a very manly muppet

[snapplepossumjeans]

about me

age: 20s

Here to browse and interact with fanfiction for the few TV shows/media I'm familiar with. At the moment it's mostly Pedro Pascal's roles, especially in Narcos and TLOU b/c those are two of the 10 tv shows I've seen in my life, but I don't like RPF.

I very very occasionally write things.

Never have I ever challenge

El Fusilado

Some content may be explicit. Needless to say, minors DNI.

[gutsby]

Loophole

Pairing: Sex Ed!Joel x Reader

Summary: Joel teaches you a different kind of sex.

Warnings: 18+. FIRST TIME ANAL, NO ONE LOOK AT ME!!!! Need all my backdoor baddies behind me on this one, both literally and figuratively. Unprotected p-in-a. Daddy kink. Breeding kink. Assplay. Salad tosser!Joel. Olive oil used as lube because this is, unfortunately, the apocalypse, and all sex shops are out of business.

Note: Any and all characters written in this story are adults. Reader is described as having grown up in isolation, without access to formal education, and as such, her understanding of the human body and sexual reproduction is limited. This is not a reflection of her intelligence or her ability to learn the topics.

Another note: This is a semi-sequel to Birds & Bees :-)

One more note: I’m on Instagram now (kinda), come say hi!

Word count: 6.3k

This was always the most difficult time of the month.

For Joel, anyway, it was pure misery day in and day out

Why? No reason other than it being the hardest to resist you. When you’d wake up all fidgety and hot and wanting him, and that burning sensation wouldn’t subside until long past your bedtime. Even in your sleep, to the man’s teeth-gritting dismay, that body lying next to his would inevitably wind up moving just as needily grinding up against him, and he’d feel powerless to its charms. He would have to relent.

Capitulation wouldn’t bother him so much if it didn’t mean you were ten times more likely to get pregnant.

“Ovu-la-tion,” you’d sounded out for him one morning, lips forming the most perfect ‘o’s and ‘u’ while you did.

It was in moments like those that Joel regretted teaching you sex at all. Giving you knowledge about your biological makeup and function certainly had its purpose, to be sure, but when he’d gone so far as to show you—how fucking sweet you’d looked peering up at him, then murmuring, ‘Show me where it goes?’—well, he’d just as well have gone out back and shot himself in the foot. The act probably would’ve been less painful and left him with fewer places scarred than what he endured each time he had to turn you away.

“Done told you about a hundred times now, honey, that kinda lovin’ leads to babies if we ain’t careful this time of month. Y’think we need a new mouth to feed?”

It killed him to say it.

Hell, deep down, there wasn’t a thing in the world he wanted to see more than a couple of rugrats with your pretty eyes and smile crawling around, pestering him.

But this wasn’t the time for that.

You’d pout and you’d clamp your legs together, tell him he was so mean, and why’d you even bother teachin’ me this stuff if we can’t do it when we both really want to? Joel would smile and smooth a hand over the crown of your head. He’d kiss your cheek and remind you he had fingers and a tongue, too, and more often than not, you would begrudgingly accept that offer.

Today, you were considerably more hardheaded and ornery. Everything seemed to be making you mad since you’d set off from Jackson an hour ago, and there wasn’t a lick else for Joel to do other than to—

“Fuck you,” you cursed, kicking a stump.

You’d almost just tripped over it.

Joel was leading the way home after a successful supply run in town and a visit with Tommy and Maria, and you appeared to be even more upset to leave than you normally were. You’d all but torn a tree limb the length of your body off of a nearby offending oak just fifteen minutes ago, and your impatience with nature was evidently only growing the longer you walked on.

The old man smothered a smile as he turned to you.

“Alright there, sweet pea?” he said.

“Nope,” you huffed at him, low.

Joel turned back to the path and pretended not to hear you threaten the life of some shrubbery by the wayside

He might’ve carried on like this for another two hours, at least. Surely the forty-five minutes that were left in your journey home would’ve been a cakewalk—and more than a little entertaining to him, despite the sharp pang of need he felt, too. When he was outdoors, and he was moving, and he didn’t have to stare for too long at your face or your body or the little swishing movements of your dress as you walked, he was fine. Or OK, anyway, and able to play it cool.

“I wish you’d bought me a bigger dildo.”

As soon as you said it, Joel choked.

Alright, so he wasn’t perfect.

“Hon, what did I say about—”

“Yeah, yeah. You told me don’t say nothin’ too ‘graphic’ about our sex life when we’re not at home, but that doesn’t really matter out here, does it?” You stopped in place, and that made him stop, too. “We’re out in the middle of nowhere. I can say I get fucked every day—”

“Baby.”

“—except when you’re scared of knockin’ me up!”

It would’ve been funny if it wasn’t also painfully true.

If Joel wasn’t currently watching you shrug off your knapsack, drop the thing to the forest floor like a bag of potatoes, and glare at him as if he were maybe the single meanest man alive, he might’ve even laughed.

Then you dropped to your knees. Right there in the middle of the clearing the two of you had just been trying to cross, you went and reached inside your bag.

He’d bought it as a precaution—this…gadget.

On the nights that he knew he’d have to spend away from home for patrol or a hunt or just some emergency run to Jackson that he couldn’t have you join him on, Joel had bought you a little toy to keep you company.

