it's less about keeping the horny off main and more about making the horny easier to navigate. (sideblog). My mental health thanks all the x reader writers for your service
Born in the 1900s
def would be obsessed w a part 2 of the sonar fic :33
Bat-Brained Decisions
Prompt: You thought you were just helping your best friend through a rough month. He thought he could handle it. Now he’s under you, overstimulated, fanged, and begging.
Pairing(s): Victor (Sonar) x vampire!reader
Warnings: NSFW, Dirty smut, oral sex (f receiving), face sitting, overstimulation, biting, vaginal sex, creampies, multiple, breeding, knotting, bat boy go stupid, he go crazy
A/N: might make besties sonar x vampy reader a series type shit, like a daily look into their lives when they fuck JAJAJAJA also IM AWARE THIS TOOK A LONG TIME TO PUT OUT…….i got to busy doing other shit
Masterlist
You prance around the office, taking a small shortcut to the break room. It’s been a couple of months since the whole incident with Sonar went down.
Literally.
He went down on you.
On the floor of your apartment, back against your couch, face buried between your thighs until you could barely remember your own name. He’d made a complete mess of himself and you, and then both of you just… ordered food and watched something stupid like nothing life-altering had happened.
And honestly? It hadn't.
You can’t say much has changed since then. You both went right back to your usual shenanigans like it hadn’t happened at all. The two of you still bicker, still talk shit, still flirt just to piss off everyone around you. Best friends first, menaces always.
If anything, the only real “win” from that night was that you finally broke up with your boyfriend.
Yeah, there was no way you were going to keep pretending he was enough, not after Sonar made true on his promise to eat you out better than your boyfriend ever had. Once you’ve been ruined properly, it’s hard to go back to “adequate.”
You push the break room door open and beeline straight toward the fridge, rummaging around to see if you have any blood packs left tucked behind someone’s sad salad.
You’re elbow-deep in the break room fridge when the door clicks open behind you. You don’t have to look to know it’s someone with enough presence to trigger your fight-or-bite reflex.
Still, you glance back.
“Oi,” Malevola greets, strolling in like she owns the entire building. Tail sways behind her, lazy and predatory.
“Hey Mal,” you greet casually, triumphant when you finally locate a blood pack shoved behind something that used to be yogurt. You pop a straw in the pouch like it’s a Capri Sun.
Mal watches you sip for exactly two seconds before snorting.
“That for breakfast, or is this just… Tuesday for you?”
“Don’t judge me,” you warn. “I’m at ‘bite someone’ levels of hungry.”
She waves a hand. “Sweetheart, if you bite an intern I’ll give you twenty bucks and a standing ovation. Half of ‘em annoy me anyway.”
You bark a laugh, nearly choking on your blood.
Mal leans back against the counter like she’s settling in for a good show. Her eyes rake over you in that mildly threatening way she has—like she’s assessing your aura, your sins, and your credit score all at once.
“You look lively today,” she notes. “Almost radiant. I’d ask if you found religion, but… well.”
She gestures to herself. “I am the competition.”
You snort. “Please. The day I worship you is the day Robert learns to relax.”
“Hot,” she replies dryly. “But no, really— what’s put you in a good mood?”
You shrug your shoulders, totally unbothered. “Maybe it’s just a good day today?” you offer, like that isn’t the most suspicious statement you’ve made all week.
Truth is, you’re not even sure yourself why you’re in such a stupidly good mood.
You haven’t gotten laid in a while.
Your blood intake is back to pathetic little “sippy cup” portions.
And life is… life.
You pause, then snort into your straw. “Actually? It’s probably because I don’t have a fuck-ass boyfriend to take care of anymore.”
Mal grins like she’s heard the funniest confession of her immortal life.
“Oh sweetheart, hallelujah. Consider me your lord and savior for guiding you out of that nonsense.”
You snort into your straw. “You didn’t guide shit.”
“Incorrect,” she corrects smugly. “I judged it. And my judgment is law.”
You roll your eyes, but your smile doesn’t fade. She watches you a moment longer, tail curling idly behind her, eyes sharp and pleased.
“Honestly,” she adds, tapping a claw thoughtfully against her chin, “you’ve looked freer ever since you cut that man loose. Must be nice not having some insecure mortal breathing down your neck every time Sonar so much as exists.”
You pause mid-sip, eyebrow creeping up.
Mal raises one right back.
For a full two seconds the two of you stare at each other like feral raccoons in a standoff—and then you both snicker.
Of course she knows.
Everyone knows.
Every poor soul in this building has survived at least one of your rants about your ex losing his entire mind anytime Sonar breathed in your direction.
“Well, what can I say,” you drawl, lifting your blood pack like you’re toasting to your own freedom. “Good riddance.”
“Good riddance indeed,” she cackles, sounding like she’s about to consecrate the break room floor in your honor.
“…Speaking of which,” you murmur, brows knitting a little. “Have you seen Sonar lately?”
Mal flicks her gaze toward you thoughtfully, “No actually. Not since… what, last Friday? Think he’s okay? Or maybe sprawled out somewhere high as hell?”
You shrug. “Probably. Could also just be taking an impromptu vacation. Bat boy goes feral and vanishes sometimes. Part of his whole… ecosystem.”
Truthfully, you’re a little surprised you haven’t seen him.
Last time was about a week ago—the two of you sitting cross-legged in a park like delinquent pigeons, downing pizza slices the size of your head and talking shit about the team’s performance that day.
Mal hums thoughtfully. “Sonar disappearing is either normal… or concerning. Depends on the level of cocaine involved.”
“Mm.” You sip again. “I’ll check in on him later. Just in case he’s face-down in a dumpster somewhere.”
Mal laughs. “He’s your problem. I’m not designated bat wrangler.”
You flip her off casually.
Then the break room door opens.
Malevola’s smirk grows slow and wicked.
“Well,” she murmurs in that faux-holy tone she likes to use, “look who crawled out of the cave.”
You don’t even get the chance to play dumb.
“The hell are you on about,” comes a familiar, exhausted voice behind you.
You turn.
And yeah—it’s Sonar.
But not the Sonar you’re used to.
Both you and Malevola exchange a glance.
He doesn’t look different.
But he looks different.
Tiny things.
The tilt of his ears.
The sluggish blink of his white eyes.
The way his shoulders don’t sit quite right beneath his suit.
You tilt your head at him, frowning slightly.
“…You good, dude? You kinda look like shit.”
Sonar stares at you, flat and deadpan, like your concern personally offends him.
“Thanks,” he mutters, “love hearing that first thing in the morning.”
“It’s noon,” Mal supplies helpfully.
Sonar flips her off without looking.
His gaze returns to you—tired, sharp, assessing you the same way he always does, even when he’s clearly running on fumes.
You sip your blood again, slower this time.
Because now that he’s closer… something’s definitely off.
Here’s the thing.
You’re not a goddamn bat.
You’re a vampire.
People love to lump you two together—“what’s the difference?”
The difference is you’re a fucking vampire–you eat people for a living, you're prettier, you smell better, and you have actual standards.
But yeah, you’ve got overlap—like having a high sense of smell.
So when something changes in someone’s scent? You catch it.
Your nose twitches automatically, and you ignore it at first until the scent hits again.
Heavy.
Musky.
Sharp around the edges, soaked into him like it’s been there for hours, maybe days. It’s buried under his usual cocktail of caffeine sweat, old cologne, and whatever cheap-ass soap he uses—but it’s there, almost persistent.
You scrunch your face, confused, and take another pointed sniff before you can stop yourself.
Your head tilts slowly.
Expression going from casual confusion to: What the actual fuck???
Because Sonar smells… different.
Not sick.
Not drugged.
More like—
Sonar raises a brow, deadpan.
“…Why are you sniffing me like that?” he asks.
But you barely pay attebtion to him.
You’ve only ever smelled that exact scent under two circumstances:
1. Right before you feed on someone who really, really wants you.
2. Someone who has aphrodisiacs swimming in their system for whatever reasons.
And Sonar?
He smells like both.
Slowly, the realization hits.
You slide a hand into your pocket, whip out your phone, checking the date.
Ah.
Right.
It’s the first week of mating season.
You snort under your breath, shove your phone away, and lean back against the counter like you didn't suddenly connect every weird detail.
“No reason,” you reply lazily, stabbing your straw back into your blood pouch and downing the rest like it’s the most casual Tuesday morning activity.
Malevola gives you a slow, wicked smile—one that says “I know exactly what you just figured out” and also “I am absolutely going to scream about this in the group chat.”
She snickers and gives your shoulder a pat before turning toward the door.
“Robert just called for me. Try not to start a soap opera while I’m gone, yeah?”
You flip her off as she leaves.
The room goes quiet.
Your eyes slide back to Sonar—who is currently rummaging through the cabinet and grabbing a bag of dried crickets like he didn’t just walk in radiating the kind of scent that drives others wild.
He tears the bag open with his teeth and you watch him chew sluggishly. He swallows, glances at you, ears twitching again.
“…What?” he asks flatly.
You stare him down.
He stares back.
“What?” he repeats, flatter this time.
You snicker, pushing yourself up onto the table and leaning back on your hands like you’re settling in for a show. “Why on earth are you here?”
Sonar lazily follows the movement of your legs like it’s instinct before snapping his eyes back up and raising a brow. “What do you mean? I work here.”
“Mmh, yeah, no, I know that.” You wave a hand. “But why are you here. At the office. In public. Around civilians.”
He squints.
“Like I said. I work here.”
“Sonar,” you say slowly, tilting your head at him with all the subtlety of a brick. “You should be home.”
He freezes like you said something that confirmed a suspicion he didn’t want to have in the first place.
You see the exact moment the truth hits him.
His shoulders drop.
His ears twitch once in defeat.
Then he sighs—long, exhausted, and so deeply put-upon you almost feel bad.
Almost.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
You beam at him sweetly. “Nope.”
He glares. “You can smell it?”
“Oh yeah.” You stretch, making no effort to hide your satisfaction. “It’s strong as hell, by the way. Like… offensively strong.”
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “For fu— I didn’t even think it started yet.”
“It did,” you chirp. “Congratulations. You are officially in season.”
“Don’t,” he warns, pointing at you like a tired substitute teacher at the end of his contract.
“You’re literally dripping pheromones all over the room,” you continue, thoroughly entertained. “And you’re working like everything’s normal. You should be home.”
He drags a hand down his face. “I hate this. I hate all of this.”
You shrug. “Go home.”
“No.”
“Why?”
He gestures at himself. “Because I’m fine.”
You snort.
“Sonar. Babe. Buddy. Pal.” You lean forward. “You smell like you crawled out of a heat-sponsored orgy.”
He stares at you, dead behind the eyes.
“This is the worst day of my life.”
“No it’s not,” you coo. “Last month you microwaved a fork.”
His ears flatten in offense. “It sparked, okay?”
You swing your legs idly off the table, studying him with shameless curiosity.
“So,” you hum casually, “you gonna keep pretending you’re fine… or are you gonna admit you should be locked in your apartment right now before you do something stupid?”
His eye twitches.
And for the first time today, he looks away from you.
He sighs, rubbing the back of his neck.
“I feel… fine,” he mutters, which is already a lie. “Other than maybe a bit sluggish, but I’m fine enough to work and shit. Shouldn’t even hit me fully for like… a couple more days.”
A couple more days.
Oh, the poor bastard has no idea.
“Mmm,” you hum, sliding off the table with a slow, lazy stretch. You stroll right into his space, close enough that he has to tilt his chin to look down at you. “You smell… nice.”
His brow shoots up, suspicious.
You smirk and let your eyes flash red for half a second, just enough to make his breath catch.
“You know,” you purr, “it’s dangerous for you to be walking around smelling like that—”
Your head tilts, fangs peeking slightly as you breathe him in again.
“—especially for those who get affected by your pheromones.”
His ears twitch.
“Dangerous?” he repeats, deadpan.
You nod slowly, lips curving.
“Like dangling a piece of meat in front of a starving lion,” you snicker. “I’m shocked no one’s jumped you in the supply closet yet with you smelling this delicious.”
His mouth opens but nothing comes out because he knows you’re not exaggerating.
He just hoped you wouldn’t notice.
Idiot.
You step in again, closing the distance, your chest nearly brushing his.
“Sonar,” you murmur, voice dipping just enough to make his spine straighten, “you’re leaking pheromones like you’re trying to summon a mate.”
His jaw clenches.
“And you’re saying this just to annoy me?”
You grin.
“No. I’m saying this because if some thirsty little nobody wanders in here and picks up that scent before you get home…”
You lean in, lips grazing the shell of his ear as you whisper.
“…I might have to kill them.”
He shivers.
And for the first time since he walked in, you see it.
The look.
The one he had the last time he was under you, wrecked with endorphins, whining into your skin.
You straighten up, smug as hell.
“Go home,” you tell him.
He stares at you.
And the scent coming off him—heavy, hot, wrong in all the best ways—rises just a little stronger.
“Say please,” he mutters weakly.
Oh.
So that’s how today’s going to go.
Your smirk turns into something dangerous.
“I don’t think you want me to say please,” you murmur. “Not when you're like that.”
He swallows hard. He knows you’re right, knows exactly how this ends if he doesn’t walk out that door.
You watch him struggle with himself for another second—the stubbornness, the pride, the Sonar-ness of it all—before something in you softens a bit.
You let the smirk fade into something smaller, quieter, the kind of smile you don’t hand out often.
“…Go home,” you murmur.
He blinks, thrown off by the shift in your tone.
You reach into your pocket, pull out your apartment keys, and press them into his palm before he can argue, his fingers curling around them automatically.
“Crash at my place,” you tell him gently. “I’ll come after my shift ends.”
You step back, giving him space to breathe, to think, to not combust in the middle of the SDN break room.
“There’s enough room for you to shift if you need to,” you add, eyes dragging over him once more, cataloguing every tired line of his posture. “The couch, the floor, the balcony—whatever. You’re safe there.”
He swallows, looking at the keys like they’re radioactive.
You continue anyway, already slipping back into your usual rhythm.
“I’ll let Robert know you won’t be in for the next month or so,” you say simply. “I’ll tell him your season started.”
His eyes flicker. “A month?”
You raise a brow. “You're lucky if it's just a month.”
He doesn’t argue.
You adjust your jacket, back-stepping toward the door.
“Need me to bring anything?” you ask lightly.
He opens his mouth but you cut him off with a small, tired wave of your hand.
“Never mind. I’ll bring snacks.”
You slip out of the break room, leaving him standing there, holding your keys, stunned, scent-hot, and suddenly very aware that he may not be spending this mating season alone.
And honestly?
You’re not sure which one of you that’s more dangerous for.
The rest of the day was still a struggle, but not because the Z-Team suddenly forgot how to function without Sonar.
They were fine.
Chaotic as ever.
Robert’s sanity, though? In shambles.
Telling him about Sonar’s condition had been the highlight of your day. You’d said “So… Sonar’s out for mating season” and watched the light leave that man’s eyes in real time. He closed them, pinched the bridge of his nose, and went silent in that way that screams “I regret every life choice that brought me here.”
Then he sighed and said, with the patience of someone signing a death warrant:
“Fine. Tell him he can take September and October. All of it. Just... stay away from HQ.”
Two months. Paid.
Because his biology decided to throw a horny party.
You’d pouted the entire walk from his cubicle. All that time off for pheromones, huh? Meanwhile you’re out here getting maybe a long weekend if you don’t die on shift.
By the time your hours were up, you were more mentally fried than physically. Too much comms chatter, not enough blood, and way too much thinking about the bat currently haunting your apartment.
You twisted the knob of your door and stepped inside, letting it close behind you with a soft thud. Shoes off. Jacket on the rack. A long, bone-deep sigh leaking out of you as you padded toward the living room and then stopped, your senses catching everything:
Warm air.
Drawn curtains.
And Sonar’s scent, settled into the room like he’d been breathing there for hours.
Yeah.
He made it.
You hum low as you trek deeper into the living room.
Your couch never stood a chance.
Sonar, who was in his bat form, was sprawled across it like a cryptid that broke into a studio apartment. All seven-foot-five of him, limbs and wings draped everywhere, fur bristled in sleep, his stupid tie somehow still on.
You snicker.
“Sonar,” you murmur softly.
He stirs, a low rumble vibrating out of his chest as one ear twitches. He peels his eyes open slowly, unfocused at first, then zeroing on you.
“…Vespera…” he grunts, voice deeper.
Your grin widens.
“Hey, big guy.”
You head toward the kitchen, setting the grocery bags on the counter with a soft thump—blood packs, water, painkillers (because you know he’s going to pretend he doesn’t need them later), and snacks that are definitely not FDA-approved.
Behind you, the couch groans under his shifting weight.
You feel his attention track you, glowing red eyes watching your every movement with slow, hungry awareness.
You hear him move, the soft scrape of claws on wood, the low rumble of breath, the faint shift of weight as something massive stalks up behind you.
Then his hands slide around your waist, clawed fingers curling lightly against your hips, sharp, yet gentle enough to remind you he’s him.
He leans in, snout pressing into the crook of your neck, breath ghosting across your skin. He inhales deeply, long and slow, dragging your scent into his lungs like he’s been craving it.
The exhale that follows is pure contentment. A warm, heavy purr that vibrates against your shoulder.
You lift a hand and rest it on the back of his neck. His fur is thicker in this form, plush and warm, and when your fingers rake through it, he lets out a series of small, involuntary clicking noises.
Cute.
If he wasn’t a seven-foot-five nightmare creature, it might even be adorable.
“How fucking domestic of us,” you snicker.
He huffs in amusement against your neck, a breathy half-laugh, half-growl.
“How are you feeling?” you ask, tone light, your hand still moving through his fur in slow, grounding strokes.
He hums low and deep, almost considering, like he’s actually trying to translate instinct into words. His claws trace along your hips in absent little circles, careful not to break skin, his body pressed close. Another rumble vibrates out of him.
Then finally, rough and low:
“…Weird.”
You keep your hand at his nape, thumb stroking a small patch of fur to keep him steady.
“Weird good or weird bad?” you murmur.
Glowing red eyes blink, slow and uneven.
“…Both.”
You hum at his words, slow and thoughtful, fingers still brushing over the warm fur at his nape.
“Yeah… sounds like everything’s gonna hit you hard by tomorrow.”
You tilt your head slightly, inhaling again, the scent rolling off him thick, simmering just under the surface.
“Smells like it too,” you add, voice dry.
His grip tightens on your hips for a split second before you gently push him back.
“Alright, Scooby-Doo, personal space. Move.”
He lets out a reluctant grumble but steps back enough for you to reach the counter. You pull out a plate and dump the dead mice you bought earlier onto it. He eyes them, ears angling forward with interest.
“Here,” you say, sliding the plate toward him. “Eat something.”
He hesitates for half a second, then he’s on the plate like he's never fed before. You can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of you.
“Get some energy, big guy. You’re gonna be too focused on wanting to breed something to eat later.”
He freezes mid-chew, ears flattening just slightly, a low offended chuff rising from his chest.
You ignore it, humming to yourself as you start packing away your blood supply and the rest of your groceries, settling into your routine.
You head into your room, peeling off your clothes with a tired little groan, tossing your jacket onto the bed. Faintly, you hear the low scrape and crack of bones rearranging, the familiar sound of him shifting back into his humanoid hybrid form.
At least he’ll fit in the damn clothes.
You rummage through your dresser, digging past your own sweats until you find one of the oversized pairs he left behind months ago. You hold them up, give them a quick sniff (clean enough), then pad back out into the living room.
He’s hunched over the now-empty plate, finishing off the last mouse like it’s a snack pack.
You drop the sweats on the arm of the couch.
“Clothes,” you announce.
He grunts his acknowledgment around a mouthful, already pulling them on with that eerie speed he has when he’s not pretending to be civilized.
You flop onto the couch, grab the remote, and start flipping channels. Eventually you settle on some mindless reality show where everyone is shouting and somehow still boring. Good enough for background noise.
You lean back, stretch your legs, and glance over at him.
He’s sitting on the floor beside the couch now, half-dressed, eyes lidded. His chest rises and falls steadily.
“…Feel better?” you murmur.
He wipes a smear of blood from his mouth with the back of his hand and looks up at you.
And he does actually look better.
“Let me eat you out.”
Just like that.
No buildup. No context. No shame—not even a dramatic pause.
You blink at him once.
“...The fuck, Sonar,” you snicker, lips twitching.
He shrugs, absolutely unbothered. “Been a while. Wanna eat you out.”
Like it’s part of his biological needs. Water. Sleep. Food. Your pussy.
A laugh spills out of you before you can stop it, “Okay, okay—down, boy.” You point a finger at him teasingly. “No biting you this time, though. Not trying to send you into another spiral.”
He snorts, settling between your knees already like he was just waiting for you to say yes.
“Yeah, whatever,” he mutters, hands sliding up your thighs. “Didn’t ask for teeth. I asked for a meal.”
“Yet,” you say, tone dripping with smug amusement, “you haven’t asked me for teeth yet. You’re gonna get pussy-drunk and then beg me to bite you, and that’s when everything goes straight to hell.”
You’re laughing under your breath as you lift your hips, letting him slide your shorts down your legs in slow inches. His fingers tease your skin on the way, deliberate enough to make you shiver.
He settles between your thighs like he’s been waiting there for days. His palms bracket your hips, thumbs stroking once, twice, claiming their spot. Those pale white eyes lift to yours, already a little hazy.
“I might be going into mating season,” he mutters, “but give me some fucking credit. I’m not bat-brained right now.”
You tilt your head, gaze drifting downward slowly, deliberately.
Down to his shoulders nestled between your legs, to the way he’s breathing through his mouth like he’s trying not to salivate, to the subtle twitch of his nose as he inhales your scent and pretends he isn’t doing exactly that.
Then you lift your eyes again and your smile is wicked.
“…Really?” you murmur, voice soft and loaded.
He tries to scoff, pretend you’re not seeing him unravel in real time.
“Don’t,” he mutters, staring pointedly at your face. “Don’t give me that look.”
You blink innocently. “What look?”
“The one where you pretend you’re not doing this on purpose.”
You grin.
“Sonar,” you whisper, brushing your fingers through his fur, “you’re literally kneeling between my legs looking desperate as fuck.”
He rolls his eyes at your sarcasm, a tired little flick that says yeah, yeah, keep talking, before he pointedly drops his attention to something far more important.
You don’t even get a full second to smirk before his head dips, the bridge of his snout brushing the edge of your cunt—light enough to tease, intentional enough to steal your breath. His inhale is slow, indulgent, dragging your scent deep into his lungs like he’s been starving for it.
He may have been drunk off your bite last time, blissed-out and incoherent, but this is different. This is him sober. Fully aware, fully present, and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t get a taste of you like this.
His tongue slips out—pink, warm—giving you one slow, deliberate drag from the bottom of your wet pussy up to the top, collecting everything you're giving him.
You feel the breath leave him in a shuddering sigh against your skin, too pleased for someone who swore he had “control.”
He noses your inner thigh once, almost nuzzling, then goes back in with another slow lick, like he’s reacquainting himself with a favorite flavor he hasn’t had in months.
“I swear…” he mutters against you, voice low and rough around the edges, “you taste even better when I’m not high.”
You shiver in his hold, instinctively lifting and adjusting your legs until you’ve framed his face exactly how you know he likes, your thighs snug against the sides of his jaw, his ears brushing your skin every time he moves.
“Is that a compliment?” you breathe, voice shaky, “I’ll take it as one.”
He huffs a soft, dismissive snort before his tongue pushes in deeper.
That first slow thrust has you sucking in a gasp through your teeth. The second one is firmer, more focused, and then he’s properly eating you out, mouth greedy and practiced like he’s been replaying the memory for months and now that he finally has you again, he’s going to make absolutely sure you feel it.
Your moans spill out in soft, breathy pulses, slipping free no matter how hard you try to bite them back. You tilt your head back against the couch, eyes fluttering closed as pleasure rolls through you.
His tongue drags up between your folds, savoring every bit of your taste, then dips, thrusting inside you in a maddening rhythm. Every wiggle, every push, every subtle grind of his snout sends a spark of pleasure ricocheting through your cunt.
You breathe out his name again, softer this time, almost slurred.
“Sonar…”
Your fingers drift into his fur, raking through the soft strands at the back of his head. He makes a sound somewhere between a grunt and a purr, his breath fanning hot against your inner thigh.
Then he seals his mouth around your clit, sucking harshly before flicking it with his tongue.
You jolt so hard your hand slips in his fur. He doesn’t stop—doesn’t even pause. He just does it again, working you with an obscene focus that makes your chest tighten and your breath break into little stuttering gasps.
“Fuck…” you whimper, hips twitching despite yourself. His hands tighten around your thighs immediately, holding you steady like he knew you were going to start squirming.
He repeats that same combo—suck, flick, drag of his tongue down the length of your folds—like he’s studying every reaction you give him, memorizing the way you tremble.
“Doing so good for me,” you sigh, voice syrupy, dazed. “Eating me out so well… fuck, baby…”
The second you praise him, he groans into you. A deep, rough sound that vibrates right against your clit before rolling through your whole core. You feel it in your spine, feel it in your toes, feel it in the way heat blooms in your belly.
He responds to praise like it’s another aphrodisiac.
His grip tightens again.
His tongue moves deeper.
Hungrier.
“You like that, huh…” you murmur breathlessly, sliding your fingers through his fur and scratching lightly at his scalp. “You like hearing how good you are for me?”
His whole body shudders.
He drags his tongue between your folds again and thrusts it inside you with a needy groan that makes your hips buck against his face.
He holds you there, pinned and trembling, completely at his mercy as he tongues you slow and deep, savoring every bit of you like he’s starving.
You can barely keep your eyes open.
Pleasure is curling tight and low, winding you up with each desperate lap of his tongue.
“Sonar…” you breathe, voice cracking just a little. “Shit… you’re gonna—”
He growls, the sound rough and possessive and vibrating right through your core, and you swear your brain blanks out for a second.
He’s savoring you, tasting you, letting every little praise and moan you give him pull him deeper under.
And the worst part?
He’s not even close to done.
Your whimpers start coming quicker—little broken sounds that slip out every time his tongue pushes deeper, every time his mouth seals around you like he’s trying to devour you whole. His name tumbles off your lips without restraint, tangled with gasps and soft curses you can’t hold back.
His grip tightens and hauls you harder against his face, practically burying himself under you. His tongue thrusts deeper, needy and desperate, the angle forcing your back to arch, your breath to stutter, and the rising heat to snap hard through your body.
Your orgasm hits with a sharp, trembling surge.
“Sonar…” you moan, voice shaking as your hips roll over his face. Slick spills down his snout, coating him completely, and he groans into it like he’s been waiting for it. “Such a good boy for me…”
He shudders at the praise.
His tongue licks you through your high, slow and greedy.
Your breathing stutters, sensitivity sparking across your skin, the overstimulation buzzing under every nerves—warm, dizzying, almost too much—before you lean back and pant down at him.
“You can give me another one, right?”
You didn’t even finish the sentence before his hands drag you back down, mouth already sealing around your clit.
You gasp, another moan ripping out of you.
“Be a good boy for me…” you whine, thighs trembling around his head. “Make me cum again.”
He growls and dives back in with a hunger that tells you one very dangerous thing:
He's going to pull more than one out of you.
He coaxes two more orgasms out of you with an obscene level of patience, working you through every shiver, every twitch, every shaky gasp until your thighs feel like they’re buzzing with static.
You barely get a breath in before his hands slide under you, lifting you effortlessly. Your voice cracks in a soft noise of surprise as he scoops you up like you weigh nothing.
He doesn’t give you time to question it.
He carries you to your bedroom in a few brisk steps, drops onto the mattress, and immediately places you on top of him, guiding you up his body until you’re straddling his chest, then his shoulders, and ultimately his face.
He pulls you down like he’s starving.
You yelp, the sudden spike of overstimulation hitting you like a shock. Your whole body shudders, thighs trembling uncontrollably as his mouth seals around you again. His tongue meets you with the same hunger as before, but sharper this time—more urgent, more primal.
“Sonar—” you gasp, voice breaking.
His arms snake around you, looping under your thighs and sliding up over your hips, locking you in place. You’re held down completely as he drags you back onto his mouth.
You tremble, instinct fighting to pull away from the intensity, but his hold is steady, grounding—pleading, almost.
The overstimulation hits harder now, a deep electric pressure curling low in your belly. Every slow drag of his tongue makes your hips jolt, every soft suck forces another noise out of your mouth.
He’s devouring you like he’s making up for every second he didn’t get to have you.
You relent, grinding down onto his face, letting him take control, letting the pleasure crash over the overstimulation until the two blur into something raw and dizzying.
His grip tightens around your hips.
He groans beneath you—deep, wanting, satisfied.
And you swear you feel the sound vibrate through you all the way to your spine.
“Need you to give me one more,” he rasps, voice roughened into something deep and primal. His breath is hot against you, his grip firm on your hips. “Just one more baby…”
Before you can respond, he drags his tongue through your folds with quick, hungry strokes that snap your breath right out of your chest. Your thighs tense instinctively, but he forces your hips to roll down against his face, pushing your clit against the bridge of his snout with deliberate pressure.
You choke out a whimper, fingers digging into the fur at the back of his head.
“T-think… I’m gonna—” your voice cracks, dissolving into a slurred moan as your body pulses with warning heat, “Sonar… baby boy, you’re gonna make me—”
He groans loud beneath you, the sound vibrating against your core, and it nearly knocks the air out of your lungs. He tightens his hold, dragging your hips in harsher, more relentless motions, guiding you exactly where he wants you.
His tongue thrusts inside you lazily again contrasting the rough grind he keeps forcing against your clit. The combination sends sparks shooting up your spine, your breath breaking into sharp, helpless sounds.
Your whole body spasms as the pleasure slams into you—sharp, overwhelming, white-hot. Your head tips back, mouth falling open on a ragged moan as your hips jerk helplessly against his face.
“S-Sonar—!”
His name rips out of you, breathless and broken, fingers locking so tight in his fur your knuckles ache.
The orgasm tears through you hard—your muscles clench, your thighs tremble violently, and little droplets gush out in quick, uncontrollable bursts. It hits his mouth first, then his chin, then down the line of his throat and onto his chest, dripping onto the sheets beneath him.
He groans eagerly and drenched, the sound only making your release pulse harder.
Your hips stutter wildly, rhythm lost, body shivering through the aftershocks. Only when you’re shaking too hard to stay upright does he finally let up.
He pulls back with a wet gasp, chest heaving, mouth and snout slick. And before you can breathe, before you can even blink, he flips you onto your back.
Your world tilts, sheets rustling under you, and then he’s above you—hovering, crowding in close, kissing up your stomach in slow, claiming presses of his mouth. His hands roam your hips, your waist, your ribcage with irresistible focus.
By the time he reaches your chest, you’re already grabbing at him, pulling, needing him close.
He pushes his sweats down just enough—just far enough—to free the heavy length straining beneath them.
He drags the tip through your still-twitching folds, letting the slick noise cut through the quiet room.
Slow. Teasing.
Dragging up…
Then down…
Then up again…
Your breath hitches.
He groans against your throat, voice low and gravelly from need.
He presses in slowly, deep and unhurried, pushing inch by inch into the heat he’s been starving for. Your back arches as his grip tightens on your waist. The moment he’s fully sheathed inside you, you both stopped breathing.
“Tight… so fucking tight,” he grunts, the words punched out of him as he pulls back an inch and sinks back in again.
He starts slow, like he’s deliberately savoring how you clench and flutter around him, how your body reacts to every single thrust. Each movement drags a new sound from your lips, each push has your back arching off the sheets.
His breath grows uneven, chest rising and falling against yours. The slow rhythm only makes it worse for him—every time he pulls out, the tightness around him makes him shudder, jaw flexing as he fights not to lose it instantly.
He watches the way he disappears into you, watches the slick drag along his length when he draws back, watches your thighs tremble.
“Fuck me…” he mumbles, voice cracking with something rawer than desperation. His brows furrow like he’s genuinely overwhelmed, like he can’t believe you feel like this.
He keeps staring—lost in the sight, lost in the heat, lost in the way your body tightens around him like it’s pulling him deeper.
And he doesn’t notice.
He doesn’t notice the way your breath changes, soft gasps sharpening into something low and hungry.
He doesn’t notice your pupils shrinking, your eyes darkening then flashing red.
He doesn’t notice the way your lips part, the corner of your mouth twitching as your fangs slowly begin to lengthen.
He’s so focused on your body swallowing him, too engrossed in the pull of your heat, that he doesn’t notice until it’s too late—your nails biting into his shoulder, your fangs glinting in the moonlight, and the hunger hitting you hard.
“Victor…” you purr, voice thick with hunger and something darker. The sound rolls off your tongue like a warning and a promise all at once.
His head snaps up at you.
His hips stutter mid-thrust the second he sees your fangs out—long, sharp, gleaming under the dim light. His pupils blow wide, chest heaving.
“Shit. Fuck. Bite me,” he blurts out instantly, like the urge hits him harder than reason ever could. He knows better. He absolutely knows better.
But he still says it—voice rough, hips pushing into you in a slow, shaky rhythm he’s barely hanging onto.
Your hand drifts up his abdomen, feeling the way goosebumps rise under your touch. You trace the hard lines of muscle, move up his chest, then higher—where skin gives way to fur along his collarbone. His body shivers under your palm.
Your eyes drag over him hungrily.
Your eyes drag over him hungrily, mind very much focused on one thing. Before he can say another word, you lean in fast and precise, sinking your fangs deep into his bicep.
A sharp gasp tears from his throat, hips bucking into you with pure instinct as your teeth pierce his skin. The moment his blood hits your tongue you feel your eyes flutter closed. Satisfaction floods your senses, deep and immediate, clouding the edges of your thoughts.
His hand shoots to your waist, gripping tight.
A ragged groan leaves him—half pain, mostly pleasure, melting into something helpless and obscene.
You drink deeply, savoring him, while he thrusts into you slow and trembling, trying to keep control and losing it just a little more with every pulse of his blood on your tongue.
You drink from him like you’ve been starved for months.
Every pulse of his blood against your tongue pulls you deeper, blurs your mind further, loosens the delicate restraint you thought you had. Satisfaction rolls heavy through your chest, then thicker, denser, until your body hums with it.
You don’t even realize how much you’re pumping into his system.
Not until his hips slam forward with a sharp, involuntary jerk that rips his rhythm to shreds.
“Ah—”
His entire body seizes under you and then absolutely collapses into the pleasure flooding him. His eyes roll back hard as his sweaty hands clamp around your waist, hips taking over completely.
He starts thrusting into you fast, sloppy and erratic, like he’s chasing a high that just keeps surging higher and higher. Each movement punches another helpless little sound out of him, nothing like his normal controlled self.
The whimper he lets out when he slams into you again is almost broken.
Your fangs are still embedded in him, still pumping dose after dose of your aphrodisiac while drinking him in, not exactly in the right state of mind to realize what you’re doing exactly.
He can’t handle it.
Not like this.
Not this dose, not this intensity, not with your body wrapped around him.
His cock twitches violently inside you.
Then again.
Then a third time, harder.
“Fuck—” he gasps, voice cracking sharply as he spills inside you, hot and sudden, like the pleasure ripped it out of him without warning. His hips jolt, trembling with overstimulation, but he doesn’t stop.
He can’t stop.
“Hah—hah—fuuuck—” he stutters, forehead knocking into your shoulder, breath shuddering against your skin. “Sweetheart… ngh—too much—too much—”
But his hips keep driving up into you, chasing a rhythm he can’t maintain.
He reeks of desperation, pleasure so strong it borders on pain.
