, answering phones and taking his emails and—”
“I know who you are.”
Okay… noted.
He still hadn’t sat, but you gestured to the bench anyway, careful not to sound too eager. “Can I talk to you?”
He waited a beat longer than necessary, then eased down at the opposite end. Not close, but not perched at the edge either, occupying the space with quiet confidence. “Mask?” he said.
You nodded, pulling yours from your pocket and placing it over your nose, and then taking a deep breath, you looked out at the brittle grass.
“There’s a job opening,” you said. “In Public Works. Entry-level consultant for development planning. I applied.”
He didn’t react.
“But I need a letter of recommendation,” you went on. “From a government official. Someone with seniority. It’s part of the requirements.”
Still nothing. You felt the silence stretch between you, starting to sting.
“I know you’re not exactly thrilled with anyone connected to Joe,” you said carefully, “but this isn’t about him. I’m trying to get out, I hate it there. I have a background in environmental policy. I’m not—” You stopped. “I wouldn’t embarrass you. If you were to…write it for me.”
That did it. Just a slight tilt of his head, a brief glance in your direction.
“You’re sure about that?” you heard him say, muffled under his mask.
Your mouth went dry. “Yes.”
“Because a letter from me carries weight around here,” he said. “And if I vouch for someone who turns out to be unqualified, careless, unstable—”
“I’m not any of those things.”
“How would I know that?”
You stared at him. “You just said you know who I am. And I know for a fact you know my mom and dad.”
This time he met your gaze fully.
“I do.”
And that was it. No warmth, no advantage, nothing to be proud of, clearly.
You exhaled once, sharply and tried to recover.
“Okay….I could…” you were looking around, as if the blades of dried shrubbery could give you an answer, “I could pay you.”
He actually laughed at that, short and amused. “Bribing a public official. Great pitch for your career.”
You closed your eyes for a second, rubbed your temple. “It was worth a shot.”
He stood, smoothing the front of his shirt. “If that’s all—”
“It’s not.” You rose quickly after him. “Just… One more thing.”
He didn’t walk away. That was something, at least.
“Don’t laugh,” you said.
“I’ll try.”
You swallowed. You looked at the grass, the shadows of the bench moving as the seconds ticked by, anywhere but his face. To say you were spiraling might be an exaggeration, your brain was whirring around, lungs heaving in shallow breaths, trying to steady yourself. He waited, and you realized then how tall he was. You hadn’t ever been in front of him like this, so close, and some kind of cologne was wafting off of him in the breeze, warm and mixed with some oud wood and tobacco.
But he didn’t move. He wouldn’t push or fill the silence for you, and you couldn’t leave empty handed, not after everything you’d risked just to be here. Because what would happen if you let this slip through your fingers? If you trudged back into the office with nothing to show for it but a nasty sunburn?
The thought made your stomach twist, because you could already see it so clearly. No letter of recommendation = no chance at that job. No foothold into city planning, or any path forward, no future that looked anything like the one you’d imagined for yourself on those long. There were so many sleepless nights spent lying awake and furious, cataloguing all the ways this town was rotting from the inside out and how you’d fix it, if only someone would let you try.
You looked at Ted then. He was still watching you, expression hidden behind those dark sunglasses, posture easy and unmoved, like none of this touched him at all. Like he didn’t owe you a single thing. Because, in truth, he didn’t.
You wet your lips and told yourself not to flinch.
“There’s one other thing,” you said.
And finally, finally, that got his attention. His head tilted, just slightly, waiting.
You felt the blood roar in your ears.
“I could…I could pay you. In other ways.”
He was watching you silently, and God, you hated those sunglasses. You wished you could reach out and snatch them from his face, just to see what this was doing to him, if anything at all.
“I could…I could send you photos.” you said meekly, quietly.
“Of?” he asked, head tipping down slightly, as if genuinely puzzled.
“Myself,” you whispered. Then you straightened, spine stiffening as something stubborn took hold of you. If you were going to say it, you were going to say it with your chest. “Naked.”
For a moment, he didn’t move. You wondered if he’d even heard you through the mask, through the noise in your own head.
And then, as stern and business-like as ever, he said: “Get back to work,” already turning away from you, shaking his head like he found it all so damn ridiculous.
“Is that a no?” you called to him.
He didn’t bother answering you, nor did he glance back your way as he walked off.
A few hours later, your phone rang.
An unmarked number. Local, but not saved. Your stomach tightened before you even picked it up, a quiet, anticipatory pull low in your spine, as if some part of you already knew exactly who it was.
“Hello?”
“Send them to this number,” he said, no greeting, no preamble. “Tonight. After work. I want one tonight, and one in the morning. After you shower.”
“I shower at night.”
The words came out before you could stop them, clipped and absurdly practical, like that was the sticking point here. Not the fact that the mayor of Eddington was calling you before your shift had even ended. Not that he was asking for something that could dismantle your life if it slipped even slightly out of your control.
There was a pause on the line. Long enough to feel deliberate. Long enough for your mind to race—was he reconsidering? Had he already decided this was a mistake? Had reality finally caught up to how reckless this all was?
“Then I’d advise that you start showering in the morning,” he said before the line went dead.
You stared at your phone for a second too long before lowering it, heat blooming beneath your skin. Fucker.
And yet, when your shift ended and you stepped out into the evening, there was a lightness in your stride you couldn’t quite tamp down. You told yourself not to analyze it, not to interrogate whether it came from the faint outline of an exit finally appearing, flickering uncertainly ahead, more warning sign than promise. Or whether it came from something smaller and darker and more thrilling.
There was something intoxicating about being naughty.
By the time you reached your apartment above a local restaurant, you were climbing the stairs to your door as your nerves hummed. You fumbled with your keys, hands clumsy, pulse loud in your ears. Inside, you greeted your four-legged shadow at the door, forced yourself through the familiar motions—food, water, routine—letting the normalcy steady you, anchoring yourself to the fact that the world had not yet tipped off its axis.
Only once you were alone again did it catch up to you.
In the bathroom, you braced both hands on the sink and stared at your reflection, your face flushed, eyes a little too bright. Your breathing felt shallow, like you’d just come in from running.
It’s just pictures, you told yourself.
And then, immediately: What if he shares them?
What if he uses them as proof, as leverage, as a weapon—not just against you, but against Joe?
He wouldn’t do that. The thought came fast, instinctive.
But how could you be sure? You’d barely spoken to him before today. Yes, your families knew each other—your mother and him in the same classrooms as kids, your father beside him through years of a high school debate club—but that was history, not trust. And if he told your parents?
There was too much at stake, too many ways this could end badly.
So you pivoted.
In your bedroom, you went to the back of your closet and started digging, pushing aside clothes you hadn’t touched in years. Your fingers closed around something soft and unfamiliar, and when you pulled it free, you almost laughed.
Lacey and delicate, barely considered clothing with how little there was to it. Just something you’d bought for an ex a lifetime ago, meant as a Valentine’s surprise that never happened because he’d left you the night before, leaving this small, ridiculous relic behind.
It had never been worn.
It was perfect.
An hour later, you were stretched out on your bed, pillows stacked behind you, the room lit warm and low. Your makeup was done with more care than you’d given it in years, lashes dark and thick, mouth soft and glossy. Your hair spilled loose across the sheets, catching in the fabric as you shifted, every movement hyper aware. You took photo after photo, adjusting angles, discarding most of them immediately, but you felt… good. Confident, even. Excited. Yes, still, beneath it all, there was a faint tremor you couldn’t quite shake, a tight awareness in your chest that kept you alert, careful. You took photo after photo, not frantic or rushing, just adjusting, refining, discarding the ones that didn’t feel right, like you were weighing something valuable before deciding to let it go.
Eventually, one stopped you, and you stared and edited it a bit for the lighting and contrast, before mustering up your courage and hitting the send button.
And now there was nothing to do but wait.
And wait, you did.
No response, nothing the entire night. The evening stretched on, the silence pressing heavier with every passing minute. You paced your apartment, checked your phone, set it down, picked it up again. You checked the number at least twenty times just to be sure you had the right one. You hovered over the text field more than once, fingers itching to ask if he’d received it, to say something casual, something safe, but you stopped yourself every time. You refused to beg. Refused to show need where it hadn’t been invited.
By the time you crawled into bed, your thoughts were looping, chest buzzing with too much awareness and too many imagined outcomes. You dry swallowed a Xanax just to quiet it as you lay staring at the ceiling until the night finally softened enough for sleep to take you.
By the time you were back at your desk the next morning, you were vibrating.
Too much coffee, for one thing, but also the undercurrent of exhaustion that made everything feel a half second off, like the world was lagging behind your thoughts. You hadn’t slept worth a damn. Even with the Xanax, even with the ceiling fan spinning slow and steady overhead, your mind had kept circling back to the same questions, the same what-ifs, the same imagined outcomes you couldn’t quite shove away.
You kept waiting for someone to look at you differently.
Joe was already in a mood, pacing near his desk, muttering under his breath about the march downtown, about streets being closed, about “lawlessness,” like inconvenience and injustice were interchangeable things. Every time he spoke to you, your shoulders jumped, a jolt of adrenaline sparking before you could stop it. You tried to keep your face neutral, eyes on your screen, posture loose, like nothing was wrong, like you hadn’t handed over something fragile and dangerous in the form of you, scantily dressed in only your towel this morning.
Your leg bounced under the desk. You kept checking your phone, then forcing yourself to stop, then checking again.
You took another sip of coffee and immediately regretted it.
Maybe you should call Ben later, you thought dimly—Garcia’s kid, once the march wrapped up, once he was done being visible and brave and good in ways that felt impossibly far away right now. You could use more Xanax, or just anything to take this edge off.
The phone on your desk rang, blaringly loud, taking you out of your looping thoughts. You jumped nearly out of your seat, and stared at it like it might bite you.
A local number from a government office. Not unknown, but not one you recognized either. Your stomach dropped hard and fast, the blood rushing loud in your ears as your mind leapt ahead, already assembling the worst possible version of events. He told them. Ted told them everything. Someone put it together. Someone decided to make an example out of you.
Joe glanced over. “You gonna get that?”
You nodded, fingers feeling numb as you picked up the receiver. “Sheriff’s office,” you said, voice miraculously steady.
“Hi,” a woman said on the other end, brisk but pleasant, and then asked if you could connect her with your name.