Especially in times like these, when you were horny and heated as you’d ever been, it had seemed ideal.

He just wished you hadn’t chosen an open field almost an hour away from home as the first place to pull it out.

“Sweetheart,” Joel said, tone now appreciably firmer. “You ain’t gettin’ down in the dirt and…and…playin’ with yourself with that brand new toy daddy got, OK?”

But it was too late.

You’d already taken it out.

The man deserved to be punished a little bit.

What, did he think he could just open up a whole new universe of debauchery and pleasure and then shut you out of it whenever he damn well pleased? Of course, Joel had taught you about consent and how each party to ‘playtime’ between adults needed to give it enthusiastically in order for their actions to be considered sex at all, but you weren’t asking him to participate if he didn’t want to. You weren’t begging for permission, either. You just wanted to act on the natural impulses you felt inside yourself and not be treated like some kind of freak for wanting relief.

So you would fuck yourself, plain and simple.

Only it wasn’t so simple, really.

Joel had instructed you on intercourse, giving and receiving head, touching your partner in their erogenous zones, and knowing how and when to cum—many, many times since he’d first taught you in the spring—but he hadn’t shown you how to fit this thing.

You were slicker than an oil spill between your legs. The skirt of your dress was flipped up, and the pale ivory material was spilling out over the ground beneath you. Your panties were off, and your cunt was on full display.

Joel was perched between your knees, hovering.

A sheen of sweat had broken out across his brow, and you could see the moisture beading at his temples before they slid down, rolling slow to reach his beard where a sea of silver and black consumed each droplet. Lined and weathered and pathetic was the face peering down at that treasure inside you. Brown eyes blinked slow, as if in a trance, and a tongue darted out to wet his lips every now and again.

If this wasn’t power, you weren’t sure what was. Smiling sweetly, you moved the tip of the bright pink toy down your seam and wriggled your hips a little.

You pretended like it was for dramatic effect and not because you had no fucking idea how to fit a dildo inside you and actually make it feel like sex would.

“Lemme lick her some,” Joel said, lowering his head. He was on his stomach, and his face might’ve been a foot and a half away from your drooling, aching heat.

It would be so easy…

Just a couple strokes from his tongue, maybe a finger or three pumping in and out of you. Groans rumbling between your thighs and in no time, you’d find bliss.

But that wasn’t the point of all this, was it?

The point was self-sufficiency.

Not needing anybody else.

In keeping with this thought, you spread your legs even wider and began to push the tip of the toy to your core.

It made it less than a centimeter before it met with resistance. At the same time, Joel let out a strangled:

“S-Sweetheart. Baby, let me show you.”

“No.”

“But darlin’, you’re gonna hurt yourse—”

“So?”

With your other hand, you began to play with your clit.

Maybe a little pain wasn’t the worst thing to feel now.

A breathy moan slipped out of you, and you could just tell that the less-than-secret Sex Ed professor in Joel was dying inside. He couldn’t bear the thought of something hard and phallic that wasn’t his penis brushing against your velvety walls unless he had some sort of say in it. He wanted to teach you again.

“Pussy’s too…fuck.” He watched the silicone sink in half an inch before your hole forced it back out, leaking. “She’s too fuckin’ tight. Needs daddy to stretch her out a little, get her ready for the fun, huh?”

“Nuh-uh. I can take it.”

This time, you gripped the base of the thick, veiny fake cock and pushed up—three or four inches, all at once.

“Fuck, daddy,” you whimpered. “Oh, that’s so good.”

And that was all it took, apparently.

Three and a half inches, two seconds, and one soft, pleading look from you had Joel changing his mind. Or deciding something, at the very least. He flipped you.

He caught your pink toy slipping back out and held it.

“Hands an’ knees, baby. All fours, yeah. Jus’ like that.”

You could barely breathe, let alone process the words being spoken to you, but somehow you managed to follow his orders. Your mind was swimming with lust and a bone-crushing need, your body pulsing with a warmth unlike anything you’d felt in a while. That sensation would come in waves during the time of the month you were most sensitive, when you were ovulating, though those moments were all short-lived.

Now Joel was indulging you in the feeling, and really dragging it out. Not only touching you but filling you up with something that wasn’t just his tongue or his fingers. You kneeled there, awed, and you could feel your fingers curling into the grassy earth beneath you.

You arched your back, dropping down to your elbows.

And Joel took control of that toy, sawing it in and out of your dripping pussy with practiced, near-perfect precision. Even as his hold shook a little, when the grip of his free hand on your ass tightened and you heard him mutter, low, ‘Fuck, that’s it, pretty girl. Take it all inside,’ he stayed focused on you. It went in deep.

It wasn’t him, but it was close, and Joel was kind.

“Lemme stretch her out. Make her feel real nice.”

Your cunt was making loud sucking sounds with each withdrawal and entry of the dildo, and your legs had started to shake. You clawed at the grass, whimpering.

“Da—ah— d-daddy.”

“There’s a good girl. Always so sweet openin’ f’me.”

Sometimes you swore you could finish from Joel’s words alone. His timbre, his control, the way he spread your cheeks open and spit—it all made you feel filthy in the best way. In your current hormonal state, wildfire blazing through your limbs, you couldn’t help yourself.