“Already—already—” His voice cracks, high and shaky, like he’s hanging onto the world by a thread. “Already c-cumming in you—shit—shit—”
His thighs spasm beneath you.
He thrusts again, harder than he means to, burying himself deep as another wave hits him without mercy. His body trembles, muscles quivering as he tries to breathe through the intensity.
You pull your fangs from his arm slowly.
He whines, eyes blown wide when he looks at you, glazed and frantic, his breath coming in fast, shattered bursts. He’s still thrusting—gentle, trembling motions that he can’t stop, like his body is acting on pure instinct.
“Gonna— g’nna— ngh— gonna cum again—” he babbles, hips stuttering into you. “You’re s-so tight— so hot— god— I can’t— I can’t think—”
He gasps against your throat, voice climbing higher with every thrust.
“You feel—fuck— you feel too good— too good— losing— I’m losing my fucking mind—”
Your walls flutter around him and he nearly folds.
“Sweetheart—please— I—”
Another broken thrust.
Another helpless whine.
A full-body shiver.
“Too warm… too wet…” he gasps, feverish. “I can’t— can’t stop— god, I can’t—”
Your vision pulses with red as your body tightens around him again, that instinctive hunger mixing with the aftershocks of your release. His blood still clings to your tongue, thick and warm, and the taste of him only amps the heat curling through your core.
He’s not doing any better.
Every thrust shoves him deeper into the haze he’s drowning in. His senses are turned up past max, his brain unable to process anything except the feel of your body gripping him. It’s too much for him, unbearably so—every squeeze, every slick drag, every pulse of your walls has him unraveling further.
“Sonar…” you gasp, your voice breaking as your orgasm wrings through you. Your nails rake down his back, your thighs clenching tight around his hips. The moment you tighten around him he whimpers—a raw, involuntary sound ripped straight out of his chest.
He spills inside you again.
His hips give a violent jerk, his voice cracking as he pushes through his climax without slowing. His rhythm collapses, but the need driving him doesn’t—his body keeps thrusting into you, rough enough to shake the bed beneath you.
“I— I can’t— ngh—” he whines, the sound high and desperate. He drags you closer, as if he’s scared you might pull away before he finishes. His hips snap up again, sloppy and hard.
“Breed…”
His whole body tenses like he’s on the edge of something overwhelming.
“Need to… need to— need it to…” His words slur together, barely there. “Need it to stick…”
A sharp warning flickers at the back of your mind—your instincts pricking at the edges. You force your gaze up, and the sight of him hits you hard.
He’s gone.
His eyes are barely open, heavy with exhaustion and overstimulation, completely unfocused.
His mouth is slack, murmuring fragmented phrases that don’t fully form, just broken noises and half-words slipping out between labored breaths.
Drool gathers at the corner of his mouth, dripping down his chin.
Sweat mats down his fur, sticking it to his neck and chest. His abdomen is tight, spasming with every pulse of pleasure still ripping through him. His thighs shake under you, trembling with each thrust.
And he’s still moving.
Still pounding into you.
Still gripping your hips like he needs the contact to stay conscious.
Your slick is smeared down his length, mixing with the thick, milky ring at the base—evidence of how many times he’s already lost himself inside you. He’s flushed, panting, his entire body trembling with overstimulation as he ruts into you like he can’t stop.
“Need… need you…” he pants, head falling forward until his forehead presses clumsily against your shoulder. “Too warm… too tight…” His hips thrust sharply, a helpless reflex. “I can’t— I can’t think— just— need to—”
Another thrust.
Another cracked moan.
He’s barely holding onto himself, everything starting to override whatever thin thread of control he has left.
You notice it before he does.
The way his shoulders twitch.
The way his breath deepens.
The way the muscles under your hands shift from something instinctual clawing its way up.
Alarm shoots through you.
His fingers—no, his claws—dig into your hips suddenly, sharper than before, the tips piercing just enough to sting. His back arches, chest expanding, fur thickening as the first tremors of transformation ripple down his spine.
“S-Sonar…!” you yelp, grabbing at his shoulders as his body lurches. His thrusts falter for a moment from his changing size.
He lifts his head and looks at you.
And that’s when you realize he’s gone.
Completely gone.
His eyes are fully red now, half-lidded, glazed and feral. His breath drags out of him in deep, animalistic pulls, panting through his teeth as his body grows beneath you.
“…Victor!” you cry, voice cracking when another surge of pleasure bolts through you. You cling to him, trying to anchor him—or yourself—but the shift only accelerates.
He snarls.
A deep, guttural, vibrating sound from somewhere low in his chest, rolling up his throat as his hybrid form takes over. His frame expands, shoulders widening beneath your thighs, fur spreading thick over his body. His grip becomes stronger, almost bruising.
“Fill you…” he growls, voice warped into something deeper and rougher than human. “Gotta f-fill you up…”
You feel it as he changes.
His cock—which was already thick inside you—swells further, pulsing as it grows. More girth, more pressure, more heat stretching you open around him. The change forces a gasp out of you, your nails digging into his furred shoulders for balance.
He thrusts again—harder, heavier with a new animalistic power behind each movement.
Your breath stutters.
His head lowers until his snout presses right against your neck, inhaling deeply. A shudder runs through him, hips grinding upward with a possessive desperation that rattles through your whole body.
“Smells… good…” he rasps, voice nearly unrecognizable. “Mate…”
The word vibrates down your skin.
“Gonna fill you good…”
Another thrust, deep and unyielding.
“Make you feel… full…”
And then you feel it.
A swell at the base of him, pressing harder, bigger, stretching you further as it begins to form.
A knot.
You choke on a gasp, body tightening instinctively as his hips drive forward again, the swelling base grinding against you as if his body is determined to lock him inside you.
His thrusts get rougher, needier, more desperate by the second.
He’s not thinking anymore. He’s acting on pure instinct and every part of him is focused on one thing:
To knot you.
Your fingers dig into his shoulders so hard you feel the texture of his fur give under your nails. He snarls at the pain but instead of pulling back, he drives into you harder, like your desperation feeds his own.
His hips slam into yours with force that knocks the breath from your lungs. Every thrust sends a sharp jolt through you as his tip crashes against your cervix over and over, with no hesitation and no mercy.
Your back bows off the mattress, head thrown back, lips parted on a cry you can’t hold in. Your body is caught between unbearable intensity and addictive pleasure, every nerve lit and trembling.
Sonar bends over you, breath ragged, eyes blazing red and half-lidded.
“Gonna fuck you so well…” he murmurs against your cheek, voice shaking with the effort to speak. “So deep you won’t be able to think about anything but me.”
He punctuates it with another brutal thrust that forces a gasp out of you.
His tone drops lower, rougher, instinct tugging at every word.
“Everyone’s gonna know you’re mine,” he snarls, hips snapping into you again. “This pussy is mine. Gonna fill you up so good— you’ll be dripping for days.”
His breath breaks around the last word, turning into a pant. His fur is damp with sweat, chest pressed to yours, muscles quivering from overexertion and overwhelming pleasure.
Then there’s the knot.
You feel it swelling against you—thick, hard, pulsing with his heartbeat. Every thrust grinds the expanding base against your entrance, pushing, stretching, testing your body as though he’s trying to claim you completely.
He tries again, harder, forcing the knot forward.
You cry out, body tightening around him.
He groans at the sensation, head falling forward for a moment before he forces himself upright. He shifts onto his knees, gripping your hips and dragging you up with him, angling you so he can drive deeper.
Your lower belly ripples with every impact.
He watches the bulge in your abdomen rise and fall as he thrust, his length outlined beneath your skin each time he slams forward. His mouth falls open, a long, broken moan spilling out.
“G’nna— ngh— gonna get you pregnant…” he whines, voice dissolving into raw instinct. He thrusts again, hips trembling, knot swelling larger with every pulse. “G’nna make it stick… need it to stick…”
He’s panting like he can’t get enough air, eyes barely open with instinct and need as he tries—again, and again—to push the knot inside you.
“Please…” he gasps, hips faltering before surging forward again. “So close— just— just need—”
The knot presses harder, stretching you around the widest part of him.
His entire body is trembling with the effort of holding himself back, hovering on the thin edge between instinct and collapse.
The moment it happens, your body reacts before your mind can.
With a rough, instinct-driven thrust, his knot forces its way inside you, stretching you wide, locking him in place with a thick, undeniable snap of pressure that jolts through your entire core.
Your body jerks violently at the intrusion, a garbled whine ripping out of your throat as your back arches against the mattress. The fullness is overwhelming and it steals the breath right out of your lungs.
Sonar’s reaction is immediate.
“Yes… yes…” he hisses through clenched teeth, voice torn between relief and raw instinct. His claws tighten around your hips in a bruising grip as he grinds his length deeper into you. “Fuck—fuck—breed well…” His breath shudders. “G'nna— g'nna breed this cunt…”
His words melt into panting, desperate noise.
You twitch beneath him, overstimulation crackling through you, his body pressing you down into the sheets with unrelenting weight. The knot pulses inside you, every push grinding against your walls, forcing another wave of heat up your spine.
Then your climax hits.
Hard.
Your body seizes around him, clenching tight enough to pull a strangled groan out of his chest. Your vision blurs as you cum one last time, your legs shaking uncontrollably beneath his hold.
He whines at the way your body grips him.
“So… good…” he manages, voice wrecked and shaking. His head drops to your shoulder, breath hot against your skin. His tip twitches inside you, pressed right up against your cervix, sending a shiver through both of you.
“So good for me…” he moans, hips locked tight. “Don’t— don’t worry… gonna fill you up… n-nicely… promise…”
His words crumble into another shaky whine as he grinds into you a few more times, each movement slow and desperate, the knot keeping him welded to your body.
Then he breaks.
His release floods into you in heavy pulses—thick, hot and unrestrained. His entire body trembles with every spurt, breath hitching, whining softly in your ear as he empties himself completely. His claws loosen, but only barely, still holding you flush against him as if afraid you’ll pull away.
“B-be… a good little mate…” he whimpers, voice slurring with instinct and exhaustion. “Keep it… all inside…”
His hips give one last shallow grind, sealing the knot even tighter.
He’s fully locked to you, body pressed flush, breath shuddering as he rides out the last throbbing pulses inside you.
By the time his mind claws its way back into his body, he’s still pulsing inside you, weak spurts leaking from his overstimulated length, each twitch making your walls flutter around him.
“V-Vic…” you slur, voice trembling, “baby… I’m f-full. Please. I c-can’t take… more…”
You’re delirious, shaking, stuffed to the point of ache.
He lets out a broken whimper at your plea, pressing his forehead against your shoulder, breath shuddering over your skin.
“Just a bit more…” he whispers, almost pleading, “please… I’m not done…”
His body shudders again, balls drawing tight as he forces out the last thick pulses he has left, spilling everything into you until he’s practically dry. Your legs give out entirely, trembling uncontrollably under him as the last wave finally hits.
When he settles, you feel impossibly full, almost painfully so, every drop of him held inside by the swollen knot still locking you together.
You groan weakly, head rolling back against the mattress.
“I feel like I’m gonna… fucking puke your cum out…” you complain, breath broken and shaking.
A soft, ruined chuckle rattles out of him.
“…Don’t do that…” he murmurs, still hazy, “Or I’ll just… fill you up again…”
A violent shiver runs through you at the threat, your tired body clenching around him in reflex.
You try to steady your breathing, relaxing as much as your overstimulated muscles allow.
“How long are we stuck like this…?” you whisper, voice rough.
He shakes his head slowly, eyes half-closed, still panting a bit.
“Couple minutes… I don’t… fucking know…”
You groan again, throwing an arm over your face like you’re ready to file a complaint with HR.
“Next time I’m putting wax on my fangs…” you mumble, exhausted. “Fuck… I think I jumpstarted your cycle…”
Right on cue, his cock twitches inside you eagerly, betraying him instantly.
The knot hasn’t even fully deflated yet and he’s already responding to you again.
He snickers weakly, the sound warm and wrecked.
“Yeah…” he breathes, giving your hip a squeeze, “Yeah you fucking did.”
Summary: You and Sonar don't exactly get along. After one bad interaction, you two have become about as compatible as oil and water. But then Malevola gives you an invitation to a house party out of the blue and after you make a discovery that wasn't meant for your eyes, it has you looking at him a little differently.
Content: 21.3k words. 18+, MDI. AFAB. Enemies to lovers adjacent (more like petty inconveniences to lovers). Sonar being an obnoxious little perv. Restraint via telepathy, biting, P in V, creampie, switch dynamics, breast play.
Notes: I don't know, I never thought I'd be here, and yet here we are. I blame it on my crush on Moistcr1tikal. Inspired by the fan art from ☆ Purple | Sonar Nation ☆ on tiktok, they get all the credit, sonar's happy trail has infected my brain like a worm. Gif by @seashellisinmyheart, divider by @omi-resources
You shouldn't be here. You don't know why you are, but your feet have picked themselves up and carried you here anyway. The uncertainty, the hesitation makes the hallway you're standing in daunting somehow, as simple as it is. Barren, pale walls lined with polished doors; clean tiled floors so pristine that you can practically use them as mirrors; the light fixtures on the ceiling above dot the corridor in a bright glow. It all seems so expensive, decorated with the kind of interior design that's so immaculate and exorbitant that you're concerned that you might leave tracks in your wake, dirt smudges and shoe prints.
You contemplate turning around and leaving, but curiosity keeps you cemented in place. Music thumps past the barrier of the door, seeping through the wood, and you know that it must be absolutely blaring inside the apartment if you can hear from this side of the threshold. It's something upbeat, energetic, good for dancing. There's no way they're going to make it through the entire night without one of the next-door neighbors raising a noise complaint to whatever manager might be in the building.
You could leave. Right now. No one would notice. You hadn't exactly confirmed that you would show up at all. You'd somewhat left it vague, and when she had sent you the text of what you'd assumed to be her address and apartment number this evening, all you had responded with was an unsure, "I'll see if I can make it," and you threw in a heart emoji at the end for good measure. In the hopes that it made the response seem a little less rigid and disinterested, but it mostly just made it awkward. Somehow, you felt as though you've never held a conversation in your entire life.
Despite all of your doubts, you can't deny that you are intrigued. That just maybe you had been a little excited — and extremely bewildered — when Malevola had approached you this Tuesday, making herself known by placing a gentle hand on your shoulder to get your attention. Your teammates had gone quiet around you, the pair falling into a fascinated hush as you turned to acknowledge her with a smile. Though you're sure that the confusion you had felt was still apparent, eyebrows raising when you greeted her.
It's not like you're unfamiliar with the Z-Team. It's impossible to work at the Torrance branch and not be somewhat aware of them. They're notorious. A group of ex-villains becoming employed under the counsel of SDN made for a lot of heavy gossip. Old cons, murderers, petty thieves trying to turn a new leaf. And despite you being a few ranks higher, up in the D-Team, you've managed to have your fair share of run-ins out on the field with a few of its members — especially one member in particular, because you were just oh so lucky in that way.
But you've never spoken with Malevola all that much, apart from extending a brief greeting when you would cross paths down a hallway, or you'd once vented to each other in the breakroom about having to pull double-shifts last month, with every hero at SDN spread thin by a fucking hydra. It had been particularly nasty to deal with, 80 feet tall, armored flesh, fast healing, the ability to spew lava from its multiple heads. Not fire. Lava. In molten, gigantic breaths that traveled up to forty meters.
You don't recall reading about any lava breathing in middle school when you had gone over Greek myths, but it would have been nice to know. It had plowed its way through downtown, tottering, pulverizing asphalt with each step, knocking into skyscrapers and buildings like it was drunk. It had spread the Torrance branch thin, an all-hands-on deck kind of situation. And when one overzealous hero had decapitated one of the heads, he'd only made the situation worse, two more sprouting from the gnarled, raw stump with a terrifying quickness. It had taken over 24 hours to take the monster down.
But that specific instance, a temporary, shared moment in expressing your equal exasperation, had been the only real time you'd ever talked to her. So it left you confused when she had approached you out of the blue, effectively snuffing out the conversation you'd been sharing with a couple of your teammates — though you're actually kind of thankful for it. Mimic and Hazard are great, but sometimes they talk too much, and if you had to listen to them having a debate about Nickelback any longer, you were going to lose it.
"We're having a party this weekend. Nothing big, just a little get together. Some of Z-Team is gonna be there." Malevola had explained, definitely prompted by your visible (but you hoped, not unkind) confusion. "Don't feel obligated to turn up, but I just thought I'd extend an invitation. I'll text you the address, yeah?"
And then just as quickly as she has arrived, she was gone. Walking away from you, tearing open a gap in the air with a rip of shimmering, pink light and was stepping inside before you could question her or properly agree. You didn't have a chance to ask her how she managed to get your phone number, either.
And now you're here. You had contemplated turning up for longer than necessary, and you had almost decided forgoing the whole thing entirely, pacing around you bedroom while you struggled with that to wear. You figured you would just be staying inside at home all night, enjoying the time off before you'd have to wake up early for your shift at work. But the idea of that monotony, of doing the same thing you do every other night, had been bitter in your mouth, a nasty taste that your body rejected like a pill forced onto your tongue. You didn't want that. You didn't want to sit on the couch again or turn in for bed at 10 P.M. like some kind of elderly person twenty years past their prime.
You only showed up because you thought that it was her party. Her apartment. But you had quickly deduced that you were wrong in that assumption. It isn't her place, it's Sonar's. The marble floors in the lobby and the fancy furniture in the adjoining waiting room kind of tipped you off as soon as you stepped foot inside the building, and it was enough that you had almost immediately turned around and called it night. But for whatever reason, you didn't.
The door to his apartment almost seems imposing somehow, even though you've taken down countless villains, defeated monsters and beings beyond your comprehension, and yet what's pretty much a polished piece of wood unsettles you. It has apprehension prickling along the notches of your spine, uncomfortable, the scuttling of an insects legs on the nape of your neck.
You don't give yourself time to hesitate or to change your own mind. You don't bother knocking, either. Judging on the noisy volume of the music booming inside, you doubt that anyone in the apartment would be able to hear it anyway. You try your luck with the knob, twisting the cool, rounded metal, and thankfully, it opens with a muffled click.
The song playing is loud in your ears when you step inside, and you're assaulted with the pungent scent of weed and various flavors of vape, something tropical and mint. The rhythm of the tempo is so pronounced that you can feel it trembling throughout your body, rattling softly across your bones, churning in the center of your gut, and it's an awful combination with the nerves turning your stomach over. A perfunctory sweep of the apartment reveals that there's a lot more people present than just some of the Z-Team, though you do notice a few of its members scattered about the crowd. Prism is on the sofa, holding onto a sweating glass bottle, leaning into the cushioned support of the backrest while she talks with people you don't recognize who are accompanying her. Coupé is in the adjoining kitchen, seated at the small table in the corner, seated opposite to Punch Up, the both of them holding a fanned-out assortment of playing cards within their hands — probably poker or the like.
Flambae's laugh scales high over the music playing, amused but audibly scathing, sarcastic; you still haven't spotted him yet, but he's here somewhere. You continue your survey, scanning the surrounding area, taking a vague count of the people in the room all mushed in like sardines in a tin can, bodies shifting and swaying in vague dances. There's a man reclined on the kitchen island, splayed out, shirt rucked up to his chin, exposing the length of his torso for body shots. A couple makes out furiously in a dim corner. So eager that you wouldn't be surprised if they pulled each other to the floor and started fucking in the middle of the room, hands sweeping and clawing at what they can, like they intend to maul each other, fingers groping, pulling at the other's clothes.
And then your eyes find him, and all of the curiosity and tentative excitement you felt curdles in the pit of your stomach like spoiled milk. You aren't surprised that he's here. You know that he and Malevola are best friends, so yes, you did expect to see him. Where one is, the other is never too far behind. But you were hoping that you'd at least be able to settle in, to maybe get a drink or two in your system before you two managed to cross paths tonight. But nope, here he is, in all of his . . . Glory definitely isn't the word you'd use for him. Audacity, stupidity, bullshit. Those could all work.
You'd butted heads with him from the start, but that was all his fault, really. Okay, maybe, you'll admit, you're the one who made a snap judgment. But when you see a guy walking around the workplace with crypto magazines, and you overhear his conversations where he's unironically talking about being on Reddit, it raises a few red flags. You'd caught him mention something about looksmaxxing one time, and you didn't bother sticking around to hear what his opinion really was, you had immediately turned around as you were crossing into the breakroom and went out for lunch instead, abandoning the food you brought from home for the Mexican joint down the street. Listening to that for the entire duration of your lunch break was a torture that you wouldn't have been able to withstand.
He was like a caricature of person, like every online personality had been compacted and funneled into a singular body, and the first real interaction you had with him didn't do anything to improve your opinion of him.
To be honest you didn't have to step in, but you'd been passing by, having just finished up your latest mission, and you'd spotted him when you were on your way back to SDN. He had been easy to see from your vantage point, flying high above the city, but it had been the sound of screeching, a thin, earsplitting warble that had really caught your attention.
You knew who it was soon as you'd seen him. A dark mass down below, gigantic, membranous wings expanded, flapping harshly like he was possibly trying to generate lift, but was unable to, talons lashing out at the ground beneath him. Standing tall, morphed into that famed monstrous bat form you'd heard so much about. Shrieking at the top of his lungs, his massive maw snarling, fangs glinting with drool like he was feral, standing in the middle of a public park of all places, right next to the monkey bars. And then you'd noticed them, crazed and scattering across his body like tiny, rabid insects. Children. He was being attacked by children.
You'd shifted your course like a bullet, slowing your body in the air above them just in time so your arrival wouldn't generate a sudden blast. You had them all before you even landed. The field of your powers expanding throughout and past you to lift them all up from his body, carefully plucking the kids up like they were a bunch of wayward cats, leaving them to kick and flail where you had them suspended in the air. A few of them had tried to cling to him, gripping at the thick clutch of his fur with their tiny fists, but they soon gave under the grasp of your pull, kicking at nothing in petty tantrums.
"Hey, you good?" You'd asked once your feet where on the ground, the soles of your boots crunching the wood chips of the play area with their weight. "What the hell is this about?" You'd gestured to the kids, still hanging. Many hadn't ceased their floundering, but a few had given up, gone still within your telepathic grip, loose-limbed and visibly pouting. One of the rowdier ones had actually hissed at you and bit at the air. There was about six of them all together, all equally as wild.
You had a lot of questions. Like why they were apparently rabid, and more pressing, where in the hell their parents were at. Maybe they ate them, that seemed like a sensible conclusion.
Sonar — you'd remembered his name, thankfully, had yet to acknowledge you. He shook his head, body shuddering wildly like a dog that had just finished rolling, trying to shake free any dust that dirtied his coat. You had eyed him a little wearily. You didn't know much about him, if he was really aware of himself when he was a full-blown bat monster, or if maybe, he slipped into something more animalistic, just impulses and drive.
But his gaze had shifted, ears twitching, and you knew that he had heard you. It was a little hard to gauge just where he was looking specifically, with those blank, crimson eyes, twin coals burning in his sockets. But you saw them shift, the lids twitching from the movement, almost as though he was maybe embarrassed by the whole ordeal. And then his head angled in your direction, tilting to properly look at you.
"Drugs, I think? I don't know man, I'm not sure what's wrong with them," he'd replied. His voice had been deeper than the other times you'd heard it, the monotone of it layered with a kind of strange, trilling baritone. "But I had it covered, so you didn't need to swoop in like that to try and save the day."
He sounded exasperated, words dripping with a sardonic petulance that made you huff out a bemused laugh, a little offended. You blinked, your lips pulling into a scorned smile. "I was trying to help you out, alright. A thank you would be nice."
"I had it handled," he insisted, the almost piggish shape of his nose curling it a contemptuous snarl. His behavior was pettish, showcasing every bit of immaturity that you had assumed he possessed, and it a way, it felt vindicating to know that you had been right. He really was just some bitchy, dumb guy who probably spends his free time behind a computer screen bullying twelve-year-olds.
"You know what, you're absolutely right," you relented, already drawing your body up from the ground in preparation to take off. "I'll leave you to it, big guy."
"Wait, wha-" That's all he'd been able to get out before you dropped the kids back on him, all six celebrating with an invigorated cheer as they landed upon him in a pile, latching onto his back and wings and tugging on his ears, resuming their chaos as though they'd never been stopped at all. You'd been gone in a blink, launching away with a mocking laugh that you're sure his sensitive ears had been able to pick up. Good. You hoped it haunted his ass.
Ever since that day, there's been a noticeable tension between you. Always there, bubbling beneath the surface, a kind of static building between you both whenever you have to interact. Annoyance and resentment prickling in an undercurrent, thorns prodding at your skin. It's enough that your team has remarked on it. You think the whole damn building knows honestly. Not the either of you have been exactly subtle with your hatred for each other.
Just last week you two got into an argument over coffee creamer of all things. You felt a little childish doing it, and yet you weren't able to curb back your own voice as you snapped at him, but at least you could blame it a little on your exhaustion. Sleep was still clinging to the corners of your eyes, stinging and terrible, you felt like a zombie when you shuffled into the breakroom. All you wanted was some caffeine, some fuel to help jumpstart your system for the shift ahead.
Sonar had already been there, the wooden stirrer he was circling around his mug softly scraped against the ceramic. You ignored his proximity as you stepped up to the counter, opening the cabinet to grab your own mug so you could work on pouring your own cup of coffee. It was fine. You were able to pretend that he wasn't there while you mentally prepared yourself for the day ahead, and in turn he hadn't made any effort to speak to you. It was all going well. Almost peaceful, if you were being generous. But when you moved to open the fridge, leaning down enough to look inside, a single glance had your simple morning routine snuffed out.
You've long since started buying your own creamers for work. Sure, the breakroom has an entire drawer full of pods, a variety of different flavors, but you know what, you're a little particular with the brands and types that you prefer in your coffee. So you started buying and bringing your own to work a few months after you became an employee, and you've never had a single issue before. You write your name on it with permanent markers and sticky notes, and shove it to the back of the fridge, and it's been that way for the five whole years that you've been employed at SDN. Until now.
It was empty. The entire box, but you knew for certain that you still had a few pods left when you had made your morning cup yesterday. You had enough to tide you over for a least a couple more days before you had to restock. You knew that for certain. You made a mental note of it. But there wasn't any left. What had been in there before was all gone, leaving only an empty, cardboard box in the back of the fridge.
And then you spotted it. Out of the corner of your vision, and your full attention quickly followed, flickering up to the counter where Sonar was pouring a pod of creamer into his coffee, humming gently under his breath. Your creamer. Three other empty containers were scattered out beside his mug like corpses at a crime scene, the plastic covers peeled back, all while he was in the middle of pouring another one into his coffee.
You didn't want to overreact. To be an asshole, and if it was anyone else you might have resisted the urge to lash out, but you had long since lost all patience for Sonar. In the brief interactions you've had with him, he always manages to pull out the worst in you, to prod and insult you until you're on the verge of snapping.
"Is that my creamer?" You'd asked, pointing at the vacant pods strewn out, nothing but empty trash.
"Hmm?" His brow had raised like he was clueless, head angling in your direction as he drained the small container in his hand of all its contents before dropping it onto the counter alongside the others with a hollow clatter. "Oh, yeah. It's pretty good. You should pick up some more." He stopped stirring, taking an assessing sip, making sure to slurp extra loudly just to grate on your nerves more than he already had.
"So you thought it would be cool to steal my shit?"
"The early bird gets the worm, my friend." He said obnoxiously, like some shitty online quote. "This is what happens when you drag your feet."
"No that is not what happens. This is what happens when a selfish dick decides to take someone else's shit without asking," you'd seethed.
"Mmm, I don't know. It seems that way to me."
You hated him. You hated how he smirked at you, fangs glinting, all pleased with himself. You'd entertained the idea then, of swiping your hand, letting your powers curl around the mug held up to his face to douse him with the boiling liquid, but you regrettably didn't. You let him get away unscathed, mostly because you didn't want to get suspended for giving a SDN employee third degree burns, but the memory still eats you alive sometimes.
You'd been good at avoiding him since then. Plus, it helps that you belonged to different teams, so your chances of naturally crossing paths are fairly low (though unfortunately not zero). And now you've managed to plant yourself directly in his path. Months of trying to evade him have gone right out the window, and you don't have anyone to blame except for yourself. You don't even have a proper excuse as to why you agreed to be here. You aren't friends with anyone on the Z-Team. You know them through fleeting interactions and the occasional team up on exceptionally tough missions, but you aren't close by any means.
And now he's right there, maybe 30 feet away from you, leaning against the kitchen counter with a beer in his hand, egging people on as they step up to take body shots off of the same guy as before, still laid out on the island like an offering. You've never seen Sonar like this before. He's always in those suits — overkill, honestly, fighting villains in clothes that probably cost more than his rent, dressing as though he's some corporate CEO and not a subpar hero.
The only change now is that the usual suit jacket he wears is absent. It's subtle, hardly noteworthy, and yet it makes him look completely different. More relaxed. His fur is disheveled, like he's been running his fingers through it, the burgundy tie around his throat loose, the weak knot of it seeming to highlight how the first two buttons of his shirt are undone. He looks . . . unkempt, casual, with his sleeves rolled up above the thick of width of his forearms, shirt untucked from the waistband of his pants. It's the opposite of tidy. So unlike the manicured image he tends to maintain. With him like this, you could almost imagine he isn't a complete bastard.
He's at ease, clearly enjoying himself, and totally unaware that you're here. You should leave before he realizes.
You don't get the opportunity to. Of course you don't.
"You came!" A familiar voice calls, swaddled in that soft Australian lilt. Malevola comes shifting through the crowd. The people around her part like the Red Sea as she steps directly in front of you with a mystery drink in hand, the presumably alcoholic beverage sloshing in a solo cup as she hands it to you. "I'm glad you're here. For a second there I figured you'd ditch us all together."
"I honestly did think about it." You almost cringe. It's sounds more like an insult and less like the joke that you had intended. But you don't even know what kind of joke it was supossed to be in the first place.
"I can't blame you," she reassures, the pleasant smile on her face is unwavering, still gentle despite your blunder. "We're an acquired taste." An expression that's a little sheepish passes over her face then, apologetic, but still friendly. "Also, I'm sorry for lying to you about the turn out, but I figured it would have scared you off completely."
"Yeah, it might have," you answer honestly and lean out of the way when someone shoulders past you to get to the front door. "I'm not very good at this sort of thing. Meeting new people." You almost hesitate to say it, but you're fast to decide that it doesn't really matter. She knows the truth. She's seen firsthand how you and Sonar interact with each other. You aren't salvaging anything by sugarcoating your words.
You nod your chin in the direction of the adjoining kitchen, and she follows the gesture, angling her torso so that she can comfortably look over her shoulder. "Plus, me and him don't exactly mix, so I probably won't stick around for too long. I'm sure he'll get pissed once he realizes I'm here."
She laughs a little at that. A delicate, short sound. It's hard to tell by the singular honeyed shade of her eyes, but you think that she rolls them, a playful exasperation. "You're pretty oblivious, huh."
"What do you mean by that?" you laugh at little too, but it's much thinner. Lacking any true amusement, impeded by your uncertainty. She settles you with a look then, head cocking, brows raising while she appraises you. And then she's leaning in, crowding into your space conspiratorially, closing in her proximity so that she can be heard over the music without having to raise her voice.
"It's probably not my place to say this, but Sonar doesn't hate you, babe." She answers and something mischievous passes through her gaze, and her next words makes the floor feel as though it's dropped out from beneath your feet. "He's literally had a poster of you on his wall for years; the guy's obsessed with you. It's a little pathetic honestly."
"What?" You nearly shout, your voice pitching up so much higher than you had intended, and it if it wasn't for the vocals and electric pop instrumentals projecting across the room, bouncing against the walls that have managed to feel so much closer than before, everyone would have heard you. Your grip seizes around the cup in your hand, the thick plastic popping crisply, a dent crinkling inward from the press of your thumb. You know you're staring, mouth agape, looking dumb as you gawk at her like she's grown another head, but it's a concept that you can't entirely grasp.
Sure, you've heard rumors about Sonar. About him being a bit of pervert, and you've experienced that facet of his personality firsthand. But he's never singled you out specifically, he doesn't flirt with you anymore than he does with his other co-workers. There wasn't anything special about how he would tease you. Or so you thought. You never would have imagined that he'd see you in such a way, and you don't know what to think. It's as though your mind has gone white, drawn a blank, emotions swirl up in the pit of your stomach like a storm. It's overwhelming, and you have no choice but to just sit with it while it all churns and heaves: surprise, irritation, and worse than all, intrigue, and the traces of something else that you don't want to name. It's too sudden, too warm and fluttery to allow yourself to accept.
You take the first sip of your drink, and immediately grimace. You almost choke on it completely. It's like cough syrup if it burned, searing as it goes down your throat, overly sweet from its syrup, the carbonation biting and bubbling harshly, mixing with the sear of alcohol in a way that's horrific. There's a variety of conflicting flavors that attack your tongue, the pervasive punch of the combination washes over your palate. You can't tell what the hell it is. Tequila, maybe and bad soda, but you mouth twists from it.
"Yeah, it's not too great," Malevola says, taking note as you shudder with disgust, forcing yourself to swallow. But as terrible as it is, you appreciate the burn of it right now. It gives you something to focus on, something pungent and poignant enough to guide you back into reality. "We just kinda threw together what we had. But listen . . . you can, uh, pop into his room and see it for yourself if you want. I won't blame you," she shrugs, mouth twisting into something a little sly. "It's down that way," she gestures to her right. "Down the hall, the very last door at the end."
You tell yourself that you won't do it. You're going to finish the rest of the drink — some terrible amalgamation of what you suspect to be lemon soda and God knows what else, and then you're going to get the hell out of here. You'll go home, take a cold shower, go to sleep and pretend that tonight never happened. That you didn't become burdened with knowledge that you shouldn't be privy to. There are certain things that co-workers shouldn't know about each other, and this is one of those things. The awareness of it dredges up too many feelings. So much of your own thoughts come barreling up, fast and powerful. But you block them out, hold them at bay with the promise that you're going to leave and you can continue on with your life, pretending to be ignorant.
You don't go home.
You're standing in the middle of his room after a long internal debate on morality. It's easy to blame it on the alcohol. That it's already made you too dumb, infected you with a dangerous liquid courage. You're definitely crossing a line by being in here without his permission, but then again, wasn't he crossing some kind of line by having a half-naked photograph of you up on his wall? Maybe. Sort of. The reluctance you had felt was easily eclipsed by your curiosity and try as you might to protect you own peace and not feel like a terrible person, after standing in the middle of the hallway for too long, listening to music and laughter and conversation bubble around you, you had stepped inside of his room anyway.
It's spacious for a bedroom in Torrance, where the rent prices are excessive, riding on the novelty of being so close to L.A. .It's got a high ceiling, expensive wood flooring, and a massive sky view that displays the city spanning out below. He has paintings posted around the walls of the room. The sort of art you'd find some wealthy billionaire's home. That old-money aesthetic. Oil paints, smudges made from pastels, and earthy hues stroked over canvases framed in fancy, rich wood.
But the wall directly across the from the bed — an unnecessarily large one at that; a California King with silk sheets, because of course — seems to be dedicated to important milestones in his life. Engraved plaques and photographs taken of him shaking hands with uptight men wearing business suits and oily smiles. And there, in the middle of all that over bloated self inflation and success, is a poster of you.
There in all of its glory, is your 2022 Posing for Pollution Awareness poster, made visible by the glimmers of light projecting through the window, the soft glow of street lamps and neighboring buildings trickling over the glass protecting the picture in a soft glow. You had done it for a fundraiser. Made to bring in donations for an independent organization, all to raise money and bring consciousness to properly clean up the bay of trash. Most of the Torrance branch had agreed to do it, and you (obviously) had been among the numbers who had.