“Yes,” you said, throat tight. “This is she.”
“This is the County Administration Office,” she continued, and your heart slammed so hard it stole your breath. Fuck, Ted snitched, this was it. Career ending. You squeezed your eyes shut until she went on. “I’m calling regarding your application for the Junior Planning Consultant position.
“We’d like to invite you to interview,” she said, smoothly. “Given current COVID restrictions, our offices remain closed to the public, but we are conducting socially distanced interviews offsite. We can also arrange a Zoom interview, if you prefer.”
Your hand tightened around the receiver.
“In person is fine,” you said, too quickly, then forced yourself to slow down. “In person would be great.”
She took you through the next steps, asked the preemptive lockdown procedural questions in a voice that sounded practiced and distant, like she’d already done this a hundred times that morning. You answered automatically, head nodding even though she couldn’t see you, your pen tracing aimless shapes on the corner of a notepad while your heart beat far too loudly for such a mundane exchange.
When you hung up after a polite goodbye, you sat there for a second, unmoving, staring at absolutely nothing. The office sounds filtered back in slowly with Joe’s voice somewhere behind you, the low hum of the lights, a chair scraping across the floor, but they felt far away, like they were happening on the other side of glass. Your body lagged behind the moment, like it hadn’t caught up yet to what had just happened.
You did it.
You got the interview.
The realization landed unevenly, not as a rush but as a strange, suspended quiet, your chest tight with it, your breath shallow like you were afraid to inhale too deeply and scare it off. You’d been so certain this would end in disaster, so sure that hope was something you’d overreached for again, something that would punish you for daring to want more, and yet Ted hadn’t burned you or panicked or turned you into collateral damage in his quiet war with Joe. He hadn’t exposed you or made a show of it or let this become another small-town spectacle. Instead, he’d done whatever he’d needed to do quietly, without warning you or asking for anything further, keeping his end of a bargain you hadn’t even fully spoken out loud.
It worked. The thought made your stomach flip, relief braided in with a more complicated twist. You still felt exposed, vulnerable, lying in wait for the phone to ring with some nasty truth.
But still.
For the first time in days, the future didn’t feel like it was closing in on you. It felt, impossibly, like it had cracked open just enough to let you see through.
Pulling into the dusty driveway of the address the receptionist had sent you, a flicker of confusion crept in as you took in the stucco walls and unmistakably residential sprawl of the place. Tan plaster warmed by the sun, thick dark-brown edges framing the structure, low and wide in that mesa style that made houses look like they’d grown straight out of the land instead of being built on it. This was not an office. This was not anything you’d pictured when you’d said in person is fine without thinking too hard about what that might actually mean.
The gravel bit under your heels as you stepped out of the car, sharp and uneven, and you cursed yourself immediately for choosing shoes that had only ever been meant for short, flat walks between parking lots and buildings. You tugged your pencil skirt down as you straightened, gathering yourself, reaching for your portfolio from the passenger seat, the weight of it familiar and grounding in your hands. Essays, résumés, clippings—proof and evidence of your competence.
Your heart dropped for a half second.
An SUV sat parked off to the side, dusted with yellow pollen and road grit, a bright campaign sticker slapped on the bumper: Ted Garcia for Mayor! It oddly felt accusatory somehow, like it was staring you down, as if it knew. You forced yourself to breathe as you passed it, it didn’t mean anything. No one knew. You’d only done what you’d had to do, after all.
Your nerves buzzed as you started toward the front door, each step making you more aware of how quiet it was out here, how far removed from the town center, tucked down along the hills near the edge of pueblo county. You wondered what kind of local government official lived this far out, whether the distance was intentional, just far enough to keep prying eyes away, just far enough to let things happen without being noticed.
You lifted your hand and knocked, the sound firm despite the way your pulse had started to stutter, and immediately wished you’d given yourself one more second, one more breath, anything to slow the momentum you’d already set in motion. The door was flanked by tall panes of glass, reflective enough that for a moment all you saw was yourself: interview ready, portfolio hugged to your chest, expression carefully neutral, and then a shape moved behind it.
A figure crossing the house toward you. The glass distorted them at first, bending light and shadow, but as they drew nearer the outline sharpened, broad shoulders filling the frame, the tilt of a head unmistakable even before…oh fuck— his face came into focus.
No.
No, no no no no.
Your hand clenched reflexively around your portfolio, fingers slick with sweat, and then it slipped from you entirely, the folder hitting the stone at your feet with a dull, graceless sound that seemed far too loud in the quiet.
The door opened.
Ted Garcia stood over the threshold of his own house, sunlight spilling in behind him, no mask now, no sunglasses, his expression calm and unreadable as his dark eyes moved over you in a slow, assessing sweep, head to toe, toe to head.
For a moment, neither of you spoke.
Your stomach was dropping through the ground, your brain hazy and dizzy with a hollow, nauseating plunge that made the tiled entrance feel unsteady beneath your heels. This wasn’t just an interview held somewhere unusual. This wasn’t a workaround for closed offices or social distancing. You were standing on his doorstep, your entire morning suddenly rearranging itself around that fact, the implications unfolding faster than you could stop them.
His house.
You felt absurdly exposed, like the walls themselves could see you, could read the last twenty-four hours written plainly across your skin. Every nerve in your body lit up at once, equal parts embarrassment and alarm and something darker that had your thighs trembling you didn’t want to think about.
You bent automatically, instinct taking over before pride could catch up, knees dipping as you reached for the portfolio where it had spilled open at your feet, papers skewed and peeking out like they’d betrayed you on purpose. Your fingers shook as you gathered it, the motion suddenly clumsy, ungraceful, the kind of awkwardness you could feel all the way up your spine.
Why hadn’t he said anything? Not a hello, not even moving an inch from where he loomed. You couldn’t help it, some itch in your brain to look up, to watch him watch you.
He stood exactly where he had been, one hand resting lightly against the doorframe, the other loose at his side, watching you with that same infuriatingly neutral expression, his face giving nothing away as you crouched there below him, kneeling on his front step like this was where you belonged. His gaze didn’t hurry or soften or flick away out of politeness. It stayed on you, steady and unblinking, tracking the small, exposed motions of your body as you gathered yourself back together.
Heat crawled up your neck as you straightened quickly, pulling all your papers and dustied binder into the crook of your elbow while you reached out your hand to shake his.
“Hi, sorry—I’m…” you shook your head, pulling in a deep breath, “I’m here for the interview?”
“Did you take a test?.” he asked.
You nodded quickly, “Negative, a–all good to go,”
His mouth twitched into almost a smile, and then: “Come in,” he said, voice calm and polite.
Ted stepped back just enough to clear the threshold, though not enough to give you much room, and when you moved forward your shoulder brushed lightly against his chest, the contact brief but enough to make you shiver as you stepped into the house. The smell of his aftershave wafted over you, something clean and understated, the awareness of it lingering longer than the touch itself as the door closed behind you.
The space opened up immediately, airier than you’d expected, ceilings rising high above thick plaster walls that softened the light instead of bouncing it back. Terracata underfoot, worn smooth in places, and archways breaking up the rooms without closing them off. The windows along the walls were set deep enough into the walls that the sun never felt harsh. There were signs of care, too. A touch that screamed this was no bachelor pad of a single father, a woman’s touch in places like the woven blanket folded neatly over the couch, the paintings that echoed a western life and local art. The colors, the balance of the rooms….This was a home softened by someone else’s presence, even if you’d known the truth. That his wife left him and Eric earlier that year.
You realized you’d stopped walking.
Ted stood just behind you, close enough that you could feel him without turning around, letting you look, letting the quiet stretch. It felt intentional, the way he gave you just enough time to take it all in before he moved, stepping past you smoothly, decisively, his shoulder passing close again as he gestured toward a hallway branching off to the side.
“This way,” he said, already leading, assuming you’d follow.
You did, adjusting your grip on the portfolio as you went, the sound of your heels clacking on the stone flooring, your nerves still buzzing but threaded now with something else…curiosity, maybe.
His office was the same as the house, though cluttered with papers around his open laptop, notes strewn around in haphazard messes, government files spread across a large, mahogany desk and nearby surfaces in a kind of organized chaos you couldn’t quite decode, the evidence of a mind that didn’t shut off just because the workday was supposed to end.
He stood leaning back against the edge of the desk, a solid emissary, and gestured toward the chair near the door, a leather armchair worn just enough to look comfortable rather than ceremonial. You moved toward it without really deciding to, body obeying before your thoughts could catch up, settling into the seat and immediately feeling too aware of yourself, of the way you crossed and uncrossed your legs, adjusted your skirt, tried and failed to still the nervous energy skittering through you.
You took him in as he took you in, watching each other for a long moment. His curls seemed more unruly than you’d expected, and without the mask or sunglasses there was nothing to soften the lines of his face: the pretty arch of his nose, the purse of his mouth, the kind of handsome that felt unfair to encounter when you were already this on edge.
“Comfortable?” he asked, gesturing vaguely at the chair you were already perched in, voice neutral enough that you couldn’t tell if it was a genuine check-in or a test.
“Yes,” you said, too quickly, then corrected yourself by crossing and uncrossing your legs again, the leather faintly squeaking beneath you. You folded your portfolio onto your lap like a shield, fingers gripping the edge harder than necessary.
“This isn’t how we usually do interviews,” he said, not quite apologetic, just stating a fact. “But with the offices closed and most staff remote, this was the best option.”
You nodded. “That makes sense. I figured it was… a workaround.”
“A lot of things are right now.” His gaze lingered on you, steady, unreadable. “You’d most likely be working remotely to start. Research, drafting, coordination. Once restrictions lift, we transition back into the office. Does that work for you?”
“Yes,” you said. “Absolutely. I’m organized, I keep my own deadlines.”
“I’m sure you do,” he said mildly, and something about it made your stomach flutter in a way you didn’t like.
He reached behind him and picked up one of the papers from his desk, glancing at it briefly before setting it aside again. “You’d be moving from the sheriff’s office into county planning. That’s not nothing, especially with how things are right now. What do you think that’s going to mean for you?”
You hesitated, then answered honestly. “It… probably means tension. Maybe some fallout. But I can manage it.”
“And for your boss?” he asked.
Your jaw tightened. “With respect, what it means for Joe isn’t really my responsibility.”
His brow lifted just a fraction. “Isn’t it?”