Half-cockdrunk and ovulation-crazed: “More—More, Daddy. Want your cock in me. Fuck me now, p-please.”

“You can’t have ‘im, baby. Ain’t safe right n—”

“But you wanna fuck, too, don’t you?”

Now you were peering over your shoulder, looking up at him. Joel was watching you back with an almost mournful expression, and you could tell he wasn’t just teasing you when he spoke. He felt genuine remorse.

“‘Course I do, baby,” he answered without hesitation. “I always do. Jus’ wanna do what’s…what’s right f’you.”

At the same time, you pushed your hips back a little.

Joel’s crotch was aligned with your ass, and as soon as you moved, a big, heavy, denim-clad bulge kissed you back. It bumped the dildo even deeper, and you hissed.

Joel groaned at the contact, gaze snapping down.

“What’s safe…” His words trailed off in a breath.

A barely coherent murmur: “What’s…what’s…”

You ground your bottom even harder against his front, the base of your toy no doubt bobbing back and forth.

Self-sufficient. Easy.

“Sweetheart.”

In and out.

“Daddy, I want it,” you pouted.

More friction.

More pleasure sprouting between your legs, tightening in your core and all but forcing the sentence out of you:

“Can’t you…put ‘im someplace else—someplace safe?”

Your mind was spinning perilously, not really forming any logical thoughts, but the concepts were there: your pussy, your mouth, between your tits, up and down.

Joel had started to move his lower half in time with yours—pantomiming thrusting. Grinding even harder when you dropped your head and let out a needy sound and begged him, ‘Put him anywhere, daddy.’

Joel’s hips jerked forward, and he cursed.

“Anywhere, baby?” he said, breathless.

He was dry-fucking you in doggy now.

The dildo was still lodged in your pussy, and Joel was still fully clothed, but he started to move as if he had really mounted you and was splitting your cunt, or something, open on his cock. He humped you like an animal in heat, grunting and groaning and holding your body as if it was the last thing tethering him to Earth.

Feeling equally feral, you turned your head again, and you asked him in a tone as sweet as you could manage:

“Please, Joel?”

He was going to explode.

You are not fucking her in the ass, Joel told himself. You are not doing that. Not now, not later, not ever.

Better late than never, you thought with a smile.

After verbally sparring with the man for all of five minutes—arguing that you should, in fact, use some ‘loophole’ that would keep you from getting pregnant—Joel had agreed. Angrily. Seeming to hate himself for it

“This is not somethin’ you do on a whim, hon,” he’d groused, scrubbing his beard in a slow, worried way.

He’d opened his satchel anyway. Rifled around in the thing before procuring a bottle of something sleek and sloshing. Your gut had twisted, but you’d felt eager, too

You hadn’t been entirely clear on what this kind of sex entailed, but if it was anything like the first time Joel had taught you, you sensed that you would enjoy it.

“So you just…put ‘im someplace new, is that right?”

“Ain’t like that.” Joel had shook his head.

“But—”

“No ‘buts,’” he’d interrupted at once. Poured the liquid from the bottle into his palm, the stuff gleaming in the sunlight a pale yellow hue. “‘F’we do it, we do it slow.”

So that was how you and him were doing it.

Slow.

Now you were perched at the edge of a riverbank, your gaze drifting lazily with the flow of a stream no more than four or five feet away from you and a sense of gentle, calming quiescence filtering through your system. On all fours again, you felt comfortable.

Joel had rolled out a blanket for the two of you to take your places and was careful to secure a new spot away from the beaten path, under the shade of a stand of aspens. Both of you had stripped. With the hand that wasn’t lathered up, Joel rubbed circles into your back.

“You sure you don’t mind doin’ things a little different today, baby?” His voice was low, almost grave. “Won’t do nothin’ unless you like it—I want you to know that.”

And if your body hadn’t already gone half-limp with all the pressure and the pleasure this man was inflicting on your muscles through his soft, kneading motions, you might’ve turned around and faced him. Smiled and said something like, ‘Don’t be silly, daddy. I like it all.’

Your contented hum evidently conveyed that well enough, because the next thing you knew, there was a new force beneath the kneading, between your thighs.

Solid, wet pressure you were more than familiar with.

“Daddy,” you giggled, body jerking forward a little at the sensation of him licking through your folds. “‘S’ain’t— ain’t no different! We always do this!”

At first, Joel didn’t answer—he simply tracked his tongue down the length of your seam from behind and lapped wetness from it. Nosed further between your legs and used his beard to stimulate the extra sensitive skin while he nipped at your slit, kissed your aching clit, and sucked your essence with the sweetest fervor. It didn’t take much for the arms holding yourself up to grow weak, then, and shortly, you were moving down onto your elbows with your rear pointed up at Joel.

He speared your dripping, quivering cunt with that tease of a muscle repeatedly, in and out again and again while you shuddered against him and sighed.

He maneuvered the hand that was coated in that slimy substance, finally, and started palming your ass with it.

“Daddy…p—please…I want…”

Joel paused just long enough to unglue his mouth from your pussy: “Want what, now, darlin’? What?”

You wriggled again, and you let out a dramatic huff.

“You know what,” you told him, words a plea. You rooted your bare knees even deeper into the blanket, and you canted your hips up. Pushing back onto him. “Wanna come, and I want…want you to be…inside.”