The photoshoot wasn't anything too scandalous. What they had dressed you in wasn't much different than what you would wear at a pool or out on a day at the beach. It was a simple bikini, exposing enough to ensure that the pictures would sell but not enough that you would feel demeaned wearing it. Simple, black, a smooth material that hugged your breasts in flattering way, making them look perky, supported, and you had appreciated how it complimented them.
You were posed out on the beach, stretched out on the sand, skin damp and glittering in the sunlight, dewy drops glowing amber from the warm luminosity. The ties of the bikini's bottoms were cinched high around your hips, pronouncing their shape, the subtle arch in your back only perpetuating the sultry position the photographer had guided you into.
You did admittedly feel a little awkward when he had requested for you to try and give the camera a flirtatious expression, something confident and salacious. But looking back at the end result now, you don't hate it. You look . . . good. Great, if you're being truthful with yourself, and the risk of being completely narcissistic, you can see why Sonar has this particular poster secured at the foot of his bed. He even framed it. Not even in some basic, plastic frame, but in an ornate one that you would see holding a portrait, gold and exuberant. Overkill. It felt more akin to a shrine than just some dirty totem, used for him to gawk at and jerk off to.
Surprisingly, you aren't mad. Or even disgusted like you expected yourself to be. There's no repulsion, not even as a symptom of your shock. You suppose this is the sort of thing you had assumed the posters would be used for. Sure, you had hoped that it purchased mostly as a gag gift, or more importantly, because people wanted to contribute their money to a good cause, but you weren't ignorant. You knew that some pervert out there would end up buying it for less than innocent reasons. You had just never guessed that one of those perverts would be your co-worker.
You hate how you almost feel flattered. Maybe there's just something wrong with you, but you're more amused than anything, satisfied almost. It's funny in a way, to know that the same guy who's been giving you so much trouble, making your life at work hellish with petty little disruptions and immature jokes has been coming home every night to a massive photograph of you on his wall, framed and hung up like it belonged on an altar.
For a brief second, the thought raises, flickering up from the fringes of your mind, passing and thin, that maybe you should finally go home. Maybe snap of picture of the poster he has with your phone for future blackmail and then leave. But that thought passes over and past you, drifting away until it's as though it never existed in the first place. Maybe it's because for the first time in a while, you feel like you're actually in control of this stupid little game that you've both found yourselves in. After months of toying with each other, stealing things, playing childish pranks, all the paint bombs you've planted in the drawers of his cubicle's desk, this is the first instance where you truly felt like you've not just evened the scales, but completely tipped them in your favor.
And you aren't letting an opportunity like this pass you by. You aren't leaving. Not yet anyway.
The sound of approaching laughter snaps you out of your stare, and your head jerks to face the door. You hold your breath as someone nears, their footsteps muffled as they carry themselves down the hall. You see their shadow break through the warm light that trickles in beneath the thin gap underneath the door, bobbing and swaying unsteadily for a moment, hovering there long enough to make your heart stutter, but thankfully whoever it is keeps walking. The noise of them stumbling into the neighboring room is noisy, shoes squeaking on the tiles, and the gentle click of a toilet seat being lifted and the damp retching that follows lets you know that they'll be occupied for a while. It should give you ample time to slip past without them noticing.
You do take a picture of the poster before you leave. Just for insurance.
When you nudge his bedroom door open, you're careful to be quiet, even with the cover of the music raucously thundering throughout the apartment, impossible to not be heard. How they haven't managed to get a noise complaint yet is entirely beyond you. You lean out just enough to glance around the hallway, checking for anyone who might be present, but it's clear, not a soul in sight thankfully.
You're quick to slip out of Sonar's room, carefully closing the door behind you and then you're moving, treading down the hall with casual footsteps, tucking your phone into your back pocket.
You find him effortlessly. He's right where you last saw him, except the guy who was doing body shots is now gone, and the island has been repurposed for beer pong. Sonar is playing with the few people who are scattered around him, intently watching as one of his opponents steps up, drawing his posture up straight and raising an arm to line up the shot with the triangle of cups posted at the opposite end of the island. There's a brief pause, everyone watching seems to hold their breath, concentrating as best as they all can, some only a little buzzed and others completely trashed, watching with the glazed eyes of drunks as they all track the trajectory of the ball when the man tosses it through the air.
It misses completely, striking loudly on the counter, just a few scant inches from the cups, and ricochets off the counter, shooting somewhere into the living room, vanishing into the sea of bodies.
"Ha! Get wrecked loser," Sonar insults maturely. Now he's the one stepping up, clutching onto a hollow ball within his fingers, shouldering past his rival, but not without passing the man another derisive comment. "Now watch and learn."
He doesn't even look when he launches it with the flick of his wrist, keeping his eye contact settled on his opponent with a smug grin, canines sharp. All that the other guy can do is observe, just standing in place and staring as the ball coasts smoothly through the atmosphere in a graceful arch and meets it target. A bullseye, landing neatly in the center cup with an empty, plastic clatter. The sound of defeat.
"And that is how it's done."
Some people cheer, others wince at the other man's loss, who is now mumbling something under his breath as he harshly slaps a few bills into Sonar's outstretched palm. His grumbling is too low against the clamorous volume of the music for you to hear, but you're sure it isn't anything nice. You take the lull in the game as an opportunity, weaving through the fringes of the crowd to sidle up next to Sonar where he's backed up against the kitchen counter. He's oblivious to your proximity, too busy counting the cash that he won from the game, nimble fingers rotating through the singles and the couple of fives he'd been given before folding them and slipping them safely inside of his front pocket.
"Good game," you compliment, settling the base of your spine against the counter, leaning your weight on it to get comfortable, standing close enough to him that you can feel the subtle hints of his body heat caressing over your skin. All balmy and unnecessarily pleasant. You try not to focus on it, instead taking another swig of your drink, even though it still makes you grimace as it goes down, spreading a blaze in your gut.
Sonar practically flinches when he hears you, jerking a little, eyes blinking as he tilts away to properly assess you, gaze darting over you from head to toe as though he can't believe you're real. "What— you're here. What the hell are you doing here?"
"Malevola invited me," you answer, voice pitching up to be properly heard. But it's probably needless with how keen his hearing is.
"Mal invited—" his words clip of abruptly, a heavy pause expanding between you both, terribly silent despite the near deafening chaos and excitement fizzling and sparkling across the space around you. As though a cloud had settled over your bodies, and only you two. You dare to look at him then, watching as his eyes dart around the living room before falling steady, locking onto something with an intensity that almost concerns you. When you allow yourself to track his stare, you find Malevola. They gaze at each other from across the distance, and something wordless and personal passes between them. A discussion unsaid, one that you aren't apart of. You aren't sure if the smile on her face should unsettle you or not.
"Cool, cool. That's . . . cool," he says and it takes you a second to realize that he's speaking to you. "So, you enjoying yourself so far? How's the punch? I made it, it's not too b—"
"It's terrible," you answer without hardly processing it, the alcohol having made you a little loose lipped.
"Terrible," he agrees immediately. "It really is."
"What even is it?"
"It's vodka mostly, but there's some tequila in there too, I think. And to make it go down easier I mixed some old lemon soda and a dash of Coke." His eyes widen a little, maybe worried from how you're squinting and glaring at the inside of the cup, analyzing the opaque brown liquid like it's something toxic.
"The drink!" he hastily adds. "Not . . . the substance."
"I'm glad you clarified," you joke, and it catches you off guard. You can't think of a single time where you've ever been this relaxed around Sonar. Sure, he doesn't frighten you or really make you all that uncomfortable, but he is irritating, that is indisputable. Whenever you two happen to be in the same vicinity, it's pretty much a guarantee that some kind of fight will break out, some type of immature bickering. You've never really sat like this. Never allowed yourselves to exist in the same space without some type of vitriolic exchange. It's startling, really, how nice it is. Something as simple as breathing next to each other. Peaceful in a way that sort of scares you.
It would be easy to pin it on the liquor, and hell, maybe it is. But you really don't think so. It flows too naturally, settling somewhere in your spirit too organically; two rigid, jagged pieces finally fitting together. You've spent a lot of time with him, minutes and hours and weeks, spent taunting and troubling each other with stupid pranks and infantile jokes, and right now it's as though all of that history has taken a back seat.
He's different, almost awkward right now. Like he doesn't know what to do with himself now that you're so close to him. As though your proximity has thrown him off, made him loose around the edges. You can't recall a time where he hasn't spoken to you with some level of annoyance or smug superiority, but now he's almost rigid, shoulders drawn up tight, his left hand white-knuckling his beer as though it's a life line. He's nervous.
"Are you alright? You're being all chill right now, it's odd." You eye him from your peripheral vision skeptically, raising a questioning eyebrow.
"What do you mean, I'm always chill."
"Yeah, with other people. You're always giving me shit. You literally call my team 'Dick Team' and you're constantly stealing from my desk. You took my white-out and like, eight of my pens."
"I don't know," he shrugs, and his nose twitches in a way that's always a little adorable — not that you'd ever admit it aloud. "I guess you're just easy to pick on. Plus, you're not innocent either. Are you conveniently forgetting the time you stole my spare suits from my locker? I had to walk around the office completely in the nude; you're lucky I'm confident with my body."
"You deserved it," you volley back.
His gaze narrows, those milky, flat eyes squinting like he's made a clever discovery, read between the lines and now he's all self-congratulatory. You can practically see his chest puffing out in pride, heaving behind the pale fabric of his shirt, all male bravado. "You just wanted to see my dick, didn't you."
An amused puff of air escapes you, making you pause before you take a sparing sip of your drink. "If I wanted to see your dick, I don't think it would take very much."
His mouth drops open, lips parting in a shock that you know is fake, large ears shifting forward, intentionally overexaggerating it before he sets his expression into what seems like an offended sneer. "Are you slut shaming me right now? What makes you so confident, huh? I may have given a few hand jobs behind The Sardine for some blow, but I am not a whore, alright."
"Sure, sure," you agree noncommittedly. It's all so relaxed, your bodies having shifted closer than you think either of you had realized in the time that you've been talking, as though some kind of gravitational pull had gradually drifted you both into the others orbit. So close that everything else becomes faint, a thousand miles away, as though the party surrounding you is a dream, all hazy and distorted and somehow, he's become reality, a centered point. Clear, and vivid, and familiar. It's almost unsettling in a way. How at peace you are standing next to him, with the fridge humming beside you, the overhead cast from the overhead lights bathing everything in a soothing glow, his warmth gliding over you when his arm brushes against yours. Too close and somehow, despite everything, it feels right. Normal.
So of course, your mouth goes and ruins it.
"The poster in your room, that's what makes me so confident, big guy."
He freezes, you can feel his body go still and you want to kick your ass as soon as you register what you've said. You want to tape your mouth shut, or maybe just crawl into a hole and cover yourself with earth until decades pass and you've been able to properly forget this little interaction. But you can't do any of those things, you can't take back time or retract what you've said and now you're left to deal with the aftermath, stranded directly in the middle of it.
"You, you went in my room?" He asks, and now he actually sounds genuinely appalled. Maybe horrified. Now you want to pour the rest of your drink down your throat in the hope that maybe if you're lucky enough, it'll choke you out and you won't have to face this situation. He doesn't give you the opportunity to defend yourself, to try and make some kind of explanation, even though all of the ones that you've been running through your head don't sound all that convincing. And the truth is just as flimsy. Almost worse than the lies you've been mulling over.
Your best friend told me to go snoop inside of your room and so I did?
That sounds terrible.
And now he's leaning into your space, turning on the heels of his shoes to properly face you, crowding close while his mouth shapes into a smile, one of pure delight, all teeth. There's that perverted glint reflecting in his eyes, one you've seen a thousand times, one that's been directed at you, present with every crass joke he's ever made at your expense. Like when he sees you after a particularly rough shift out on the field, combat suit tattered, revealing strips of skin that are typically hidden, he can't seem to resist passing you a sleazy wink. It's the same stare that he gives you when he sees you at the start of your respective shifts, always greeting you with a monotone "Mornin', sugartits." A salutation that's become an expected part of your routine.
"Oh-ho," he chuckles, excited. "Who's the pervert now, huh? Classic case of the pot calling the kettle black."
"Okay," you roll your eyes. Pretending to be exasperated at this point really. A façade to keep him from seeing the relief that floods through you, as though a new life had been breathed into you. The alleviation that comes with dodging a bullet.
He dips his voice low, dropping it into something obnoxious, saturated with faux modesty, his typical monotone flourishing with a lilt. "I hope you didn't steal any of my panties."
"Ew, don't say panties."
He goes quiet again. Leaving you both in another bout of silence, except this one isn't as comforting as before. It's unsure, brittle, shaken in a way that your dynamic, as strange as it typically is, strained and charged, has never really been before. You feel a little lost, like you've been stepping around blindly and your foot has slipped, leaving you tripping and struggling to reorient yourself in a sightless struggle.
If it weren't for the music, you're sure you'd be able to hear yourself breathing. You've become hyperaware of everything. The fit of the clothes on your body and the brush of each individual thread rubbing across your skin, the press of the floor beneath your shoes, the plastic cup within your hand, having long since turned lukewarm, no longer chilled. It all settles you deep into the moment, planting you directly in the thick of it and forcing you to confront it. You can't hide from any of it, and nothing is helping to distract you. Not the music, not the laughter, not even the guy who's passed out on the middle of the living room floor, a man (his friend, hopefully) giggling to himself as he creatively sketches a penis on the unconscious dude's forehead. None of it works.
"But, uh, so what do you think?"
It takes you off guard. The abruptness of him speaking again, the almost timid nature of his tone, reluctant, soft around the edges. For perhaps the first time since you've met him, he sounds uncertain. Anxious. For a second, your brain falls blank, caught and spun up within his sudden embarrassment. He seems modest, a little delicate, prodding you for your approval, and you hate how much you like humility on him. The tips of his ears have gone a little lax, almost as though he's wilting from his own unease, gradually caving in on himself and once again he's holding onto the sweating beer in his grip like it's a comfort blanket.
Everything feels raw. Sensitive. Like there's a new direction spanning out in front of you, expanding, stretching far beyond your ability to comprehend, but it tugs at you. It reaches for you, grasping with inquisitive, longing fingers, urging you to step forward, to take the plunge. You aren't sure what's happening between you two. What caused the shift. If it's just the alcohol getting to both of your heads, or if it's just that damned poster that's caused the change. Struck something previously unseen between you, now demanding to be acknowledged. But as much as it frightens you, you don't entirely hate it, either. It fits somehow, like slipping into a jacket that had gone ignored in the back of your closet for years, unexpectedly snug, warm and well-fitted.
You decide immediately, standing along the fringes of a wild party that seems to exist and carry on outside of you, that you want to test this — whatever this is. You want to study it, live in it, if only temporarily, and discover where it might take you, and if it blows up in your face, then you'll take it. You'll endure it, let it roll off of your back like oil. You can take whatever disaster may come. Take the cowards way out if you have to and pretend that it was all done under the impressionable influence of liquor — one silly night and one dumb moment of vulnerability. And then you and Sonar can go back to loathing each other, returning to the security of those stupid pranks, because that's what you've always done. But for now, you can let yourself be honest, you can indulge in the odd sincerity that's swaddled you both and take that daunting step forward.
"About the poster?" You question, though you really don't have to. "It's fine. I mean, it's what I expected it to be used for if I'm being honest. Though the frame was a bit unexpected. It's kind of sweet. . . In a really strange, sort of creepy way."
"You think so?" He visibly perks up, ears lifting, as though he's been revitalized, life breathed back into him.
You only shrug, but the smile you offer him is the most genuine and gentle thing you've probably ever directed at him, and it seems to soothe whatever doubts he may have had. His eyes seem to widen by a fraction, pale and glittering in the amber lights. You can hardly recall a single moment where you two have ever been so cordial. Sure, you've had rare exchanges in the breakroom. Brief interactions where you would both mind your own business or maybe, you'd coexist long enough to do something inconsequential like grabbing a plastic utensil from one of the drawers to pass it to the other, but that's about as far as your kindness would extend. You've never seen him like this, almost soft. It's jarring, especially because of how pleasant it is.
"I like . . . looking at you." It's such a reluctant confession. It's genuine, hesitant in its delivery, like he's almost afraid to admit it. And then, inevitably, the dreamy expression on his face shifts a little, becoming familiar in the flirtation that's shown. As though he's reminiscing, thinking back fondly on filthy memories, every bit of the pervert that you're used to. "A lot."
In any other circumstance, you'd give him hell for it, insult him a little bit for turning a good thing crass. But weirdly enough, it hasn't ruined the moment. That authenticity is still there, tender, weaving naturally through the conversation despite his antics.
"I like you like this. Us like this, I mean. Not being complete dicks to each other," you divulge. And you almost have to force the words out. They leave you slowly, like if you utter them carefully enough, you might have time take them all back. "It's nice."
"Yeah, I like you too — this too." He clears his throat, the pink flesh of his snout wiggling, crinkling as though he's internally admonishing himself.
If you were still acting like your old self — the you from literally an hour ago — you'd probably tease him for it. This entire night and interaction have given you the kind of blackmail material that you could hold over his head for years, something to dangle and taunt him with whenever he gets under your skin (which is constantly). And yet, the desire to do so barely crosses your mind. It flickers over you, as quick as a dying ember, losing its heat in its trajectory and smoldering out, dark and smothered. And with its passing, something unexpected and more than a little insane blossoms in its place.
You feel crazy by just thinking it, and you want to pin the blame on the horrendous blend of vodka and tequila coursing through your system. But you know yourself. You know your limit, and yes, you can feel the liquor beginning to settle in your body, fuzzy and balmy, but it's clement. Mild. Little more than a dull thrum gliding along your fingertips and toes. You're just starting to feel a buzz, and it's no where near the point where you can't trust yourself to make proper decisions.
You know that if you say what you really want to then you'll reach a point of no return. There will be no pretending, no way to back track. You're staring down an event horizon. But now that you've had this, seen firsthand how life can be between you two, you really don't want to return to your old ways. You don't want the anger and hatred, the constant baring of teeth and the immature, humiliating comments that you both spit back and forth at each other like venom. This connection, as outlandish and unforeseen as it is, is something you can't help craving now that you've had a taste of it, and it forces you to make a realization that you don't think you would have otherwise. That against all odds and common sense, you might actually like Sonar.
Sure, maybe it's just a spur of the moment type of deal. Maybe tomorrow, you both will wake back up and be at each other's throats again as though tonight never happened; treat it like a fantasy. A hallucination. But if that's the case, there's really no reason in fearing the jump, hesitating to take the plunge. You might as well, consequences be damned.
"Hey, do you maybe wanna go to your room and see how that poster on your wall compares to the real thing?"
It doesn't take him long to process what you've said, and when it clicks, he stands ramrod straight. Spine stretching to its full height, ears directed forward as though they've locked onto a target. You don't think you've ever seen anyone's eyes light up with such delight and disbelief before. Glittering with a wonder that seems innocent despite the perverse ideas and images that are no doubt flooding his brain in a deluge of pornographic excitement.
His attention snaps onto you, gaze narrowing, heavy-lidded with equal parts skepticism and joy. "You mean, like, looking at your boobs and stuff?"
For being so smart he has a tendency to act incredibly dense, and yet you find yourself smiling anyway, laughing softly in weary amusement. "Yes, Sonar, like looking at my boobs and stuff."
He stares at you heavily. Long enough for you to almost second guess the offer. For you to get a little insecure. His nose twitches again, like he's trying to sniff out a lie, breathing in the air for even a sliver of hesitation or the hint of a joke on its current. He leans so close that you can smell the cologne on him, fresh and amber, robust with a subtle spice. The clean notes of it still surprise you even now. Honestly, you expected him to wear something like Axe Body Spray, not whatever this is, notably expensive and mouthwatering in a way that's kind of humiliating.
"Are you fucking with me?" He presses, the bushy shape of his brows drawing close in an doubtful pinch. "You can't dangle the promise of boobs in front of man's face like candy and then not deliver. That would be cruel, even for you."
You long to roll your eyes at him, to jab at him for his doubts, but you don't. For reasons beyond you, you're bold tonight. You feel empowered when you reach out and grab ahold of his tie, looping your fingers around the smooth texture of the fabric, rich and fine in your hand, like water inside of your palm as you glide it up the length of the material, seizing ahold the knot secured at the base of his neck. He bows to the drag of your arm without a sliver of resistance, malleable and compliant, all of his previous bark snuffed out with a singular gesture. He lets you guide him into your space, obeying the weight of your hand as you urge him closer, eyes already glazing over like he's become high on your confidence.
"I'm not fucking with you, Sonar. Yet." You answer, and the dopey way his ears droop, already tangled up inside the implications of your words makes you want to laugh. "But play your cards right and you just might get lucky."
His eyes widen with the realization and then he's rambling, a hasty, stumbling stream of emotions pouring over. "Please, please, please, I'll be so good. I'll play my cards right; whatever you want—"
"Then come on."
You barely tug on his tie at all, and he still falls in after you, allowing you to guide him forward as though he's been lured in. Hypnotized and trapped under a spell. You both barely have the minds to leave your drinks behind, forgotten and abandoned in favor of the anticipation and hunger. You move your way out of the kitchenette, Sonar close on your heels, and through the flurry of enthusiasm and sound, you can hear him muttering to himself, brief utterings like, "Holly shit, I can't believe this is actually happening."
It makes you smile, amusement bubbling in your chest, fluttering and light. But you don't make it out of the party unseen. Celebratory voices rise up, following after you two before you can step down the hallway — the Z-Team. Whooping and hollering from their places scattered around the apartment. Wolf-whistles pitching high, laughter popping in the air like fireworks.
To your utter surprise, Sonar doesn't make a comment, missing the prime opportunity for him to shout something douchy. He's too busy chasing after you, mind narrowed down into tunnel vision, pinned on you, locked tight.
It happens in a blur, the trip down the hallway, with how desperate you both are, the thrill of what's to come alive and sharp, working through your bodies like electrical currents. And then you're back in his room, and he's stumbling in after you, quick-footed and taut from his suspense.
"Go sit on the edge of your bed," you order as soon as the door is shut.
"I always knew you'd be the dominating type," he comments, voice syrupy and thick, all satisfied in his quipping. He obeys your command without resistance, walking across the room quickly to seat himself down on the mattress, creating a divot there with his weight. He settles his hands in the middle of his lap, fingers flexing like he's concentrating to combat his own urges, knuckles turning pale. "Don't worry, I know the rules: I can look, but I can't touch."
You huff in amusement, briefly eyeing your poster as you step away from the door before you shift your attention onto him, moving to stand close, directly in front of him. He seems captivated by your movements, staring as you shift yourself in front of him, standing so close that there's only a few inches between your legs and his knees. Just enough room for you to comfortably move around and toe off your shoes, swiping them out of the way with the kick of your feet.
When you lower your fingers to the metal button of your jeans, thumb circling and pressing it down to guide it through the buttonhole, he narrows in on the movement with a zealousness that delights you. It lights up in your veins like an aphrodisiac, hot and pulsing, made intense, overwhelming by the way he watches, as though he's fascinated by your every micromovement. Captivated by how you softly sway your hips to aid your arms in rucking your pants down from around your waist and past your thighs. They pool down around your ankles in a pile, meeting the wooden floorboards with an almost inaudible thump.
You're taken off guard about how you don't feel and ounce of shame or humiliation. It's almost impossible to with how he's observing you, eyes large with fascination. Awe. You didn't imagine that Sonar would be capable of this type of admiration. Innocent in its intrigue despite what you're doing being anything but innocent. He's just . . . tender. Soft even though his want is palpable. Noticeable with the white-knuckled grip he has around his own hands.
It's all the drive you need to reach from the hem of your shirt, pulling it up and over your head in single movement. You let it fall to the floor as you step out of your jeans. And now you're standing in front of him in nothing more than your undergarments, which are completely unsexy. They don't even match, just a basic, lace bra and a pair of cotton underwear, blank gray and boring.
But Sonar is still staring at you as though you created the entire night sky, strung the stars up and molded the moon with your own bare hands.
"I'm not a striper, Sonar. You can touch me," you say, already reaching behind your back to undo your bra's clasp.
"You serious?" His jaw drops a little, fangs poking out, fully exposed from his disbelief. You wonder what it would feel like if he bit you.
"Very," you reply. And then with a few practiced movements, the fastenings come loose, the straps around your shoulders go slack, already slipping from their perches and you let them shift free. Your bra drops down by your feet with the rest of your clothes, and now you're practically naked. The tepid air gliding over your breasts has your nipples hardening, but the salacious look he gives you, roving over you from head to toe, is white-hot. He hasn't even touched you and you already feel as though you're being eaten alive, consumed piece by tiny piece at a time.
But his hands aren't off of you for long. Suddenly, they're there, taking ahold of you, warm and greedy. They slip around your ribs long enough for him to hold you, moving you in between the spread of his thighs with so much enthusiasm that you nearly trip on your feet, but he manages to keep you steady. And then they brush around the shape of your torso in a pair, leaving fire in their wake as they move to grab onto your breasts in avid handfuls, fingers tensing to squeeze.
"This is so much better than how I've imagined it," he remarks as he kneads the swell of your chest, tracing the shape of it with his thumbs.
"Yeah?" you breathe, arching into the press of his fingers when he plucks at your nipples, circling them in teasing glides, causing a thin gasp to snag in your throat. "Better than the picture you've got right there?" You angle your head, gesturing it towards the wall behind you, trying to focus as he continues to play with your breasts as though they're the most fascinating things on the planet, kneading them in zealous gropes.
"Oh yeah," he answers without a second of delay. "That camera really doesn't do you justice in comparison to this; you have no idea."
But you think you do have a pretty good one with how eagerly he's still grasping at you. There's no opportunity to tease him for his desperation. The words you had ready, forming in the back of your mouth are snuffed out as quickly as they were building, vapor in the hollow of your throat. Because now he's tilting forwards, jaw hinging open to lick a long, steady trail between your breasts with the flat of his tongue. It's wet, leaving saliva glittering on your skin, pleasure darting on your nerves from the slick weight of it.
He fucking purrs. Guttural, contented clicks lifting from somewhere deep behind the pit his ribcage as he tastes you. You feel his fangs graze your flesh alongside the drag of his tongue, lethal pinpricks caressing over you in sharp nicks. When your gaze drops downward, jumping to glance down at him, he's already watching you. Eyelids droopy, the flat white of them turned a little vacant, like he's managed to get drunk off of some simple heavy petting.
"This okay?" he slurs around the width of his tongue, refusing to detach the press of it from your body for so much as a second. As though the separation, no matter how temporary, would be debilitating for him. Soul crushing.
"Definitely," you nod.
He doesn't verbally respond. He only hums, a long, satisfied vibration against your skin; you feel it bone deep, trembling inside of your marrow. He gets adventurous now, hands shifting, moving reluctantly from your chest to explore the rest of you. They're everywhere, seemingly all at once. Your back, your waist and hips, moving low to grope the shape of your ass, massaging the fat with an appreciative rumble. And then he's sealing his mouth around your right breast, maw large enough to encompass the entire thing within the stretch of his jaw if he wanted, lips clasping around the nipple to suck.
Your spine bows, muscles coiling from the suction, damp and molten, the serrated edges of his teeth lightly dragging over it, and the dull pain rips a weak moan from your lungs. He's fast to calm the sting with his tongue, circling the large point of it around your nipple, easing the muted throb.
In a blur he's hauling you up into his lap, arms coiling around you like steel bands to secure you to the length of his torso. It leaves you scrambling, gripping onto his shoulders for support, nails biting into his shirt, and through the abruptness of it all you notice it — Of course, he's already hard. Firm and pressing at you through the fabric of his pants. His hands return to your waist, starved for friction, self-restraint fraying around the edges, and he grinds himself between your thighs, right up against your cunt.
You didn't exactly have a plan for this encounter. It was impulsive, abrupt, and you didn't have anything particular in mind except that maybe you'd let him see you naked, maybe you'd tease him a little, indulge in some harmless fooling around. But those initial intentions were quickly slipping right out the window. Maybe they'd been tossed out of it as soon as he'd gotten his hands on you, or maybe they were just a lie you had been telling yourself the entire time. Stupid and flimsy. Meant to trick your own mind, so you could pretend that you didn't want anything more from him. Giving yourself the curtesy of pretending to be shocked by your own actions when you roll your hips to meet his. But deep down in your bones, in the center of your body where your soul might sit, you know you want this and so much more.
He moans when you swivel your hips down, driving them in a steady roll directly against his, right on his cock. He says something, mumbled and clipped around the edges, too distorted for you to make out, but you catch a few swears and pleads scattered inside of his murmurings. Little glimmers of 'fuck yes' and 'just like that.'
It comes over you like a wave, great and sudden, rising within you in a lashing of instincts that can't be ignored. You take ahold of his face, directing it out from your chest, and his loud complaints go disregarded to your ears in favor of threading your fingers through the silky tufts of his fur and nudging his chin up to press your mouth to his.
"Oh, c'mon, don't take 'em away from me ye—" His voice dies out on your lips. His body goes still under you, muscles tensing as though he doesn't know what to do with himself. But his stupefaction is temporary, and now he's moving, hands roving over you and clasping tightly like he wants to steal you away and hoard you for himself.
Kissing him takes a moment to figure out. The mechanics of it aren't the same as it would be with a regular person. His mouth is larger, a little wider, and the narrow shape of his fangs frame the corners of your lips when you press them against his own, the sharp points of them scraping over the delicate skin. But you do manage to find a rhythm, as unusual as it is, though it's not unpleasant by any means. Only different.
It's sloppy, bordering on harsh, though that's mainly due to his enthusiasm. His tongue lapping inside of your mouth, the serrated edges of his teeth nipping, and spit smears from the messy exchange. You've never been particularly aroused by sloppy make outs. You've endured one too many guys who think its sexy to punch their tongues into your mouth, lacking any kind of technique or tact. Locking their lips with yours like they're trying to eat your face whole, but somehow, despite his fervor, he manages to do it in a way that doesn't make you want to crawl out from your skin.
There is a kind of restraint to it. You can feel it in the way that his muscles coil beneath your palms, taut and flexed, as though he's really repressing the desire to extend his jaw and eat you alive. Maybe that should terrify you. He did used to eat people, those are some of the rumors that circulate SDN, at least. That during his stint as a villain, human flesh was a key part of his diet. But you aren't scared of him. A part of you even likes it — not the death part. Just the teeth, the prospect of him biting, and you can't help but imagine what it would be like if those honed barbs of enamel would sink through your skin.
The thought of it, the brief fantasy has you lose control of yourself for only the flashing of a second. Your powers pour from your body in a flare, an uptick of it surging, and in a blink an invisible push has Sonar shoved back on the bed. The oxygen from his lungs escapes him in a whoosh. He stares up at you, eyes wide from his place on his back, arms splayed out and pinned down to the mattress by the thrumming of your power. You expect him to complain, to bitch a little about being thrown around, but there isn't a shred of offense on his face. Once his initial shock wears off, satisfaction takes its place, smug and delighted, as though there's no other place on the entire planet that he'd rather be right now.
"I love a woman in charge. So, now that you've got me all vulnerable and at your mercy like this, what are you gonna do with me?" His ears lean forward while his mouth pulls into a smile, eager, ready to be used up. He's not fighting against the weight of your power. He's malleable beneath it, fully relaxed.
Honestly, you don't know what you want to do with him. You didn't exactly plan to shove him down like this, but now that you have him here, flat on his back and compliant, it's not an opportunity that you can let slip by. It's too good to pass up.
You let your sight spill over him, taking in every inch and detail that you can from your perch around his hips. The heave of his chest, the smear of spit around his mouth, glittering in the warm spill of light projecting through the window. If it wasn't for his fur blocking the view, you're pretty confident that he's blushing, the skin beneath the thick cover of hair flushed red. He's pretty like this, in a lethal, monstrous kind of way, eyes glimmering and eager.
"You gonna let me do what I want?" you ask, pressing your hips down over his bulge, dragging your pussy right over the length of it. You're already wet. You can feel your arousal soaking your underwear, making the fabric cling to you, and the texture of the fabric presses right over your clit when you circle your waist over him.
"You can do absolutely anything you want to me. My body is yours." Such a cornball. And a slut, not that either of those things surprise you in the least.
You don't bother touching him outright. You let your ability do all of the work, mentally shaping your power to pluck at the buttons of his shirt like fingers, carefully slipping his tie loose from around his neck. You feel him try to press into the weight of your field, and you cut him some slack, easing up the pressure enough to give him room to move, to really feel the hum of the energy pulsing around him. So he can indulge in the brush of it gliding across his chest as you continue to pluck the buttons free.
More and more of him gets revealed to you as you work, and you take in each bit of him that gets exposed in an appreciative stare, tugging the drape of his shirt down and over his shoulders between the squeeze of his body and the mattress. You've wondered an embarrassing number of times how far the fur around his head travels. If it just stops at his neck or keeps going. His hands are human, that much you know. And the bit of his forearms that are visible seem the same, except for the thick smattering of hair that peeks out past the rolled-up cuff of his sleeves above the base of his elbows. But that never gave you too much to draw a proper estimation from, no matter how much you tried to imagine it.
Now you finally have your answer. With the final button undone, you're able to tear the front of his shirt open with a lazy push of your powers, gripping ahold of the cotton material with a tangle of energy, and his compliance allows you to tug the sleeves down from around the length of his arms simultaneously. It leaves his shirt nothing more than a wrinkled-up pile of fabric under his waist, forgotten and useless, and his torso is now deliciously bare. Free for you to ogle him, shameless and starved.
The fur keeps going from around his neck, spanning down his shoulders and upper arms. It's thick around his chest, as full and dark as the rest of it, completely covering his pectorals in a rich coat. His abdomen is bare though. Human, pale soft skin, defined and shaped by light muscles — abs, he has abs? — that you didn't expect; lithe but still visible. And there, from top to bottom is a thick stretch of hair that splits directly down the middle of his torso, expanding out from his chest, starting from his sternum and scattering in a path all the way down until it vanishes under the waistline of his pants. Referring to it as a happy 'trail' wouldn't do it any justice. It's too broad, made from a heavy scattering of coal gray fur, probably almost as wide as the width of your palm.
It's stupid how hot it is.
"Like what you see, huh?" Sonar gloats. "I knew you would."
"Oh, shut up." You scoff, but there's no real bite in your voice. You're too distracted to really chide him.
"Nah," he responds. So much arrogance dripping from one tiny word. He's a little too confident in your opinion, content and relaxed underneath the pulse your energy, white-hot, an electrical field molding around the shape of him, swaddling, stroking against his skin and fur. It's made him relaxed. Happy to lounge and soak up the sensation of it all.
"I could shut you up, you know?" You lean in a little, just enough that you can feel the warmth from his muzzle brushing over your nose. "Pretty easily."
"I'd love to see you try," he goads.
You don't bother with any cheeky one-liners or boastful assurances; you just do it. The field flowing from your skin funnels, molding down into the vague shape of a hand, elongated fingers stretching around the width of his snout to trap it shut, wrapping and overlapping to seal his jaw together. Tight enough to be secure, but not enough to cause any pain. But you want him to feel it. To know that it's there, and you aren't disappointed. You see the realization creep in on his face. First, it's confusion, brows drawing close in a bewildered furrow, and then understanding dawns after, eyes expanding as he stares at you. It's that particular expression that makes you feel truly in control. You've got him at your fingertips, spun up and contained within the threads of your grip like a fly strung within a web. But unlike a fly, he doesn't seem all that concerned with getting free.