You met his gaze, heart hammering now. “Why? Are you nervous about what it’s going to mean for you?”
The question hung there between you, heavier than you’d intended. Maybe it was too prodding or rude, but it was the giant elephant in the room. His political rival, an unruly sheriff who took the law into his own hands and didn’t care about policy or state mandates.
“I suppose we’ll see,” he said.
Your pulse thudded loud in your ears. You wondered, not for the first time, what he really saw when his eyes lingered on you like that…Did he see a stupid girl that worked with the fascist asshole in town? Maybe your résumé and things you’d achieved? Or your carefully put-together outfit? What if it was something else entirely? Or maybe…maybe, the image in his mind was the one you’d sent two nights ago, lace barely covering anything at all, or the one from the next morning, your body wrapped in nothing but a towel, skin still damp from the shower.
You shifted in the chair, suddenly hyper-aware of your posture, your breathing.
He watched you for a moment longer, then said, almost conversationally, “I’m worried about the fact you don’t follow instructions very well.”
Your head snapped up. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“I—” heat was flooding your face, “Yes, I do. I’m very thorough.”
“I’m not so sure” He tilted his head slightly, studying you. “Because I was very clear.”
What the hell was he getting at? Your mouth opened, then closed.
“You've barely said anything to me, Mr. Garcia.” you said cordially as possible as your stomach threatened to throw your lunch all over his lap. Your voice was low, as if you should be worried of any intruders privy to your conversation, “I offered something and you accepted.”
He pushed off the desk and took one slow step toward you, stopping just close enough that you had to tilt your chin up to look at him. His voice stayed even and low.
“I asked for naked,” he said. “You sent yourself in some lace get up. And a towel.”
The room felt smaller suddenly, air thick and close around you.
You swallowed. “That—those were—”
“Covered,” he finished for you.
Your fingers curled into the edge of the chair. “I didn’t think—”
“No,” he agreed. “You didn’t.”
He held your gaze, calm as ever, letting the silence stretch as your nerves buzzed painfully under your skin.
“This position requires attention to detail,” he said finally. “And the ability to follow through exactly as instructed.”
Your heart was racing now, not only with embarrassment but with something sharper, something electric and terrifying all at once.
“I can do that,” you said, just a whisper, barely a breath.
He studied you for another long moment, expression still so god damn unreadable, before straightening again, taking that half step back that returned the balance of the room. You let out a breath you hadn’t even realized you’d been holding before he went on.
“Over the desk, Miss,” he said, using your last name, his voice calm and even and threaded through with a kind of authority that made it sound less like a suggestion than an expectation.
Your heart leapt into your chest, “What?”
He stared from beside the desk, hand flat against it, a tan where a wedding ring might’ve been, while his other hand lifted slightly, the first two fingers curling inward toward his palm in a slow beckoning that made your stomach drop.
You stared at him, eyes wide, mouth parted, thoughts scattering all at once, your body registering the moment faster than your mind could make sense of it. You felt unmoored, caught between disbelief and a sudden, humiliating pull to comply, and before you could talk yourself out of it you were rising from the chair, legs unsteady as you crossed the small distance to the desk.
His hand came to your lower back, gentle, “Say the word,” he said quietly. “And I will stop.”
“Stop…what?” you whispered.
“You’re trembling, Miss,” he said, using your last name again like it was something official, something clinical, though it did nothing to soothe the knot twisting in your stomach.
“No, I’m not,” you protested, brows knitting as you tried to regain control of yourself. “I’m—I’m just confused.”
“We’re assessing whether you’re right for the job,” he said, tone unchanged, like this explanation made perfect sense to him.
“And what job is that, Mr. Garcia?” you said, quiet as a mouse, your gaze landing and somehow unable to leave his lips.
A small smile tugged his lips, his mustache twitching with the movement, and for the first time, you could see every naughty thought behind those dark eyes as they lit up with amusement.
“Coordinator, of course,” he said gently, and the hand on the lower back was very still, not pushing, though you felt his thumb inching under the hem of your shirt to rub at the warm skin there, making your stomach flutter, “I’m going to make sure you know how to listen to direction, assess you’d be the right…fit for me.”
You swallowed. The taste in your mouth had gone thick and strange, and your skin felt tight across your shoulders.
“Are you going to tell anyone?” The words came smaller than you meant them to, your hands now resting on the desk, fingers splayed against the wood as if for balance. Your body had already begun to tip forward, some part of you answering him before your sluggish mind could catch up.
“No.” he said very seriously, “this stays between you and me.”
You let out a breath of relief, and laid yourself across his desk, warm cheek to cool wood, arms tucked at your sides, palms flat.
“Now,” he said, voice deeper. “First things first. I need to assess you. Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
A light slap landed where your thigh curved into your ass, the juncture where your skirt had started to ride up. You yelped a little, though the sting felt…welcome. Like a confession. A truth. Like the feeling inside of you suddenly had a name.
“Yes, sir,” he corrected, “You will call me Mr. Garcia, or sir,”
“Yes, Mr. Garcia.” you murmured.
His wide hand soothed over the spot where he’d slapped, fingers dipping too close to your panty line, making you tremble. Your stomach was doing flips, pussy already throbbing with a humiliating need for him to be closer.
Then his hands were at your skirt, dragging it up your thighs, bunching it high at your waist. He let out a light groan of approval as he gripped the globes of your cheeks, massaging them, pulling them apart before pushing them together. He was sort of bent over you, you could feel his body leaning over your lower back from beside you at the desk, eyes looking down over your backside.
“Yes,” he said, barely a breath. And you realized, where he was leaning against the desk and his jeans dug into your arm, was incredibly thick and hard and…and pulsing, “Yes, this will do just fine,” he kept using your last name, kept saying it.
“Mr. Garcia?” you asked quietly.
“Yes?” he stopped, taking his hands away, standing beside you upright.
You shifted, skin flushed hot, mouth dry. “Would you mind… not calling me that? I hear it all the time at work and—” your voice shook a little, “—I’d rather not... If that’s okay with you.” You swallowed. “Sir.”
“Of course,” he nodded, “What would you like me to call you? A little slut?” his eyes were watching you now, waiting for a reaction, maybe, as he went on, “Or maybe baby? Sweetheart?” His voice softened, teasing the edge of something too warm, too indulgent. “You really are sweet, aren’t you, honey?”
It was like his voice had been dipped in honey, the way the pet names rolled off his tongue, and he must’ve seen what it did to you, because he was smiling, and suddenly, a cooing expression pinched his brows, pursed his lips, “Awww, what a sweet little thing, just wants to be a good girl, doesn’t she?” and as you watched him in silence, his hand came up again to your ass, squeezing it hard, “Answer me.”
“Yes,” you gasped, his fingers pulling at the trim of your panties. And you could both hear the light squelch of your pussy being pulled, the slick that was already gathered there, “Yes, sir, yes Mr. Garcia, I want to be your good girl.”
“Good job, that’s it,” he nodded, “are you okay with continuing, baby?”
Your knees knocked against the edge of the desk as you shifted, seeking relief that didn’t come, your body already aching for more contact. Your center pulsed with want, feeling neglected between your thighs, gushing thick slick as your breath trembled out of you.
“Yes, sir,” you said quietly, your voice steadying as you spoke. “I’d like to continue.”
He moved around the desk, and the space he left behind felt strangely empty, the loss of his proximity sending a chill across your skin. A moment later, you sensed him behind you. You couldn’t see him, not clearly, but his presence was an unmistakable warmth radiating toward you like a furnace opening.
You tried to look back just as he bent to his knees. His hands returned to your ass with a different kind of touch, careful this time, spreading you open with slow patience, making your whole body hum. His breath drifted over the back of your thighs, warm and intimate, and you shivered.
“Ohhhh,” he sighed, pleased in his tone, “Look at you, already so wet and ready for me.” His fingers pressed more firmly into your flesh as he pulled you apart again, the cotton of your panties stuck to your thick, viscous need, the humiliating sound of the lips soaked in honey. You thought you heard him mutter a quiet fuck under his breath, like he couldn’t help himself.
“You’re a naughty girl, you know that?” Ted said, his tone dipping lower as his fingers hooked into the band of your panties and began to ease them down, inch by aching inch. “Only bad girls show up to a government official to offer their naked little body for a job. Only a really bad girl bends herself over her mayor’s desk like this.”
You were whimpering, thighs pressing together in hopes of any kind of friction, though once your panties were off he was pushing them apart again.
“I’d have never known better,” he went on softly, almost in wonder, pussy stretching with his fingers as he pulled it apart to watch it gush and clench for him. “With you working for that asshole all this time, a little minx with…” his breath stuttered, his voice falling rough, “with the prettiest little pussy just waiting to be taken. Tell me, sweetheart, are you a bad girl?”
“No, sir,” you whispered, heat sparking beneath your skin as you said it. “I’m a good girl. I want to be a good girl for you, Mr. Garcia.”
He clicked his tongue, a slow sound of pity or pleasure, it was hard to tell which, before cooing low and warm, “Ain’t that just sweet.”
You felt the tickle of his mustache first, coarse and warm against your most sensitive skin, and then his tongue followed, flat and wide, cupped like a basin made for collecting, for holding everything you gave him. And as he licked you from clit to asshole in one slow, devastating sweep, the groan that left his throat was long and low, vibrating up through the muscle of his tongue and into his lips where they pressed against you, open and hungry.
“Fuck,” he growled, pulling back just enough to spit, the warm glob landing right at your entrance, slick meeting slick. You moaned at the sensation, at the filth of it, at the way his spit joined the obscene wetness already dripping between your thighs. You could only imagine what you looked like, bent over his desk with your cunt drooling and thighs trembling, the floor beneath you surely catching every drop of what he’d coaxed out of you.
His tongue found your clit again with an unrelenting precision, lips sealing over it with a greedy hunger. His teeth grazed, just barely, sending your hips jerking forward before he soothed the sting with an open mouthed kiss, tongue plunging into your cunt like he could taste your obedience there. The sounds were nasty in their clear disdain for anything sweet—wet and messy, echoing against the terracotta tile as he devoured you. He wasn’t gentle. He was eating and taking and devouring every drop you gave, as if you were a little lamb finally caught in his jaw.
“Oh fuck, Ted—oh god—” your voice cracked as you pushed back against his mouth, your thighs quivering with effort, with desperation. His hands gripped your ass so hard you swore you’d bruise, spreading you wide, holding you open while his tongue fucked into you like he could unmake you from the inside out.