“That so?”

And to your surprise, you heard a chuckle, soft and low

At almost the same time, the hand covered in the slick, oily stuff started sliding down your ass again, inward, sliding through not just your folds but the entire cleft.

Joel knelt again.

Put his tongue to work again.

And for a second, you wanted to rebuff him…again.

Felt tempted to kick your feet and say this lickin’ ain’t any special or different, daddy! Sure ain’t no loopho—

“Oh.”

You froze.

Stared straight at the river and watched it churn and gurgle and flow and saw none of what was going on, really, because you’d just been hit with a new feeling.

Realization.

Penetration somewhere else.

You couldn’t even wonder at where that originated. Your legs clamped together, and you let out a breath.

“Wh— Why’re you lickin’ there, daddy?” you stuttered.

Joel’s hum vibrated through your center all the way to your teeth, causing them to grind together while you tried making sense of this novel feeling. Whimpering.

A few more featherlight, languid licks from Joel, then:

“Need it wet back here if I wanna play with her, right?”

“But that’s not my—”

“I know, baby.”

After Joel’s, your next words were swallowed up in a moan when the man started tracing circles—making an outline of a ring, again and again—and it was all you could do to keep from rutting your hips in helplessness

Ever the patient teacher, Joel stroked your back with the hand that was dry, again, and gave you a second to soak it in. With the hand that was coated in slick, he followed after his tongue with just the fingertips rubbing, coaxing the flesh. Prodding it to open.

“See, this hole doesn’t self-lubricate like your pussy does, sweetheart,” Joel said, near-pedagogical now. “No matter how turned on you are, it’s never gonna get all drippy and wet and pliant on its own. ‘S’why I gotta coach her along. Make sure she’s nice and slicked up.”

“But why?” you squeaked, reflexive. “For— For what?”

“For this.”

Then Joel slid something inside—not his tongue.

It edged in once, maybe half an inch, then slid back out. And in again, deeper, before retreating to the rim and toying with the muscles you felt clamp in unison.

“Try to relax, darlin’. Only makes it harder if you don’t.”

“But how come?” You squirmed. “Feels funny, daddy.”

Joel took a beat, and for that moment, he didn’t move. Just held whatever he’d stuck in you—presumably, his finger—and he didn’t poke or push you again, just held the tip tight to your puckered ring and hummed softly.

“Y’know the stuff I put on my hand?” he asked.

“Some…Some kinda oil, I guess?”

“Olive oil, that’s right, baby. It ain’t ideal, I’ll admit,” Joel paused, and it felt like he was shifting around. Adjusting his grip, maybe, until you sensed what felt like his thumb pressed up against that slicked place. “Back in the old days, they made real, um…gooey stuff special for doing things like this. Called lube, OK?”

OK. You nodded, still too off-kilter to look behind you.

Suddenly, swiftly, Joel’s thumb started to rub a little.

And you couldn’t say why your body jumped the way that it did, but you jolted before you could even try to keep it in. You mewled like some kind of strange and wanton creature, and you pushed your hips backward.

Embarrassment gripped you almost immediately.

Blinking hard and staring straight ahead, you shook your head, “‘M’sorry. Sorry. Don’t know why I did that.”

“Aw, honey,” Joel cooed. “Baby. Don’t apologize, OK?”

Still, your face was hot. You hated how you’d sounded.

“Would you turn around and look at me, sweetheart?”

Slowly, you did.

Behind you, your old man was perched on his knees, with a serene and gentle expression on his face. The fine lines and wrinkles had smoothed considerably, and what was left behind looked like understanding.

Wanting, too.

“Ain’t nothin’ to be ashamed of, what we’re doin’,” he started, slow. He rubbed a big, slick hand over your skin, and your whole body warmed in response to it. “Might make some different sounds, ‘cause Daddy’s playin’ with a whole different hole, and that’s OK. What’s important is that you like what’s happenin’.”

A brief beat of silence.

“That’s…consent, right?” you said shyly.

Joel grinned. “Yeah, darlin’. That’s consent.”

Consent when he edged in his finger to the knuckle next. Consent when he sawed it in and out, and twirled it around. Consent when he added a second, then a third, then quit the stretching altogether and just bent down to latch his mouth onto your wet, quivering ring.

He kissed it and licked it and laved it in saliva. Spit on it more than a couple times. His beard must’ve been drenched by then, but Joel didn’t seem keen on stopping for a while, judging by his grip on you.

Meanwhile, you were amped to no fucking end.

“Oh, daddy,” you hissed out a sigh of pleasure when his tongue slipped back inside, all the way and wriggling. “Daddy, put it—put him in, now.”

Joel grunted and retracted his tongue.

“You sure you’re ready for it?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“And where do you want daddy inside?”

“Um.”

You snagged your bottom lip between your teeth.

It felt wrong to say it, so you simply pushed your knees wider apart. Arched your spine, blinking back up at him

“There,” you whispered, wiggling your hips.

“Darlin’, you’re gonna have to say the place out loud if you want me to fuck it, OK? That’s all part of the deal.”

“But daddy.”

“I need you to get comfortable with stuff you think is wrong or ‘taboo,’” Joel continued, gentle but firm. “Don’t want you gettin’ halfway through and thinkin’ maybe you shouldn’t’a done it, and feel ashamed.”