All of his initial shock has drained away, fleeting, and now all that remains is pure, unadulterated joy. As though he's thrilled by the prospect of being put in his place, pinned down beneath you. You should have expected this honestly. All of the months he's spent burrowing under your skin, plunging himself there like a thorn, burrowed deep and irritating. It makes sense, and you're pretty disappointed with yourself for not noticing it sooner. All of the verbal sparring in the past, the stupid fights and arguments, they've been foreplay to him.
. . . And for you too, if you're going to be truthful with yourself. He knows how to get you heated, how to piss you off in just the right way, more often than not, about the most inconsequential, pathetic things. It was only four days ago that you two spent, probably about fifteen minutes fighting over the copy machine and who got to use it first.
(You were both so caught up with being petty that two other people had used it while you were arguing.)
You both debated with more passion required for something so trivial, crowding up into each others spaces, so close that you could smell his cologne. It was a simple thing, and if it were anyone else, you would have been more than alright with allowing them to go ahead before you, but it wasn't anyone else, it was Sonar. And because of that, you two remained that way, caught up in the tension building between you, thick and toxic like poisoned fumes, because the hatred gave you an excuse to be close.
But you don't need that excuse anymore — you probably never did. Now you can sit in his presence and not have to pretend to loathe the air he breathes. You can touch him and not make excuses for the soft-edged fuzz that fills the center of your stomach whenever you're around him, wedging behind the pulse of your heart, cradling it in cotton and warmth, soaked in sugar.
It's a little terrifying, how much you like this. Him. But you don't want to run from it either. Not now at least, when you have him splayed out and wanting.
You shift back, moving the press of your body from his hips to slip a little lower, settling down across his thighs instead. Sonar responds as best as he can, a mournful, petulant groan rumbling from his chest in an inarticulate complaint about the absence of your weight on his cock. You know that if he was still able to talk that he'd be giving you a mouthful right now. You can see his desire to grumble and protest reflecting in his eyes, burning and passionate. That bit of indignation is doused out quickly as soon as he notices his slacks being unbuttoned by an invisible force, the polished button slipping free from its notch with a simple tug.
You only pause long enough to give him ample time to reconsider, eyeing him from your place on his thighs with an evaluating stare. You don't let him free completely, easing up the potency of your hold enough for him to give you some kind of indication that he's having second thoughts. You get the total opposite. His head lifts up, now free to do so, craning downward so that he's able to properly look at you, chin brushing against his chest. And then he's nodding, frantic and overzealous; muffled words are trapped behind the ghostly hold around his snout. You can't understand the majority of it, but you are able to make out a smothered "hell yes, please," before the rest becomes completely inaudible.
That's all it takes for you to slip the zipper down its metallic teeth, pulling it with a hand that isn't truly there. You let yourself watch the show, sitting back on the support of his thighs, while your powers do all the work. He just as entranced by the display, staring down while his pants and boxers get rucked down in a steady grip, bunching up in their downward drag. You lift yourself just enough for the rest of his clothes to slip off around his ankles, and you remove his shoes and socks with it all in one firm tug. They fall down somewhere at the edge of the bed, landing with a pronounced thump.
He's fully naked know, exposed to the scope of your attentions, and you are entirely brazen as you take in the sight of him. Visually eating up every sliver of his body like it's a feast for your eyes — to you it is. Because damnit, as much as that tiny part of you that's trying so badly to cling onto your hatred doesn't want to admit it, you have to. He is pretty.
He's there, all of him, spread out for you to admire every detail. The athletic muscles and the subtle divots of his ribcage contacting with his every breath; the way the dim whisps of light catch on the dark smoky hue of his coat, tracing along the pale hue of his skin in fragments of gold, his large eyes shimmering like twin pearls as they watch you.
And then there's his cock, long and rock hard, head flushed a dusty pink. He looks turned on enough for it to seem painful, the veins trailing down the considerable length are throbbing — leave it to Sonar to be practically ready to bust from a little dry humping. He's already leaking, precum trickling from the tip in a decent flow, pouring all the way down the entirety of his cock and dampening the thick bush of fur covering his balls. It's a pretty impressive amount that he's produced considering that all you've done is some making out and a little grinding. You can't imagine what it'll be like once you actually fuck him, how soaked and full he'll get you. It's almost humiliating how much the thought of it affects you, and your blood seems to turn molten at the prospect of filled up to the brim until its leaking out of you, your pussy clenching around nothing.
"Christ, Sonar, is this normal?" You can't keep the awe out of your voice, but you can't be bothered to contemplate how your obvious astonishment is going to have terrible consequences on his already inflated ego.
He's not able to give much of an answer, but the flirtatious way his brows lift up is conformation enough. You can practically hear his voice in your ears despite his silence, a conceited, "Pretty impressive, right? There's a lot more where that came from."
You don't sit in your stupor for long. It's difficult, now that you have him in front of you like this. You don't resist temptation any longer. As much as you want to touch him yourself, to bask in the warmth of his skin against your palms, you also want to be able to absorb every twitch and microexpression unencumbered, and so you let your powers encapsulate him entirely. It's holding his mouth, sweeping over his chest, pinning down his hips, and now, it's coiling around his cock.
He tries to lurch, body involuntarily shaking and jerking against the weight of your influence, restrained and embraced within the expanse of it, but he's helpless. Caught.
You mold the shape of your power around his girth, fitting snuggly over the whole length of him, tight and heated. You get to watch as the glide of that indiscernible grip smears the wet rivulets of his cum over blushed skin, making him soaked and messy. Maybe it's a little mean how you get to toy with him like this. Sitting, (mostly) unaffected, turning him into your own personal entertainment while he's tortured by a pressure that he can't see, only feel. And it's everywhere. You extend it across the planes of his body, encompassing him, stretching hands and solid weight over his chest, threading a stimulating energy through his flesh and sinew, saturating him at a level that'll root down to his atoms.
Phantom fingers rake through his fur; they caress his skin and seep into his limbs like a throbbing warmth. It has to be overwhelming. Agony in the best way possible, and the expression on his face reflects that. It's crumbled, all pinched tight as though he's in pain. His chest heaves, a thin breath hiccupping within the back of his throat, a purr blurring with a pathetic whine.
It's such a good look for him, pathetic and a little fucked out.
"Is this what you do when you're in here?" You lean forward, holding yourself up by settling your hands on the base of his hips, fingers gripping onto the silky coat that envelops his lower waist and upper thighs. "You sit in here at night jerking off to a poster like some kind of perv."
He's nodding again — it's all he can do while you keep him muzzled and work his cock with firm, invisible strokes. Drawing his arousal out of him, making it spill from him in a flow that's thick and constant. He tries to speak regardless. He's rambling, a flood of words gushing from him, welling up inside the hollow of his throat with no where to go. And maybe you're just weak willed. Pathetic in your own way, but you're intrigued — desperate, really — to hear what he has to say.
As soon as you release his mouth, a deluge of comes rushing out of him, utter filth. Voice all slurred and rapid, carried out on a moan that almost sounds pained. " — ou have no idea. So many nights. So many fucking nights, fucking my fist wishing I was pumping into you instead. So fucking — I can smell you right now and it's killing me. I want you to soak me; it's gonna feel so good. I know it will. C'mon, ride me, sit on my face, I don't care. I don't —"
It's a snap kind of decision. Jarring in its arrival. Hurtling down on you with all the mercy of a violent storm. But it's so inspired by the sheer scope of his want, the passion of it, that you're tired of all the fanfare. You two have been at it for long enough, the constant push and pull, the denial of feelings, and the fissures that's been weakening your resolve have finally grown too wide, and it splits your restraint right down the middle. With the loss of your self-discipline, your powers go with it, the gentle weight that you've been suppressing him with vanishes like a light.
"Sonar." You breathe, collecting yourself as best as you can. Gripping tightly onto his thighs to steel yourself against the rampant emotions welling up inside of you. That want, the anticipation; lust and liquid fire blazing in the pit of your stomach. "I want you to fuck me. Think you can do that?"
"Do I think—" His eyes narrow with his offense, growing sharp at the challenge. It's the only warning you get before he's hauling you up, hands as strong as iron when they grab onto you and flip you over on your back. The air in your lungs slips free, rattled from the jarring swap in perspective when you meet the mattress with a cushioned thump. He's over you now, caging you in with his hands on either side of your face, his hips wedged between your thighs, forcing your legs open, keeping you pinned and helpless by his weight.
He's so close that he blots out the poor streaks of light spilling inside of the room, and now it's only him, eaten up by shadows. Consuming your vision, and he almost seems wild. His teeth glimmer, soft and lithe like porcelain. Only inches away from your face, it's perhaps the first time you've actually considered how massive they are. But you're forced to confront it now with how close they're hovering within your proximity, imposing, fatal in their potential to sink into you and tear. By all accounts, it should be a little terrifying, but you aren't scared.
Like a damned degenerate, you're only turned on. Maybe it's the threat of danger, or maybe it's because it's just Sonar. It's hot because he's the one who's draped over you. Trapping you in place, keeping you wedged between the warmth of his body and the smooth press of a comforter that probably costs more than your monthly income. If it were anyone else, you'd have the urge to resist more, but for whatever reason — from pure horniness or something deeper — you trust him.
"You're a real pain in my ass, you know that?" He sneers, lips pulling back to flash those rows of jagged teeth. His eyes flash, red scintillating behind the white, opaque hue of them; a hellish glow. It's the same shade that overtakes his stare whenever he goes full bat, crimson, monstrous. It makes your heart race a little faster. "Always walking around with that holier than thou attitude."
"Because you're such a delight to be around," you quip.
"I mean, I must be, considering that you're the one who dragged me into my bedroom during a party so I could fuck you," he snarks back. And yeah, he makes a good point, but you aren't going to tell him that.
You could insult him back, take the boring, simple route to try and one up him. But in the duration that you've been co-workers, you've learned a thing or two about Sonar, and it's this: Despite being a savvy, tactful business and con man, that intellect and cunning do not follow him throughout all of life's facets. He may be guileful, but when it comes to sex, he's a complete and utter sucker. And you can have him in the palm of your hand if you lean into those vices. It's a little dirty, but, maybe it's his fault for being easy.
You soften your expression, refocusing it from irritated to coy. If he was a little sharper, he'd be able to see right through it, but Sonar is a slave to his desires and it clouds his judgement. You know as soon as he sees the tender, flirty look on your face that you've got him. Hook, line, and sinker. And all it takes is for you to turn a little bashful, playing into the act by arching your back, flaunting your breasts and shoving them directly into the plush fur layered across the contours of his chest.
You reach up with both hands to cradle the sides of his face, combing your fingers through the dark fluff there, curling them to scratch your nails over the soft skin underneath to relax him. He melts like butter, going lax as though his skeleton is made of wax and he's been held over hot coals. Eager and willing. The sharp, pitchy chirps that reverberate from the pocket of his lungs, trilling through the depths of his throat, are telling enough that you've got him right where you want him. But if you had any doubts, that glazed sheen that glosses over his eyes would have been enough to destroy any of that uncertainty.
"Come on Sonar, you've finally got me right where you want me. You said it yourself, remember? All of those nights spent right here, all alone with nothing but your hand, wishing I was here." You draw him closer and he lets you move him. His arms bend and drop down until he's holding himself up with his elbows, leaning in towards you so his nose is brushing on yours. It lets you tilt your chin towards him, angling your head so that you can press a kiss over his mouth, chaste and brief, a brush against the smooth shape of a single fang. "So why don't you just take what you want?"
His body has gone tense. He feels like a live wire being pulled from both sides, taut, muscles quivering and skin searing. You can feel his cock, heavy and throbbing, sitting on your stomach. You can't see it from how close your bodies are, but you know that he's still leaking. Precum is dribbling onto your bare skin, leaving it damp and wet from his arousal.
Usually you would tell a guy to eat you out before hand, or at the very least, stretch you out with their fingers before they even think of putting their dick inside of you. But you really don't think that you have the patience for that tonight. You're pretty sure that if he doesn't get inside of you within the next five minutes that you might actually lose it.
"Sonar, please —"
He severs your voice off before you can finish speaking. "I'm gonna fuckin' ruin you. Don't say you didn't ask for it."
You hardly register the sound of fabric tearing over the throaty snarl of his voice, but you feel your underwear being ruthlessly ripped from around your waist. He shreds them like they're made of paper, flimsy and delicate, but the noise they make is as harsh as the bite of them tugging into your flesh before they give to ferocity of his pulling. He's reduced them to scraps, and you just barely manage to track the scattered bits of their remains fluttering through the air when he tosses them. Or what's left of them.
You aren't super upset about the loss, but you wouldn't have had the chance to be pissed off anyway, because in what seems like a near instant, he's slipping cock down to the entrance of your cunt. Notching the head there, getting it slick and soaked, and then he's pushing himself inside in a single, brutal stroke that steals the oxygen from your lungs like a hit to the chest.
You're wet. You've been wet since the moment you had gotten him pinned down on the bed, but that doesn't make taking him all at once any easier. You vaguely catch yourself shouting his name, you feel your arms fly up to grab at his shoulders for stability, but it all seems so distant. As though you've been separated from your body, already overwhelmed from the girth of him splitting you open, forcing your pussy to adjust and give around the shape of his cock. It fills you with an ache that almost hurts. A sting that throbs and sears through your middle, but it also feels good in the best way possible. A sensation that balances delicately between the blurred line that splits pleasure and pain into their respective halves.
Your hips twist, body involuntarily floundering like it doesn't know if it wants to shift away or move in closer to the weight of him. You aren't sure what you want either, tortured deliciously on the length of him, devastated and hyper-stimulated, and you've only just started.
"Ah, ah, ah." He admonishes, arrogant, catching your waist in the tight clasp of a single hand. Holding you down on the mattress. He's smiling at you but it's all teeth. "You wanted this so badly. So be good and take it."
He draws himself back, retracting his cock until he's sitting inside of you by only the tip, and then with another long push he's fucking himself inside of you in a grueling pace. It's deep, heavy strokes. The kind that hits spots inside of you that you haven't had a guy find a long time. It shows a level skill that you really weren't expecting from Sonar. As much as you wanted to sleep with him, you never truly bought into all of his bravado and flaunting, especially those boasting his supposed sexual prowess. You figured that he was just gassing himself up. That he'd been lied to by one too many women and was actually out of touch enough to believe them.
You've never been happier to be proved wrong.
"Shi — God — fuck, Sonar." You ramble in disbelief, words shoved up out of your throat by the repetitive drag of his cock. Your fingers lock around the width of his shoulders, nails digging into them with enough strength that you know they're splitting flesh under the edges. He doesn't seem to mind the bite of them though.
Air puffs from his lungs, the amused brush of it gliding along your face. You know that your blissed out cries are doing wonders for his ego. He's going to be unbearable after this. If he was hell to endure before this, then every second at work from this day onward are going to be insufferable. But it's worth it. Absolutely worth it.
"Feelin' good, aren't you." It's rhetorical. Even your brain, as stunted and sluggish as your thoughts are becoming, is still able to gather that much. You nod regardless, your head rolling loosely on your neck because you can't be bothered to manage anything else. All you want to do is take it. To let yourself be greedy, delightfully overwhelmed. You hear him chuckle, low and smug in your ears. "I love you like this. It suits you, pretty and fucked out. I should keep you right here, in my bed, all the time. Sounds like a good plan to me, what do you think?"
"Fuck yes," you answer, breathing through a particularly intense thrust that makes your eyes roll.
"Yeah," he rumbles. "I agree."
His hips grind down on you, catching your clit on the rough patch of hair on his pelvis, and the texture shoots sparks over your nerves. You chase after the sensation of it, lifting your legs up to circle around his waist, rolling your pelvis to meet the rhythm he's set. Drawing out the ecstasy that lights up within you, eating its way through your bones and veins, rippling up your spine in a thick spiral.
He groans when you tighten around him, curling in on you to drop his head into the junction of your neck. He swears into your skin, strained and inflected with quiet tremors. The hand he has around your thigh squeezes, and the talons that's grown in place of his usual filed nails catch on your flesh, dragging to leave marks, etching the evidence of his grip onto your body.
"Do that again," he begs, groaning lowly against your throat. "Just one more time. Feels so good —"
His words are clipped off. Dead air when you tighten yourself around him again, gripping him with your cunt, wet and warm. You aren't disappointed in his reaction. He whines a little, pathetic and relieved, as though you've grazed over something buried deep inside of him, vulnerable and gutted. He jerks up, muscles coiled as though it takes a great amount of effort and discipline to do, lifting himself above you so that he's bearing most of his weight on his knees. And then he's raising an arm with the movement, stretching it out over you to cling onto the headboard, holding it so tightly that you know his knuckles are bleached from the strain.
It has your hips tilting, shifting from where your ass is settled on the front of his thighs and it makes the angle he's fucking you in change. He hits so deeper than before, the width of his head grazing right along your g-spot and your jaw drops from the heavy strokes.
"Sonar," you gasp raggedly.
"Victor," he replies. Spits out between the clench of his teeth.
"Huh?" You ask dumbly, brows furrowing while you pant through each pronounced thrust.
"It's Victor. Please say it. I wanna hear you say it. Thought about it so much." He babbles.
Despite the fact that he's in the middle of railing your brains out, you smile. A lovestruck, drunken grin. It's sweet. Nice. Your heart swells a little, because regardless of your old hatred for each other, all the hostility and aggression, he's willing to share something so personal with you. Sacred. You decide then that maybe it's only fair that you return the exchange, even though he didn't ask for you to. It just makes sense. You have to focus to say it, holding in a gulp of air so that you're able to properly vocalize, and once you can, you don't hesitate. You say your name, loud and clear.
His eyes go a little wide at the sound of it, lighting up with recognition, and you could laugh at the adorable expression if you weren't so preoccupied.
"That's my name," you offer.
"I know." He responds, nodding as best as he can. "I . . . shit . . . I hacked into Blazer's computer and read you file a little after I got boarded onto the Phoenix Program." He notices your confusion, sees the shock blatant and bare on your face, and he must feel regretful because his brows furrow, something that seems a lot like a worried frown tugging at the corners of his mouth. "That's not a turn off for you, is it?"
You should probably be angry. Or annoyed. It's a clear invasion of privacy and a clear violation of company security and somehow, once the surprise wears off, you don't manage to feel so much as a flicker of rage or irritation. You're indifferent. Uncaring, but maybe that's only because he's balls deep inside of you, and once this is over, that repressed indignation — if there is any — will come swelling up the surface. Now though, you can't be bothered to care.
"No, not really," you shake your head, though it's a little restricted from the pillows crowded around your skull.
"Cool."
The entire interaction is laughable, and it's exactly the sort of thing you had expected from him — Victor. It's a fitting name for him, though you probably wouldn't have guessed it yourself if you had been asked to —
"Victor!" you gasp abruptly, chest heaving at a rough drag. His cock ploughs through you, and it sounds sloppy. Wet, messy noises fill the room, made each time he pulls himself out of you and thrusts back inside.
"Yeah, just like that. Let me hear it," he urges, leaning as close to you as he can while still gripping onto the headboard. The mattress is creaking, or maybe it's the bedframe, rattling and groaning with every grind. Even with the music playing throughout the rest of the apartment, if anyone were to wander down the hall, the noises coming from inside of this room are unmistakable. It's bad enough the Z-Team had practically announced to everyone at the party what you two were doing in here, but that doesn't mean that you want someone to be able to listen in, either.
And the noises he's pulling from you don't help matters, but you can't help it. He's got you stretched open, dousing you with fire and bliss with every rock of his hips, punching moans from you with too much ease.
"Slow down. People are gonna hear."
He seems affronted by the mere idea of it, eyes squinting into a glare as though you've slapped him (but he would probably enjoy if you did that, honestly). "I don't care. Someone could come crashing through the door like the fucking Kool-Aid man, and I still wouldn't stop. Let them hear."
And maybe you are thankful that he doesn't change his pace, because you can feel yourself getting close. The muscles in your abdomen flex with your impending orgasm, drawing tight to hurtle you over the edge. Dragging you closer and closer to the fringes of a rapture that feels molten. Scorching liquid pooling in the base of your gut, searing within the junction of your hips to ravage you from the inside out, smoke searing through your sinew and blood.
It's building within you with a startling ferocity, twisting and frothing under your sweat-slick skin; a torrent of sensation seething at a bone deep level. You grab at whatever you can to settle yourself through the anticipation, nails digging at his shoulders, his chest, reaching around the claw at his spine. If it wasn't for the fur cloaked thick down his back, taking most of the damage, you're pretty sure that you'd be leaving scratches behind, nasty and raw.
He groans, some rumbling noise that comes from a place deep inside of him, right from the depths of his lungs. It urges you to look at him, lashes fluttering as you nudge your chin to stare at him above you. It's impossible not to admire him like this, sweat glittering over the sections of his exposed skin, simmering in faint flecks of gold, made more dramatic by the shadows pouring over his body like spilled ink. Your vision traces over as much of him as you can, struggling to keep your attention focused through the bliss eating away at your soul, but you manage it. Sweeping your vision over the arm gripping onto the headboard, muscles made defined from the tension keeping them stiff. The tendons and veins in his wrist bulging from the exertion, locking his fingers around the the wooden structure in a vice grip.
His focus is drawn elsewhere, head bowed downward to watch the pornographic view of his cock repeatedly plunging in and out of you. Ears tipped forward to listen to the wet smack of him filling you up, stretching you open around his girth. You can't help but to look now, angling your chin to see it for yourself. Taking in the way his abdomen heaves, abs clenching as he drives himself into you, his girth visibly soaked with the combination of your arousal.
You can't help how seize up, pussy clenching around him and he practically whimpers because of it, gasps slipping from his mouth in low, thin puffs of air. "Fuck, you're getting so tight, it's — baby, you're, you gettin' close? You gonna come for me?"
You're barely able to make yourself nod, much less talk, and all you can push from your throat is a sluggish sounding "Mmhmm."
"Yeah, I can tell," he remarks, settling back into an arrogant, but weakly put together façade like he wasn't just whining because of you a few seconds ago. "I wanna feel it. You can let go for me, make a mess. I wan' you to soak me with it. I need to smell you on me for days."
It's disgusting, utter filth, and yet you don't think you've ever been more turned on in your entire life. His mouth latches onto your breast just as his free hand wedges between your bodies, shifting low for his fingers to slip between the slick press of where you both meet, thumb finding your clit with deft precision, careful not to accidentally nick you with his claw. He works tight circles around it, and you jerk from the gush of pleasure it provides, ecstasy hurtling through your blood stream like an electrical pulse. He keeps his pace consistent, steadily working you up, the heat swelling to a new high, suspended by the sweep of his damp thumb around your clit and the wet suction of his tongue. Lapping and tracing your nipple into his mouth, grazing it shallowly with his teeth.
You're right there, just a tiny step away from the precipice, a long drop that'll sweep you under, and you chase after it. Rolling your hips to meet the drive of his own, hurtling you both closer to your respective orgasms. And all it takes is a few more thrusts, the heavy drag of his cock stretching you open, repeatedly nudging into that sensitive spot inside of you that makes your eyes roll, the repetitive coast of his thumb working around your clit, for you to tip into a devastating end.
You try to warn him, a weak moan cresting from your throat, but that's practically all you manage. A pathetic hiccup of his name, broken and lazy on your tongue, but he understands the warble regardless.
"That's right. Give it to me, le' me feel it," he urges, a smoky purr in your ears. When he detaches his mouth from your chest with an audible, sloppy pop, tongue sticking out to lick a path up to your shoulder, you aren't expecting him to sink his fangs into the junction of it. The pain bleeds through you right when you come, either exceptionally well-timed on his part, or executed purely on luck, but the sharp throb of it is the final push you need to give in to the rush. You light up like you've been thrown into a pyre, everything in you drawing up tight like you're bound in tugging strings. Clenching, muscles spasming almost violently to wring out every possible ounce of pleasure.
Your nails dig into the flesh on his back, sinking past the barrier of his fur to scratch. You feel the sound of his moan reverberate along your fingertips, humming across your throat from the clasp of his teeth banded around your neck. You hear the whimper in your ears, a punched out, elongated murmur, broken up only by a string a profanity and pleads, and then you feel him come, only seconds after you. It floods you with warmth, a steady, copious flow that fills you up, full to the brim and drenched from the warmth of it. Your spine arches from the sensation of it gushing inside of you, waist angling up in some primal urge take in every last drop.
He groans deeply, an exhausted, satiated noise before he lets go of the headboard and all but collapses onto of you, cushioning his fall by temporarily taking the brunt of his weight on his elbows. His body crowds over yours, shoulders hunched as he closes over you, satiated with the kind of satisfaction that hums in one's marrow, down in their blood. But he doesn't stop. He's not even pulling out at this point, he's just grinding against you, pressing the subtle swell of his pelvic bone into your clit in sluggish, languid swivels.
You're sensitive from your first orgasm. Everything feels raw from the pleasure still popping and fizzling across your nerves, aftershocks ebbing and flowing through you. It makes the press of his hips grinding against yours almost too much, too good, too harsh. He still hasn't let go of your shoulder, though his teeth have slackened, the bite of the enamel going lax, but not releasing, and the sting makes you twitch and tremble.
It catches you off guard, the blossom of it heating between the messy apex of your thighs, completely unexpected. You come again, much gentler than your pervious. A smaller orgasm riding off of the first, light and fleeting in comparison, but just as good in its own way. Sweeping over you in a dreamy, balmy glide, a summer gale ghosting over your skin, making your thighs twitch, ribcage shuddering from the delicate weight of it.
It's only then that he stops, the overstimulation having become too much for the both of you, and the sluggish grind of his hips slow to a halt. He sags against you completely, relaxing with an appeased sigh, and he finally releases his teeth from around the tender, raw flesh on your shoulder. He lets his head slump on your chest, nuzzling into the shape of your breasts with a pleased huff, and the massive width of his ears unintentionally nudge across your nose with the movement.
You want to laugh, maybe you do, but it's difficult to tell with the flood of endorphins surging through your system, stuffing your brain full of a calm, hazy fog. You're covered in a layer of sweat; his cum is trickling out past the plug of his cock, wet and slick across the inside of your thighs, and he bit you hard enough that you won't be surprised to find out that you're bleeding whenever you manage to drag yourself to the bathroom. The bastard. Most people only have to worry about hickies, but it feels like he damn near took a chunk out of your shoulder.
You wince at the sting, groaning lowly when a dull throb pulses over your nerves, and that seems to attract Sona— Victor's attention. He lifts his head up from your chest just enough to properly look at you, and you notice his eyes shifting through the glow of the city lights, flickering as though he's assessing you. He looks like a mess, but you doubt you're any better. His fur is all disheveled, the long tuft between his ears is mussed, his eyes are hazy, clouded over from sex, and there's a clear smile tugging softly at the corners of his mouth.
"Don't worry, you're not bleeding," he mumbles, still slurring at little around the edges. Well that answers that, at least. His eyes rove over where he sank his teeth into you, no doubt appreciating the impressions that his canines have left on your skin. "I'm sorry for biting you, I kinda have a tendency to get a little caught up in the moment."
You roll your eyes at that, not judgmental, just amused. "No, you're not."
He hums at that, a syrupy, gratified noise. Thick, rich, a purr. "You're right, I'm not."
He yelps when you swat at him, smacking your hand on his back, but it's mostly out of surprise. You're still sluggish. Limbs rubbery and lethargic, and you know that even your best hit right now wouldn't be enough to cause any actual pain.
"Ow," he grouses. "The hell was that for?"
"That was for biting me, you ass."
"I said I was sorry."
"I know," you reply, unimpressed. But he's easy to soothe, the furrow between his brows smoothing out as soon as you press a kiss the tip of his nose. The silence that follows after is tranquil in a way, and you both just allow yourselves to sit in it. Absorbing the silence (well, it's sort of silent, you can still hear the party outside bleeding in past the walls), enjoying the other's body heat and the rise and fall of your chests. He takes the lull as the opportunity to slip out of you, and you both hiss from the sensation of it, too tender for it to be enjoyable. Worse than that though, is the gush of his cum pouring out of you, a profuse amount, way more than a normal man would produce, and now it's soaking down your thighs.
"Shit, that's . . . a lot," you mutter in astonishment, mostly to yourself. You can feel it cooling on your skin already, becoming tacky, sticking your flesh as it trickles down the swell of your ass in a stagnant flow. It's disgusting. So gross, and so soon as you find the will to move, you're immediately taking a shower.
"Yeah," Sonar agrees, but it doesn't share a single shred of your awe or mounting disgust. He's knelt down between your legs now, attention fastened down on your cunt, no doubt watching how his cum is flowing from you in its abnormally heavy pour. His hands settle across your thighs, squeezing them within his palms, massaging the pale ache from them as he gently guides them open, spreading you so that he can get an unimpeded view. "Can we stay like this, for just a minute?" He asks, and the expression that crosses his face lets you know that he's not above begging for it.
"Ugh, you're such a guy, I swear," you grumble, but it lacks venom. You don't resist or make any effort to deny him. You remain reclined, settled back on the rumpled blankets, swaddled in the silk, cool and gossamer on your heated skin, catching your breath.
"I now the timing is a bit weird, considering I'm staring at your pussy right now, but . . . " he trails off, gesturing his snout down towards the middle of your legs, and you don't resist the urge to playfully nudge your knee into his side at the motion of it. He smiles a little at the jab, but it's a dull one. The hesitance in his voice doesn't fade. He remains soft spoken, hushed, as though this moment is fragile and he's afraid it might shatter if he handles it too roughly. "I just want to say that I am sorry. For how I've been acting, how I treated you when we first met. . . I know it's not much of an excuse, but I was embarrassed, I guess. You were this sexy, bigshot hero — someone who — " he sighs. "I've followed your career for years, believe it or not. And then I was just fucking up. Right in front of you, and I hated it. And then I made you hate me, so . . ."
"So you've been acting like a dick this entire time because you have a crush on me?" You ask bluntly. It's without hatred, or the means to offend. You don't want to ruin this, to squander it or give him a reason to withdraw inside of himself, to hide behind his usual ego. He's being a genuine, a rare show of the man who lies beneath all of that debonair flirtation, and you're drawn to it, his vulnerability. His trust in you. There's an undeniable sweetness there that you long to explore, to understand on an intimate level, saccharine and serene.
"Well when you put it like that it sounds stupid."
"Because it is."
"Hey, I'm trying to be honest here. So can you not? Way to kick a guy while he's already down." There's no true snark in his tone. Maybe some frustration but that seems to stem from himself, rather than you. It's humiliation, clear as day, etched in the gold and the dark that filters in through the window, winking lights bathing the room and the shape him in their shifting, incandescing hues. Spilling over his embarrassment like a spotlight.
If you're being honest, you have to take some of the blame. You were fairly quick to cast your criticisms on him, to snub him as soon as you met. Labeling him off as a lost cause and you hadn't bothered looking back, did it without a flicker of hesitation. You'd met him when he was in a stressful situation, and even though he absolutely handled it poorly, baring his teeth, lashing out as though you were the problem, you hardly paused to properly consider him. You gave up. Just like he did. You both hold an equal number of wrongs in this, choosing to squabble like a pair of middle schoolers instead of sharing a conversation like actual adults. It's uncomfortable to think about, to confront the reality of it. To admit that you aren't perfectly blameless. It's bitter, a vile pill sitting on the flat of your tongue, but you will yourself to swallow the truth down anyway.
"It's fine. I treated you pretty badly too." You sign deeply, and for a moment you allow your focus to flicker about the room, a temporary distraction from intently he's watching you now. This entire thing should be a whole lot more awkward. You're naked, he's naked, and he's sitting directly between your cum smeared thighs, and somehow, despite all of uncertainties, it's not so bad. It feels natural, in a way. As simple as breathing. "We both made some mistakes. We were stupid. Really stupid. I mean, we could have been doing this the entire time if we'd just pulled our heads out of our asses."
You joke to lighten the mood, and when you return your attention back to him, you're relived to see that it worked. That the smile on face is a little more authentic, the ghost of his usual demeanor slipping back into his body. His posture straightening, filling out with his confidence; expression now relaxed, blithe. "A true shame," Victor agrees.
"I guess we'll just have to make up for lost time then." It travels across the atmosphere like a kind of offering. An extension of an olive branch, a white flag waving up in a hopeful surrender. A vow, a promise, an extended hand waiting to be accepted, taken in by another reaching palm.
His smile is answer enough, appeased, happy. The remnants of the worry that was clinging on to him has finally relented, withdrawing its claws to slink back, forgotten. Like maybe, a part of him had been worried — expectant that you would want to go back to the way things were. To pretend that tonight never happened, a moment of weakness that would get shunned into the shadows. But that's not going to happen. Not in a thousand years. You want this. Whatever it is. And now that you've had him, seen what you can have with him, you're not letting it slip from your grasp so easily.
"Yeah, I guess we will," he agrees.
That feeling passes between you two again. The same one you experienced back in the kitchen. That hopeful, wistful shift. A current gliding between you, sanguine and irresistible. A lure, a shimmering of lights that you both can't help but fall for.
His grin stretches, turning wolfish, sharp but no less ecstatic, canines flashing, pale and lethal. The grip on your thighs strengthens, fixing around you tightly just before they release to settle his palms on the bed. It makes the mattress shift when he moves, his knees whispering over the silken blankets when he bullies his shoulders between your thighs, settling the flat of his stomach down to rest comfortably within the spread of your legs, making a home for himself there. Carving a place as though it's where he belongs.
His breath spills over you, clement, rasping over your sensitive skin. His eyes glimmer in the dark, large white coins, duskily reflecting the lights belonging to the city skyline. He looks starved again, already desperate for more. You know what's to come, you can feel it ripple through the air, still scented with the heady perfume of sex.
"What are you doing?" You really don't have to ask, but you do it anyway. A smile presses at the corners of your mouth while you watch him from the support and comfort of the pillows haloed around your head, holding you up to aid you in getting the perfect view. You watch as he gets comfortable, hands smoothing up, massaging your thighs, fingers tracing over you as though you're something to be cherished, but he looks at you like he's wants to eat you alive. Until nothings left, bones, blood, all licked clean on his tongue. You think you'll let him.
"What's it look like I'm doing?" He angles his head, sweeping his lips along your flesh. "I'm cleaning up my mess."
It's going to be a long, long night, but you've got no complaints.
☁️ okay but what about catching pope jerking off in your bed with a pair of your panties | thots ☁️
✶ pairing | andrew pope cody x f!reader
✶ word count | 2.1k
✶ warning(s) | 🔞 smut; dirty talk, getting caught, praise kink, panty kink, masturbation (m), boyfriend pope, voyeurism
masterlist | ao3 | inbox | requests, taglist, submissions: open
say you come home to your apartment after running some errands expecting to find him where you left him - only he doesn't come to greet you with an arm slung around your shoulder and a kiss dropped onto the side of your temple.
when you check, he's not in the living room, and you don't hear the god awful pipes clanking in the walls so he's not taking a shower. you try calling out but there's no response.
surely he wouldn't leave without telling you, right? besides, he doesn't have a job lined up any time soon. he told you he wanted to spend time with you so where the hell is he?
then what sounds like a faint curse comes from the depths of your apartment in the direction of your bedroom so you shrug and follow the noise only to freeze, brows nearly touching your hairline, gut clenching hotly at what you find.
a violent, visceral reaction that makes all moisture flee your mouth because there's no way he's... except then a grunt breaks the tense silence; a smothered, breathless little noise that echoes low and wounded into the hallway.
if you hadn't been standing right there, if you hadn't been looking for pope, the distant hum outside would've hidden the filthy wet sounds of his palm stripping his cock fast and hard.
warmth creeps up your neck, pools in your cheeks - leaves your skin altogether uncomfortable; itchy and tight like a nasty burn. every tentative step you take forward feels like walking on a tripwire, your heart tattooing a rhythm against your ribs as the slightest creak of the floorboards rings out, the pop of a gunshot.
it's a miracle you make it to your door, haphazardly cracked with slats of sunlight spilling across the floor. then he grunts again, his voice cracking and trailing off into a pained whine.
you can't help it - can't resist the urge to watch how pope pulls those kinds of sounds from the depths of his throat, to see what tempo he likes to stroke his cock to when he's alone.
with your heart lurching, and a mouth full of cotton, you peek around the doorjamb. nearly brain yourself on the floor when you lose your balance.
while it's difficult to get an unobstructed view of what his hand's doing between his thighs with how he's planted his feet on the mattress and bent his legs, what you can see...
well, fuck.