And just as you felt it that sharp, rising crest curling hot in your belly, tight in your thighs, the pressure so sharp it was almost painful, just as you bit down on your lip to keep from screaming his name, tasting the metallic rush of blood—
He stopped.
Before you could pull in a breath, he was on top of you, leaning over your body, pressing you into the desk so the breath was knocked from your lungs.
“You’re not going to come,” he growled near your ear, voice rough with authority, “until you learn how to fucking listen, little girl.”
“I’m sorry—please—I didn’t mean to—” The words came out panicked, broken as you began grinding back against his thick length blooming beneath his slacks, your slick soaking through the thick fabric in a shameless, shining smear. “I was so close, please, please, please—”
He chuckled, a sound that vibrated against your back, dark and indulgent.
“Oh, that’s it,” he purred, voice dripping with cruel affection. “Grind that needy little cunt on me, baby. Go on. Show your fucking mayor how bad you want this job.”
Shame crawled up your spine like heat, but your body wouldn’t stop. Your brain was too far gone, thick with need, pleasure mingling with humiliation until you couldn’t tell the difference anymore.
“You want me to fuck you?” he asked, not teasing anymore. “You want to come on my cock, little lamb? Is that what you’re begging for?”
As filthy and deranged as it was, yes. Yes, that's all you wanted.
“Yes, yes sir, yes Mr. Garcia, please,”
“There she is.” His fingers slid up your jaw, cupping your face until you turned toward him, lips parted as he squeezed your cheeks with his thumb and forefinger, “now listen close, baby.”
His lips brushed yours with every syllable, every word as he went on:
“I’m going to fuck you, and then you’re going to call your swine of a boss and resign. And you’re going to tell him its because Ted Garcia stole you from him. That I’m better than that shit piss of a man. That you’re my girl now. ”
“Ted!” you chastised.
He had a little wicked grin, and kissed you fully on the mouth, “You know it’s true. But you will resign, and you will come work for me. Do you understand?”
You nodded fervently as he kissed you again, open and wet and possessive, moaning into your mouth. His tongue plunged past your pursed lips and licked behind your teeth, sliding against the wet muscle of your own mouth, taking you, making you taste the honey and musk of yourself.
One of his hands had descended between your bodies, and you heard the sound of his belt buckle clattering, a sound that sent a pavlovian shiver through you, making your legs part without another thought. You sighed into his mouth as he wrapped a hand around his cock, spreading the weight of it through your weeping entrance. He was so wide and heavy and—Jesus, how thick was he? He notched himself at your entrance, just barely, and the stretch had you gasping before he’d even moved.
“Gentle—please—gentle, Mr. Garcia,” you breathed, throat tight and shaking, “I’m—I haven’t… oh god, at least not in a long time.”
His breath stuttered, a low groan dragged from deep in his chest as he pushed in another few inches, his other hand now gently laying around your throat.
“Ohhh,” Ted moaned, leaning his forehead into your shoulder, “but fuck, you feel so—” he pushed in a little further again, the sound of his pleasure nearly a whimper as you clutched the desk. He was stretching you obscenely, thick from tip to the middle of his shaft, feeling never ending as he kept pushing and pushing into you, both of your moans a harmony of pleasure.
Deeply seated inside, he pushed your back down to arch your ass up a bit more, adjusting his angle to hit just right, the air was rented with only breath—heaving chest against your back. You became aware, all at once, of how poorly dressed you were for this. With your blouse twisted and damp, your bra still on, the lace clinging to your skin. As if reading the thought, his hand slid and tugged at your collar, dragging it down to expose you. He chuckled softly when he saw the lace, then pressed his mouth to the back of your neck.
“You always wear such lacey things to job interviews?” he asked.
You exhaled a shaky laugh, grateful for the flicker of levity. “Only when it involves the mayor of Eddington.”
He hummed like that pleased him as his hand moved from your neck to push your hair to the side to continue his assault on your neck, kissing and licking and biting, grinding his cock up into you again, up and up and up, making you whimper, your brow pinching. And as he pulled out only a few inches, you hissed through your teeth.
He barely gave you a moment’s reprieve from then, and you let out a little yelp as he slammed his hips into your ass.
He set a relentless pace, the contrast stark in the way he fucked into you hard, over and over, while his hands stayed gentle, cradling your breast, holding your body close. He had you laid flat on the desk again, arms wrapped around you now, keeping you steady as you turned your head toward him, mouths meeting in a gasping kiss.
Open mouth on open mouth, panting, moaning, your skin slick with sweat, the heat and friction and everything blurring together. It was euphoric. It was everything.
“This isn’t going to last very long,” he said into your mouth, “You feel like fucking heaven, sweetheart.”
The praise went straight to your lower belly, where your lost orgasm had been quietly rebuilding, a bramble of nerves now tumbling fast toward the cliff’s edge, making your legs shake as they did their best to stay standing.
“Mr. Garcia—” you moaned, “please, let me come, I wanna come all over your cock, sir,”
His lip curled back into a growl as his head stayed beside yours before he kissed you again, his entire body eclipsing yours from behind. The room was full of the slap of skin and your moans as the sun shifted across the tile floor, unnoticed.
“Tell me who you belong to now,” he commanded, “whose pussy is this, baby? Who are you gonna work for from now on, hm?”
“Y–you, Ted—fuck, fuck, fuck—!”
He’d suddenly hooked his palm beneath your knee, dragging your leg up onto the desk, opening you wider, and somehow he fucked you—unbelievably—deeper. His balls slapped snugly against your clit with each thrust, and the pressure made you wail.
“Yeahhhh,” he growled, pace never faltering. “Yeah, who’s fuckin’ you this good, huh? Say it. Say my fuckin’ name, baby girl. Takin’ my cock so goddamn good—c’mon, say it and I’ll let you come.”
“Ted! Fuck, Mr. Garcia! You are!” you were wailing, past the point of caring at how humiliating it all was. You’d never felt like this, so fucked out and drunk on a cock so perfect it felt like it had been made to split you open. It filled every inch of you, kissed your womb, made your pussy clench tight around him as you held the orgasm back, your stomach aching, your thighs trembling.
“What a good listener you are." he said in your ear, "Come for me, sweet angel girl. Let me feel her.”
Your eyes rolled back into your head, sparks of galaxies being born and rebuilt bursting as your cunt squeezed him like a fist, fluttering and locking down around him, your leg that still held you up suddenly turning to jelly. Only he held you upright now, thick, banded arms around you, pushing you into the desk so you wouldn’t fall as your body broke open.
He was grunting his praise into your hair before he seized up, body taut and hips punctuating every groan, and you could feel his come pooling into you in thick ropes, each twitch of his hips pushing him deeper into you, sealing the two of you together.
And once again, the room was full of nothing but breathing. Heavy sighs and thick inhales, the hissing of teeth when he finally pulled his spent cock from your velvet walls after a few long moments. You heard him adjusting himself, letting your leg down from the desk gently, smoothing your skirt back into place.
You felt his spend already dripping from your fucked cunt, oozing down over your clit, still sensitive and twitching from your climax. Hardly able to stand, you just watched him from where you lay face down on the desk, boneless, dazed, neither of you saying anything for a moment.
“You all right?” he asked, voice low like his throat felt thick.
You nodded. Or maybe you made a sound, you weren’t sure which in the hazy cloud of post coitus.
He went around his desk and pulled some papers out of a drawer, suddenly so professional it felt taboo to be thinking of his cock just splitting you in half. The image of him inside you was still blooming warm between your legs, that euphoric, syrupy high of it still glowing behind your ribs like an ember.
He laid down a paper in front of you.
Employment Agreement: Junior Planning Consultant
City of Eddington – Office of Public Works
“Is this…” you asked, eyes squinting sleepily as you sat up on your elbows.
“I was serious.” he said, serious indeed. “If you have any questions, you can—”
You hummed dreamily, interrupting, “I do have a question, as a matter of fact. For you.”
He paused mid-motion, buckling the metal clasp of his belt, adjusting the waist of his trousers. “Oh?”
“Is fucking on the job a one-time thing,” you said, a little more confident and sly, “or a regular perk?”
His shoulders dropped, a real smile finally pulling his mouth, molasses eyes crinkling at the corners, “I believe we can make something like that work. On one condition.”
“And what’s that?” you asked, looking around and picking up a nearby pen, clicking it so the ballpoint became visible. When he didn’t say anything, you looked up again at him.
The sun had shifted, haloing behind him in the narrow pane of the stucco arched glass window. The light caught the pollen dusted on the glass, diffusing into a soft glow that backlit him completely. His hair damp and tousled, sweat still catching in the hollow of his throat, his hands braced in fists against the desk as he leaned forward, close enough to exchange air.
“I don’t share.”
Your breath hitched.
“If you take this position, you’re mine while you’re in it.” He didn’t look away from you, holding your gaze, making your throat tighten. “And that means no one else can fuck you.”
There was no smile on his face anymore.
“Understand?”
“Yes, Mr. Garcia.” you whispered.
The words tasted like submission, like something permanent, and yet…You could feel yourself softening where you lay, spine bending under the weight of his command, and there was no fear in it. Only a warm ache of surrender, slow and… and welcome, like something inside you had been waiting for this exact moment. It made you feel secure, wanted…valuable.
His eyes softened, his left hand coming up to drag his knuckles gently over your cheek before he stood straight and pulled away. And as if suddenly remembering, he reached into his back pocket, pulled out his cell phone, and tossed it onto the desk in front of you.
summary: You're home earlier than expected, Montclair.
|| smut MDNI 18+, harry castillo x montclair!reader, xoxo au, christmas eve, lingerie, sexting, harry is so down fucking bad dude, pinv, ill be real guys this shit is sickly sweet, f!recieving oral, missionary on the floor, pet names like honey / baby / sweetheart / princess, harry has a bad back and throws it out while fucking you you're welcome ||
a/n: this is an xoxo au with my montclair fmc but can be read as a standalone! there are some little easter eggs from the fic but you don't need to know about them to enjoy!
Harry was trying very hard not to keep checking his phone tonight.
You were due home, and he’d been waiting for the usual Just landed! you always sent. But nothing had come, and so he stood in his suit and tie in the bar at Nobu, feeling every minute of your absence.