Maybe that was part of it.

Maybe you did feel a little embarrassed that your body was currently in flames, and you wanted this man inside you so badly that you’d accept him anywhere, anyplace, even if you hadn’t the faintest idea how—

“Baby.” Joel interrupted your thoughts.

“Yeah?”

“Tell me all the places we’ve already done it.”

Your cheeks warmed reflexively.

“We…we’ve…”

“In your pussy?”

You nodded back.

“Between your tits?”

“Y-Yeah. There, too.”

“And…?” Joel trailed off.

“And…” You stared back at him, cheek resting on your forearms and your naked ass still up high by his face. Admittedly, this did feel a little enervating. But you tried to bite the embarrassment with a little smile. “You’ve…put ‘im in my mouth—fucked my throat, too.”

Joel grinned back. You took that as your cue to go on.

“And um…well, I’ve sat on your face. Rode your…thigh a little bit before. And you’ve rubbed your cock, like, between my legs until you spilled all over my pussy.”

“Anything else?”

“We did that ‘69’ thingy.”

You were pretty sure that was all of it.

Joel hadn’t been teaching you for that long. Compared to him, anyway, your experience was but a blip on the radar, and you had a good ways to go before you could say you were anywhere near as knowledgeable as him.

You peered curiously at your teacher; he peered back.

“Now, can you be a good girl and say where daddy’s goin’ next?” Joel goaded you gently. Edging in closer.

“In my, um…” You couldn’t help it when your face heated again. You braced yourself. “In my…backside?”

It sounded dumb as fuck saying it like that.

Surely there had to be a better word than—

“Anal.”

“Anal?”

“Yeah, sweet pea.” Joel smoothed his touch up your spine, then back down again. He rubbed at the muscles that were tensing slightly. “That’s it.”

From your position under him, it was hard to read his face. You couldn’t begin to imagine the look on yours.

When you didn’t say anything at first, still processing that one word, Joel went on—massaging, and talking.

“Old school birth control, I guess you could call it. Probably more effective’n rubbers. And it means daddy can cum as much as he wants, deep as you’ll let ‘im, y’know, cause, uh…y’can’t make a baby in the butt.”

You let out a giggle.

Again, you couldn’t help the reflex.

“Really?”

“Really, really.” Joel smirked.

Solemnity of the moment temporarily suspended by a couple sly, stupid grins and laughter sneaking out between you, Joel dove in. He didn’t drop his whole body weight on top of yours, but he got damn near close with the way he pretended to collapse and his entire torso draped over your back while you kicked and squirmed and bit out, giggling, ‘Get off, daddy!’

You lay flat on the blanket, belly-down, and Joel planted his forearms on either side of your frame, caging you in. He bent down to pepper you with kisses.

“That tickles!” you hissed, chin jerking against the assault of his lips. You writhed and laughed with him.

The little detour couldn’t have lasted more than a minute or two, Joel touching and teasing and kissing you in that sweet way he did, and you pretending to be annoyed. But your body relaxed, and you didn’t protest in the slightest when Joel tilted your chin back to him to get a proper kiss. You opened your mouth without thinking, melting under that calm and tender caress.

Warmth crowded you. Something hard pressed into the space between your legs, and you parted your thighs unconsciously. Joel groaned into the kiss.

“Darlin’,” he started, only for his breath to hitch a second later. You’d lifted your hips the slightest bit and pushed back toward him, so the tip of his cock was nudging between your cheeks. “Hey, there’s no rush, OK? Daddy can wait longer if you need more time.”

“I don’t. ‘M’ready now.”

Really, you didn’t understand why Joel seemed so loath to try this with you. Had he changed his mind?

With the side of your face cradled in his big, warm hand, you craned your neck slightly to meet his gaze, and you asked him, quietly, “Do you…not wanna…?”

Joel blinked once.

He looked almost ready to internally combust or blow up when he nodded his head, fast as he ever did before

“Yes. I do. Sweetheart, I wanna be inside you so bad, but this kinda sex…I just get nervous, might hurt y—”

At the same time, you raised your hips again.

With Joel’s broad and bare and massive body blanketing your own, it was hard to push far, but you did well enough. You pressed the blanket for leverage.

You notched the head of Joel’s thick, leaking cock at the entrance it had never breached before—that taut little ring of muscles—and you sank in backward. Slow.

“Oh,” you groaned at the sting, which was immediate.

Joel had been right: it hurt. It wasn’t remotely the same as being penetrated in any other place, and it almost made you want to squirm away with how tight and uncomfortable it felt. The oil barely helped at all.

Then Joel groaned, too. The hand holding your jaw tightened its grip reflexively, and as it did, his cock jerked inside you. He was no more than half an inch in.

“Baby, fuck,” he cursed. “You’re so fuckin’ tight.”

You lips twitched up a little, despite the burn.

“It h-hurts. Feels…weird,” you said honestly.

Joel halted without a moment’s hesitation.

He bit out a soft, rasping apology, ‘’M’sorry, sweetheart. ‘M’sorry. Daddy didn’t mean it.’

And, just as he moved to pull his tip from your achy hole, you eased your hips back onto him again, further.

Your muscles clenched hard against the intrusion—a dull throb spiraled from the spot where Joel was entering you, right up through the column of your spine—and a pitchy whine clawed out of your throat.