“…h-haaah…ss-shit, that’s…”
he's so fucking pretty like this; half-naked and wanton, needy and stretched out across the middle of your bed.
there's so much to catalogue, to track - the visual input overloading your brain. it's honestly a miracle you notice the scrap of fabric draped over his chest, your attention grabbed by it purely because of how bright and oddly familiar it is.
but you're too far way to truly identify it, and decide to refocus on more important things.
like how he looks like some wild, half tamed creature come to steal you away; the briar of his curls a dark halo on the pillows, short strands sticking to his damp forehead.
meanwhile his eyes are hooded and hazy, watching as the pink tip of his cock appears through the circle of his fingers with every upwards rut. mouth slack and rosy, tongue glimmering like a tempting prize when he wets his lips.
desire hooks behind your navel, an unscratchable itch that'll drive you crazy, sent reeling as a gush of slick squishes between your thighs the next time you squeeze them. he waits behind your eyelids with every blink, his cock thick and heavy, curved towards his belly and throbbing with each measured stroke.
his sturdy thighs tremble, his toes digging into the bed spread. "fuhhck, please - please, let me..."
it's impossible to look away, your teeth shredding the inside of your cheek as you chew on the gummy flesh. god you wish you were there, feeling him throb against your palm.
"gonna cum, oh god. yeah, just like that - hngg - s'good for me."
rough fingers tug at the hem of his plain black t-shirt, rucking the fabric up and out of the way. it bunches under his armpits and exposes the cut of his chest, the valleys of his muscled frame, the width of his heaving shoulders, muscles straining with his movements.
if you could you'd bite down, sink your nails into his pecs as you rode him hard and fast, his hands anchored on your hips to guide your movements.
"right there - o-oh - right there." his abs clench, hips kicking up. "just like that, come on."
you're nearly mad with desire, only stopping yourself from pouncing when he pauses what he's doing after a few more hurried strokes, the lines of frustration etched between his brows deepening. the hand on his cock slows, and he hooks a finger around the scrap of fabric resting on his chest.
he raises it up to dangle in front of his face - and shock lances through you, followed by ohmygod, are those...?
no wonder it looked familiar.
your pussy clenches, knees nearly buckling as all thought processes grind to a halt once you recognize your favorite pair of panties hanging off your boyfriend's finger.
anticipation swells hot and all-consuming behind your navel until you're shaking because fuck, you never thought seeing pope like this would affect you so much. never even imagined a scenario in which you would (god why didn't you?).
no way.
"mm, so pretty," he murmurs, voice whiskey rough and low. his fingers spread beneath the crotch to stretch out the fabric. "just for me."
all you can do is watch as he scrutinizes the whorls of delicate lace and sheer panels. he's not really going to... is he? (you hope he does).
please, please, please.
then he bites his lip, spares your panties another long look before working them down his body. his nipples stiffen when he trails it down the valley of his pecks, the drag of the lace tickling his skin. a breathy curse escapes him when they glide over the band of his hips, skin pebbled with goosebumps.
you choke on your own spit.
it's almost impossible to believe the andrew pope cody is about to jack off with a pair of your underwear - that you get to witness it for yourself - but then he's switching hands, and you see how pretty the fabric looks stretched over the girth of his cock.
the texture must feel amazing because pope full-body shudders, his eyes pinched shut and his brows furrowed like he's in pain when he lurches forward. he catches himself before folding in half, a shaky breath puffing past his lips.
fingers flexing, the fabric scrapes over his sensitive shaft and teases along his swollen balls. his hips rut up into the sensation, and he whines. "oh my fuh - that feels so good."
if only you know what he's imagining right now, what gets him so hard and leaking; tip flushed where it peeks out from the bright lace, pre-cum oozing down the throbbing shaft in thick, sticky rivulets.
every hitched whimper gets your ears ringing and your legs crossing, the drag of your shirt over your nipples uncomfortable with how hard they are. the slightest shift has your folds sticking together, a wet gush you'd love to soak his cock with.
you don’t even care that he’s getting a little too loud. so what if your crotchety ass neighbor files another complaint? the sight more than makes up for the headache of dealing with management.
though pope's more considerate because he stuffs the corner of his shirt into his mouth - his pretty, desperate noises locked behind the fabric of his makeshift muzzle. when the circle of his fingers meets the base, knuckles white as the crotch of your panties pulls taut over the flushed cockhead, his thighs tremble.
it's getting painful to watch and do nothing, to swallow the moan creeping up from the depths of your chest at imagining all the things he's gotten up to while you were gone as heat crackles down your spine.
it's a physical ache that shoots through you at not slipping inside to drape yourself over his chest, rock your hips down and slip him deep inside your tight little cunt. to feel the burning stretch as he fills you to the brim, the painful pinch of his tip kissing your cervix as you chase after your pleasure with his neck between your teeth.
or maybe you should let this play out? let him stain your panties with cum and then put them on, wear them around the apartment until he fucks you over the counter.
oh god.
your cunt flutters - desperate and empty - at the thought of feeling him on your skin, all slick, messy friction for hours. knowing how filthy he's made you.
right now, the slightest touch could make you cry, you’re so turned on. your clit aching for friction, swollen and raw, all while pope continues to drive himself pleasure drunk.
mind made up, you keep as quiet as possible and shift closer to hear the slick, sloppy sounds of him fucking into the grip of his fist, track the flex of his wrist and the apologetic glide of his palm as he staves off another orgasm. somehow, you clear the doorjamb, the handle itself a faint sensation at the back of your elbow.
you stop breathing, heartbeat thudding in your ears as blood rushes so fast you swear you might pass out. the air thickens with tension, the musk of fevered arousal heavy in your nose.
vibrating in place, the only thing that stops you from lunging across the room and attacking him like a wild animal is the sweetest moan you've ever heard breathing through his cotton gag. he must hear your stuttered inhale, the grit of your teeth because the world slows, then stills completely as he freezes.
muscles coil, his body a rigid line - ready for anything. then those pretty kerosene brown eyes pop open.
immediately seeking you out, pope swallows and unhinges his jaw. the makeshift bit slips free from his mouth, his shirt fluttering back down to his chest.
a patch of damp sticks to his skin.
“you're...” he says, his voice thick with pleasure - low and rough like smoky whiskey - while a flush blooms across his cheeks, “you’re home…”
without responding, you take a step into the room. the closer you get, the tenser pope becomes - his breath locking in his throat and his eyes falling shut.
at some point, his hand pulls away and tries to tuck your panties off to the side. it’s too bad you’ve been watching the whole time, otherwise he might’ve gotten away with it.
pope clears his throat and scratches at his jaw. “i was just - uh, y’know…”
he trails off, his hands fluttering around his hips. as if there’s a way to hide the excited twitch of his cock or the drool of pre-cum when you stop at the bedside.
with a faint smile and a raised brow, you ask, “having fun?”
“i - i’m so…” a muscle in his jaw jumps. “‘m sorry.”
he refuses to look at you.
and that just won’t do.
“shit!”
pope jolts, a drawn-out moan full of heat ripped out of his mouth when you press your hand over the heated skin of his throat.
all the air whooshes from your lungs and you watch your thumb trace over the swell of his adam’s apple, enchanted. his body strains up into your tender touch, every hard line demanding you finish what he started.
“need some help?” you ask, feeling him gulp against your palm. “sure looks like you do.”
it’s apparent he can barely think, gaze clouded over in a haze of desperation. your nails dig into his oversensitive skin to see him flinch, to watch as a shudder rolls down his spine at the delicate bite of pain.
his cock bobs against his belly.
“come on, baby. wouldn’t you like my hand or pussy better?”
“shit, i -” he groans, tossing a forearm over his eyes. “why are you like this? you’re gonna kill me one day.”
you chuckle, tracing the swell of his bottom lip, the bow of his top lip. “that still doesn’t answer my question.”
every pass of your hand works your fingers higher until the tips press in at the corners of his mouth. you repeat yourself, “do you need some help?”
at the taste of your skin, pope groans; a soft, deep-throated thing that injects heat into your veins. his tongue is soft against the pads of your fingers, wet and cradling.
a lone eye peeks up at you from behind his wrist, hooded and burning. “… please.”
you feel a deep affection for the little girl who wanders into the store you work at unaccompanied and a deep vitriol for her seemingly neglectful father. when she is given over to the custody of her uncle, it's easy to see he's way out of his depth. less easy to see how completely obsessed with you he is. ( 9.6k words )
warnings : gun mentions, clear neglect of lena on baz's part, reader has an extremely strained relationship with her father, parental abuse, food insecurity, age gap (reader is twenty eight, pope is thirty-nine), mandatory tag for employee/boss relationship but mostly not really 18+mdni cw smut, reader is a bit of a perv (just a bit!!), female masturbation, voice kink/voyeurism? not sure how to tag it? inappropriate use of a platonic voicemail?
note : back to my roots with a long pope fic this is the first full length fic i've written since valentine's day why did nobody tell me???? i do intend for this to be a multi-part fic but that depends on if anybody reads this so if you like it please consider reblogging/commenting i actually worked so hard on this one and i'm really proud of it so i hope you enjoy!!!!
The craft store on Fern Road has been there ever since you could remember. Nestled between a hair salon and a bakery right in the middle of Main Street, it doesn’t get a whole lot of natural light once you venture past the huge open windows. Surrounded by a U-shape of shelving around all three of the back walls, most of the middle of the store is taken up by display tables or large metal crates of stock. There’s a system, so meticulously organised you could probably recreate it with your eyes closed.
Notebooks go on the left wall; A5 bullet journals on one end and A2 canvas sketchbooks on the other and everything else in between. Planners, calendars, to-dos to stick on the fridge, everything had a place. On the right wall were the art supplies, paint at the back and crayons at the front, organised by skill level, price point and colour. The back wall was for the more novelty items, mostly things that you only buy one or two of. Hot glue guns, easels, even a sewing machine that’s been collecting dust since you were in high school.
It had been there the day you got the job; fourteen years old and itching for something to keep you occupied outside of your house. Mrs. Rayskel had been a lot more involved in the operations of the store back when you had first started as its only other employee, but now she mostly leaves you alone.
The middle sections are the ones most likely to entice a child, you think. Huge metal crates of stuffed animals, short, open cabinets of bracelet making kits and paint by number books. There’s a table right as you walk in that has hundreds of different types of pens in dividers on the outside, the entire area of the surface taken up in thick sheets of paper meant for testing pen types, but really just being a place for kids to draw.
You’re assuming that’s what brought in the little girl sitting on the carpet now. It’s pouring with rain outside, early afternoon in the middle of the week, and you haven’t had anyone come in all day. You don’t mind the slow periods. You keep your work station clean and organised (one of the perks of being the only employee is you don’t have to worry about someone else fucking up your shit), you have your crochet projects to keep you company at the desk. Most of the time you put on a calming playlist of royalty-free music and mind your business until the early evening when you close. Mrs. Rayskel only works weekends now, so you’re in every other day from 8:30am to open until 3:30pm to close. You’ve got about two hours until you need to start your sweep (assuming anyone comes in at all), checking the pen caps have been put on, replacing sample paper, rotating stock for visibility, when you spot her.
She’s quite small, can’t be older than seven, sitting on the plush rug by one of the windows. You hire a carpet cleaner every three months to treat the floors here, and you know it hasn’t been very long since the last time. Still, when you approach, you only bend down on your knees. “Hi.”
You hadn’t heard her come in, and you’re not even sure if you were in the store when she did. You could’ve been in the bathroom, or taking a few minutes out the back door, or completely zoned out at your desk.
“Hi,” she says back, shy. She’s wearing a purple raincoat that seems to have done a very good job of protecting her from the downpour, her dark hair sitting loose around her shoulders. In her hand is a stuffed unicorn toy, and discarded in front of her is a pegasus. “Am I in trouble?”
You frown. “No, of course not. You’re not in trouble.” Where are her parents? You’re not sure if she’s old enough to be in school yet, but it’s close enough to midday that she should be there if she is. It’s not particularly cold outside but water is flowing down the gutters like rivulets, and you haven’t seen anyone walk by in almost an hour. “What’s your name?”
She shrinks in on herself slightly. “I’m not supposed to say.” Right, don’t talk to strangers and all that. That doesn’t help you.
You nod slowly, careful not to come on too strong. She’s quiet, most unaccompanied kids you get in here are little hurricanes, impossible to miss. You’re not even sure how long she’s been here. Surely not longer than ten minutes.
You tell her your own name as a gesture of goodwill, pointing to the name tag clipped to your sweater. “I work here,” you wave your hand awkwardly at the rest of the store.
She likes knowing your name, you can tell. She says it softly, stuttering over one of the syllables, before eventually shuffling in her seat and speaking up again. “I’m Lena.”
Okay, you can work with that. Step one is establish trust, step two is locate her guardians. Step three might be call CPS if you can’t get those two done before you close but the likelihood of that happening is extremely low. You have kids wander in here by themselves all the time, just not usually quite so young.
“Hi Lena,” you say gently. “Can I sit with you?”
She nods politely, still looking like you might scold her, and your heart aches for this girl. “I’m sorry for touching your toys,” she says as you cross your legs.
You couldn’t care less. “That’s okay. Do you want to play?”
Lena perks up, still hesitant. “Can I?”
“Sure!” You try to give her your softest, kindest smile. “Do you want me to play with you?”
That’s what really gets her, like she hadn’t been expecting you to offer your time. “Can we play with the ponies?” When she smiles one of her bottom teeth is missing. You never want to let her go.
“We can play whatever you’d like.”
Lena carefully gathers the unicorn and pegasus into her lap, examining them with great care. She hands you the pegasus. “This one is yours,” she says, smile threatening to take over her entire face.
You accept it seriously. “What’s her name?”
Lena looks at you like you haven’t been paying attention properly. “She doesn’t have one. Her name got taken by the evil magic unicorn.” She holds up the unicorn for emphasis. “She has to get it back.”
You haven’t played pretend like a little girl since you were one, but it was pretty easy to get back into the swing with Lena. Never just a game, always a full world with rules that spring forth fully formed, buried beneath layers of stories of princesses and ghosts. You remember how it felt to hold all of that in your head all at once, never about good prevailing over evil and instead how it felt to be betrayed, or forgiven, or loved.
You let her hold onto that for the next thirty-eight minutes until the bell above the door rings again.
“Lena.”
Lena smiles up at the man dripping onto the welcome mat just inside the door. “Hi, Daddy.”
Pretty much all bravado you’ve had about tearing Lena’s guardians a new one, simmering and stewing the longer this poor girl sat here with only a stranger for supervision, disappears immediately when you look up at Lena’s dad. He smiles politely at you in a way that scares you more than anything, barely glancing at his daughter. You’ve been yelled at by customers before, but based on the lump on this guy’s left hip you think this man might not be the yelling type.
“I thought I told you not to wander off,” he says, uneasy smile on his face. You think you might have read him wrong; not the type of man to yell in front of someone else.
Your metaphorical grip on the little girl in front of you tightens in panic. You had thought this entire time that what you wanted was for Lena’s parents to come and collect her, and of course you don’t want for them to have abandoned her. But there seems to be no secret third option where they just misplaced her and they’re worried sick and they took their eyes off her for a second and when they looked back she was gone. “We need to get home.”
Lena looks up at him like for a second she doesn’t recognise him.
This man is clearly her father, or at least another relative. They bear a striking resemblance, the features Lena is still growing into looking sinister and cruel on the older man. You wonder briefly if he’s always looked like that. If there had been a time when her father had been a kind and loving man.
Right now at least she looks like she knows different than to argue with him. “Okay, daddy.”
She looks at you, the same smile on her face that he’d given you. It looks lovely and gentle coming from her. “Thank you for playing with me.”
You don’t want to let her go - least of all without offering some big act of kindness. You want her to remember you, if she ever needs something to hold onto.
“Do you want that one?” You gesture at the unicorn in her hand and hold out the pegasus. “You can have them both.” You’ll take it out of your paycheque. Hell, you’d give her the whole damn crate. She had been so excited to have someone to play with.
Lena’s dad is already halfway out the door as she stands up, brushing her knees off. “No, that’s okay.” She leaves the pony on the floor. “Thank you for playing with me.”
She’s gone before you can figure out what to say.
You close up quietly, doing all your normal checks. You’re not quite sure what to do with yourself, mind stuck on the little girl with the purple coat. You don’t know what’s going on between her and her father. There’s a high likelihood that he’s just having a bad day, that he’s usually warm and affectionate and not someone his daughter has to be scared of. You don’t know this man, and you don’t know his daughter.
But you recognise the look on her face when her father showed up. She’s so small, barely up to your hip. You can’t imagine being her parent and not being obsessed with her. She’s clever, and articulate, and the story she dreamed up with those two stuffed toys shows that. Her father had a gun on him on a Thursday afternoon, in the middle of Main Street. She’s so little, she can’t comprehend cruelty.
She has to make up evil creatures to process things.
You think about her for a few days after she leaves. You kept both the stuffed animals behind the counter; it felt wrong to put them back on display. Who knows, maybe you could have been reading way too far into it anyway.
——
You never really learned how to shop. It wasn’t really a skill that you thought you’d have to learn, you supposed. Adults know how to do it, you’ll probably figure out how to eventually. At twenty-eight, you figure it’ll come to you any day now.
The store is always too bright, even though you always come in the evenings. Harsh, fluorescent lighting makes you feel like you’re somewhere more important than in your body. You’ve been standing in the cereal aisle for longer than you need to, one hand down by your side holding your basket against your calf, the other hovering over a box you’ve already picked up twice.
$4.49
You turn it over, reading the nutritional label like you’re expecting anything called ‘Cinnamon Raspberry Crunch’ to be even a little healthy. Most of the other cereals, less sugar, sit right beside it, all about a dollar cheaper.
You put the first box back.
Your basket has exactly three things in it: bread, milk, and a packet of penne that goes on sale every two weeks. You don’t need anything else, you never really plan on getting much. But you’ve been thinking about this stupid cereal for days now, since you last came in and passed it on your way out. You could just buy it. You’re almost thirty.
You can’t explain it, can’t verbalise, can’t even articulate for your own peace of mind the unease that comes from that box of cereal. Your chest constricts and you can’t form any rational argument other than the fact that thinking about buying it makes your head hurt.
Your phone starts ringing. The timing is almost funny.
You let it ring two full times, trying to control your breathing. You never understood how some people can just take a deep breath before doing something and feel braced for impact. It’s never really worked for you.
“Hi, dad.” Your voice wobbles.
Your father doesn’t bother saying hello on the other side, instead waiting. You think it might have been the amount of time it took you to answer the phone, but you don’t bring it up because you hear how ridiculous it sounds even in your own head. “You took your time.”
You shift your weight, glancing the other direction down the aisle to make sure there’s no one else around. “I’m at the store.”
“At this hour?” You can practically hear him deciding what version of himself he wants to be today. “I suppose you are a busy girl.” You don’t know what to say to that so you say nothing.
He doesn’t need you to talk to keep the conversation going. “Making good choices?”
“Yes, dad.” You feel like a little girl. Your father never knew what much to do with a girl. He’d call you sport and drag you places like fishing. “I know.”
“You have a few bad habits,” he says, like he’s spoken to you face to face even once in the last five years. You don’t think he could pick you out of a lineup if the cops asked him to. “Never quite grown out of them,” he says gently.
You stare at the shelf in front of you like it might save you from this conversation. “I know.”
There’s that silence again.
“You don’t have to stop,” he says, voice dripping. Disappointment slides into his tone like it knew it was expected. “I’m trying to help you.”
“I didn’t mean to snap.” It’s been a long day and you know you have a pile of laundry to fold when you get home. “I’m sorry.”
Your father exhales, long and slow. You have the entire time to ruminate while he’s making his mind up. There really is no rhyme or reason to him sometimes, it is left purely up to his whim. Sometimes a mood you think is a good one can sour in an instant. You’ve known him for how long and you just can’t get a read on him.
“Anyway,” he breezes past it. “I called because I realised you never paid me back for your electric bill last month. Remember? I covered it because you were short.”
Your car had died and you’d blown most of your savings on getting it fixed, leaving you short on your electric bill for the month. Your father had been practically a last resort, first spending hours researching all possible public transit routes to see if there was any way you could make it work. You’d given him the money back immediately when you’d been paid. Asking your father for anything has always made you feel like you’re disappointing him and when it comes to your dad disappointment can look like a lot of things.
One time when you were really little there had been a party at your house. You don’t remember what it was for — just that it had been really important because your dad said it was, and that meant everything had to be right. You remember more of the buildup than the party itself if you’re honest. The air was tight, so quiet that not even the house dared settle. Every day you would take the school bus home and every day you’d drag your feet longer and longer, anything to avoid getting home.
Your father is a perfectionist, you tell people now. Highly strung. Particular.
You remember being made to eat dinner on the porch that week, plastic plates balanced on your knees. You weren’t allowed at the table, your dad insistent you would make a mess. You didn’t think you were a messy child but your dad isn’t the kind of person you argue with. He hated cleaning up after you — that part, at least, had always been made clear.
The night of the party, the house filled up in a way it never had. There had been too many people, all too loud, all of them laughing like your house wasn’t riddled with landmines intentionally set to detonate around your father. You stayed outside, sitting on the stoop, watching the older boys from the neighbourhood ride their bikes up and down the street under the orange glow of the streetlights.
You could hear everything going on inside. Glasses clinking, voices rising, your father’s laugh louder than you had ever heard it before. Then a sharp sound, one that you knew could only come from the vase on the dining table being knocked over.
You had known what that meant, even back then. Something small goes wrong and everything else follows. The night would fold in on itself, people would leave too quickly.
You could hear someone inside begin apologising and all you could picture was your father standing there, shoulders tight the way they would always be right before he snapped.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said, like it was nothing at all.
You didn’t come inside until you were sure the last person had left; nobody came to make sure you were in bed. You have never been sure of where you stand with him.
So you’re careful when you speak up again. “I did pay you back.”
He hums. “I don’t think so.”
You’ve barely been able to afford gas this month because of the extra money being taken out of your account. Your job is consistent and pays you pretty well but you still work retail
“I did, I transferred it. I’ll check-”
He cuts you off with your name, sharp and steady. “Okay, calm down. You don’t have to get upset. If you say you did then I’m sure you did.” He clearly doesn’t believe you. You don’t mind him being wrong, but to assign you facets of yourself that don’t really exist is what spikes your heart rate.
“Dad-”
He doesn’t let you cut him off. “No, I won’t keep you. If you can pay me back when you get paid, I’d appreciate it. Maybe this will take you to be a bit more responsible with your money, hey? Love you, kiddo.” He hangs up after you repeat the sentiment weakly, leaving you staring at the cereal, burning up under the fluorescent lights.
——
You’ve become somewhat of a creature of habit as you enter your late twenties. You have your small, solitary hobbies — your crocheting, your crafts, your scrolling through social media and seeing which of your high school friends are getting engaged. Spring breaks into summer and you spend the next couple of weeks preparing for the summer rush. The rain settles, giving way to a dry heat that has you grateful your car’s air conditioning hasn’t gone yet.
The store’s air conditioning is fairly reliable and since you’re the only one who works no one ever messes with your settings. The store is kind of a hangout spot for some younger kids who have clearly been set loose for the first time. They come in for the ever-rotating collection of board games, and you become somewhat of an unpaid babysitter.
You don’t mind, though. Most of them are polite and well-behaved, and you’ve always loved being around children. Most of the time they’re a lot nicer to be around than adults. There’s no small talk, no worrying about filling the silence, or being annoying. Most of the time, the type of kids who want to come into a quiet store and draw or play chutes and ladders for hours, they just like when adults pay attention to them. You hope you can make them feel important, even if it’s just for an afternoon. Education had been something you’d considered going into once you graduated high school but the workload and the student loans and the decisiveness of the whole thing had been too daunting and eventually you’d put it off for so long it didn’t seem worth pursuing anymore.
You keep the two ponies under the counter, kept safe from stock rotations and curious children by your careful hands. You protect them from dust, keep them safe. It feels a bit silly to keep them there, keep them clean and ready. You can’t bear to separate them.
The summer rush comes and goes and with it comes the back to school rush. You end up paying your father back a second time, too busy with work to have the energy to deal with the stress of it. You don’t think he has your address, but you also didn’t think he had it the last time he’d shown up at your place.
It’s perhaps the first day of the slow season, early in the afternoon, right after all the kids have gone back to school. You’ve done all the restocking, you’ve done all the normal cleaning, all the normal admin. You’ve even gone as far as to dust all the baseboards, you’re that desperate for something to do. Muscling through the boredom, you’ve finally settled in your comfy chair behind the desk, crochet project on your lap and calming music playing through the speaker connected to your phone.
The bell twinkles as the door is shoved open and you don’t even really have the time to look up before your name is being called, bright and warm. She’s not wearing her purple raincoat but you would recognise Lena anywhere. She looks at you sheepishly, like she’s just considered the idea that you don’t remember her.
You’re sure it must be something awry with you. So desperate for connection, to find the innate good, to understand everything in your life, you’ve always been incredibly quick to attach. Perhaps not attach exactly, you think, you’re probably less attached to Lena than perhaps the idea of her. You don’t have the best memory, it’s not photographic or eidetic or anything, but you remember faces and names. You remember people in your kindergarten class, and adults who showed you kindness, and customers you had completely mundane interactions with. You wonder often what it says about you the memories your brain has decided to latch onto, what has shaped you into who you are. Your preschool teacher scolding you for talking during nap time when you hadn’t been, being abandoned at the bus stop by a friend who promised she’d wait for your bus before beginning her walk home. One time, you had been maybe seventeen, down by the waterfront after a vicious fight with your father. You don’t recall what the fight was about, but you remember the little boy you had seen by the water’s edge. He had a bucket filled with seashells, and his grandmother was sitting on the sand helping him decorate a sandcastle with his findings. Eventually she’d stood up, dusting herself off, and told him they had to head home for dinner with his mama. The boy had cried something awful, tears and sobs, begging his grandma to just help him find one more shell. One more, just one more. Is it odd you can recall the moment with perfect clarity, feeling your own heart split in two just at the sound of his upset?
Lena has grown since you last saw her, and if she hadn’t referred to you by name you would’ve thought you’d projected her likeness onto a new girl. She beams at you with a missing tooth, skipping forward as if it’s been five minutes instead of five months.
She’s flanked by a man who is new to you, not the same guy who had come to collect her last time she’d been in. He’s staring at you when you look away from her, holding the door open for her to come inside and making sure he catches it before it slams. Blue eyes stare straight into you deeper than you think you’ve ever really looked into yourself, and he doesn’t look away at being caught.
He’s thick, broad in the shoulders and stocky in the chest. You squirm under his gaze, feeling suddenly like you’re doing something wrong by looking at him. Your chest stirs and you’re completely aware of every single one of your limbs.
“Hi, Lena.” Her smile widens impossibly far for such a small face. Your heart does the same thing. “How are you?”
She seems more forthcoming this time, telling you all about how she’s just started second grade, the friends she’s been making, how hard the classes are. She talks with a level of familiarity about her life the way only a second grader could, like it would never even occur to her that you wouldn’t have anything to compare it to. You discard your crochet project, scooting your chair forward and leaning over on your elbows to make sure she knows you’re giving her all your attention.
Well, almost all of your attention. The man she came with stands directly behind Lena, arms crossed as if he’d expect you to try and hurt her, and his eyes stay trained on you. You’re not sure if he’s just a starer — some men are; how creepy it is depends on how long it goes on before he tries to talk to you — or if he’s watching for something.
You kick off where you’re leaning, wondering if he might stop if you move. “I have something for you,” you feel foolish already. Chances are she’s forgotten, or she doesn’t even like horses anymore, or she didn’t even at the time but they were her only option. “People bought all the other ones but I remember you liked these ones.” You look like a fool holding out the two stuffed animals in your hand, not even knowing if she wants them. Lena’s eyes light up at the sight of the ponies but she doesn’t move towards them.
Instead, she looks up at her bodyguard. “Can I, Uncle Pope?”
Lena’s uncle Pope finally tears his eyes from you, looking down at her. His mouth pulls into a small smile, strained like he’s not used to doing it but fond like he can’t help it anyway. “Yeah,” his voice is crackly and quiet. “How much are they?” He looks back to you.
You wonder if he thinks you’re going to quiz him on your eye colour or something. You shake your head, practically tripping over your own actions to get ahead of yourself and skip through the first part of interactions. “No, it’s fine. They’re for her.”
Lena gasps, collecting them both into her chest with an iron grip. She thanks you and doesn’t have to be reminded, eyes shining. You get the idea that Pope has heard about the two of them before. He watches her glee, affectionate an albeit untrained smile widening on his face. “Do you want your pen things?”
Her eyes widen to saucers. “I can still have them?” Pope nods and Lena practically shoots off towards the stationery section, leaving the two of you alone. He turns to orient his body towards her instinctively, but he’s standing so close to you that you can smell his aftershave. It sends a hot feeling from your chest to your stomach.
His hair is thick and unruly, such a rich copper it almost looks brown in the warm lighting of the store. His curls look well loved but less well maintained and you find your mind stumbling forward again; what hair products does he use? Does he like it touched? Does he have anyone there to touch it? What would it feel like?
“She talks about you a lot,” Pope says, sounding like whatever the opposite of conversational is. He speaks like he regrets it retroactively, aching for solitude but subjecting himself to small talk with strangers. “Practically begged me to come here since she has a half day. I told her if she did all of her homework she could get some of those pens.” He mimes using a pen. “Y’know the ones, they smell like all the different stuff? Bananas and apples and crap?”
You nod. They’re just called scented markers, but you don’t feel the need to correct him. You picture him at a kitchen counter, trying to coax his niece into finishing a reading log with scented markers. You know Lena has a father, a man that she at least called ‘dad’ five months ago. What happened to him? Why isn’t he bringing her to get sniff pens? Is he still around, with his concealed carry and his seemingly cold indifference? That’s probably unfair, you don’t know this man, and Lena had clearly loved him.
But she looks far happier today than she had the last time you saw her, you can’t lie to yourself about that.
“She’s a good kid.” You have to assume. She’s lovely, incredibly easy to be kind to, but you don’t know her when it really comes down to it. “Seemed like she was having a hard time last time I saw her.” You shrug with an indifference that feels completely unnatural. “I wanted to do something nice for her.”
Pope looks over at her, taking the caps off the sample markers to smell them, then down at you. You feel real juvenile with your little crochet stars in your lap, you’re planning on making bunting out of them, sitting there in your work outfit. He’s clearly older than you by a significant amount, he’s probably got a respectable job, maybe a wife. You wonder what kind of family they are, both of them so different from Lena’s father. Perhaps you’re being unfair, maybe it wasn’t a gun, and maybe he’d just been having a bad day. You want to ask Pope about him, but you bite your tongue.
“You didn’t have to,” he says gruffly, looking down. He doesn’t have a wedding ring on, and the fact that you have noticed makes your cheeks warm. “Lot to do for someone else’s kid.”
You feel a little bit scolded, shrinking into him. This man clearly cares a lot about his niece, perhaps more than her father, you want him to think you’re good for her. Want him to like you.
You’re sure it has nothing to do with the fact that his biceps are too big for his shirt and when he’d been staring at you all the blood in your chest had stalled.
“I didn’t mean to overstep,” you say cautiously.
He blinks at you. The expressions that he’s shot your way have been nowhere near as emotive as the ones he’s given Lena which is to be expected on a certain level, but he’s really been giving you nothing.
He looks at you for so long you have to be the one to break eye contact. Lena bounces up to the counter, marker pigment around her nose with a pack of scented felt tip pens. “Oh, Lena,” you say, eyes darting back over to her uncle. He’s looking down his shoulder at her. “You’ve got pen on your face.”
“Sorry,” she frowns, scrubbing at her nose with the back of her hand. “’S’it gone?” She juts her head back to present to you.
You bend down to rummage through your purse, fishing out a pack of face wipes from the bottom. “Here,” you pull one out of the package and present it to her. “Do you mind if I wipe it off?”
Lena shakes her head, curls bouncing wildly. She’s got beautiful, dark hair, and she clearly didn’t get that from her dad. She doesn’t look much like Pope at all, and you don’t remember her father’s face with as much clarity as you’ll recall her uncle’s, but you don’t see much of a family resemblance between the two of them. He could be from her mother’s side but given that Lena is clearly mixed you’d made an educated guess that the two of them were brothers.
“Thank you,” she enunciates, nodding slightly on each word. You wipe away the pigment gently, catching sight of the way Pope watches you out of the corner of your eye. You’re not sure if you’d been overstepping when you’d brought it up but you’re pretty sure it qualifies now. You finish up, curling the wipe in your hand and sitting back. Lena looks up at Pope with a toothy smile. “All better?”
He nods at her. “Be careful with them. We can’t go to grandma’s if you’ve got pen all over your face.”
He doesn’t have that way about him that people who spend a lot of time around kids usually do. None of the fake niceties in the voice, there’s clear affection there and he’s good with her, but there’s a level of clumsiness there. The love had come naturally but the mannerisms are still forming themselves. Easy and wrought with the deception of labour in the same breath.
He’s holding a twenty out to you and you realise with a start it's for the pens. “Right.” Your face gets hot and you stand up to escape the feeling. You take the twenty, your fingertips tingling where they’d connected with his. They’re rough, calloused, and they don’t shy away from yours. You reach for the key to unlock the cash drawer in the till to get him his change.
“Keep the rest.”
He says it in a way that makes you not want to argue with him. You ignore that instinct.
“They’re four dollars.”
He stares at you again. “You have a tip jar, don’t you?”
Technically, sure. There’s a jar there that’s labelled for tips, but people rarely leave cash in it. You know his name but you feel wrong saying it. Yours is displayed on the badge you have clipped to your top. You tell him anyway, changing the topic.
Pope blinks, eyebrows furrowing. “Everyone calls me Pope.”
“Well, Pope,” you say as if you hadn’t collected that and tucked it away the second that Lena had referred to him. “That’s like a two hundred percent tip, so.” You turn the key and the drawer pops out. You tuck the twenty away and hand him back a ten. $5.15 with tax, $4.85 tip. "Happy?” You dump the coins in the jar. He frowns, which is more of a reaction than you’ve gotten the entire rest of the time, so you take that as a success.
Lena tugs on his sleeve. “Are we going to Grandma Smurf’s now? She said I could go in the pool, s’long as I wear sunscreen.”
Pope’s frown deepens slightly but he manages to fix his face before he looks down at her. “We can go now. You sure?” Lena nods resolutely.
You watch them go, Lena turning around to wave at you at the door. Pope looks right at you and raises an arm in goodbye. There’s a vein that runs down his arm and you have to duck behind the counter, mortified. When you make your ascent they’re gone but your face is still hot.
You spend the rest of the night thinking about Lena’s uncle Pope. You wish you’d introduced yourself with your surname so he’d been inclined to do the same. He hadn’t given you any indication that he had liked you in any way, so you’re not sure exactly why he’s got you all hot and bothered. He’s at least a decade older than you, if not more, but you can’t argue and claim that’s not your type.