He had just about had enough of Ted’s talk about SolidGoldMagikarp until that point. The man could go on for hours about the “future of mid-market innovation,” and normally Harry could handle it the same way he handled everything else at Castillo Investments: smoothly and yet never over promising, but always with enthusiasm for his clients. Tonight, though, his patience was thinner than the stem of the martini glass in his hand. He’d learned to get a taste for them over the past year and a half—nice and brine-y, ice cold—especially when you were away. It made him think of you.
He was antsy tonight, he knew it. He felt it buzzing under his skin like static and hoped no one else saw it.
He tried, really, he was trying, to be merry, to enjoy the conversation and blend into the warm glow of a Christmas Eve cocktail hour. All his team and a handful of overseas investors were thrilled to be experiencing a rare white Christmas in New York. Outside, snow drifted down in soft pillowy sheets, gathering against the windows. And inside, the lights reflected in garnet cocktails and flushed cheeks, everyone pleasantly loosened by holiday spirit and expensive liquor.
He had told himself he’d stay for at least an hour and a half. Just ninety minutes. But he’d only been here for thirty and was already losing his nerve.
The velvet box in his jacket pocket that he’d picked up from Harry Winston that afternoon felt heavier with every passing minute. Not heavy like doubt, but heavy like destiny. Heavy with a certainty he wasn't sure he'd ever felt before. It sat against his ribs, an unyielding reminder that you were coming home tonight. Back from Paris, back from Serena and Dan’s new adventure, back to him.
If he had to listen to Ted go on about his tech-positive hometown one more second, he really might lose his mind. Maybe on another day he’d have had more patience—he’d hear him out, talk restructuring, global expansion, all the things he was paid handsomely to care about. Christmas Eve, however, was not that day.
And just as Ted began to call over his son to introduce, Harry’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He eagerly pulled it from his trouser pocket, and glanced down at the screen. Whatever practiced composure he’d managed to hold onto wavered as the message came into focus, the image stealing the air from his lungs before he could think to steady himself.
“Apologies, Mr. Garcia,” Harry said, cutting in before the man’s son could launch into whatever eager introduction he’d prepared. The young man—tall, lanky, carrying the same earnest brown eyes as his father—had barely reached him before Harry was already shaking his hand. “I’m afraid I’ve got an emergency. Wishing you and your family a very happy Christmas.”
He didn’t wait for more than a gracious nod.
He turned on his heel and made straight for the coat check, weaving through clusters of colleagues and investors without so much as pretending to slow down, leaving his half finished drink abandoned on the high top table behind him. As he shrugged back into his coat, he lifted the phone to his ear, already calling George.
The moment he stepped outside, the cool air wrapped around him, sharp and awakening after the overheated hum of the party. Snow muffled the city’s usual edge, settling in soft drifts along the pavement and crunching beneath the tires of the sleek black Mercedes pulling up to the curb. George rolled down the window as Harry approached, the interior light catching the faint smile on his face.
“Early exit tonight, sir?”
Harry nodded, slipping into the backseat with more haste than dignity, and pulled the door shut behind him. He opened the text again, unable to stop himself, the image burning against the screen. When he’d first opened the text, he wondered if you’d taken it on the plane, stretched out in your lie-flat seat, teasing him from thirty thousand feet above. But no, after a moment’s glance, he knew better.
He recognized the Christmas tree skirt you’d insisted he buy, the tangle of colorful ornaments you’d picked out, the glass bauble from Longwood Gardens where he’d taken you to see the lights before you’d left on your trip.
He knew you were home.
“I suppose you knew she’d be landing early?” Harry asked his driver, tone carrying that dry edge he didn’t bother to hide.
George met his eye in the rearview mirror, a fond look in his eyes, and said simply, “Her instructions outranked yours tonight, sir.”
Harry huffed a disbelieving laugh and shook his head, unable to take his eyes off of your photo, ignoring the winter wonderland that passed outside his window
The car eased to a stop at the private entrance, and Harry was already opening the door before George had fully parked, bidding him a good night and a Merry Christmas. The cold wasn’t sharp so much as immediate, a chill that woke him up after the heat of the car. He crossed the short walkway with purpose.
“Welcome home, Mr Castillo,” the doorman said as he let him inside.
The lobby was quiet at this hour, lights dimmed and a gigantic Douglas Fir decorated with extravagance for the holiday, and the elevator slid open the moment he approached. He stepped in, keyed the code, and watched the numbers blink in a soft amber. The ride was short, but it gave him a moment he didn’t want—time to look at the photo again.
The red bow, your glowing skin beneath the tree lights. You were wearing a diamond pendant necklace too, sparkling in the low light against your cleavage. God, you were so fucking pretty, even in a simple little selfie like this one.
And you were home. That fact settled somewhere low and steady inside him, more grounding than anything he’d felt all night.
The elevator doors slid open soundlessly, and as he crossed the threshold, he saw your giant checked bag forgotten in the corner by the bedroom door, and in the air something smelled like vanilla and cinnamon, like you’d lit a candle. Yet something lingered beneath it, something like your Roja Haute perfume, and the pine from the tree in the next room.
The foyer stretched out in front of him, and his attention and his feet moved down the hallway. The sconces along the chocolate-gray walls were already glowing low, a steady amber guiding him down the hallway, and he loosened his tie as he walked, tugging it down through the collar because something restless had started in him from the instant he’d stepped out of the car. The dark wood floors were warm beneath his socks when he slipped out of his shoes, and he passed every framed painting you’d changed from his cityscapes to those of charming local artists over the past months—small pieces of you in every softened edge of this once-sterile penthouse that now felt entirely yours.
The glow from the living room reached him before he did, a golden spill across the end of the hallway, and he felt that familiar tightening in his chest he got whenever he knew you were close, that quiet awareness he couldn’t have explained even if someone asked. He stepped forward, the room opening in front of him, and whatever breath he had left stalled in his throat.
The Christmas tree stood tall in the corner, green and brilliant beneath its strands of light, black and gold ornaments shifting gently with the draft he’d carried in.
And beneath it, on the buffalo-plaid skirt you’d insisted he buy even though he’d argued, was you.
You lay on your side at first, propped on one elbow, idle fingers drawing small, slow circles over the bare stretch of your hip, the ribbon tied across your chest catching the light each time you breathed. The lingerie was red, the same shade as the lipstick you wore, the same shade that had been sitting like a promise on your vanity the morning before you left for Paris. You looked up at him as though you’d been expecting him for ages.
He didn’t realize he’d dropped his coat until he heard the soft thud of it hitting the floor.
You’d turned him into someone with no composure, no restraint, no sense of performing the part he played everywhere else in the world. Here, with you laying in front of the tree as if waiting for him alone, he felt stripped to something honest and bare.
You pushed yourself upright, knees folding beneath you, hands resting lightly on your thighs as you smiled at him, a vixen, the curve of your mouth knowing exactly what it did to him.
“Merry Christmas, handsome.”
For a moment, he only stood there, utterly enraptured by you. Every thought emptied from his brain, every breath gone from his lungs. He took you in, no longer a photo or a figment of his imagination on a plane thirty thousand feet in the air, but here, home, with him.
He felt his body move before his mind caught up, crossing the distance slowly, drawn forward as if a hook was in his navel, a thread coiled tight between you. And you watched him back, that sweet, sly smile making his stomach roll and his cock twitch against his thigh beneath his slacks. When he reached you, he didn’t trust his voice. Didn’t trust himself to speak without ruining the quiet spell you’d cast over the room. He found himself lowered onto his knees in front of you, his breath leaving him in a steady rush as he came level with your pretty eyes. Up close, you were sin itself. Heat pooled thicker and heavier in his body, in his loins, hands twitching to touch, tongue darting out to taste.
“Hi, baby,” he finally whispered.
“Hi,” you murmured back, a twinkle in your eye, and not just from the lights of the tree behind you.
He let his palms finally reach out to touch, settling on your waist, the thin fabric warm to the touch. His thumbs brushed your ribs, pulling you in closer and closer. He dipped his head down, kissing your neck gently, down your shoulder where the dantiest little strap held up your bustier. You exhaled, long and heavy as if you’d been waiting for him for far too long, and he should’ve never made you wait. He should’ve been waiting here, for you, not at some stupid business cocktail party.
“Harry,” you whispered, your manicured fingers finding the buttons of his shirt.
“Yes, sweetheart?” he said softly, kissing the line of your jaw, breathing you in. Rose, jasmine, the perfume he’d once gifted you.
You hummed softly as he pressed his cheek into yours, guiding your head aside so he could take more of your neck, the delicate column of skin there already warm, already waiting. Your mouth parted, your grip tightened, fabric shifting under your hands as his shirt slipped free.
As he discarded his shirt, his eyes found yours once again, and yours had gone swallowed by blackness, arousal.
“I missed you,” you whispered.
Harry answered by easing you back onto the rug beneath the tree, lowering himself with you until you were framed in gold light and shadow, his hands braced on either side of you as he took you in like something he couldn’t quite believe belonged to him.
“I’ve missed you more,” he said quietly, his fingers finding the red satin bow at your chest, tugging once, tentatively despite himself. “Can I?”
“Please.”
He smiled then, seemingly soft and ruined all at once. “Sweet thing,” he murmured, pulling gently until the ribbon loosened and slipped away, revealing the lace beneath. Red clung to you still, sheer enough that he could just make out the shape and color of your nipples, and it made his stomach flutter.
“I’ll never get over this,” he whispered, though he wasn’t sure he meant to say it out loud, “I’ll never get over you, you’re just…you’re perfect,” and he leaned down over you, your warmth, your closeness, and wrapped his arms around the breadth of your body, hugging you close, latching his mouth over your covered nipple and moaning along with you, a harmonized pleasure.
Your hands slid into his hair immediately, nails scraping lightly along his scalp, that familiar touch undoing him faster than anything else ever him, it was always his favorite: hands in his hair, pulling him in closer. He sank into it with a sound he didn’t bother containing, something low and second nature, a kind of comfort that came only from being exactly where he was meant to be after too long apart. Wanting to tell you just how much he’d needed you, and not just like this—with his cock now straining in his slacks against your covered center where he ground down into you, your thighs locked around his waist. But how much he needed you every day, every waking hour. He was insufferable in his love for you. It scared him a little, sometimes. And as if reading his mind, you said:
“I’m obsessed with you,” countering back at him, “didn’t have any fun in Paris without you there, it was awful.”