You ground your teeth and sucked in a breath, feeling as split open, exposed, and vulnerable as you’d ever been. It didn’t seem like something should go there.

But desire had other plans for you both, apparently.

The plea bled into your tone, covert and quiet.

“Keep goin’, daddy. Please. I want it.”

Your eyes locked with Joel’s, your hips stirring again, and that look communicated everything you needed.

Joel swallowed.

It had to be a relief to him. Dreamlike, almost.

“That right?” he said, slow smile starting back.

And you like it like this, don’t you? was implied.

The first wet drag of your heat down his length was painstakingly slow. You made it halfway to the base when your rim squeezed tight, and you made a face. Pain flared, but only momentarily. Joel was there to hold steady, knees firm on either side of your legs, as he let you take the lead a little. He kissed your neck.

“There’s my brave girl,” he murmured in your ear. “Takin’ it all like a big girl, huh? Like usin’ this hole?”

You nodded, fucking yourself further onto him.

New. Taboo. Stretching out a different place, all because you were ovulating, and this was one of the few ways to make sure pregnancy didn’t happen.

Joel let you sink back until the swell of your ass was kissing the coarse gray hairs at the base of his abdomen. Your hole fluttered and sucked at his cock, and Joel’s grip flexed on your jaw. His hold lowered.

And, just as the muted sting had begun to settle in your stomach, reality of what was going on and how you were taking him gradually touching your conscious brain, you felt fingers press your throat. They were gentle, not forceful. Just testing your level of comfort.

“Where’s daddy, baby?” he murmured softly.

“In my ass,” you answered. Holding his gaze.

He squeezed more, groaning when you squeezed back.

“You like takin’ cock up there, sweetheart?”

“Yes, daddy. Love—Love feelin’ you here.”

And it was strange—the harder he held you to him then, the more he stretched you and made you want to whimper and writhe on the blanket, the better it got. The more pressure he applied and the more possessive he seemed to get with each aching second that passed, the easier that weight felt inside you.

The deeper desire burned when Joel lifted up and dragged his cock with it, tip sliding to your entrance.

You wanted him sheathed back inside you.

You wanted to take some control yourself.

So, before the old man could make the next move and ease back in, you pushed up swiftly. You heard, and you felt, a wet squelch as your channel spread to accommodate his girth all at once. It burned a bit.

“Fuckin’ hell, baby,” Joel cursed.

“Like that, daddy,” you whimpered.

You turned your head so you were facing the river again, fingers curling into the worn, plaid material of the blanket beneath you. Joel lifted slightly, as if unsure what else to do but needing more, and you obliged by sliding back. And forth. Rutting your hips and rubbing your raw, wet hole up and down his shaft.

You didn’t ride Joel often. He was usually the more dominant one, wanting to take charge and fuck you senseless. But today, on this sweet, quiet, balmy summer afternoon, you made the man pant and groan and grip your throat helplessly while you used your taut, yet-untouched orifice to drive him out of his mind

Pleasure sparked low in your body, in a place you didn’t think it was possible to feel it. The pain turned sweeter.

It wasn’t like it disappeared altogether, but it did become something you could use to get yourself off.

That, on top of Joel’s strangled, labored words right next to your ear, damn near pushed you over the edge.

“Pussy must be feelin’ extra lonely seein’ daddy love all on this other hole, ain’t she, sweet pea?” Joel shifted, lifting your hips higher to fit his hand between your thighs. He groaned at the contact. “Can feel her leakin’ somethin’ awful—like she’s achin’ to be stuffed, too.”

Now he was meeting your thrusts; they got weaker and sloppier while he took two fingers to your clit and started rotating them over the swollen little nub.

Euphoria blinded you for a moment. Your body jerked, teeth sank into your bottom lip, and you cried, hoarse.

“Fuck me, daddy, please.”

You didn’t care which hole.

Your bodies were colliding, grinding in frantic tandem with one another and making the most obscene sounds as you did. Joel’s strokes were maddeningly shallow, like he couldn’t keep out of your warmth more than an inch or two before he needed to be driving back in, scraping your insides and fucking you fast.

“Wanna fill you in both, next time,” Joel said, almost helplessly. Rutting in harder with each new word. “Stuff that pretty pink dildo in your pussy while I take your ass, or the other way around, whatever y’want.”

Your eyes squeezed closed at the thought. Stars burst behind the lids while Joel fucked you relentlessly, and you pictured getting plugged up by both your toy and his cock, and you almost hit your peak in the moment.

Then your eyes opened again, and Joel had lowered his head beside yours. He tilted your chin to him with the hand that was still on your throat, pressing tenderly despite how hard he was pounding you from behind.

“How’s that sound, sweet pea?” He smiled.

You trusted him.

You nodded your head.

Then, in what felt like it might’ve been out of place with any other man but him, you kissed. Deeply. You parted your lips, let Joel’s tongue invade your mouth, and you absorbed every grunt and moan and praise while you did the same with those quick, sharp thrusts. The dichotomy was so dizzying you almost didn’t hear the good girl, and sweet, perfect thing, takin’ all o’me.

His words were so continuous and sweet, and your orgasm was so rapidly approaching that you almost didn’t say what was humming in your skull, presently.