He probably wouldn’t have captured your attention so severely if he hadn’t been so good with his niece. It had been something that you’d realised rather suddenly a few years ago; that you were no longer a girl but rather just a woman. You’d felt your whole adolescence that you were too young to be an adult. Mrs. Rayskel had hired you two days after you had turned fourteen, so when you woke up one day and realised that you were actually an appropriate age to be working, in your mid twenties. That you’re not a young adult, instead, an adult. An adult who thought she would’ve been in a relationship secure enough to at least be thinking about having children. Men your age don’t want to settle down, at least none of the ones you’ve ever met have.
But an older man with a niece he clearly adores? You have to slap yourself in the middle of stirring your pasta to stop yourself from perving on this poor man. You wonder if he’d mind.
——
You spend maybe two weeks having your heart race every time the door to the shop opens, and are rewarded for your diligence when eventually Pope does return, this time without Lena in tow.
You’re actually working this time, restocking the board games in the corner. You’re mostly hidden behind a shelf so you’re able to pretend you haven’t seen him and thus, act adequately nonchalant as he finds you.
“Oh, hi.” You’re kneeling on the floor restocking the bottom shelf and despite the fact that your skirt ends at your calves you tug it down self-consciously. “Lena’s uncle, Pope, right?”
He nods slowly, so slow it’s like it’s something he needs to process. He looks marginally less happy this time and you know it’s probably because his niece isn’t with him but there’s a small spark in the back of your head that whispers his frown is directed at your outfit. You’re being ridiculous, he doesn’t give a shit what you’re wearing. He offers a hand and you don’t even think before taking it. His hand is so much bigger than yours, and the vein on his arm bulges as he helps you stand. “Everything okay?”
You dust yourself off, looking down at your ruffled socks against your boots. It’s still been fairly warm during the day but you have errands to run after sundown. You’ve come to the conclusion about Pope that he might just be a quiet man. It’s not any disdain for you or anything you’ve done, he’s just a pensive man.
“What…” he clears his throat. Pope leans up to tug on a patch of his hair at the back, centring himself and speaking up again. “What do you do when you’re not at work?”
You perk up a little bit. There’s no way… he’s not asking you out, right? It’s probably that he wants to know which crafts you engage in, maybe he needs gift ideas for Lena. The answer is embarrassingly sparse, and you definitely paint yourself as a bit of a homebody. “Crochet, drawing, I watch documentaries sometimes…” you need to work on how you present yourself. If he wanted to go out with you before he probably won’t after this. “Then errands mostly.”
“You don’t have a boyfriend? Kids?” He asks bluntly.
“Uh… no. Why?”
He has the good sense to look sheepish at his abruptness. “Lena’s my brother’s daughter.” You can hear every breath he takes, heavy and with a heaving chest. That answers that question then. “I don’t know how to take care of her, thought this shit was meant to be easier. Thought all the hard parts about parenting were diapers and tantrums and she’s got neither of them. All I had to do was make sure she ate and did her homework and said please and thank you.” He lets out a hot rush of air. “’S not like that at all.” He shakes his head, looking up at the ceiling.
You have no idea what he wants you to say. Did he come to vent — for parenting advice? Did he assume you must have kids based on how you acted with her?
“All that shit was fine when she had her mom and dad but now,” he looks down at you, and for the first time since you first met him there’s a different emotion behind his eyes. You don’t have very much to go off, can’t even name his baseline, but from the fluttering eyelashes and the furrowed brows this looks very much like a man out of his depth finally confiding a fear. “Now I have to look after her. Have to, get to.” He shakes his head. “I don’t know how he did it. But I have to work, and she needs someone to watch her after school, and the sign out there says you guys shut before four in the afternoon.”
You raise an eyebrow at him, more surprised than anything. “You want me to… babysit her?”
Pope seems to realise that this is an odd request. Perhaps not the most appropriate, either. He clears his throat and pulls again at the curls on the nape of his neck. “You can tell me to get lost.”
“No, just…” you feel like if you don’t shut your mouth he might realise how strange this is. Most people would like to vet a babysitter, I’m a random adult you’ve met once, how do I know you’re not insane and won’t just dump her here and run away? “You want me?”
Pope gestures to you, your pretty skirt, your general disposition. “She likes you.” He shrugs stiffly like the action is something unfamiliar to him.
“When would you need me?” As much as you like Lena and as much as the thought of having him in a position where you’d need to see him every day makes your heart palpitate against your ribcage, this is your job. You can’t quit it for this, definitely not before you’re sure it’ll shake out. “Like after school? I’m usually here until four-ish.”
“She finishes school at three forty-five, it’s only three blocks. You have a car?” You nod. “Good, a license?” You nod again. “If you need to stay here to finish up she can take the school-bus here, stops down the street.” He points out the window, you’re too preoccupied looking at the way his shirt strains at the arm to see the bus stop. “If you can, you pick her up from school, bring her back here or to your house or the park or my apartment or wherever. Keep her entertained, make sure she does her homework and eats her veggies. Sometimes I’d need to work late, so she’d need to spend the night with you and you’d have to take her to school. You can do it at my place or if you want to keep her at your apartment that’s fine. School starts at nine but she can go in at eight if you need to be here. Plus weekends. Not every day, and not always that late. I just…” he looks almost embarrassed to need the help. “I can pay you.”
You’d hope so, for all that.
“Lena mentioned her grandma?” You ask gently. “Do you think Lena could stay with her some days?”
He looks at you as if he’s surprised you would bring her up. “No, I don’t want her around my mom.” He sniffs, looking away from you. “If you don’t want to just say it. Don’t have to make shit up to help me. I could give you fifty bucks an hour — what do you make here?” It’s not fifty bucks an hour, you can say that right now. “Double on weekends and for nights. Plus money for anything she needs, gas money for you to pick her up, money for dinner and whatever.” He’s almost breathless. “I can pay you.”
What the hell does this man do?
“Pope. It’s a lot to ask,” you say. “I can definitely take her on the weekends, and probably a couple of days after school. I don’t know about nights, but depending on where you live I could maybe swing by in the morning and help her get ready for school, drop her on my way?”
Pope looks back at you, some semblance of a smile twitching the corner of his lip upwards. It’s the kind of smile that makes it impossible for you to not smile as well, which is surprising considering it still doesn’t make him look particularly happy. For a guy this steely, you suppose any amount of joy on his face makes you smile.
“Why don’t I give you my phone number, and we can talk about this while I’m not at work?” What Pope and Lena probably need is a nanny, or at least someone who can full time devote themselves to Lena. You have a job that, while it awards you a lot of freedom, is something you couldn’t live without. And while you adore Lena, and you’re sure that’ll only grow with time, you need the money desperately.
Pope reaches for you and after drawing a complete blank, you realise he wants your phone. “Oh, sorry. I left it on the desk.” Your father has been calling you, upset that you’d fallen asleep last night and forgotten to reply to his message. You know what it’ll be, either asking you for something or scolding you. You haven’t the energy to entertain him at the moment. The two of you swap information and when he hands you your phone back he lingers.
“Do you like this job?” He asks quietly, cocking his head and studying your face. You nod, lost for words with him so close. One step further in and you’d practically be chest to chest. “When you were a kid you wanted to be a… craft girl?”
You can’t hide your snicker, ducking your head, and he frowns like you’d yelled at him.
“No,” you admit. “This isn’t what I wanted to do when I was little. I wanted to be a teacher.” You’ve never really told another person that, never had another person to tell. By the time you graduated high school you were lucky if your father noticed you hadn’t been home in days, and when you finally moved out at twenty he’d looked at you like he’d forgotten you even lived there. Now he calls you every week, which is nice of him, but you wished in the decade it’s been since you last saw his face you’d developed a thicker skin. Or at least the ability to not cry whenever he hurts your feelings.
Pope’s eyes light up. “See, you’re perfect.” He tilts his chin down to mirror yours like the two of you are sharing a secret. “This is basically like being a teacher.”
You laugh again and this time he doesn’t seem so offended. “Goodbye, Pope.”
This time when he leaves he doesn’t turn to wave at you, but it gives you ample time to watch him cross the street to his car. There’s a man there who snickers and punches Pope’s chest when he gets in, but Pope doesn’t even bat an eye, pulling the car out and meeting your gaze right as he reaches the edge of the window.
You look down at your phone. “Pope Cody…” you muse, looking at his contact information. You’re surprised he offered his surname at all, the longer you speak to him the less he seems the type. You smile down at it and startle, caught, at the sound of the bell. Your phone slips from your grasp and you bring up your other hand to catch it before it hits the floor. The app closes in the fuss, and with it goes his unsaved contact information. “Shit.” You hiss, looking up at the customer, a mom and two little boys who thankfully don’t look like they heard your expletive and put your phone down on the counter. You can only hope that he texts you first, you suppose you’ll find out if he expects you to make the first move.
——
It’s late when your phone rings. So late, you know it’s not Pope. So late you’re going to regret this in the morning when you have to get up and clean your apartment in the morning. You’re not not going to sleep, you’re just not trying very hard. You’re sprawled out on your bed, watching the ceiling fan spin, trying to fight off a headache.
It’s your father, he’s the only man with the audacity enough to call you at midnight on a Friday night. You’ll call him back in the morning, he has no way of knowing you’re awake to ignore him. You’re so exhausted, your sheets are so warm and smooth, you’ve been teetering on the edge of consciousness for a while now. The vibrating doesn’t even catch up to you until it’s almost finished ringing.
Your phone screen goes black again, plunging the room into the sub-darkness that only comes from the whole city being asleep. Then, it lights up again with a text.
Huffing, your face pressed against your pillow, you slap the mattress on your side until you finally wrap your hands around the device.
You have 1 New Voicemail.
Your father has never left you a voicemail. Spam callers might, but usually they’re unintelligible. Your phone will have taken a transcript as best it can, and you squint at the brightness. It streaks right past your retinas and into the core of your brain, making your headache worse.
Uh hey it’s pope Cody—
You scramble up until you’re on your knees, heart rate spiking. You can’t be laying down, not with your ears ringing the way they are. Based on the paragraph it’s not a super short message, and you bite your lip with delight when you see it’s almost a full minute.
There’s a feeling in your chest you can’t get rid of, can’t deep-breath or count-to-ten away. Itching for movement, you feel your hand start wandering up of its own accord from where it’s resting on your thigh upwards, slipping under the hem of the big t-shirt you’d been intending on sleeping in and finding your nipple. You toy with it almost distractedly, stuck in limbo of being desperate to rake your eyes over his words and wanting to hear him.
God, how tragic are you? Your nipples are both hard already and perhaps it’s just from the breeze drifting through the open window but you also feel a throb of neediness light up your core. You roll onto your back, clenching your thighs together. This is a line you shouldn’t cross. Sure, it’s late, you’re horny, whatever. But this guy is about to be your boss, you should be able to listen to a voicemail without needing to touch yourself.
He’s such a serious man, you can’t imagine what he’d say if he saw the state of you, shirt lifted just below your breasts, soaking a damp patch into the front of your panties. The only way you’re going to be able to get through the message is going to be to get yourself off first like a teenage boy trying not to get a boner on a first date.
Pope’s also painfully awkward and it really does it for you. From the way he moves, to the faces he makes, to the way he talks. Fuck, the way he talks. You let your phone rest on your chest and your other hand finds its way down underneath your panties.
You haven’t been fucked in a while but you’re way more turned on than you have any right to be. You don’t bother teasing yourself, pressing the flat of two fingers against your clit. Your hips buck at the feeling, clearly more untouched than you thought.
Your fingers aren’t as thick as his, and you can’t help the perversions that cross your mind at the thought of Pope. How would he touch you? Would it be clumsy? He’s pretty assertive, perhaps that would overtake the awkwardness. You let a whine escape your bitten lips into the darkness of your bedroom as you rub your clit.
Fuck this, you reach for the phone blindly, half blinded with the vision of his hand shoving yours out the way. You fumble for the button, but after a little while his voice rings out in your bedroom.
“Uh,” he coughs. “Hey, it’s Pope Cody.” Two of your fingers slide inside, your other hand coming to replace the fingers at your clit. The position is awkward but you can’t focus on anything but the sound of his voice, already humiliatingly close. His voice is low and the phone quality crackles but it mimics the grooves of his voice well enough you don’t even care. “Look, I know it’s late but do you think you can call me in the morning? I don’t know how this thing usually works, the whole babysitter thing.” His fingers would probably get deeper than yours, but you curve them slightly until they hit your sweet spot.
Frustrated with the limitations the fabric is giving, you pull both your hands out and shove your underwear down your legs, letting it slip off your foot and onto the floor of your bedroom. “And you sound like you know what you’re talking about.”
“Fuck,” you hiss, drawing your fingers from your hole and fucking them back into yourself slowly. He seems like the type of man who would take his time, or maybe that’s just you projecting for slowing down so you don’t cum before he’s even done talking.
“And I’m sorry about ambushing you at work, it felt like the best place to come talk to you. I won’t come by again, if you don’t want. But I want to see you.”
You’re only halfway through it and you can already feel an orgasm forming. It’s downright sinful the things you want him to do to you.
“I need to talk to you, I mean. About Lena. And about… yeah. I know this is probably stupid as shit but I’m way in over my head here so… Whatever it is you want to do, I’ll do it. You want more money?”
You bring the hand rubbing your clit up to your mouth to sink your teeth into the back, instead grinding on the palm of the hand you’re using to finger yourself. The walls in your apartment are thick enough you don’t have to worry about making a small amount of noise, but you don’t need Erin and Carlos from next door to hear you whining. “Anything you want. Anything.” You can practically feel him breathing into your ear. Anything you want.
He says your name, low and deep and you tip into your orgasm, back arching against your sheets and tears pricking at the corner of your eyes. They’re clenched shut, white filling your vision, and his face lives on your eyelids. Those big, sad eyes. Thick fingers and thicker arms.
He’s gruff, and unsmiling and awkward and stiff, but Pope doesn’t seem like the kind of guy to get hung up on rules. He’s older than you, and he’s about to be your boss, and you realise with a thrill that you don’t think that would stop him if he wanted you.
“Or if you don’t want or, or you can’t or whatever. Then if you know anyone, or like, a way I can find a babysitter? I don’t fuckin’ know… Thanks for the help. I’m around, if you want to call me when you’re not asleep. Okay.” He ends the message without a goodbye.
Your eyes are practically glued shut, walls fluttering around your fingers as your breathing slowly returns to normal. How the fuck are you meant to work this job? You can’t even listen to the man talk for a full minute without soaking through your underwear.
You don’t remember falling asleep, you wake up with a rumpled shirt and a new pair of panties you must’ve slipped on in a daze. It’s a Saturday, so you don’t have to get up if you don’t really want to. You have chores to do and sleep to catch up on, you can hear the faint sound of rain picking up outside. Perfect circumstances for a day at home, resetting and fixing yourself up on one of your two days off.
Instead, you roll over and immediately reach for your phone.
Hey, sorry! I fell asleep and didn’t get your call. I’m free today, I’d love to see you. You chicken out and tack onto the end and Lena! I can come over to your place or we can meet somewhere else?
You barely have time to close your eyes again before your phone is vibrating in your hand, once, then twice. The first message is an address. The second: give me an hour.
You roll back onto your stomach and try to stop yourself from screaming into your pillow.
Summary: pt 2 to Floaty, but not alone: After Robby leaves for work, Jack realizes you’re already halfway dropped and trying way too hard not to need anyone. The more gently he takes care of you, the softer and more submissive you become, until you’re half asleep in his arms letting him hold everything together for you.
Part one: here
Cw: established Rabbot, fluff, established relationship, suggestive content
Wc: 6.8k
An: first part 2 to a story, let me know what u think!! I got way more carried away w this than part one lol…
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Jack is already reaching for his keys before Robby finishes the second text.
She says she’s okay which means she’s absolutely not okay.
Then, thirty seconds later:
Please get there fast.
Jack doesn’t even answer before he’s out the door.
Because Robby does not ask for help lightly.
Especially not about you.
Especially not like this.
The whole drive over, his phone keeps buzzing in the cupholder.
Jack glances at red lights and reads them one-handed.
She’s barely tracking conversation.
Didn’t eat.
Looks exhausted.
I hate leaving her alone like this.
Then finally:
She looked at me like she was trying not to ask me to stay.
That one hits hardest.
Jack can picture it too easily.
You wrapped in Robby’s hoodie. Sleepy and floaty and trying so hard to be “easy” even while your brain is halfway slipping under.
Trying not to ask for comfort because somewhere along the way you learned needing things made you difficult.
And Robby seeing right through you anyway.
By the time Jack gets to the apartment his chest already aches.
He unlocks the door fast enough it bangs softly against the stopper.
“Hey,” he calls immediately. “You awake?”
There’s a pause.
Then your sleepy voice from the couch.
“Mhm.”
Jack rounds the corner and nearly stops breathing.
Jesus.
You’re curled so tightly into yourself it almost looks painful. Bare legs tangled in the blanket. Robby’s hoodie swallowing your hands completely. Eyes glassy and heavy when they finally drift toward him.
You look soft.
Not in a polished way.
Not put together.
Soft the way people get when they’re exhausted enough to stop pretending they don’t need anybody.
Jack feels something deep in his chest pull painfully tight.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he murmurs.
Your face changes immediately at the tone.
Tiny thing.
But he catches it.
The way your shoulders relax.
The way your eyes soften.
Like your body recognized safety before your brain did.
Jack shuts and locks the door behind him before crossing the room fast.
He drops down into a crouch in front of the couch, forearms on his knees while he studies your face carefully.
“Hey, baby.”
Your lips part slightly.
Jack nearly swears under his breath.
You’re so gone right now that every soft word lands directly under your skin.
“Hi,” you whisper.
Your breathing catches softly.
There.
That reaction again.
Jack notices immediately.
He notices everything.
And right now?
Right now you’re practically dripping submission without even realizing it.
Sleepy. Needy. Looking at him like you want direction because holding yourself upright suddenly feels too hard.
Jack’s voice gentles even further.
“How long have you been sitting here?”
You shrug slightly under the blanket.
“Dunno.”
“Did you move at all after Robby left?”
Another tiny shrug.
Jack sighs softly.
Of course not.
His eyes move to the coffee table.
Half-drank water.
Untouched snack.
Your phone face down beside you.
Like you just… stopped functioning the second Robby walked out the door.
And somehow that thought doesn’t frustrate him.
It devastates him.
Because all he sees is someone trying so hard not to be needy while clearly needing somebody very badly.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he says again.
You blink slowly at him.
Jack reaches up carefully and brushes hair away from your face.
The second his fingers touch your skin your eyes flutter.
Warmth spreads across your cheeks instantly.
Jack’s stomach flips hard.
Jesus Christ.
“You’re really floaty, huh?”
“Mhm.”
“You know who I am?”
That gets the tiniest sleepy smile out of you.
“Jack.”
“Good girl.”
The praise slips out naturally.
Your entire body reacts.
Tiny inhale.
Thighs pressing together unconsciously beneath the blanket.
Eyes softening so fast it nearly knocks the breath from his lungs.
Jack stills.
You freeze too a second later once you realize what just happened.
Heat floods your face.
Jack watches every second of it.
“Oh,” he says quietly.
You immediately hide your face halfway into the sleeve of Robby’s hoodie.
Jack feels his chest cave in a little.
Not because it’s sexual.
Not really.
Because it’s trust.
Instinctive trust.
Your body hearing praise and melting toward it because somewhere deep down you feel safe enough to let go.
“Sweetheart,” he murmurs softly.
You make the tiniest sound in response.
Jack exhales slowly through his nose.
“Robby and I are so fucked.”
Your eyes peek over the sleeve immediately.
“What?”
“He’s already obsessed with you,” Jack says quietly. “And now I find out you get all soft when I get to take care of you?”
You groan weakly and hide again.
Jack actually smiles this time.
Warm. Fond. Aching with affection.
Again your breathing catches.
And fuck.
You really don’t even realize you’re doing it.
Jack glances down when his phone buzzes.
Robby:
Did she answer the door okay?
Jack types back immediately.
She’s okay. Very dropped though.
The typing bubble appears instantly.
Like Robby’s just been staring at his phone waiting.
Tell her to eat something real.
Pause.
And keep her talking.
Another pause.
She gets quieter when she’s overwhelmed.
Jack stares at the message for a second too long.
Something about it guts him.
That careful attention.
That deep knowing.
Robby notices every tiny shift in you.
Every silence.
Every change in your breathing.
Every way you try to disappear when you need comfort most.
Jack looks back up at you curled into the couch.
Your eyes are already on him.
Soft and sleepy and trusting.
“He’s worried about you,” Jack says quietly.
Your expression shifts instantly.
Guilty.
Jack hates it immediately.
“Nope,” he says softly. “Don’t do that.”
You blink slowly. “Do what?”
“That thing where you start apologizing in your head for needing people.”
Your eyes widen slightly.
Caught.
Jack’s expression softens painfully.
“Oh, baby.”
You look away immediately.
Jack reaches forward before he even thinks about it, fingers curling gently beneath your chin.
“Hey.”
Your eyes drift back to him automatically.
Another tiny inhale.
Another visible melt.
Jack’s pulse jumps.
“You really need somebody to hold your brain together right now, huh?”
Your face burns.
But after a second you nod.
Small.
Honest.
The sight nearly destroys him.
Because you trust him enough to admit it.
Jack stands slowly and holds his hand out toward you.
“C’mere.”
You look at his hand like you’re thinking about it way too hard.
Then slowly place your fingers into his.
The second Jack closes his hand around yours you sway toward him.
Instinctive.
Needy.
Trusting.
“Oh,” he whispers softly. “Easy, sweetheart.”
Your forehead lands against his chest.
Jack’s entire body goes still.
You just… folded into him.
Like it was the most natural thing in the world, because it was.
His arms come around you automatically.
One across your back.
One cradling the back of your head.
And Jesus.
You melt.
Actually melt.
Your whole body loosens against him with a soft shaky exhale that sounds dangerously close to relief.
Jack murmurs immediately.
Your fingers clutch weakly at the front of his hoodie.
Not grabbing.
Just holding.
Like you need the contact more than you know how to say.
Jack’s chest aches so hard it feels bruised.
“You held it together until Robby left, didn’t you?” he asks quietly.
Tiny nod.
“And then crashed.”
Another nod.
“Yeah,” he whispers. “Thought so.”
One hand slides slowly up and down your spine.
Grounding.
Steady.
The kind of touch meant to hold you together instead of overwhelm you.
You make another tiny sound against his chest.
Jack closes his eyes briefly.
Fuck.
You’re so soft like this.
So responsive.
No walls left.
Just sleepy submission and aching trust wrapped up in Robby’s oversized hoodie.
“You eat for me if I make something?” he asks softly.
You nod immediately against him.
Good girl.
This time he almost says it.
Almost.
Because he knows exactly what it would do to you now.
He can see it already in the way your breathing changes every time his voice lowers.
The way your eyes go glassier when he gives direction.
The way your body relaxes every single time he praises you.
Subby.
Sweetly.
Desperately.
Jack guides you carefully toward the kitchen without fully letting go.
You stay close the entire time. Nearly attached to his side.
His hand stays warm at the back of your neck while he moves around the kitchen with practiced ease.
You settle onto one of the stools and immediately rest your cheek against the counter like staying upright is too much effort.
Jack watches you for a second with something unbearably fond in his expression.
“You’re adorable,” he murmurs.
Your face flushes instantly.
Another reaction.
Another tiny soft inhale.
Jack’s gone. Completely gone for you.
He heats leftovers while texting Robby updates one-handed.
Eating soon. Still very sleepy.
Robby replies immediately.
Did she cry yet?
Jack glances toward you.
You’re watching him through heavy lashes.
Quiet.
Clingy with your eyes now.
Jack types back:
Almost.
Then after a second:
She’s really subby tonight.
Three dots appear.
Disappear.
Reappear.
Finally:
Yeah.
Pause.
You know she gets like that when she feels safe.
Jack stares at the message for a long moment.
Then looks back at you.
At the way you’re curled over the counter in Robby’s hoodie.
At the way your eyes soften every time he looks at you.
At the way you’re unconsciously waiting for direction already.
His chest hurts with affection.
Robby again:
Make her eat before she falls asleep.
And Jack can practically hear the worry underneath it.
“You know he almost stayed home?” Jack says quietly while plating food.
Your eyes lift immediately.
“He has work.”
“He almost ignored that.”
Your brows pull together softly.
Jack sets the plate down in front of you before stepping between your knees instinctively.
Close.
Warm.
Steady.
“He kept staring at you like he physically couldn’t make himself leave.”
Heat crawls slowly across your face.
Jack notices instantly.
“You really don’t understand what you do to him, huh?”
You duck your head.
Jack’s fingers slide gently beneath your chin again.
“Eyes up.”
You obey immediately.
Fuck.
That shouldn’t affect him this much.
But it does.
Especially when your pupils widen afterward like your body liked being told what to do.
he murmurs softly.
Your breathing goes shallow.
Jack keeps his voice low and steady.
“You gonna eat for me now?”
You nod.
“Use your words, sweetheart.”
“Yes.”
Jack smiles faintly.
“Good girl.”
This time the reaction is impossible to miss.
Your thighs press together hard enough the stool creaks faintly.
A tiny shaky breath leaves your lips.
And your eyes—
God.
Your eyes go completely soft.
Jack’s stomach twists hard.
“Oh,” he whispers.
You look embarrassed immediately.
Jack moves closer without thinking, one hand settling warm on your thigh just above your knee.
“Hey.” His thumb strokes once slowly through your skin. “Nothing to be embarrassed about.”
Your breathing stutters harder.
“You’re exhausted,” he murmurs. “And you trust us. That’s all.”
Us.
The word makes something deep inside you ache.
Jack sees it happen.
His expression softens even further.
“You know Robby loves taking care of you, right?”
Your eyes drop immediately.
Jack’s hand tightens slightly on your thigh.
“Hey.”
You look back up.
Warmth blooms across your chest so hard it almost hurts.
“He texted me six times in twenty minutes,” Jack says softly. “You know what that means?”
You shake your head slowly.
“He was scared to leave you.”
Your breath catches.
Jack’s thumb strokes slowly against your thigh again.
“He kept saying you looked like you needed somebody.”
Your eyes sting immediately.
“And you did,” Jack whispers. “Didn’t you?”
You nod before you can stop yourself.
The honesty of it makes his expression melt completely.
“Oh, baby.”
You break a little at the tone.
Not dramatic.
Just enough that your face crumples and your eyes go watery.
Jack reacts instantly.
“Hey hey hey,” he murmurs, stepping fully between your knees and pulling you against him. “C’mere.”
The second his arms wrap around you, you fold.
Completely.
Your face presses into his stomach while his hands settle firmly against your back.
And suddenly all the neediness you’d been trying to hide comes pouring out quietly.
You cling.
Not consciously.
Just instinctively.
Your fingers twist hard in the fabric of his shirt while your breathing shakes.
Jack’s heart physically hurts around the sound.
he whispers immediately, one hand sliding up into your hair. “Just let go for me.”
You make the tiniest wounded sound.
Jack nearly loses it.
Because fuck.
You needed this so badly.
Needed somebody to hold you together and tell you it was okay to stop trying so hard for one night.
“You don’t have to be easy with us,” he murmurs into your hair.
Your whole body softens further.
“You don’t have to earn care.”
One hand cradles the back of your head while the other rubs slow grounding circles against your spine.
“So good for us when you let us take care of you,” he whispers without thinking.
Your breath catches sharply against him.
Jack freezes.
Then very slowly looks down.
Your face is hidden against his stomach but he can still see the flush crawling down your throat.
Fuck.
“You liked that,” he says softly.
You make another tiny sound.
Not denial.
Jack’s pulse jumps hard.
His fingers tighten gently in your hair.
“Sweetheart.”
You tilt your face up slowly.
Your eyes are wrecked.
Soft.
Needy.
Pupils blown wide while you look at him like you want something you don’t know how to ask for.
Jack thinks he might die from how sweet you are.
“There you are,” he whispers.
And this time you actually whimper softly at the praise.
Jack could always tell the difference between your normal tired and this.
Normal tired still fought him a little.
You’d roll your eyes when he told you to eat. You’d insist you were fine. You’d try to stay upright out of pure stubbornness even while falling asleep sitting up.
This was different.
This was you curled into Robby’s hoodie like you’d been holding yourself together by threads all day and the second Robby walked out the door your body just… gave up.
Jack saw it immediately.
The delayed blinking. The way your attention drifted halfway through sentences. The way you looked at him when he walked in.
Soft.
Too soft.
Like you were already halfway under and looking for somebody safe enough to sink into.
By the time he got you sitting at the kitchen counter with actual food in front of you, he was already gone over it.
Not annoyed.
Not overwhelmed.
Just deeply, painfully fond.
You sat there wrapped in Robby’s hoodie, sleeves covering your hands while you poked vaguely at the food he’d heated up for you. Your hair was messy from where you’d been lying on the couch and every few seconds your eyes drifted back toward him automatically like you needed to keep checking he was still there.
Jack pretended not to notice.
Mostly because if he acknowledged how badly it got to him he’d probably end up dragging you into his lap and refusing to let go for the next six hours.
His phone buzzed again against the counter.
Robby:
Is she eating?
Jack snorted softly.
You looked up immediately. “Is he still worrying?”
“He’s at work trying very hard not to drive back here.”
Your expression changed instantly at that. Guilty around the edges.
Jack saw it happen in real time and sighed quietly.
“I see,” he murmured.
You frowned faintly. “What?”
“That look you get when somebody takes care of you and you start feeling bad about it.”
“I don’t feel bad.”
“You do.” Jack leaned back against the counter beside you, arms folded loosely over his chest. “You get this little crease between your eyebrows like you’re apologizing in your head.”
Your hand tightened around the fork.
Caught.
Jack’s face softened immediately.
“Baby.”
The word hit you visibly. Your shoulders dropped a little. Eyes lowering for a second before lifting back to him.
Jack watched the reaction carefully.
You got so pliant when you were exhausted. Not mindless. Not incapable of deciding things. Just softer around the edges. Less guarded. Every emotion easier to read.
And right now what he saw all over your face was need.
Not sexual even.
Just a deep aching need to be taken care of without having to ask for it.
“You don’t have to make yourself smaller when we worry about you,” Jack said quietly.
Your throat moved when you swallowed.
“I know.”
“No.” His voice gentled. “I don’t think you do.”
Silence settled between you for a second.
Not awkward.
Just full.
You looked down at the food again, picking at it slowly while Jack watched to make sure you actually ate.
After another bite your eyes drifted back to him again automatically.
“You’re staring,” you mumbled.
“You’re cute.”
Your face heated immediately.
Jack smiled a little.
“That too.”
You huffed softly and looked away again but he could still see the tiny smile threatening at the corners of your mouth.
was.
That’s what Robby meant.
The second you felt safe enough, pieces of you started reappearing.
Jack reached over absently and brushed his fingers through your hair where it had fallen into your face.
You leaned into the touch before you even realized you were doing it.
The movement was small enough you probably didn’t notice.
Jack definitely did.
His chest tightened hard.
“Jesus,” he murmured quietly.
Your eyes lifted sleepily. “What?”
“You really are gone tonight.”
“M’tired.”
“I know, sweetheart.”
Your breathing changed at the pet name.
Not dramatically.
Just enough that Jack noticed.
And he always noticed.
You’d been together long enough now that he understood your tells almost as well as Robby did.
The tiny pause in your breathing when one of them used a soft tone.
The way praise settled into you before your brain could process it.
The way you got clingier when you were overwhelmed. Needier. More responsive.
Especially with them.
Especially when you were exhausted enough to stop pretending you didn’t want comfort.
Jack picked up your water and held it out toward you.
“Drink some more.”
You obeyed immediately.
Again, not because you had to.
Because right now thinking felt hard and letting him guide you through things felt easy.
Safe.
Jack watched you drink half the glass before taking it back from you gently.
“Good,” he murmured.
Your eyes fluttered slightly at the praise.
There it was again.
Jack exhaled slowly through his nose.
“You know Robby warned me about this?”
Your brows pulled together faintly. “About what?”
“How soft you get when you’re tired, when I’m not here”
Heat bloomed instantly across your face.
Jack smiled despite himself.
“He told me if you got really exhausted you’d start acting like every bit of affection was gonna make you cry.”
You looked horrified. “He said that?”
“Mhm.”
“He’s awful.”
“No,” Jack said softly. “He and I are obsessed with you.”
The words landed hard enough that you went quiet.
Jack watched emotion flicker over your face before you looked down again quickly.
God.
Sometimes he forgot how deeply you still doubted this.
Not them loving you.
You knew they loved you.
But the intensity of it still seemed to catch you off guard every time.
Like some part of you still expected there to be limits on how much care you were allowed to receive.
Jack stepped closer slowly until he was standing between your knees.
Your eyes lifted automatically.
He murmured.
You melted immediately.
Not physically at first.
It was your face.
The tension leaving around your mouth. Your shoulders loosening. Eyes softening until you looked almost dazed from the attention.
Jack rested his hands lightly against your thighs.
“You with me?”
“Mhm.”
“That’s not an answer.”
A tiny sleepy smile appeared.
“Yes.”
“Good girl.”
The reaction was immediate and impossible to miss.
Your breath caught sharply enough that your whole chest moved with it.
Your thighs pressed together beneath his hands.
And your eyes—
Fuck.
Jack felt heat curl low in his stomach at the way you looked at him after that. All wide-eyed and soft and wanting.
You realized it a second later and immediately tried to hide your face.
Jack caught your chin gently before you could.
“Nuh uh.”
Your gaze flicked back up to his.
“So pretty when you let us take care of you,” he murmured.
You looked wrecked from the words alone.
Jack could practically watch the thoughts slipping slower behind your eyes now. Every bit of affection sinking directly into your body.
“You like that?” he asked softly.
You hesitated.
Jack’s thumb stroked once across your jaw.
“Talk to me, baby.”
Your pulse jumped visibly.
“…yeah.”
“Yeah what?”
Your face burned hotter.
Jack waited patiently.
Not teasing now.
Just steady.
Grounding.
“Yeah, I like it,” you whispered.
Jack’s chest tightened painfully with affection.
“You know what I think?” he said quietly.
You shook your head.
“I think you spend so much time trying to be low maintenance that the second somebody takes control for a minute your whole body relaxes.”
Your breathing went shaky again.
Jack watched your fingers twist uselessly in the sleeves of Robby’s hoodie.
“And I think,” he continued gently, “you trust us enough to let it happen.”
That one nearly broke you.
Your eyes turned shiny immediately.
Jack’s expression softened at once.
“Oh, baby.”
You ducked your head hard.
“No no.” One hand slid up to the back of your neck. Warm. Steady. “Look at me.”
You obeyed immediately.
God.
That alone did something dangerous to him.
Not because of obedience itself.
Because you trusted him enough to give it so easily.
Your eyes fluttered.
Jack rubbed his thumb slowly against the side of your neck while he studied your face.
“You know what Robby texted me right before I came upstairs?”
You shook your head slightly.
“He said, ‘She’ll try to pretend she doesn’t need anything. Don’t let her.’”
Your throat tightened visibly.
Jack saw it happen.
“He knows you,” Jack said softly. “Really knows you.”
You looked away again, voice quiet when you answered.
“So do you.”
Something in Jack’s chest twisted hard.
He stepped closer instinctively until your knees were pressed against his hips.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I do.”
The room felt smaller suddenly.
Warmer.
You looked exhausted and vulnerable and so deeply loved it almost hurt to look at you.