He frowned in a cooing way, pulling his brows together in mock pity, though he really did feel a little bad, “Aw, poor little baby,” he whispered before suckling on your other lace covered nipple. You arched into him with a gasp, and his other hand was coming up to pull the fabric away, clawing at it.
“Wait—Harry, don’t—” Your protest broke apart, his hands already gripping the back of the body suit. “Oh!” you squealed as he ripped it down the back, pulling the fabric apart, gently now, ridding you of the thing, so he could have you as he liked. It wasn’t like him, not really, to be this ravenous, this uncontained, but he was past caring. He didn’t feel in his right mind right now, like this, needing you so badly, being equally if not more obsessive, and yet he felt more himself than he ever had before.
“I’ll buy you more,” he kissed against your skin, “buy you anything you want,” his lips made their way down, and he watched as goosebumps rose against your soft skin from the scrape of his facial hair, his tongue dipping out when he reached your navel, making you giggle.
“Yeah, you better Castillo. That was not cheap. Paris lingerie stores are, like, insane.”
You were teasing, but he could barely keep up with what you were saying anymore. His brain felt hazy, clouded by you, your smell, the taste of your laugh, the shape of you under his hands. He wanted to say something clever back, something about how no Paris boutique could compare to you, bare and shining and sprawled out like this, in the apartment you shared—but the words wouldn’t come.
As his mouth descended on your center, you were already slick with want for him. His tongue dipped out to taste and your head fell back in relief, in ecstasy.
He was getting dizzier by the second, drunk on the sweet and salt of your honey on his tongue as he ate at you, the symphony of sounds spilling from your mouth. He’d chase this forever, keep it burned into memory—this feeling, this vision of you, spread out and open for him. His hands gripped at your waist, pulling you closer, one sliding up to palm your breast. God, he just wanted to touch all of you, cover every inch with his hands, his mouth, his praise.
You were so fucking warm. So ready. So ripe with wanting. He could feel the flutter of you against his tongue as he plunged it into your soaked pussy, your moans growing louder, losing their shape. His fingers came down to strum at your clit now, and he felt your spine arch into his hold, back bowing beautifully as he kept you grounded.
Your hands were still in his hair, tugging him closer, and as his tongue met his thumb against your clit, you were wrenching him in, jaw unhinged, suddenly your eyes on him, lips shining with a little bit of drool weeping from them, so pretty, cheeks warm and…and you were smiling at him, little minx of a woman you were.
“Feels so good, huh, baby?” he muttered into you, voice low, hungry. He dragged his tongue in lazy circles now, then faster, then slow again, watching your body react, watching you squirm, never quite able to get the friction you wanted. “Could spend the rest of my life right here.”
And he meant it. God, he did.
“Good,” you exhaled, “cause I plan to keep you,”
He could hardly believe you were teasing him while he had his mouth on your soaked, pulsing cunt, while your body trembled under him like this. But the truth of it was—he’d never had the power. Even now, controlling every wave of your pleasure, he was the one undone. He was yours. Always had been.
And suddenly, as his lips sealed and suckled on your clit, you were yanked off the edge, throwing your head back in a yowling sort of pleasure, moans filling the home you shared together and riding his face to your end line. Your thighs pressed tight against his head and he was moaning too, gripping your thighs until he was sure he might bruise you, the idea of you with marks of him making him grind into the floor beneath him.
As you came undone and your thighs unlocked around his shoulders, Harry didn’t give you much time to recover. He was already climbing over you, belt clattering as he shoved his slacks down just far enough, his cock flushed and dripping with the need he hadn’t even tried to hide. He slid it through the slick mess between your thighs, teasing the heat of you, smiling like he couldn’t believe his luck.
You reached up with gentle fingers to wipe your nectar from his face, glistening in the dark hairs along his jaw. You kissed it off his lips, then kissed him again. He kept his eyes open, needing to see every flicker of emotion, the pinch of your brow as he pressed in just a little, enough to stretch.
He was thick. He knew it, and he took his time. Your kiss softened, mouth falling open in a gasp.
“Been a while, hasn’t it, sweetheart?”
You nodded quickly, still chasing his lips with your own, trying to breathe him in even as he breached you slow and deep.
“Missed you so fucking bad,” he sighed, seating himself all the way, hips flush to yours. Your velvet walls gripped him hard, fluttering, resisting, then yielding. His breath stuttered. “Jesus, baby…”
“Oh, god,” you whispered, eyes fluttering.
“I know, I know,” he cooed, one hand cradling the back of your neck, angling your head to make you watch. He pulled out just enough for you both to lay your eyes on your arousal painting his cock in creamy white streaks, thick and glistening along the shaft.
Both of you went slack at the sight.
“So pretty,” you whispered, breath catching. “You’re so pretty, Harry.”
“No,” he whispered back, shaking his head as he eased your head back onto the rug. “No, baby,” he said again, kissing your cheeks, your jaw, the line of your neck, nipping softly at your shoulder as your arms wrapped around him. “You are. Prettiest girl, prettiest fucking pussy—”
He moaned the last words, more like a groan, lost now in the rhythm of his hips, in the way your body opened for him. He pushed in deep, all the way, grinding up into you, the press of his pelvis flush to yours. Balls snug against your ass, the crown of him dragging up and into the cradle of your body like he was trying to kiss your womb.
You cried out, a sharp little plea. “Harry—too deep—oh, God, it’s so—too deep—”
He shushed you softly, lips brushing your ear, whispering his praise between each thrust, steady and sweet, though he felt more ruined inside by the passing minute.
Something was shifting, but he couldn’t think, not very clearly, at least. All he could do was move, feel, watch the way your face contorted with pleasure, how your eyes rolled back when he angled just right. He was gone to it, to you, chasing the high like it was his last.
But suddenly, you hefted your leg over his right hip to pull him in, ankles against his bottom, and he let out a screeching—
—OUCH!
You froze beneath him, eyes blown wide, chest rising fast.
“Harry?” you asked, breathless.
He was shaking his head, frozen, immovable. Damn him and his age. And dammit, 46 wasn’t even all that old, really!
“I think—oh fuck, ow, ow, ow,” he groaned, though he was still seated inside you, both of you still pulsing as if this sweet oblivion outweighed everything, despite the pain that was suddenly shooting from his lower back, “It’s fine, I’m fine,”
“You’re not fine!” you exclaimed, “what happened!?”
He was already pressing kisses into your neck again, trying to distract you, trying to soothe. One hand slid down to your ass, squeezing it gently, tilting your hips to ease the bend in his own.
“Just my hip, or my back, I don’t—fuck, I don’t know. Doesn’t matter. Come here.”
“You old man,” you muttered, shaking your head with half a laugh. “You’re about to break your back on me and you still can’t stop?”
“Never,” he said with a shaky laugh. “Could break in half and I’d still keep going. Never wanna stop fucking you, honey.”
“You’re insa—” But the word broke off into a squeal as he thrust hard into you again, deep and deliberate.
Your eyes bulged, mouth open in a gasp, and all he could do was grin down at you, like the pain wasn’t even real, like nothing mattered but the way your body kept opening for him, over and over.
He winced again as his hips rocked forward, that tight pinch deep in his lower back flaring like a hot wire. Fuck. It hurt, no point in pretending it didn’t. But your moans were pouring out like honey, hips writhing up to meet his, and he couldn’t bring himself to stop. Not when your mouth was open and your fingers were digging into his shoulders and your walls were clenching down around him like your pussy never wanted to let him go.
He gritted his teeth, powered through another thrust, deeper, skin slapping skin, “S'okay,” he whispered, kissing your temple, your cheek, the tip of your nose. “God, you just feel so fucking good.”
You looked up at him like you didn’t believe him, like you might call it off, pull him out, and that just wouldn’t do, so he braced himself. Let the pain settle like background noise. Planted one hand beside your head, and the other under your thigh, lifting your leg higher, opening you wider for him.
And he fucked you.
Deep, worshiping, faster and faster, every roll of his hips sending a wave through both of you, your body so open and welcoming it almost brought tears to his eyes. He’d never known anything like it, the way you gave yourself to him, the way you looked up at him like he was something worth needing.
“That’s it,” he rasped, watching the way your brows pulled together. “You’re doing so good for me, sweetheart. So fucking good.”
You whimpered beneath him, legs trembling, your fingers sliding up into his hair again, anchoring him, grounding him. He dipped down, kissed you slow, felt your gasp melt into his mouth as he angled his hips just right.
“Ohhh, right there, yeah?” he asked, voice low and breaking, “Remind me again, who that belongs to. Right there, baby,” he said with another punctuating thrust.
“Y–you, Harry, always, oh godddd,” eyes fluttering, lips parted in a quiet cry. “Feels so good, Harry, please don’t stop—”
“Not stopping, princess,” he said, barely breathing it, “even if it kills me. Wanna feel you come on me again. Let me have it, sweetheart, yeah? Come on, can feel how badly she wants it.”
He picked up the pace, grinding up into you with each thrust, the sound of your slick bodies meeting bouncing from wall to wall. His thighs ached, his back was screaming, but all he could focus on was you—your pleasure, your voice, the way you were starting to unravel again, fingers clutching at his back, your breath stuttering.
“I can’t—Harry—oh God—”
“Yes, you can,” he coaxed, thumb sliding down to rub your clit again, slow and perfect, just the way he knew you liked. “You’re right there, come on. Come for me, pretty girl.”
Your body locked up beneath him, a cry ripping from your throat, your walls spasming around his cock like you were trying to pull him in deeper, hold him forever. He gasped at the feeling, stars bursting behind his eyes.
“Fuck—fuck, baby, I’m—”
He let go inside you, hips grinding in deep, cock pulsing hard as he spilled into you. The pleasure cracked him open from the inside, the tight ache in his back drowned out by the way your body milked him through it, the way your name fell from his lips like a prayer.
You both stayed like that for a long moment, tangled and still, breath catching in each other’s mouths, skin slick and flushed, your arms wrapped tight around him like you could hold the ache at bay.
Harry let out a long, low groan, his forehead pressed to your collarbone.
“Fuck me,” he mumbled.
“I just did,” you murmured, grinning, fingers combing through the mess of curls at the nape of his neck.
He laughed softly, winced immediately. “M’back’s gonna seize up any second now.”