But it came out before you could try to stop it.

“In—In my pussy next time,” you panted from the kiss. Staring at him. “Want you to come inside me, a-and—”

Joel’s cock throbbed inside your ass, and he groaned.

“Baby. Please. Don’t say it.”

You knew he wanted to hear it, though; it was just a matter of how dangerous the declaration would be once it left your lips and hung in the air between you.

The knot of pleasure in your stomach swelled to the size of a fist. Your body shook with each thrust Joel delivered, and the sweet feeling curled your toes, made drool start to peak out of either corner of your mouth.

Your eyes were as soft as they’d probably ever been peering up at Joel then, watching him stare right back.

Your insides squeezed, and he drove in even faster.

Joel’s lips couldn’t have been more than an inch away while he held you to him, knit his brows, and practically heaved the next breath out while he hammered at you.

“Don’t wanna…play it safe next time?” he groaned.

You shook your head.

“Want me to come inside your pussy next month?”

Your soft yes, and its result, could’ve ended you both.

As soon as you said it, recognition that was pregnant with meaning filtered between you, and your bodies drew even tighter. Joel leaned in to kiss again, needy as you’d ever seen him, the muscles of that sweet, slippery ring choked his cock from root to tip as he stabbed in repeatedly, and you kissed back, grinning.

He erupted inside you not long after your hole spasmed and your body went lax under him, spent. You felt him fuck his seed deep in your ass and relished the feeling, while also picturing it leaking somewhere else.

Ovulation was a dangerous fucking thing.

Joel pulled out, fingering the warm, white, gooey stuff right back into your fucked-raw channel when it started to dribble out. He kissed behind your ear.

He pressed his length flat against your lower back, wet with fluids and nowhere close to going soft after the events that had just transpired—with the thoughts that were no doubt humming through his head same as you

Over your shoulder, you met his gaze, the smile on your lips a little sleepier but no less eager than it was before.

“Well,” you said, low, “I can’t wait for next month.”

[xbeababyx]

Still with these puppy ​​eyes?!?! Really?!

I can't survive this anymore.

[weird-is-life]

Code gray

Pairing: Jack Abbot x fem!reader

Summary: There's an active sh**ter at the hospital and you and Jack end up on different floors. Jack worries for you the whole time, and Robby stops him from doing something stupid (1.3k)

Warnings: based on a request, active sh**ter, mentions of blood, injuries, lil angsty, happy ending, use of pet names, pda, first time writing something like this so I hope I didn't completely mess it up :(

----------------------------------------------------

The emergency alarms along with code silver start just as you are about to wheel in your patient into the x-ray room.

Your first instinct is to panic and give in to the frantic running around of everybody in the halls. But when you hear the shots, Jack's voice is louder than the panic in your head.

You do what he has drilled into you. You rush as many people into the x-ray room as you can before you start shouting orders in the hall. For people to hide, to barricade the doors and to stay hidden until they are sure it's the police.

And in doing so you get knocked on your ass, falling face first onto the hard floor. Blood sprays from your nose as you hear the crack of the bone. It takes you a few seconds to shake off the dizziness and disorientation. You stay on the ground, groaning from pain.

Until there are hands hauling you up, familiar hands of your friends. You barely hear them ask about your wellbeing before you are shoving them back inside.

You join your colleagues and other patients in the x-ray room. You lock it tight and with the help of other you put everything you can in front of the door.

Then, you all just sit down, leaning against the wall and praying for the long minutes of shots to pass by quicker. And you just pray that your Jack is safe. That all of your friends are okay, too.

-

Jack is frantic with worry. He keeps calling you and calling you, just hoping you'll fucking finally pick up, but the call always ends up in voicemail.

The only thing keeping him from running after you is Robby and about a dozen of patience that he's hauled up with in a room.

"Quit fidgeting, Abbot." Robby whispers sternly, it's so quiet that he barely hear it. "Y/N is fine. She's a smart woman, smart doctor. She knows all the right steps. You made sure, she knows, right?"

Jack itches to scold Robby for speaking, but he's right and his words calm Jack down a bit.

"Yes, she knows." Jack says quietly and flinches at the sounds of the shots.

Jack checks his phone for any new messages from you, but finds only messages from his SWAT buddy that keeps updating him on the police's move.

They are still couple of minutes out and Jack just hopes they hurry. Especially, as the firing stops, replaced by the quiet before a storm.

-

You know the shooter is on your floor and with the minutes ticking by and still no sign of police, you take the last steps of your survival.

You position yourself on one side of the door, scalpel in one hand and injection with heavy dose of morphine in the other. Your colleague, shaking, stands on the other side, prepared to try to take out the shooter if he somehow breaks in.

-

The text of the shooter being down comes 15 minutes later. Fifteen painful minutes later. There's still code gray beeping because the police still have to do a fully throughout sweep of the whole hospital to be really sure there are no more threats.

And the wait for that is somehow even worse. Jack contemplates saying fuck it to waiting, but Robby gives him the 'no stupid ideas' look so Jack stays.

"She's okay, brother." Robby reassures him again. Jack is so pent up by now that it doesn't help.

Jack just shakes his head, letting out a shaky breath. He hasn't felt this kind of fear in a long, long time.

"But if she got shot or-or...."