Jack’s hands slid slowly up your thighs, just enough to steady you when you swayed slightly toward him again.
“You’re drifting,” he murmured.
“Tired.”
“I know.”
Your forehead bumped softly against his chest.
Neither of you moved after that.
Jack just stood there holding you steady while your breathing slowed against him.
After a minute he felt your fingers curl weakly into the front of his shirt.
Clingy.
The realization made something affectionate and possessive bloom warm beneath his ribs.
“You need attention so bad right now,” he murmured quietly.
Your face immediately buried against his chest.
Jack laughed softly under his breath.
“Sweetheart.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
One hand slid slowly into your hair, scratching lightly against your scalp.
The sound you made nearly knocked him flat.
Soft.
Content.
Needy enough that his entire body reacted to it.
“My girl,” he whispered.
You melted harder against him.
Jack closed his eyes briefly.
Fuck.
You trusted him so much.
That was the thing that kept hitting him over and over tonight.
Not just physically.
Emotionally.
You trusted him enough to let him see you like this.
Exhausted and clingy and aching for reassurance.
You trusted him enough to let him lead.
Jack pressed a soft kiss into your hair.
“You know we love this part too, right?”
You tilted your head enough to look up at him sleepily. “What part?”
“This.” His hand rubbed slowly down your back. “Taking care of you. Having you all soft and clingy with us.”
Your breath caught.
Jack smiled faintly.
“Robby acts all calm about it but he gets ridiculous when you’re needy.”
A tiny laugh escaped you.
You actually smiled this time.
Sleepy and shy.
Jack thought he might die from how fond he felt right then.
“He called me twice on the drive here,” Jack continued quietly. “The second call was just him asking if I thought you’d eaten enough today.”
Your face crumpled slightly around the edges.
“Oh,” Jack said immediately, softer now. “Baby, no.”
“I just…” You swallowed hard. “Nobody’s ever worried about me like that before.”
The honesty in your voice hit him like a punch.
Jack stared at you for a second before his entire expression broke open with affection.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
You looked embarrassed the second the words left your mouth.
Jack’s hands slid fully around your waist before he pulled you against him properly.
“You never have to be embarrassed by that with us,” he murmured into your hair.
Your arms wrapped around him immediately.
Tight.
Instinctive.
Jack held you closer without hesitation.
“You know what Robby said before he left?” he asked quietly.
You shook your head against his chest.
“He said he hated leaving because you looked like you needed to be held.”
Your breathing shook softly.
Jack’s hand moved slowly up and down your spine.
“And he was right,” he whispered. “You did.”
“And he was right,” he whispered. “You did.”
Your face stayed hidden against his chest after that, arms looped tightly around his waist while Jack held you in the middle of the kitchen.
He could feel how exhausted you were now.
Not just sleepy.
Done.
Like your body had finally realized it didn’t have to keep pretending everything was manageable because somebody else had stepped in to hold you up for awhile.
His hand moved slowly up and down your back beneath Robby’s hoodie.
“You’re shaking,” he murmured quietly.
“M’cold.”
That immediately decided it.
Jack pressed a kiss into your hair before shifting his grip lower on your waist.
“Okay. Shower.”
You tightened your arms around him instantly.
“No.”
The refusal came muffled against his chest.
Jack smiled helplessly.
“Baby.”
“Don’t wanna move.”
“I know.” His fingers slid gently into your hair. “But you’re exhausted and freezing and I think your brain stopped functioning twenty minutes ago.”
You made a sleepy little noise that sounded suspiciously like agreement.
Jack laughed softly under his breath.
“Yeah. Thought so.”
His phone buzzed again against the counter.
Without letting go of you, he pulled it out one handed.
Robby:
How is she?
Jack glanced down at you practically folded into him.
Still clinging.
Still hiding your face against his chest like you lived there now.
He smiled despite himself before typing back.
Very needy. Taking her to shower now.
The response came instantly.
Good. Wash her hair. It helps when she gets overwhelmed.
Jack’s chest tightened painfully around the casual intimacy of that sentence.
The knowing.
Robby knew exactly what helped you calm down. Exactly how your body reacted to stress. Exactly what kind of care made you soften instead of shutting down harder.
Jack slipped the phone back into his pocket before tilting your chin up gently.
“C’mon, sweetheart.”
Your eyes blinked open slowly.
Sleepy.
Warm.
Trusting.
God.
“You gonna let me take care of you properly?”
The question made something in your expression soften immediately.
You nodded.
“Words.”
“Yes.”
“There’s my girl.”
Your breathing caught softly.
Jack saw your thighs press together slightly beneath the hoodie and nearly melted on the spot.
Not because it was sexual.
Because you trusted him enough for praise to hit you like comfort instead of pressure.
He guided you slowly down the hallway toward the bathroom, keeping one arm around your waist the entire time because every few steps you drifted back into him again.
By the time he flicked the bathroom light on, you were practically asleep standing up against his shoulder.
Jack turned the shower on first, adjusting the temperature carefully while steam slowly started filling the room.
Then he turned back toward you.
You looked impossibly soft standing there.
Robby’s hoodie swallowing your hands.
Hair messy.
Eyes heavy.
Completely gone for every gentle thing he gave you tonight.
Jack stepped closer and brushed his knuckles softly along your cheek.
“Arms up for me, baby.”
You obeyed immediately.
No hesitation.
No embarrassment.
Just sleepy trust.
His chest ached so hard it almost hurt.
Jack pulled the hoodie slowly over your head and your hair fell loose around your shoulders.
You immediately leaned back into him the second he touched your waist again.
“There you are,” he murmured quietly.
Your whole body softened further.
Jack kissed your temple before helping you out of the rest of your clothes carefully, hands gentle and unhurried the entire time. He undressed and took of his leg, guiding you both into the shower.
Every few seconds he checked your face.
“You okay?”
“Mhm.”
“You with me?”
“Yes.”
“So good for me.”
Another visible shiver rolled through you.
Jack smiled softly.
“You really like praise tonight, huh?”
You hid your face against his shoulder immediately.
He laughed quietly under his breath and wrapped both arms around you for a second before guiding you beneath the warm spray.
The second the water hit your skin, you exhaled shakily.
“Oh.”
Jack whispered before stopping himself again with a grin. “I’m hopeless apparently.”
A tiny sleepy smile appeared on your face.
Jack stepped in behind you after a second, one arm wrapping securely around your waist while the water poured over both of you as he sat into the shower bench Robby had gotten.
You melted backward against his chest immediately.
Like your body had been waiting for somewhere safe to land all night.
Jack reached for your shampoo and worked it slowly through your hair.
The second his fingertips started massaging gently against your scalp, your eyes drifted shut.
And then your knees weakened hard enough that he had to tighten his arm around your middle.
“Easy,” he murmured.
“Feels nice.”
Your voice came out soft and wrecked enough to make his chest tighten.
“I know, baby.”
He slowed his hands even more after that.
Strong fingers working carefully through your hair while warm water ran over both of you.
You practically melted in stages beneath his hands.
Every circle against your scalp loosened another piece of tension from your body.
Every quiet word made you softer.
Jack could feel it.
The way your weight settled more heavily against him. The way your breathing slowed. The way you unconsciously tilted your head to give him better access when he scratched lightly at the base of your skull.
“There,” he whispered when a tiny sound escaped you. “That’s the spot, huh?”
You nodded immediately.
Too tired to be embarrassed anymore.
Jack thought he might actually die from how much affection he felt all at once.
“You hold all your stress here,” he murmured, fingers carefully working over the tense muscles at the back of your neck. “Poor thing.”
The sympathy in his voice nearly undid you.
Your hands reached back automatically, grabbing loosely for his wrists like you needed more of him somehow.
Jack’s expression softened instantly.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
He kept one arm firm around your waist while rinsing your hair slowly, fingers combing through the strands beneath the water.
You stayed completely limp against him.
Trusting him with everything.
And God, Jack loved taking care of you like this.
Loved how safe you felt in his hands.
Loved the way your body stopped bracing for impact when he touched you gently enough.
Once your hair was rinsed, he reached for your body wash next.
“Can you stand for one second without me holding you up?” he asked softly.
You immediately shook your head.
Jack laughed quietly.
“Honest girl.”
Your face heated even with your eyes still closed.
He kissed the side of your head before washing you carefully.
Slow hands.
Gentle touches.
Nothing rushed.
Nothing clinical.
Just intimacy in the softest possible form.
You leaned against the tile while he washed your arms and shoulders, visibly calmer now than you’d been all night.
Every so often your eyes opened just enough to look at him.
Like you still needed to make sure he was there.
Jack always answered the look immediately.
One hand brushing your waist.
A kiss to your forehead.
His voice low and warm.
“I’ve got you.”
Every single time your body relaxed harder at the words.
By the time he finally turned the water off, you were practically boneless.
Jack wrapped a towel around you immediately before pulling you close again.
The second the warmth surrounded you, you sighed against his chest.
“My lovely girl.”
Your knees nearly buckled again.
Jack laughed softly while holding you tighter.
“Oh, wow. Okay.”
You hid your burning face against him.
“No more talking.”
“Absolutely not.” He rubbed the towel gently over your hair. “You’re adorable tonight.”
He dried you slowly after that, talking quietly the entire time just to keep you grounded.
Telling you little things about his day.
About Robby nearly forgetting his coffee because he was too busy worrying about you.
About how both of them had noticed you heading toward burnout days ago.
“You get quieter when you’re overwhelmed,” he murmured while rubbing lotion slowly into your arms. “Robby catches it first every time.”
Your eyes stayed fixed on him while he worked the lotion gently into your skin.
The tenderness of it made your chest ache.
Jack noticed immediately.
“What?”
“You’re taking care of me like I’m fragile.”
His hands paused for a second before continuing slower than before.
“No,” he said quietly. “I’m taking care of you like you matter.”
That one hit hard enough your eyes immediately stung.
Jack sighed softly.
“Oh, baby.”
He stepped closer again, hands warm on your waist while he looked down at you with heartbreaking affection.
“You don’t know what to do with being loved this gently yet, do you?”
Your face crumpled slightly.
Jack immediately pulled you against him.
“That’s okay,” he whispered into your damp hair. “We’ll keep teaching you.”
“We’ll keep teaching you.”
The words stay wrapped around your chest even after Jack finishes rubbing lotion carefully into your skin.
You’re standing between his knees near the bathroom counter now, freshly showered and warm in one of his oversized shirts while he works moisturizer slowly into your hands like it’s something precious.
Which, judging by the look on his face, it is.
Your eyes stay fixed on him the entire time.
On the concentration in his expression.
The care in every touch.
Nobody has ever handled you this gently before.
Jack notices the second your breathing changes again.
His gaze lifts immediately.
“What?”
You shake your head quickly.
But your eyes are shiny.
Jack’s whole face softens.
“Oh, sweetheart.”
Before you can look away, he catches your wrist gently and pulls you closer until you’re standing between his legs again.
The second his arms settle around your waist, you melt.
Like your body recognizes safety before your brain can even think about it.
“There you go,” he murmurs quietly.
Your forehead drops against his shoulder.
“Tired,” you whisper.
“I know, baby.”
His hand slides slowly up your back beneath the soft shirt he put you in.
You’re warm now from the shower. Hair damp. Skin soft beneath his hands from the lotion.
Jack feels unbearably fond looking at you.
“You’re so pretty like this,” he says softly.
Your fingers tighten immediately in the fabric of his shirt.
Jack smiles a little.
“All sleepy and warm and letting me take care of you.” He brushes his nose lightly against your temple. “Sweetest girl I’ve ever seen.”
The praise hits hard enough that your knees weaken slightly.
Jack catches you automatically with a quiet laugh.
“Oh my god.”
“No more talking,” you mumble against his neck.
“Absolutely not.”
You groan softly while he stands, arms still wrapped securely around you.
“You know what happens when you get tired like this?” he murmurs while guiding you slowly back toward the bedroom.
“What?”
“You stop hiding how much you like affection.”
Your whole face heats instantly.
Jack grins against your hair.
“It’s cute.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
You’re too exhausted to argue properly, which means by the time he gets you into the bedroom you’re basically hanging off him again.
Jack loves it.
Loves the way you follow him automatically.
Loves the way your hand keeps reaching for him every time he steps more than a foot away.
Loves how safe you feel now compared to when he first walked in.
The room is dim except for the bedside lamp.
Warm.
Quiet.
Safe.
Jack pulls the blankets back while you stand there swaying slightly in his shirt.
His shirt.
The sight almost kills him.
“Okay,” he says softly. “Into bed.”
You climb in immediately and then just… stop.
Curled in the middle of the mattress with damp hair spread across the pillow and sleepy eyes fixed on him.
Jack’s chest aches so hard it feels impossible to hold.
“What?” he murmurs.
“Need you.”
The honesty in your voice nearly destroys him.
“I’m coming here, baby.”
The second he climbs into bed beside you, you move toward him automatically.
No hesitation.
Just immediate instinctive closeness.
Your whole body presses into his while your arms slide around his waist and your face tucks beneath his chin.
Jack wraps you up instantly.
He whispers before sighing quietly against your hair. “I know, I know. I keep saying it.”
A sleepy laugh shakes through you.
Better.
More grounded.
Jack pulls the blankets higher around you both before tucking them carefully around your shoulders.
Then he pauses.
Looks down at you curled tightly against him.
And something in his expression goes unbearably soft.
“You’re so precious to me,” he whispers.
Your breath catches.
Jack’s hand slides into your damp hair, combing slowly through the strands while he watches your eyes drift heavier and heavier.
“So good tonight,” he murmurs. “Letting us take care of you. Letting yourself rest.”
An: Rabbot… lowkey sub space. First time for me. Also part 2 perhaps in progress…
Rabbot: established relationship, dom sub dynamic
Summary: In a quiet moment, Robby notices you’ve gone a little distant and gently grounds you, making sure you’re okay before arranging for Jack to come over so you’re not alone when he has to leave.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
The apartment is quiet in that soft, slow way that makes everything feel a little further away.
You’re curled into the corner of the couch, wrapped in Robby’s hoodie, sleeves pulled over your hands. Your mind feels light—floaty, like you’re drifting just under the surface of everything. Not asleep, not fully present either.
Just… soft.
Robby notices before you even look up.
He’s standing by the door, bag half-zipped, keys in his hand—but he hasn’t moved in the last thirty seconds. His eyes are on you, steady, focused in that way that means he’s already figured it out.
“Hey,” he says gently.
You blink up at him, slow. “Hi.”
That’s enough.
He exhales quietly, setting his keys down instead of leaving. “Okay… yeah.”
You tilt your head. “What?”
He walks over, slower now, like approaching something fragile. “Where’re you at right now?”
You think about it. It takes a second longer than usual. “Um… kinda floaty.”
“Yeah,” he murmurs. “I can see that.”
You give a small, lazy shrug. “It’s nice.”
“I’m sure it is,” he says softly, crouching in front of you. “But I need you a little more here with me, okay?”
You nod easily, eyes following him.
“Can you tell me where you are?”
“Home.”
“Good. And what day is it?”
“…Tuesday.”
“Perfect,” he says, a faint smile tugging at his mouth. His hand comes up, gently brushing your sleeve-covered fingers. “You’re safe. Just a little dropped.”
“Mhm.”
He glances at the clock.
And then back at you.
His jaw tightens.
“…I have to leave in ten minutes,” he mutters, more to himself than to you.
You blink slowly. “You have work.”
“I know.”
“So go,” you say, like it’s obvious.
He huffs a quiet, disbelieving breath. “Yeah, I don’t love that plan.”
“I’ll nap,” you offer.
“That’s also not my favorite plan.”
You smile faintly. “You don’t like any plan.”
“Correct.”
You watch him for a second, then mumble, “Jack’s coming later.”
“In an hour,” Robby says immediately. “Which is an hour you’ll be alone like this.”
“I’ll be okay,” you insist, softer now.
He studies your face—really studies it. The slow blinking, the relaxed posture, the way you’re barely holding onto the thread of conversation.
“…have you eaten?” he asks.
You pause.
“…maybe?”
Robby sighs under his breath. “Okay. That’s a no.”
He stands quickly, heading to the kitchen. You hear cabinets open, the fridge, the clink of a glass. When he comes back, he’s got water and something small to eat.
He presses both into your hands. “Take a few bites for me.”
You obey without argument, taking a small bite.
“Good,” he murmurs, watching like it matters. Like you matter.
You swallow slowly. “You’re worried.”
“Yeah,” he says plainly.
You blink at him. “Why?”
He lets out a short breath, almost a laugh. “You really wanna have that conversation right now?”
You think about it.
“…no.”
“Okay, good,” he says, softer now.
He pulls his phone out, typing quickly.
“Who’re you texting?” you ask, voice quiet.
“Jack.”
You perk up just slightly. “Oh.”
Robby glances at you, then back to his phone. “He’s gonna come straight here before his shift.”
“You don’t have to do that,” you mumble.
“I know,” he says. “I’m doing it anyway.”
Your chest warms a little at that.
“What’d you say?” you ask.
He huffs faintly. “That you’re a little spacey, haven’t eaten, and I don’t like leaving you alone.”
You frown. “That sounds dramatic.”
“It is dramatic,” he agrees. “I don’t care.”
Your lips twitch.
His phone buzzes almost immediately.
Robby glances at it, then exhales in relief. “Okay. He’s on his way. He’ll be here in like forty minutes.”
“See?” you say softly. “Problem solved.”
“Not yet,” he mutters.
You watch him, still not moving toward the door.
“You’re gonna be late,” you point out.
“Yeah.”
“You should go.”
He doesn’t respond.
Instead, he sits beside you on the couch, close enough that your shoulder leans into him without thinking.
“Hey,” he says quietly.
You hum in response.
“Stay with me for a second.”
“Mhm.”
His hand gently takes yours, thumb brushing slow, grounding circles over your knuckles.
“You’re okay,” he murmurs. “Just a little out of it.”
“Feels nice,” you admit.
“I know,” he says. “Just don’t drift too far, yeah?”
You nod against his shoulder.
There’s a long pause.
Then—
“I hate leaving you like this,” he admits, barely above a whisper.
That makes you look up at him.
“You don’t have to hate it,” you say softly. “I’m not in danger.”
“I know,” he says. “That’s not why.”
You blink. “Then why?”
He hesitates.
Then quieter—honest in a way that settles deep in your chest—
“Because I care about you.”
Your breath catches just a little.
“…I know,” you whisper.
His forehead presses lightly to yours for a second. Grounding. Gentle.
“I’ll stay until Jack gets here if I have to,” he murmurs.
“You won’t,” you say, shaking your head faintly. “You’re too responsible for that.”
He huffs. “Unfortunately, yeah.”
Another buzz from his phone.
Robby checks it. “He’s close.”
You smile faintly, eyelids heavy again. “Told you.”
He doesn’t smile back right away.
He’s still watching you like he’s trying to memorize that you’re okay.
Finally, he exhales, squeezing your hand once. “Lock the door after I leave.”
“Mhm.”
“Text me if anything feels off.”
“Okay.”
“And keep eating that,” he adds, nodding to the snack in your hand.
“Yes, doctor.”
He almost smiles at that.
Slowly, reluctantly, he stands. Grabs his keys.
But he doesn’t leave immediately.
“…you sure you’re okay?” he asks one last time.
You nod, leaning back into the couch. “I’m good. Just floaty.”
He steps closer again, pressing a soft kiss to your forehead. It lingers.
“Stay safe,” he murmurs.
“You too.”
He heads to the door, pausing with his hand on the handle.
“…Jack’s gonna fuss over you,” he adds.
You smile, eyes half-closed. “I know.”
“Good.”
Then he’s gone.
The apartment goes quiet again.
But not for long.
Because barely twenty minutes later, keys rattle at the door—and Jack’s voice follows immediately:
“Hey—? You awake? Robby said you’re being weird.”
You smile softly into the couch.
Not alone.
Not even for a second.
· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
An: my boyfriends who I kiss at the same time.. formatted on phone will fix laterrrr X
andrew and gf being soooo loud they make it everyone else's problem
series masterlist
-
craig finally understood why his brothers acted the way they did. why they gave him looks and cursed him out any time he stepped out of his room in the morning, hickeys to be found all over his neck and shoulders and red lines trailing down the length of his back.
because last night he'd learned just how thin the walls at the cody house were.
he'd learned that, yeah, maybe he should've been a little more considerate of his brothers when staying up all night with a new girl in his room every other day.
but, to be fair, there was no way for craig to know that this was what his brothers were hearing through all hours of the night when his promiscuity got the best of him.
"i swear to god, if i hear one more 'andy-!' i'm going to march in there with a shotgun."
deran could only chuckle into his mouthful of cereal, clearly way less impacted by the noise than his brother.
he was used to it. courtesy of craig himself.
"what, not as fun when it's not a girl screaming your name?"
before craig could answer, the slam of a headboard hitting the wall that separated the kitchen and pope's room began to accelerate once more, interrupting anything he could've said.
and when he opened his mouth after a short pause, he was interrupted once more, except this time by something worse — wails of his brother's name.
"a-andy, fuck! please, fuck, andy—!"
"you've gotta be fucking kidding me," he muttered under his breath before addressing his brother, "no. in fact, sex completely loses its appeal when i'm not the one on the receiving end."
"shit! oh, andyandyandy- don't stop!"
craig rolled his eyes, movements brusque as he took out a few things to make himself breakfast. he could feel a headache coming in.
"hey, be happy it's only her you can hear. i can't even imagine what pope would soun-"
craig grimaced, "don't finish that sentence, man. i don't wanna know what fucking pope sounds like during sex."
deran shrugged, continuing to eat his soggy cereal. nonchalance seethed out of him.
some moments of silence passed between the brothers, with the occasional eye roll from craig and the snicker from deran as the noises came and went. both brothers shared a fleeting thought, which was just how long could the two of you go for?
"i mean, there's no way pope's that good, right?"
"dude, you just said you didn't want to think about pope having sex."
"okay, but listen," craig interrupted halfway through making himself a sandwich, "do you hear that? there's no way she's not faking it. pope can't be that good. he's way smaller than me, his dick can't be that-"
"dude."
"i'm just saying—!"
unfortunately, the hammering at the wall reached its crescendo just then, halting any further conversation that could be had.
your screams increased in volume, and now a few sounds could be heard coming from the other party involved. andrew's pained groans joined your wails, making both guys share a look of terror between one another.
and then a very loud grunt from pope was followed by silence.
craig felt some heat reach his neck, but he shook his head in a shudder in order to snap out of it.
meanwhile, deran felt weirdly shocked. he was happy that his brother had found what seemed to be the one and trusted them enough to bring her back home, but this was way more than he'd ever expected to hear from a brother. and this was said with craig's sexcapades in mind.
"okay, i'm gonna kill him-"
"that'll just make him go harder next time."
"fuck, you're right."
and so they found themselves at an impasse.
after the silence began to invade the next room over, it didn't take long for the eldest cody brother to walk into the room, breaking the awkward and defeated silence that had formed in the kitchen.
as expected, be was almost fully nude, with only a tight pair of boxers covering his manhood and a variety of marks adorning his upper body — although craig's nosy eyes noticed a faded trail of hickeys to be found on pope's inner thighs, making him gag internally.
andrew immediately took notice of the weird silence and the shared looks behind his back as he neared the fridge for some cold water.
slowly turning around, he asked, in a somewhat pointed tone, "what?"
settled on opposite sides of the kitchen island, his brothers looked to him with different expressions.
deran seemed mostly incredulous. craig was just frustrated — either jealousy or annoyance, not even he could tell.
"'andy'?" was all craig said.
"got a problem, craig?"
"maybe keep it down next time, yeah, brother?"
deran sighed, continuing to occupy himself with his cereal. pope could be a bit of a ticking time bomb if poked just at the right moment. this was uncharted territory, so he wasn't very sure how much craig could push before making pope blow up.
but craig continued.
his crown had been toppled a little, maybe.
"you're saying that to me?"
with a scoff and an incredulous chuckle, andrew turned back to the fridge, grabbing himself two water bottles before closing it back up and facing his brothers once more. to him, the conversation must've been over.
"i'm just saying, it's a shared space. i don't need to hear your girlfriend, or whatever, screaming your name all fucking night."
pope's eye twitched at the tone in which the word girlfriend was said, but he let it slide.
there was a certain, uncharted, sense of pride he felt at the comment.
his girlfriend screaming his name all night long.
yeah. this could easily become the new normal to him. he had felt a slight surge of confidence upon leaving his room that morning, somewhat aware of how much noise you'd been making, but just completely careless about it. it had been at the back of his mind, but every thrust just buried the thought deeper. up until the point where it became completely insignificant.
(how could he think about decorum when he had you under him, clawing at his back, crying out 'andyandyandy-' in the prettiest voice he'd ever heard, going higher and higher the more he lost himself in your pussy—)
but when he turned around, craig continued to glare at him as if he'd personally offended him.
and normally andrew would've been perfectly fine with decking him, telling him to get fucked, and walking past him. but a very welcome interruption entered the room before he could.
"baby?"
it came from behind craig, leading to the hallway that connected the walls of the kitchen and his room. the soft sound of your voice caused all boys to face you. deran offered a smile, albeit a little forced and awkward. craig scoffed to himself and nodded in semi-polite greeting, hands in pockets as he leaned against the counter in order to create space for you to get to pope.
there you stood, hair disheveled, makeup running slightly down your waterline and donning only one of pope's plain pajama shirts.
with a little extra attention, it would've been easy to spot the matching trail of hickeys up your thighs. and some x-ray vision would've provided the life-ruining sight of your hidden skin filled with marks made by andrew's teeth.
"you were taking too long, what's wrong?"
and, fuck, andrew almost went hard again at those simple words.
pride swelled in his chest, a weird sense of superiority invading him at having his sweet, pretty, gorgeous girl standing in front of his family in such a state.
andrew didn't need to argue with craig any longer. no words were needed as the appearance of his sweet girl said everything that needed to be said.
"sorry, sweetheart, just saying good morning to the guys."
andrew took the few steps that separated you and held onto your hand with one hand as the other held the two bottles of water (swoon), beginning to lead you back where you came from.
at that you smiled at them, sleepy demeanor leaving you a bit as you mumbled 'morning,' seemingly unaware of craig's earlier complaints.
as andrew passed in front of craig, he smirked to himself, twice as much when he noticed craig's annoyed scowl.
"might wanna get some earbuds or somethin'" he mumbled under his breath as he walked away.
once he was gone, craig groaned to himself, speaking up one last time.
Maybe Robertson x reader, reader sees her Robert all tired and looking like hell (bro looks like a small stretch can cause every bone to crack very concerningly) reader decides to give him a whole self-care weekend like masks and massages that he’s just on cloud nine, weekends over that SDN just notices he looks alive and smells like cucumber that they are lowkey asking for readers help.
Yessss this was so adorable!! I hope you like it! ❤️
Pairing: Robert Robertson x fem! Reader/ Mechaman x fem! Reader
Word count: 2.3k
Tags: No use of Y/N, no specific physical description of the reader except for clothing, established relationship, cw suggestive language, cw food mentions, fluff!
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The soda on the table is dripping in condensation, and the popcorn beside it makes the whole apartment smell like a movie theatre. Your eyes fight to stay open, and you’ve been yawning too much. Your limbs ache from all the superhero-ing you had to do, from teaching kids first aid, to beating up a kaiju downtown, the whole week just piled on you, from one call to the next, you feel like your batteries are drained.
To add salt to your wound, you absolutely miss Robert.
Yawning for the umpteenth time, the crappy reality TV you put on doesn’t even help you stay awake anymore. You’d crawl in bed but you want to wait for Robert to get home when you feel like you haven’t seen him in ages. The only times that the two of you have crossed paths this week can be counted in one hand. Whenever you’d kiss him goodbye while he’s still half asleep, and when he’d greet you with a kiss when you’re already deep into slumber. Your schedules haven’t matched up as well as before with the amount of work the two of you had to do. If you’re not at home, he is, but when you’re home, he’s out there burning the midnight oil with the Z-team. Forget meeting up for lunch at work either when your breaks don’t match with his.
But now that it’s the weekend, you’re both free to see each other, hopefully more of each other.
Your hearing picks up the sound of keys outside and you immediately perk up with a smile. As if you were jolted with lightning, you’re vaulting over the couch and towards him in the speed that even Chase would be proud of.
The second the door opens, Robert is met with your smiling face, like a golden retriever, who’s excited to see him home.
“Hi.” Tilting his head, Robert smiles softly at you, feeling that you’re practically vibrating from the longing, waiting for his go signal. “C’mere.” He opens his arms and you’re immediately right on him like velcro. “Missed me?”
“Do you even have to ask?” You say whilst peppering his face with kisses. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“Fuck,” his facade falls as he drops his bag and keys onto the floor, arms patting the back of your leg as he tells you to hop and wrap yourself around him. You do as you’re asked without a second thought as he kicks the front door closed. He can’t ignore the fact that he heard his knees creak when he carried you, but if you did hear it, you didn’t say a word. But you did hear it though. “I missed you.”
Your back meets with the wall, his hand tucked in between your head and the hard wall, acting like a cushion to shield you. “I missed you too— wait, where’s beef?”
Robert clings to your warmth and the cucumber scent of your soap as he inhales deeply atop your neck. “With Chase.” Voice muffled, he tilts your head up with a nudge of his nose on your throat as you comply happily and give him space. “I figured…” his lips peck you sweetly, teeth grazing your skin, tongue brushing along your pulse point. “That we need alone time.”
“And you’re absolutely right.” Sighing with longing, your fingers dig into his hair as you push him impossibly close against you. Pulling his hair back to kiss him, you meet with his glossy eyes, cheeks flushed, mouth agape as he heaves and waits for your next move. And yet, you find his tired eyes and blanched face worrisome. “Have you eaten anything yet?”
“Does half a granola bar and three cups of coffee count?” He jokes, but you don’t find the humour in it when he tries to lean into your lips only for you to tug at him back. Robert would let out a satisfied hum if not for the worried look in your eyes. “Sweetheart, I’m fine, it’s just been a busy day. Fuck, I just need you, please—”
“What you need is food.” Unwrapping your legs around him, you stand and peck his cheek with a promise. While he looks utterly disappointed, like you dangled a candy bar to his face only to yank it back. “And sleep.” Brows furrowed, you wince at the heavy dark bags under his eyes. “And moisturizer. Lots of it.”
“Am I that crusty?” He chortles, hands still on your hips, thumbs pushing aside the waistband cheekily, waiting for you to change your mind.
“No,” you shake your head with a gentle smile. Taking his wrists away and pecking his knuckles. “Just a bit, come on, I’ll warm your food.”
“I’m really fine—”
“It’s lasagna.”
He doesn’t even contemplate or protest some more as he gratefully follows after you in the kitchen.
—
His stomach is so full of pasta and cheese that he could barely stand up from his seat. You went somewhere else while he was unbuttoning his pants to give him some breathing room. Robert signs in content, a hand wrapped around a glass of wine, that he doesn’t even know he had in the apartment, as his nails click against the glass rhythmically.
Robert hears the faucet squeak, and the sound of running water, as he tilts his head to take a peek inside the bathroom. He swears that you already took a bath judging from your still damp hair and the scent of the cucumber and citrus soap on your skin when he got home.
You feel his eyes on your back whilst you pour bubble bath inside the tub. “This’ll only take a minute, babe.”
“Take all the time you need.” Ogling you unabashedly, Robert smiles as you twist your hand back to flip him the bird playfully as if you have eyes on the back of your head. “Those shorts look good on you.”
“They’re your boxers.” Your voice bounces off the tiles, grabbing a clean fluffy robe from the cabinets, the same one that is all pink and girly that Chase gifted to Robert as a gag gift for his birthday. It even has his name bedazzled on the back like he’s some Victoria’s secret model.
Robert usually loves seeing you use it, especially when it has his name right on your back. But he can’t lie when he occasionally uses it to feel how soft it is after a shower.
“Everything looks good on you, sweetheart.” He watches you with a fond smile, eyes glimmering with want as you saunter out of the bathroom with the bathrobe in tow.
“You’re not getting lucky tonight until you’re properly taken care of.” Opening the robe and showing him how fluffy it is, you smile over it, wiggling your brows. “Take your clothes off. After this I’m putting a face mask on you and lathering you up in my finest lotion.”
“Can I suggest one thing though?”
“Of course.”
“How about a massage too?” He asks innocently, but you just know from the glint in his eyes and the slight smirk on his lips that it’s not so innocent.
“If you don’t fall asleep before then, sure.” You lean against the doorframe casually, acting nonchalant from his proposition and hugging the towel. You’re not the best at massages, but you’ll try your best, or at least for a minute or so before he pulls you on his lap instead. Or fall asleep the moment you squeeze his aching muscles.
He’s already stripping his clothes off with excitement. Starting from unbuttoning his work shirt that has become associated with your boyfriend. The colour does suit him though, but you’d rather see him wear something else that doesn’t smell like day old coffee.
You don’t notice him walking closer and closer to you whilst you’re utterly fixated to his bare torso.
“Calm down, Robert, this is for relaxing—” you’re suddenly lifted off the ground, finding that Robert has you over his shoulder, smacking your behind as he takes you to the bathroom. For someone who has only eaten a granola bar and inhaled three cups of caffeine today, he’s stronger than he looks. Maybe this is what people say when it comes to adrenaline, this is his lifting the car moment. “Robert!”
“What? If I’m going to relax then so will you.” He says casually, entering the steaming bathroom as he kicks the door shut with his foot.
Your squeals echo around the tiled walls, as Robert’s amused laughter mingles with the sound of splashing water and the towel landing right over his face.
The bathroom is quickly flooded with bubbles and sweet scented soap, and you find yourself back in the bath once again with him joining you.
—
The hair dryer blows hot air right at his silky tresses, now free from oil and whatever Golem accidentally spilled on him during his lunch break. Robert sits in between your legs, back pressed against your front, and eyes closed as the hot air flutters his lashes. He looks utterly blissed out, smelling like a bed and body works. He’s absolutely content in your arms as you gently rake the comb through his hair.
He has a face mask on, “it’s aloe vera,” you said, he doesn’t care whatever it is but it’s doing wonders to him. It’s like having a slice of frozen ham slapped right on your face minus the smell but with twice the cooling effect.
Robert feels fucking amazing.
His palms cup around your knees, thumbs drawing small gentle circles all over your well moisturized skin. The two of you smell incredibly good, enough to eat, and he’d kiss every bit of your skin if he wasn’t so sleepy.
Robert could sleep right there and then, he would, if not for the loud whirr of the hair dryer and the hot air blowing right at his head.
“You okay?” You whisper to the shell of his ear, gooseflesh immediately rises on his arms as he hums a reply. The hair dryer shuts off, and he could feel sleep take him. “I guess you’re too tired for massages.”
His eyes suddenly open at the speed of light. “No, I’m not.”
“Really?” Your hands knead at his arms tenderly, like you’re massaging herbs and spices onto a slab of beef. You truly have no idea what you’re doing, but it seems that Robert loves it. “Let me take care of you this time, okay?”
He would be on his knees begging for it if he wasn’t already in bed. Eyes gazing up at you sweetly, Robert’s brows furrow, lips pouting slightly as he lets out a sound from the back of his throat that is akin to a whine. “Please.”
“Anything for my Robert.” With a smile, fingers grasping at his chin, you lean down to press a saccharine kiss on his forehead, one of many for tonight.
—
“So I said to him, go suck a fat— what the fuck is that?” Sonar looks perturbed, eyes wide and staring at something, or someone that just walked through the door.
Malevola follows his line of sight, gasping at the sight, almost stumbling over herself. “What happened to you?” She asks, almost disturbed by the sight.