You pulled back just enough to look at him. “Are you okay?”
“Not sure,” he said plainly, though he was grinning. “This really messed with my plans for tonight.”
"Oh yeah?" you teased, "And what plans were they?"
“Very romantic ones,” he said, faux serious. “Candlelit. Multiple positions, maybe possibly some of that light choking you said you wanted to try.”
You snorted.
“Now,” he went on, groaning as he tried to shift, pulling his spent and wet cock from your cozy warmth, laying beside you, “instead of spending Christmas with you and my family, I might have to spend it with my chiropractor."
“You poor thing,” you cooed, mock sympathy laced through your voice as you kissed his cheek.
"And my other plan...well..." he was reaching beside the couch, into the pocket of his trousers where they had been crumpled and discarded earlier. His breath hitched, not from pain this time, as he pulled out the little velvet box.
Holding it in one hand for a second without opening it, he looked at you instead as your eyes grew wide as saucers. His other hand reached up for yours, found your fingers still curled against his chest.
“I was going to wait until we were clean and dressed and, I don’t know, vertical,” he said, breath catching with a quiet laugh. “But I just can't And you…God, sweetheart. You’re just amazing. And I know you said you were fine with the emerald,” he said, nodding to the familiar green stone still sitting on his finger, given back to him before your trip, “that you didn’t need anything else. And I believed you, really, I promise.”
His thumb rubbed along your hand. Your skin so soft, so warm.
“But I wanted to give you something special, something I picked out just for you. And maybe… maybe it could come close to what I feel when I look at you.”
He opened the box slowly, a little breathless. His heart was pounding now, voice feeling too thick in his throat.
“No ring’s ever gonna be big enough or perfect enough to show you how much I love you, but I still wanted to try.”
And then you were moving, climbing into his lap, arms around his neck, mouth pressed to his with so much joy it made his chest ache. He felt your laugh against his lips, tasted it, felt your fingers slide into his hair like you couldn’t touch enough of him fast enough.
“So…” he said, amused, almost boyish in its glee even as he grunted in pain. “That’s a yes?”
“Of course,” you were saying, “Yes, yes, yes.”
He groaned, letting your hands explore as they wanted, back into his hair, your legs bracketing his hips. He let his head fall back against the cushions, grinning through it, groaning.
“Careful,” he wheezed, “you’re gonna paralyze me.”
But God, if this was how he went out, with a ring on your finger and your smile pressed to his mouth—then fine. He would be content.
“I love you, old man,” you said against his mouth.
His gaze never left your face. He was watching the shape of your smile, the crinkle at the corners of your eyes, the way the Christmas lights painted color across your skin like something holy. He could’ve sworn you were glowing.
“I love you too,” he said softly, and every word felt like truth made flesh.
You shifted just enough to lean your hand against his chest, and together you looked down, both watching the way the ring caught the colored lights, throwing off sparks as your fingers rested over his heart.
“Mrs. Castillo,” you whispered, tasting the name.
He hummed, lips brushing your knuckles. “And as Mr. Castillo,” he said, voice dipping with dry amusement, “I’d like to discuss your blatant manipulation of my very loyal driver.”
You grinned. “Who, George?”
“Yes, George,” he said, mock-affronted. “Who has been on my family’s payroll since I was seventeen. Who lied to me.”
You laughed, then shrieked when he made a sudden grab for your ass, groaning when the movement pulled at his sore back.
“Ah—fuck—ow,” he hissed, collapsing back into the floor. “Christ, my spine.”
You were already on your feet, slipping away from his reach with a devilish little smile, walking backward toward the hallway with your hair wild and your body still glowing with warmth.
“If you want to punish me, you’ll have to catch me,” you said sweetly. “Though I’m not sure you're in any condition for that, old man.”
He groaned dramatically, hand draped across his chest. “You’re evil.”
You just giggled, disappearing around the corner with the softest whisper of bare feet on the floor, and in your absence, he let his head fall back with a slow exhale.
And suddenly, the vision of you bent over his knee and your little ass the same red as the ruined lingerie on the floor—well, that had a way of making the pain in his back vanish almost completely.
“God help me,” he muttered, pushing himself upright with a wince. “I’m gonna marry a menace.”
>>if you liked this fic and haven't had a chance to read xoxo yet (tumblr & ao3) id highly recommend just for the juicy drama of gossip girl, fun text pics like the ones here, and fake dating and being hopelessly in love. the best tropes lol
summary: all suffering originates from craving, from attachment, from desire. —the second truth
|| smut MDNI 18+, dream-like state, drug use / altered state of consciousness, fever-dreamy, YEARNING, obsession, pinv, kissing (you know I love kissing), post-outbreak, qz!joel, soft but also mean joel? he's a bit confusing here, prosey pls forgive me, not quite dacryphilia but reader cries a little, slight cockwarming at the end, needing and wanting, jealous!reader, very self indulgent if im gonna be real ||
wc: 3k
Existing is such a human thing, isn’t it?
The thought sparks alive as you’re climbing on top of him, hips opening with a straining stretch to accommodate his large breadth of body—so warm, so thick, every inch hewn from earth and sweat and sadness over years of living.
You suppose existence is so miraculous in some ways, yes. You arrive, you’re thrown into this, into the depths of a world that does not love you, and then you’re told to make the right choices— to survive it, when truly, when had you ever asked for any of it? Animals don’t think about the choices they make, they aren’t thinking about tomorrow or yesterday, the consequences of such things. But humans…humans dwell on existence. It’s meaning, it’s reasons. As if you’re given any sort of actual choice. Freedom is real, maybe, but mostly made from luck and circumstance, birth happenstance, never able to choose the who or how or where. You think it’s responsibility that determines the rest. The choices made molding the world around you. The universe offers no ready-made meaning. You make it now—meaning, that is—mouth against mouth, tongues sliding and voices overlapping in ecstasy.
Maybe you’d taken too many pills, too eager for the trade, skin too itchy to wait another minute. You wonder what kind of person it makes you—not the drugs, no, that was normalcy now, but specifically the escape of it all. The ease with which you climb into this man’s arms given the chance. That is what you wonder about, if it’s the right choice or just for the sake of fuck-it-all. This is actually the first time here, in his den, where contraband is piled in the corners and dust coats surfaces. You’d never been to this one, this place where he hides his horde of small treasures that no one else is allowed to see. Only a small oil lamp beside the old couch gives any light to the darkness. You admit you felt a bit like a naughty little thing stepping inside to see his secrets. The other place, where he sleeps and eats and …and fucks… is across town, and much too dangerous to sneak to tonight. Sometimes you wonder if he and Tess fuck in that apartment too, if they’re together like that. You aren’t allowed to know many things about him, about them. But still, the thought turns your stomach sour.
He grunts loudly as he pushes his hips up into your clothed cunt, jostling your thoughts. Your fingers wrap into his hair tighter, pulling and pushing, pushing and pulling. You think about the choices that brought you here. All the small ones, the big ones. The way one wrong turn becomes a whole new life. A ration card swapped for a bottle, a bottle traded for a few pills, a few pills leading to this: Joel Miller’s mouth pressed to yours, his breath hot and steady, the world narrowed to the sound of it.
He’s massive, all of him built for carrying and surviving, his hands broad and cracked and unflinching as they roam under your shirt. There’s something ancient about him, something that makes you feel like the last two people left alive, clinging to what’s left.
You wonder, briefly—your damn mind really can’t think straight with so much vibrating between your ears, but the thoughts still swim in and out like waves anyway—what your life might’ve been like before, or without. You think of your mother, once so steady and sweet and certain with purpose, the rest of your family all gone when the world ended. You, then, left to fend on your own, stuck here in this jail of a quarantine zone. Safe, though. There was safety in this too.
Joel’s thumb traces your jaw, rough and slow as he opens you up. He has a way about him, a way about the things he likes and takes. He pushes his thumb into the hinge of your mouth, and your tongue slides over it, allowing him to lick inside, behind your teeth, against your tongue again and again. He doesn’t say much, he never does. He just takes. And you—always—give.
Your mouth opens against his, and he kisses you harder this time, tongue plunging into your wanton mouth, pulling you down until your chest meets his, the couch groaning beneath the weight of both of you. You taste sweat, musk, tobacco from traded cigarettes on him.
He’s grunting beneath you, impatient now, and you answer back with a soft whimpering moan, his hand leaving your mouth to close around your throat, just enough. He surprises you with this gentleness. You’d thought, especially the first time, he would be nasty and rough and make it hurt. But he never did. Sometimes you wished he’d be rougher, to throw you around like you knew he could. He was so big, after all. It would be so easy.
You ground down onto his lap, the thickness of him practically throbbing under your clenching covered center. He moaned then, a sound you thought of as your own treasure, something you sought time and time again, wanting and fiending for more. You were growing impatient now too, fingers clumsily throwing your top aside, letting his mouth descend on your breast, your head thrown back in the feeling of his warm tongue against the raised nipple, licking and flicking and now biting.
“Perfect,” he murmurs, distant, like the word floated up from underwater, his mouth dragging across the valley between, and his beard is rough against your skin, scratchy and untrimmed. You think, vaguely, that you could offer to fix that for him. Would he let you? Would he trust you with something sharp, and that close to his throat? The idea of Joel Miller’s throat bared to you as such makes you moan just as his teeth latch to your other breast, and he’s groaning, hands fisted at the meat of your hips, pulling you down harder into him.
His coat is forgotten somewhere nearby, tangled beneath your discarded layers, and you shiver when the cold slips in through the walls, through the glass, the outside world reminding you it still exists with soft sheets of snow falling. You tug at his last layer, wanting to feel his skin, wanting closeness, wanting him bare to you, and he understands without a word, pulling it off himself. Instead of bringing you back down into him, his thick fingers fumble at you, impatient and sure all at once, lifting you to your feet, and you shake there, trembling with need, with cold, with the feeling that you’re right on the edge of something. He’s pushing your pants down, discarding his own until his cock is jutting thick and wanting and pulsing. A dribble of arousal beads there, a sort of pride knowing it's for you, all for you right now. His jeans aren't even fully down his legs before you’re climbing again. You barely notice his quiet chuckle at your haste, too busy forcing your limbs back over him, settling where you belong, grinding your slick folds against his warm shaft, chasing that hum in your bones.