Chase hears the commotion from the bullpen, he peeks over the breakroom doorway and sees Robert walk in normally. “What the fuck are you two gawking at?” He asks, walking closer to the pair as he holds onto his cup of coffee.
“That!” Mal takes his head and turns him to face Robert.
“Holy shit…” he utters, spluttering out his coffee all over Sonar’s suit, earning an intense bat screech from the man bat that is quickly ignored by the others, who are completely perplexed at the sight in front of them. “Alright, who died?”
Robert makes a face, nose scrunched as he places his things on his table. “No one? Why do you all look at me like I just killed someone right in front of you?”
“Yeah, you killed Robert Robertson.” Chase sidles beside him, leaning against his table with suspicion in his eyes. “Why do you look like that?”
“Like what?” The dispatcher asks, lashes fluttering on the apples of his pinkish cheeks, looking healthy and glowing.
His lips shine with raspberry chapstick, and the dark circles underneath his eyes are almost non-existent, as if he made a deal with the devil to get rid of it and make him look ten years younger. The best part is the soft smile that is seemingly permanently etched on his face that remains even when he almost got a face full of Waterboy’s water splashed on him when he first walked inside the building.
“You look like how a skin walker would wear Robert’s skin.” Sonar says, leaning close to his face to examine him further. When he tries to poke him with his claw, Robert pushes him away with a grimace.
Robert rolls his eyes, he does feel rejuvenated, almost reborn from your pampering. Throughout the whole weekend, you took your pledge to heart, you did not let him lift a finger, and the two of you spent the whole weekend in bed together. Eating meals on it, catching up on your shows whilst cuddling underneath the covers while the blackout curtains are completely covering the light outside. Not to mention the ‘strenuous exercises’ that you two did together. It was absolute bliss, and Robert almost did not go to work today to extend the peace.
“You look good, buddy.” Malevola is the first to compliment him with a friendly clasp on his shoulder.
“Smells good too.” Sonar adds, taking a whiff of him. “Looking too good. Which way is the fountain of youth? Chase could use it.” He teases before chuckling at his own joke.
Chase punches him right in the gut, making him curl around himself with a sharp inhale through his nose. The others act like this is a normal occurrence in the office.
“Seriously though, what products did you use? I could use a good under eye mask.” Mal pulls down at her under eye for emphasis. “What’s your secret?”
Robert shrugs with a knowing smile. “Get the best girlfriend in the whole damn world.” The chorus of groans echo around the office that has him smiling in satisfaction.
Hi! Love your Pitt stories and your Pope Cody Stories! Would you do a soulmate story for pope? He deserves love!
Hi!!! I'm so glad you love my stories! I am not currently writing for Pope as I haven't been watching Animal Kingdom. If the fixation comes back I LOVE a good soulmate story, but Lou Ferrigno Jr's characters have rented out all the space in my head right now.
BUT
There is a Pope Cody ABO fic in the same world as my others that I never posted. So let me at least share that with you!
Same OFC as my prior two Pope Cody fics: Meet Cute and Pre Rut
Summary: The first time you meet Andrew's brothers is picking up Lena from their house.
Tags/Notes: Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics, scenting, drug use (it's the Codys, what do you expect?), Lena is safe, I promise
Word Count: 2,127
#
The first time you meet Andrew’s brothers is without Andrew.
You get a phone call from some boy who sounds vaguely drunk, with a giggling girl in the background. There’s thumping music and it’s hard to make out their words, and at first you think they’ve got the wrong number, but then you hear Lena clearly say “Auntie? Can you come get me?” You are wide awake in an instant.
“Lena? Lena, are you okay? Where are you? Where’s Andrew?”
“Uncle Pope isn’t here,” she says, voice low. She’s too young to sound that cowed.
You know Andrew wouldn’t leave Lena with his family unless he had to, but he’d mentioned a family dinner and his mother insisting on Lena joining. After everything you’d heard about the rest of his family, you had no desire for an invitation. Something must have happened then for Andrew to have left without Lena. And why did it sound like there was a party in the background?
“Hey, this is J. Pope’s, uh, nephew,” the boy said into the phone. “We tried him but he’s not answering. Lena’s fine but if you wanna get her—”
“What’s the address?”
J gave it to you and you scrambled into flip-flops and grabbed your keys. “I thought this was a family dinner?”
“Yeah, but it’s Craig’s birthday,” J said, sounding sheepish. Craig was the party animal, you recalled from what Andrew had told you. “Pope was gonna take her home but, uh, a work thing came up.”
Andrew had mentioned being a real estate manager, did that mean he acted like a super? You’d never asked the details, but you could only guess a maintenance emergency or something would have been enough to pull him away.
“I’m on my way,” you told J, hanging up to plug in the address in your car.
#
It’s a nicer neighborhood in Oceanside, just twenty minutes from the condo you’re borrowing. There are multiple cars in the street, some parked haphazardly, and it’s immediately obvious which house is having the party. You’re appalled that Lena is here. At what looks like a frat house.
Your outdated Corolla doesn’t fit in, and you didn’t dress for a party. You’re still in your cut off jean shorts and tank from earlier, hair loose and makeup melting off by this hour. The call had pulled you out of the doze on the couch to a rerun of The Good Place.
Someone catcalls before you even make it up the driveway, and you’re very aware of being an unmated Omega in this setting. You thank the gods you’d had the foresight to grab one of Andrew’s leftover button ups before you left. His scent is a reminder that you’re taken; a warning to other Alphas. As you get closer to the house, there’s a couple making out on the other side of a car while two guys are admiring the speedboats. There are more people hanging off the front porch with red solo cups in hand, eyeballing you. You ignore everyone, beelining for the open gate to the pool, afraid to look anywhere else.
It’s chaos inside. You haven’t seen anything like it in years, not since early college. Alphas are jumping into the pool from the roof, people are doing literal lines of coke at the bar, the pool has three Omegas making out, drawing Alphas to hoot and holler, someone is doing knife tricks in the kitchen, and you see no sign of Lena.
“Heyyyy, you want a dr—” the guy behind the bar with the long, surfer-washed curls pauses as he takes you in. “Is that Pope’s shirt?”
You don’t know what any of his brothers look like, but you’re guessing this is one of them. “Yeah. I’m looking for Lena?”
“Shit, you’re the Omega he’s shacking up with.” The Alpha stumbles around the bar, eyes wandering boldly over your legs and back up, fixating on your throat. You want to yank the collar of Andrew’s shirt over the gland, but don’t want to draw any more attention to yourself. “Thanks for coming to my party.”
“I’m not here for the party, I’m here for Lena. Where is she?”
“Inside I think? I’m Craig, Pope’s bro—”
“Hey! You, uh, Pope’s girl?” Another younger Alpha calls, jogging over. His presence is gentler, not like Craig’s wild energy, but you can smell the alcohol on all of them.
“Are you J?”
“Yeah. Lena’s in her bedroom.”
“Her bedroom?” Lena has always stayed at her house, yours, or the babysitter’s these last few months. Was her grandmother trying to get custody? You left Craig behind as you followed J, who couldn’t be older than 20, into the house. You weave through groups doing shots, lines, and sharing vapes and cigarettes, trying to imagine how on Earth Andrew would look in all this and hoping Lena hasn’t seen any of it, until J opens a bedroom door.
It’s a little girl’s room like Lena’s own, with walls painted in pink and a fluffy comforter. Your first thought it that it’s not how Lena would have decorated it; she isn’t into pink at all. Another teenage girl is lounging on the bed scrolling her phone, her pupils as wide as pennies and her expression dopey. Lena is there in the corner at a tea party table with a doll, looking miserable.
“Lena!”
“Auntie!” She races over and throws her arms around your waist. You sink down to the floor, cradling her in your arms.
“I’m gonna take you home, okay?”
“Can I sleep with Big Bear?” Big Bear was a giant stuffed bear Andrew had won at a carnival on the boardwalk on one of your dates, and you’d given it to Lena. It was bigger than her, sitting in the corner of her room like a guardian when Andrew wasn’t home.
“Absolutely. Let’s get your shoes on.”
Lena darts up and for the doors, and you grab the back of her shirt. “Whoa, whoa. How about she gets your shoes, and then we sneak out?”
Her eyes go wide. “Sneak out?”
“Mm-hmm.” You shoot a pointed look at the high Beta girl who J had clearly left with Lena, as if she could possibly be the adult in the room.
“Go, Nicky,” J utters, that quiet Alpha dominance seeping into his voice, and she goes without a word.
“What happened?” You ask quietly as you usher Lena to fill a bag with whatever she wanted from this bedroom. You are going to personally make sure Andrew never lets her come back here again if this is the kind of stuff that goes on in this house.
“She was on her ATV-thing and a car backed into it.”
“What?!”
J shrugs uncomfortably. “I grabbed her before it hit her. She’s fine.”
“Lena, hun, put whatever you want in that bag. I’m gonna talk to your Uncle J for a minute.”
Lena looks at you and J with too-big eyes. She knows something is up, kids aren’t stupid, but she’s probably seen enough arguments in her lifetime. “Okay, Auntie.”
“Thanks, sweetie.”
You go into the hallway and the moment the door shuts behind you you turn on J. “What the fuck happened?”
“She’s fine—”
“You know that’s not true, J. Andrew told me a few things about your family, and right now you are guaranteeing Lena will have as messed up a childhood as you did. Who did Andrew leave her with?”
He rubs his hand in his hair, his scent tinged with agitation now. The smell of an angry Omega can make Alphas very uncomfortable and he was clearly feeling that. He hisses a breath out. “Pope was gonna drop her off with you, but Smurf needed him immediately, and Deran said we’d all watch her, but then Craig’s party got bigger, and she just…” He shrugs again. “Then the next thing I saw she was on her ATV thing in the driveway.”
You make a noise: it’s a sucked in whistling breath, somewhere between a whine of anguish and an angry cry, and J’s reaction is visceral. He flinches hard, and you see four drunk Alphas down the hall look over. You don’t care. You’re wearing Andrew’s shirt and you’re taking his child home.
“You’re lucky she didn’t get hurt. Andrew is gonna be so pissed, but he’d be on a rampage if she was hurt. And I wouldn’t stop him,” you warn.
J hangs his head. He knows he did wrong and he’s barely out of childhood himself, but it’s hard to feel sympathy right now. The high girl appears holding Lena’s shoes, and you grab them from her and go back inside the bedroom.
Lena is standing there with her little purple duffle and her jacket, looking nervously at you. You pick her up and tuck her into your neck so she can’t see anything else of the party, and carry her out. J clears the path, and instinctively Alphas and Omegas dodge out of the way of your angry scent and J’s agonized one.
You get to your Corolla parked on the street and you put Lena in the passenger side, even though you don’t have a proper car seat. J babbles something about another car with one but you can’t hear it over the roar of your ears.
“I’m calling Andrew. If you reach him before I do, tell him I have Lena and she’s safe.”
“I will.”
After buckling her in as well as you possibly can, you close the car door and turn to J one more time. “I know your family is blood to her and I’ve only known her a short time, but your pack is a dangerous. She’s a child. If I have any say I won’t let her come back here.”
J sucks on his teeth a moment then nods. “Then I’ll warn you that Smurf will fight back. You don’t want to be on her bad side.”
“I’m sure I already am.”
#
When you get home you lay with Lena on her bed, wedging her between you and Big Bear until she falls asleep. She frowns and rolls a lot in her sleep, and you pet her hair and murmur reassurances that she’s safe, there’s no one here but you, her, and her guardian bear, until her Uncle Andrew is back.
You tried Andrew several times on the way home and after Lena’s asleep, but they all go to voicemail. There’s no blame in your heart for him, you just hope he’s okay. Everyone trusts their pack first; it’s instinct. His pack is just crummy. He’s learning to separate himself from them, but it takes time, and J’s warning about his grandmother is still ringing in your ears. As the outsider you can see what a toxic atmosphere it is and the tug of war Andrew has with Smurf. You didn’t want to be in her crosshairs, but for Andrew and Lena…
There’s warmth in your chest when you think about how Lena called you. You’d made sure she had your phone number in her backpack and duffel just in case, and she’d remembered and told J who to call. You’d always wanted kids, and if they were half as sweet as Lena then you’d be set. Maybe they’d even have auburn curls…
#
When Andrew calls you back it’s 4am. You wake up to the buzzing of the phone on your nightstand and fumble to pick up.
Andrew is livid. He’s heard from J what happened and he’s rushing home to you. There are key words to make his drive safer: everyone is safe, Lena is right here with you, and you’re in his house. You roll out of Lena’s bed and go downstairs to make a cup of hot chocolate the way he likes, with the milk warmed on the stove.
You hear the key in the lock as you’re sprinkling marshmallows, another sign the universe is in favor of you two. Andrew comes into the kitchen, chest heaving, gaze on you.
“I’m okay. Lena’s upstairs asleep.”
He goes immediately and you let him, giving him time to see her, smell her, know on a cellular level she’s okay. When his footsteps come back down you have the mug ready for him and your own next to it.
Andrew doesn’t stop moving until you are wrapped in his arms, his nose burrowed in your throat, sucking in deep breaths. “I’m sorry,” he chokes, even as his hands grip your hips so hard they’ll be bruises. His scent is wild with anxiety and anger, protective rage and helpless energy. You catch a whiff of blood but don’t know the source.
“We’re okay, it’s fine. I’m here, Alpha, it’s okay. Lena is safe.”
Pope Cody who’s spent his whole life around mindlessly muscular and strong men, who never really had to work hard for those abs, who just had em. Who finds a soft belly to be the ultimate display of femininity. You’re not supposed to look like him, why would he ever want that? Women are supposed to have bellies. For babies and stuff, he doesn’t know okay.
All he knows is he fucking loves it.
At first you were self conscious about it. Popes Staring never bothered you, maybe it turned you on a little. But when you’d see his eyes on your stomach you’d panic a little. Sit up straighter and adjust your clothes. He hated that.
He always was touching it. Standing on line? Hand on your tummy. Cuddling? Arm around it, hand on it. Sex? Don’t get him started about sex. He’s the worst when it comes to sex. Kissing it, staring at it, watching it giggle and shift with each hard thrust, seeing his cock make it bulge out just a little. Your tits are right there, but he’s focused elsewhere.
Eventually you ask him if he thinks you’re fat. And then you have the balls to tell him, like it’s your place, that he doesn’t like it. Because he stares at it. He gets a bit pissed. “I stare at it because it’s sexy. Don’t tell me what I like.”
You swallow the fact, as hard as it is to believe. Becuase Pope wouldn’t lie to spare your feelings. He’s Pope.
But it becomes more explicit and obvious.
Bathing suit shopping he sees you only looking at one pieces and asks why. Maybe there’s a reason you do that. You look at him like it’s obvious. “No one wants to see that.” “I want to see it.” He says like it’s obvious. “Whats the point in showing off your stomach if there’s nothing to show” he says like it’s obvious. Like the opposite isn’t the common belief.
You wear low rise jeans and he thanks every god he’s ever heard off. It’s the best thing he’s ever seen. You’re a bit shy but he’s feral. “Muffin top” you complain about. He throws his head back and laughs. “And that’s the only part of the muffin anyone likes.”. Well. Who can argue with that logic.
quick unedited ficlet where park punches robby after he says something sexist to you//1.2k
can i come up on my break? i need a hug :((
Brendon reads your text about thirty seconds after he's finished scrubbing out of his morning surgery. His brow furrows. Yes, you're a very sensitive person -- and doubly so now that you're pregnant. That's one of the things he loves deeply about you. The way you balance out his harsh, sometimes emotionless edges. But it's not like you to interrupt the flow of your workday to seek out his comfort instead of figuring it out on your own. Usually you can do your deep breaths, steady yourself, and keep going, holding on until you're at home to fall apart about whatever upset you. You're as strong as you are soft. Which means something has gone very, very wrong.
>> of course, baby. but you have to tell me what's going on.
i will i promise
You knock gently on his office a few minutes later and step through. Your eyes are watery and pink, your lower lip wobbling, your lips swolen from biting. A mean spark of protectivenes flickers in Brendon's gut as he stands, crosses the small space, and wraps you in his arms right away.
"R- Robby told- He said-"
You take a shaky, long breath to try to stop the tears.
"Take your time, angel," he soothes. He kisses the top of your head and rubs your back. This is the side of Brendon nobody else gets to see, but it's stronger than the surface. "You're safe here with me. I've got you."
You nod into his chest, pressing your cheek to his pec to listen to his steady heartbeat for a minute. When you feel yourself calming down, you whimper out, "I finished this really hard procedure on my own for the first time and I paged him to check my work and sign off and he- he came into the room and looked at the patient and fucking said, 'Don't worry, guys, real doctor's here now' like that's funny. And then- then he checked over my work and he wasn't happy with what I did and he-" You swat tears from your cheeks again, these ones angry and hot. You set your jaw, meet your husband's eyes, and tell him, "When we were leaving the room, I could tell he was still pissed about this disagreement we had this morning over a course of treatment, right? So I'm trying to just get out of his way and let him take it out on someone else. And then he muttered, 'Don't know why I even bother trying to teach you when you're just gonna leave emergency medicine after you have the kid.'"
Rage turns Brendon's blue eyes from summer sky to stormy sea. He rolls his shoulders and attempts to find the zen his therapist has managed to help him access all of two times.
You know that look. It's his 'I'm about to do something stupid' look. So you squeeze his bicep to bring him back to center and assure, "Bren, you don't have to do anything. It's okay."
"No, I do, and it's not," he says, voice tight and controlled. "If this were some one-time thing, maybe. I'd just write him up. But after what you told me about Mohan last week? Fuck no. He's not getting away with that."
Your heart almost bursts with love. When Brendon's protective enough to fight, you have to admit it makes you swoon.
--
"Dr. Robinavitch," Park the Shark shouts as he storms out of the elevator. Every head in a five-mile radius snaps in his direction, bracing for impact. "Have a second for a consult?"
When you sheepishly follow him out of the elevator, Robby knows immediately what this is about. "Look, Shark, I already apologized for-"
Brendon's hand collides with the middle of his chest, hard enough that he staggers back. Continuing to push him toward the staff exit at a brutal pace, Brendon corrects, "I was actually thinking we should talk outside."
And he keeps pushing. Robby has no choice to walk with him, swearing and muttering under his breath with his hands in his hoodie pocket. A handful of doctors and nurses who aren't busy crowd by the open window to watch and you join them, not wanting to be too close when things boil over. Samira stands next to you, her eyes full of questions. She knows that you've vented to Park about Robby's treatment of her more than once.
Robby raises his hands up defensively. "I know I was out of line, okay? It's been a stressful day and-"
"And it hasn't been stressful for her? For everyone else?" Brendon crosses his huge arms across his chest, stance wide and impressive, making six-foot Robbt look like a fifth grader. "This isn't just about my wife. You have created an environment in your department where women are devalued in favor of less effective male coworkers. Langdon goes glassy-eyed when you talk to him in complex sentences and Whitaker's hands still shake when he does sutures, but you have women like my wife and like Mohan who are ten times as capable questioning themselves because of you."
Next to you, Samira grabs your hand and squeezes, her wide eyes trained on the situation.
"Park, calm down," Robby tries, running a hand over the back of his head like he does when he's caught. "I get it. She's pregnant. She's emotional, rightfully so, and she can't-"
Brendon's fist smashes full-force into Robby's cheek, quick and sharp. His wedding ring nicks Robby's skin, a bead of blood falling down like a tear. Everyone around you gasps. Samira's grip on your hand goes bruising. Robby nearly falls on his ass, just barely catching his balance.
Robby winces as he touches the back of his hand to his bleeding cheek. "I probably deserved that."
"Yeah. You did. And you're lucky my wife told me instead of reporting you like you deserve," Brendon spits as he shakes out his fist. "Emotion isn't a weakness in medicine. And you could literally be sued for questioning her judgment because she's pregnant, you fucking asshole." He takes a deep breath and glances at the window, where he catches your gaze and then Samira's, giving you both affirming, respectful nods. Then he turns back to Robby, shoves him on the shoulder, and says, "The next time I hear you've said something like that to a woman in this hospital, I'm dragging you up to HR myself and advocating for you to get fired. And then I'm going to beat the shit out of you. So there better not be a next time."
With his eyes big as saucers while he presses on the wound to stem the bleeding, Robby grunts, "Understood."
Brendon clenches his jaw, clearly wanting to say more but knowing he's already crossed the line. He's perfectly aware that the only reason he won't get flak for this is that people are too scared of him to bother. But they're scared of him because he's right and he doesn't tolerate bullshit. That's the difference between him and Robby. Brendon's students never have to worry about their tone or their appearance or anything superficial when they have the brains and work ethic for surgery. That's all he cares about.
So he cracks his neck, gestures to Robby's rapidly bruising face, and says, "Go inside and put some ice on that. If you have any signs of a sunken cheek, numbness or tingling in the cheek or lip, or swelling that impacts your vision, come up to ortho. I know some good bone specialists. Now get out of my fucking sight."
@t4medicroe, as I messaged, it turns out I DID write a soulmate Pope Cody ficlet, and then I never got farther than this. The hyperfixation has passed, but still super happy to share it!
Summary: What if Pope Cody had a red string leading to his soulmate?
Tags/Notes: Soulmate AU, soulmate strings, oral sex
Word Count: 3,224
None of the Cody brothers have ever admitted if they have strings. Pope told Smurf he did once, not long after his appeared, but Julia said he was lying to sound cool, and Smurf always believed her over him.
He’s grateful for Julia’s jealous announcement when they were thirteen now. As he grew up, he realized the fact that he had a red string should be kept to himself. His soulmate would be his own, the one thing he could truly call his. Not like the things in the vent in his room, the house he lived in, or his job.
Not everyone had strings. No one knew if that meant only some people had soulmates, or only some people were lucky enough to have a literal guide wire to them. Pope had never known anyone who’d actually met their soulmate either, but he paid attention to the stories. As a young teen he’d daydreamed about it suddenly connecting to Cath, or some other beautiful woman on the beach, and the jealous and shocked looks of his brothers and mother when they found out. As the years went by though, Pope came to understand how unlikely it would ever be. Odds were already low he’d ever be physically close enough for the red string to lengthen, and Smurf barely let any of the family have anything without her say-so. She certainly wouldn’t abide Pope having his soulmate.
The small hope finally died after three years in prison, innumerable terrible things done in the name of family and self-protection, decades of being alone weighing on him, and finally Baz yelling in his face that no one would ever have his child. Pope didn’t believe he’d ever get his soulmate. He could get anything he wanted with a little effort, but he’d never get what he deserved, because he didn’t deserve one.
#
Red strings go one way until they don’t. That’s how Smurf had explained it when he was ten years old, and that was still how she explained it to Lena. Innocent, sweet Lena, who was too young to have strings yet but, because Baz didn’t keep track of her TV habits, was asking questions. Pope quietly leaned against the hallway wall to listen in the twilight of a spring evening at Smurf’s house.
“Soulmates are your perfect person. Made just for you,” Smurf cooed, making Lena giggle. “One person gets a red string pointing straight out of their heart when they’re old enough, and then they’re supposed to go follow where it leads. If the string gets longer, then they’re close. The first time they touch their soulmate—poof! The other red string appears. And then they’re connected for all time.”
“Forever?” Lena asked, childish awe in her voice.
“Forever,” Smurf confirmed. Pope felt something in his chest twinge, and he looked down at his red string, which disappeared six inches from his chest.
“Then why did Mommy leave? Can’t Daddy follow the string?”
Pope’s mind went blank. He didn’t want to remember.
“Most mommys and daddys don’t have strings, Lena-roo,” Smurf explained gently. “Your parents didn’t. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Oh.”
“Even with a string it’s no guarantee, baby,” Smurf continued, her cynicism turning her voice saccharine sweet. “Life changes people. You have to be real careful who you trust. Not every soulmate match is happy.”
Pope pushed thoughts of Cath aside, shoving it under the mental rug with everything else, gaze far away. He remembered Smurf saying something similar to him and Julia when they were young; that soulmates weren’t fairy tales. In reality not ever match made it. Pope didn’t really want to believe it. Smurf didn’t have strings. He did.
He glanced down at his short string again. Then again, maybe it was people like him that counted towards those matches that didn’t make it. What if everything that was wrong with him was wrong for his soulmate? What then?
#
A couple weeks later, while rinsing blood off his arms from the latest job in the motel shower, Pope tilted his head back to wash his hair, and when he looked down again the red string was long. So long it disappeared through the tile.
The hot water turned cold because he stood there for so long staring, unable to understand. His red string was always short, fading away into nothing. It didn’t stretch a foot away from his chest. It was never so solid in color that it looked like he could touch it.
His blunt fingers passed through the invisible string, and something lurched in his chest.
He wasn’t supposed to have this. He was not a good man. He was fucked in the head. Smurf and his family would eat his soulmate alive. He had a record. He’d hurt people. Any happiness he had was stealing it from someone else.
Pope’s fist clenched over his chest like his heart hurt, but did he even have one? If he never followed these strings would they fade? Or would the strings always be there, waiting for the final connection? Would his soulmate know somehow, even though she didn’t have them? What would you feel like? Look like? What did you do? Were you in a relationship? If he never found you would you find someone else? Someone less than perfect, like a soulmate should be? Were you as broken as him?
Pope covered his eyes with his hand and hunched over, flipping off the cold water and choking back a wounded animal noise. He wasn’t supposed to have this. This was dangerous. But he wanted it—so badly it felt like his heart might burst. His soulmate would be his. Made for him and he for them. The one person who would always choose him first. He could have a new family. A better one.
The image of Smurf and her razor sharp smile floated before him and Pope made a fist, standing up in the shower. The safest thing, the smartest thing he could do, would be to never meet his soulmate. Never invite the slightest attention to them or indicate he had strings, let alone that they had lengthened, so Smurf would never know. But that’s what Smurf would want. Him at her beck and call, always alone, tied to her and his brothers only. Even in her ignorance she would be getting what she wanted, and Pope had enough of that.
Mind made up he got dressed and ready to meet his soulmate.
#
You were surrounded by boxes in your new rental, which was a lot tighter of a space than you were hoping for and a bit further from the beach than the realtor had implied, but it was new and far away from everything else. This was a fresh start. You were determined to make the best of it.
Today and tomorrow were settling-in days so you could unpack boxes and clean, and then the day after you had an interview at the local ER for a nursing position. Hopefully you could start that job soon, because your savings were being drained every day that you weren’t working, and breaking your last lease and paying moving costs had eaten into them a lot. You were still gonna splurge on pizza tonight though. You’d been lugging up boxes for two hours, and now you were cleaning out the inside of the fridge because whatever cleaning service this landlord had used was not as thorough as you were.
The knock on your door was unexpected and sharp, just two raps. You almost banged your head on a shelf in the fridge out of surprise. Maybe it was a neighbor? Nervous, your gaze flicked to the box with all the security cameras you’d had at your last place. Maybe setting those up should have been your first move.
The peephole required you to stand on your toes, and on the other side was a man you didn’t recognize. The fisheye, slightly cloudy view made it hard to see anything beyond his face, which was handsome but unsmiling. Was this one of Cameron’s buddies? There was no way he’d already found you, but if he had… You reached for the chain on the door, only to realize the second part where it should hook to was missing. Someone had replaced the front door and not included the second half. The chain dangled, useless.
“Hello?” he called. You peeped back through, and the man was still standing there, head cocked slightly to the side. You frantically considered your options. You couldn’t live your life hiding, and odds were this was a neighbor who saw you moving in. Maybe he had a jello or a casserole or something his wife had made for you, or an invitation to dinner? Maybe it was the building super, come to check that everything was okay.
You took a deep breath and unlocked your door, cracking it open. “Hi?”
The man on the other side wasn’t particularly tall, but he had thick arms and broad shoulders. His short-sleeve shirt was buttoned up all the way to the top and he wore heavy boots. He didn’t smile when his gaze locked on you without blinking.
Pope had been planning out what to say as he drove the streets of Oceanside, following the twists and turns of the roads as the red string led him north along the shore. Forty minutes outside of his hometown, in a stretch of slightly rundown apartments, it started to arch up until he pulled into the parking lot and watched the string disappear into a second floor unit. He’d sat in his truck for a good twenty minutes, watching the string move back and forth slowly as his soulmate walked around their apartment, pumping himself up for this. Pope wasn’t charming like Baz, he couldn’t flirt like Craig, and the Deran hair-flip was beyond him. He felt nervous, a rare sensation for him, but the red string was a reassurance. This was his soulmate. They didn’t want charming Baz, flirty Craig, or surfer-hair Deran. They’d want him.
But when you opened the door all the words he’d planned out disappeared. You were beautiful: dressed in relaxed clothes, barefoot, hair in a messy bun, holding a spray bottle of vinegar in yellow rubber gloves. Your big eyes took him in, confused and pretty, and fuck Pope was gone. Soulmates weren’t fairytales his ass.
“Do you live next door?” you asked, struggling to break the stare of this man and completely failing. His hazel eyes were captivating, holding you in a way that was making your belly flip. You were not going to fall for a man with good looks within literal hours of moving. The last time you’d been nice to a good-looking man he’d become such an intense stalker you’d had to get a restraining order and flee northern California entirely.
“No.”
Your hand tightened on the vinegar bottle, and that’s when the man finally blinked and offered his hand. “Andrew. I’m from Oceanside.”
You automatically started to extend a rubber-gloved hand, then realizing you were still wearing it, shucked it off as you opened the door a little more. “Is that nearby? Or the other building?”
He reached forward to grab your hand. His was warm and dry and engulfed yours completely. He had a lot of callouses that were rough against your fingers and his forearms were huge with veins the nurse in you salivated over. A flurry of butterflies filled your stomach that you desperately tried to squelch. He was staring hard at you now, not answering your question, and just as you moved to take your hand back you saw something shimmering and forming in the air.
A red ribbon the width of one finger and paper thin melted out of nothing in a straight line from his chest to yours. Your gasp was audible and you squeezed his hand tight, dropping the vinegar spray bottle.
“Is that—? Are we—?” You stuttered, unable to stop staring at the ribbon that fell into place between you, like it had always been there. Invisible but real.
“You see it?” Andrew asked, a thread of nerves in his voice, and you looked up, making eye contact again. He had beautiful hazel eyes, fine cheekbones, and a mouth you could tell wasn’t prone to smiles. He looked serious, anxious. Gods, you’d never thought— His face started to get blurry as your eyes welled up.
“A red string,” you choked out, and when you tugged on his hand he awkwardly folded into you. His cheek pressed to your head as you pressed yours to his chest, right where the string went in. He was solid and warm, and real. You swallowed back a sob, happiness and relief and bone-shaking awe overwhelming you. His arms circled around you and you could feel the tiny tremor that ran up and down his back. You swore there was a hum in the air, something electric and magnetic.
“Yeah, a red string,” he repeated hoarsely, voice full of wonder.
You bit your lip hard so you wouldn’t sob all over your soulmate just seconds after meeting him, eventually pushing back to really look at him. Andrew clearly worked out but came from some rough background, his shuttered expression and the edge to his body language said that, but there was hope there too. His grip on your waist was as gentle as if he were holding glass, and you didn’t feel afraid anymore. “Come in? I just moved here. How far do you live?”
“Oceanside. It’s south, 40 minutes or so.”
Andrew picked up the discarded yellow glove and vinegar bottle as you rambled about your hometown and followed you inside. He took in the boxes and the cleaning implements with an impassive face. “You need help?” he asked.
#
Soulmates really were everything you could possibly want.
You were probably jumping the gun but it felt that way. Andrew probably had OCD, but that was okay, because you loved a clean and organized house. Hell, you’d thought about branching out into home organization until your father had talked some sense into you about salaried jobs and benefits.
He was meticulous about cleaning out the fridge and then the kitchen cabinets as you opened boxes of lamps and bedding, and together you unpacked enough to get you through the next few days. He moved the couch effortlessly to where you pointed, and you swallowed dry watching his biceps work. When he opened the next box and saw the box of security cameras he just stared at you.
“I moved because this guy was stalking me,” you murmured softly, taking one of the cameras from his hand. “Those are from the last apartment. Just in case.”
“It’s a good idea,” Andrew said bluntly, gaze riveted on you until you blushed. “I’ll set them up. If he comes around, tell me. I’ll handle him.”
Your heart skipped several beats as Andrew started examining the space for the best angles.
As you worked he told you about his three brothers, niece, and nephew, briefly mentioning he worked in real estate, and if you wanted a better place he’d help you find one. Neither of you said it out loud, that maybe it would be a shared place, but when you asked about his home he mentioned something about a motel.
“What happened to your place?”
“Sold it,” he said shortly, stopping cold in the hallway, a drill for the camera in his hand.
“Without having a new one ready?” You asked softly.
Andrew stared at you, and you held his gaze for long seconds. His eyes were perfectly blank, empty. He was inside there, you knew it, but he wasn’t looking at you. “I was in prison.”
You put down the lamp you were holding and crossed to him, grabbing his big hand. “For what?” You murmured.
“Bank robbery.”
“Did you do it?”
“Yes.”
You blew out a breath and squeezed his hand in both of yours, and he didn’t blink, stare searching yours. When everyone said a soulmate would be perfect, they didn’t mean without flaws. They meant those flaws complimented you. Your jagged puzzle edges fit together. Of course you’d have an ex-con for a soulmate. An instant heart attack for your overbearing step-mother, and just the guy to deal with Cameron, your stalker.
“Thanks for telling me. I— I’ve never told anyone this, but I slashed my best friend’s ex’s tires. Only three of them. He was beating her, and you get a discount at the tire shop if you have to replace all four.”
Andrew’s mouth opened, and something flickered in his gaze.
“Thing is, he knew that too. So I recorded him slashing his own fourth tire and then sent that to the police. When he tried to file an insurance claim he got arrested for insurance fraud.”
For a beat no one breathed, and then Andrew dropped the drill and lifted his hand to your cheek, the fingers shaking.
“Fuck you’re perfect,” he mumbled, and then he was kissing you. It was all-consuming fire in your veins as he backed you hard to the hallway wall, crowding you in as he kissed you like you were his oxygen. You groped his shoulders and triceps as your tongues tangled, groaning at the firmness of him, the sheer muscle and strength. You were going to christen the bed of this apartment before you’d even put sheets on it.
“Andrew, fuck—”
“Can I?” He asked, mumbling against your throat, kissing his way down your body. “Can I taste?”
“Yes, yes!”
You sunk your fingers into his curls as he slid to his knees and yanked your shorts down, hungry mouth pressing to your panty-covered sex. He paused there, breathing you in, and then he tugged your underwear down and lifted one of your legs over his shoulder.
His mouth was hot and insistent, nose nudging your clit as he ate you out like it was his last meal. Your head thunked against the wall as you rocked against his face. You’d never been eaten out like this, you’d never had such thick fingers pulling your slit apart or heard such desperate moans as he sucked on your clit before his tongue was back inside you, slurping messily as your panting grew faster.
“Andrew, shit, I’m close, please, Andrew.”
He groaned deep in his chest, expression damn near worshipful, and one blunt finger pressed inside you as his lips tightened on your clit, and then his tongue was flicking so hard and fast you cried out, legs shaking.
“Oh my god, oh my god, Andrew fuck I’m, I—”
Your voice hitched as your orgasm slammed into you, hips desperately grinding into his mouth as he just kept sucking and licking at your clit, fingers pumping into you, until you almost collapsed and he had to catch you. You thought he’d lower you to the ground, but Andrew stood up, cupping your ass as you yelped, legs over both his shoulders now, and he walked you to the bedroom, slowly lowered you down on the unmade bed.
“Andrew, that was so good. Let me—”
“One more,” he muttered, eyes blazing bright as he looked up at you from between your legs, lips and chin glistening. “One more.”
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