“S’this all I’m good for to you, huh?” he teases, one hand finding your throat again, one holding himself at the entrance of your want, “Pills and fuckin', baby? That all you want of me?”
Your brain feels scrambled, thoughts slipping over one another, the pills heavy in your blood, thickening everything. It's odd, to hear him talking. He doesn't do that very much. But you shake your head, a small, helpless motion, a sound leaving you that doesn’t feel like language.
“I think it is,” he murmurs anyway, mouth brushing your chin, tongue tasting, dipping out to taste the salt of your skin. “Think you only come find me when you want somethin’, when I've got what you need. That right?”
No, no it’s not. It’s not. you want to whine and be petulant and kick at him. Doesn’t he understand? Doesn’t he realize? You’re a resentful thing, jealous and wanting. Too much want in your body to understand fully. It’s why you come to him, seeking the pills, the booze, anything to make your body stop wanting and reaching for him. It’s a strange dislike, to crave to be touched by him, all the while wanting to be rid of this. This inescapable desire that burrs in you like a thorn no matter how hard you try to resist. The pain of pulling it out and pushing it back in. You wish, sometimes, that he'd hold so tightly your spine might split in half in his arms. It deranges you, this want. Two longings pacing inside your chest, to be loved and to be alone.
You wish, so badly, that you did not want him. You wish you did not crave this closeness, this heat, more than just his body, more than his cock that now pushes into you, making you gasp. The ridge of it too thick at first, always hurting a little, always burning in its intrusion, the stretch of it. A kind of pain you love. It’s its own kind of drug, this—sharp and aching and impossible to ignore, pain braided together with relief until you can’t separate them anymore.
No other word makes your mouth as tender as his name on it, the one you whisper now as he saws into you. Heavy, warm balls meeting wetly against your skin as he thrusts all the way in, the dip of his hips as he pulls back and out. His arms wrapped tight around your middle, drawing you close, you wonder if he can’t stand being more than a breath away in the way you did. His mouth drags across your shoulder, open and hot, licking at you, teeth catching on the ridge of bone. You could feel him breathing, panting, against your skin as you held onto him, moaning and wanting.
You arched into him like a body called back to its source, like some part of you had always belonged here, clenched tight around him, open and trembling under the weight of his need. He was everywhere. On your skin, in your lungs, pressed between your legs with a slow drag that felt reverent and brutal all at once. The room swelled with the smell of sex, thick and pungent—salt, sweat, musk, and something deeper, something darker, like the cedar and whiskey that clung to him now as he worked himself inside you.
He shifted beneath you, settling deeper now, a new angle turning everything sharp again. You cried out and he groaned, not just from the heat of you or the slick glide of your cunt around him, but from the sound you made. Like it fed him. His mouth moved lower, dragging along your neck, tongue tracing over your throat, lips closing and opening in their search.
“Fuck,” he muttered, voice more breath than sound as he mouthed at your moving throat, sound spilling from you in earnest. “Takin’ me so good, baby,”
Baby. It was your favorite word, if you had to choose one. But only here, only from him. And as you lean down, hair falling over his face as you kiss him, open and greedy, tongues pushing against another. He grunts into you again, his hand finally snapping up to cup the back of your neck, the other gripping your ass as he bucked up hard, almost desperate now.
You rock against him, your body finding its own tide, rolling and pushing and pulling until there is nothing left but friction and sound. The couch creaks beneath you, leather warm and slick under your knees, the air thick with the smell of sweat and whatever chemical sweetness still coats the back of your tongue. His cock fills you so completely it blurs the edges of you, presses thought out of your skull until all that remains is the dull, liquid awareness of being split open and held there.
You sink down harder, chasing that pressure, that fullness, the way it makes your vision dim and your breath go awry, and you’re crying out as your hands slide over him, his neck, the thick expanse of his shoulders. You bow over him, forehead pressing into the crook of his jaw as he kisses you anywhere he can reach. His lips are everywhere, sloppy and hungry, dragging across the crest of your shoulder, tongue too hot, too thick, like he is trying to taste you off himself. His beard scrapes your skin raw, sparks lighting behind your eyes, and you wail, the sound loud and needy and humiliating as stars burst in your eyes.
He’s making so many good noises, grunts and cursing beneath you, feeling the constricting of your velvet walls choking him, his throat closing as if he’s run out of air. Your hips don’t stop in their obsession, circling, obscene and loud in their sticky greed. His breath is ragged beneath you, but his eyes, his pretty hazel eyes, swallowed up by the blackness of arousal, are looking at you, a stupid little grin on his face.
Your want, your anger, it feels poisonous as you watch each other.
“That’s it, baby,” he coos, “fuckin’ yourself on me so good now, huh? Takin’ what you want?”
You whine, clawing at his throat, the feeling in your thighs cramping and tired.
“God, she feels good,” he chuckles—laughs. You dig your nails in harder to his throat, embarrassed, frantic. How dare he make light while you’re unraveling like this, burning alive from the inside out, making you want him so bad it’s painful.
“Prettiest pussy,” he murmurs. “Prettiest girl.”
Your heart swells fast, too full, too much—a quick, blooming ache that presses up against your ribs like it wants out, like it might burst through its cage. Prettiest girl. You’d never heard that before. Your mind feels like watercolor, vision blurring with color and salt, the static of an old world cartoon making your eyes into big, pulsing hearts for him.
His smile drops and he leans up only to pull you down, thick bands of muscled arms winding around you so you can no longer move, tight against him, yes yes, break me, break me, you think. He’s kissing your face, no—licking it, one fat stripe up your cheek until he presses his soft lips to your temple, “Why you cryin’, hunny?” he says mid groan, fat length still plunging in and out of you as he holds you as if in a vice against him.
You hadn’t even realized you were crying. You’re too full, too sore, too overwhelmed in your want for him. Your cunt pulses, fluttering around him in the aftermath of your orgasm, brain soft and heavy, nothing left but sensation and scent and him.
You dip your head against his shoulder, eyes wet, lips brushing the thick plane of his shoulder.
“Say it again,” you whisper, rocking up as he keeps his hips moving.
He hums in a sort of feral realization, “What? That you’re my pretty girl?”
You nod enthusiastically, hiding your face. My—my my my my my. Your new favorite word.
You’re curled into him almost, knees in the couch, damp belly sliding against his, arms around him to hide from his words. Those sounds, the grunts and the moans and near whimpers, you collect them in your mind, keep them, they’re yours, even if only for now. His hands are gripping the sides of you enough to bruise, arms still wrapped tightly around your back. He’s barely rocking into you, grinding up up up, and you swear you can feel it all the way in your lungs, filling you, taking you.
“That what you wanted to hear, huh?” he pants. “That you’re mine?”
His voice sounds wrecked, but you nod some more.
“You are, y'know, been mine longer than you even fuckin’ know,”
He must feel it then, the way something vacant and dizzy passes through you. You look up at him, face slack and dazed, mouth open, pulling air, your body forgetting its simplest instincts, to swell and squeeze the blood in your hearts, the pull of your lungs all stopping at that word. Mine. Its echo fills your ears. He’s looking down at you the same way, pupils blown wide, jaw tight, sweat already beading at his temple despite the cold.
“Think I keep you supplied cause I’m nice, baby?” he says, that mean little grin back on his face with his words, leaning down to place a fat, wet kiss on your swollen lips. His hand comes up, rough and possessive, thumb and fingers pinching your cheeks, forcing your face up to him. He watches you as he does it, lip curled, hungry. “Only reason you get high is cause a’me,” he growls out, “I keep you comin’ back, keep you close, keep you from runnin’ out on me,”
You’re gripping his shoulders, “I wouldn’t—I won’t—”
“That’s right,” he nods, his hot breath on your lips as he brings you closer, and he lets his tongue out to trace your pursed lips, “No more bein' my scared little baby anymore,”
His hips snap up harder and you cry out, the stretch obscene, your body too open, too sensitive. You can feel him everywhere now—the way he’s gripping you tighter, the tremor running through his thighs, the heat pouring off him.
“You make me fuckin’ mean, girl,” he says, voice dropping, rough and somehow reverent all at once. “Mean as a damn dog.”
He’s close. You can feel it in the way his thrusts lose their rhythm, in the way his breath breaks apart, in the slick heat gathering between you. Sweat slides down the side of his face. His grip is already leaving crescents in your skin. You hope they stay, you hope they bring blood to the surface, reminders when all of this goes back to what it was before.
Your mind floats, cotton-soft and buzzing. He’s close. He’s getting so close.
“And what if I filled you up, huh?” he murmurs, almost thoughtful, almost curious. “What if I didn’t pull out this time?”
Your pussy is clenching around him, just at the thought—the thought of being swollen and round with his seed, with his baby, to be his his his his. Forever.
“Where you gonna go then?” he pants. “Can’t get high if I put a baby in you. Can’t disappear. You’d be stuck with me for good. Yeah, yeah, take my cock, good girl, yes—”
He drives up into you once more, deep and unforgiving, groaning your name as he spills inside you, hot and endless, holding you down like he means every word. You feel it, the warmth flooding you, the way he stays there, buried, breathing hard against your neck. You wade in it, in this warmth, in this feeling, the burn of his skin against yours, scalding and comforting. You savor it, stretching the moment out like a cat in the window, slow and spoiled in the sun, catching what warmth she can before the light slips away. You keep the thoughts of what next? quieted in your mind, tucked some place you can ignore for now. You’re so full, full of him, of want, a sort of hope.
Your eyelids grow heavy, though you don’t notice the moment it starts. Everything around you begins to blur, the air thick and muffled, the world softening at the edges as your body goes loose against his chest. You’re dozing like that, easy, without any thought, still wrapped around him, his cock softening slowly inside you, his spend warm and lingering where it rests. You only half feel him shifting beneath you, careful in his movement. A coat—his coat, you can smell him— is draped over your exposed back, the weight grounding and warm. He tucks it around you, holding you against him, and you feel submerged in his scent.
Somewhere, far, far away, a door opens.
A part of your brain stirs, sluggish and annoyed, the faint urge to open your eyes, to see who would dare intrude on this. On your time, on your relief. But you don’t move. You don’t have it in you.
You hear his voice instead—low, rough, territorial.
“Fuck off.” he says, and then, another voice, her voice, the one that has makes you jealous and child-like in its foolishness.
He is quick to spit back, dismissive, “Later, Tess.”
The door shuts. The sound seals you back inside the quiet.
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