"She didn't. And if she had, we'll deal with it. We'll patch her up." Robby's voice is wobbly as he tries to reassure Jack. Robby knows how much you mean to Jack, how much he loves you and you're Robby's friend too, so his worry for you isn't easy on him either.

Finally, code gray stops and 'all clear' comes through the speakers. And Jack is hauling the stuff away from the door and running out of there immediately.

He doesn't even register the pain shooting through his leg. You come first before everything and everyone else. He already lost one love in his life before and he's not losing you.

Jack is frantic by the time he gets upstairs. There's so much rubbish and blood everywhere. And yet he can't find you. Can't see your characteristic hair color or your pretty smile or that purple stethoscope you love so much.

"Jack?" Your name on his lips is like a gift straight from heaven.

He follows your voice with a sob trying to break free. And there you are, crouching in front of a patient as you bandage a wound in their arm.

You quickly make sure the bandages are tight and secure before you stand up and walk up to frozen Jack.

As you near him, he finally starts moving again. His hands end up on your cheeks, checking you all over.

You wince as he moves your head around gently. "Jesus, angel, did you get shot? There's so much blood. Oh god, are you okay?"

He rambles quickly, asking you question after question. And the sheer panic in his eyes tells you what you need to know.

Your hands come up to hold his on your cheeks. "Jack, baby, breathe. I'm not shot. I'm okay, we're both okay."

You nod, prompting him to do the same. Shaky breaths leave both of you, and Jack has to squeeze his eyes shut tight to get the hazy vision away.

"I was so fucking worried, sweetheart." Jack finally says with a steady voice. He brings your face closer to his, leaning against your forehead.

"I was too. The shots were so close and so loud. We hid in the x-ray room, but before that I got knocked down on my face by people running. That's why I look so bad." You tell Jack, and he smiles softly at you before he leans back to examine said nose. It doesn't look broken but he'll definitely make you get a scan taken just to be sure.

"Good job, sweetheart. Those doors are thick and protected. You made a great decision. I'm proud of you." Jack leans down, giving you a kiss full of relief. Screw pda policies, there's only you on his mind.

"I love you, Jack." You whisper against his lips, suddenly feeling like you don't say those three words often enough. You could have been one of the people laying dead. But by sone miracle, both of you are okay and you'll cherish it forever.

"I love you, angel. Don't scare me like this again please." His thumb is rubbing your cheek gently as he chuckles. The sound eases the last tightness in your chest. "I'm gonna keep you close to me from now on."

And finally that earns him a small laugh from you because this overbearing man already trails you like a lovesick puppy most of the time. But you love it, you wouldn't change it for anything.

"Okay, handsome. Whatever brings you the peace of mind, I'm up for it." Jack drops one more kiss onto your lips.

Right before he's tugging you after him, not giving you a chance to protest as he makes you get a scan of your nose. He does that, cleans your bloody face and just then he goes join his busy colleagues.

Jack knew he could spare those 5 minutes to make sure that you were okay. If he was really needed, someone would come get him. But now, he can get back to work with one eye still on you.

After all of the injured people are taken care of he's gonna take you home and keep you in his hands the whole time. And maybe have a little heart to heart session as well.

[richeeduvie]

a nude can be an update if you try hard enough

-- jack abbot x pregnant afab reader --

You dismantle Jack's shift when he decides to text you at 11pm. He doesn't even give you something sweet. He's so stern and smarmily dominant.

Update.

Not even a miss you? Soooo unromantic! Your first instinct is to ignore him. Your second is to remind yourself that Jack is at work, which means he's probably been checking his phone between patients with his "discreet" panic he believes passes for casual concern.

Your third instinct is of evil. Pregnancy has made you very creative.

You’re home now because Jack, Robby, Dana...and your obstetrician formed a freakin munity against you and your right to remain an employed nurse until your water breaks on Pitt property.

Fine. Whatever. Your back and tits hurt, and your skin feels too tight around your baby doing backflips inside you.

...And you are also naked.

It's just after you've taken a shower. You attempted to apply lotion, and you're ashamed to admit you were exhausted by the time you reached your back. Motherhood is already beautiful.

You're huffing and collapsing on the bed until you look into the mirror across from you.

Your tits are fuller than you ever thought possible, heavy against the top of your bump. You look...very pregnant. And bare.

...Like something that would stop Jackie's heart with great efficiency. Metaphorically, of course.

Your phone buzzes again. You find only your name in the text.

Oh? Not even Sleepy? Baby? Whore? He must be irritated.

You smile like a wimp and settle yourself above the pillows. You hold the phone and take a picture.

The first one is awful, the second catches the loaded basket of dirty laundry. Not very seductive. But the third is...good. It's not exactly as polished or as purposefully hornified as the garage-gym wall photos you've gifted Jack. The ones he pretends are purely motivational.

You're just naked and fresh from the shower. Your mouth is slightly curled in a sleepy little smile.

You type, back to smiling like a wimp.

still pregnant

You attach the photograph, and for a moment, you almost consider whether this is a wise thing to do. But where's the fun in that?

You hit send.

At the Pitt, Jack is standing outside room twelve while Shen explains the patient's diagnosis inside. He's listening. Technically. His phone vibrates in his pocket. He ignores it.

"Sooo, the patient stated there was no possibility—"

"There is a difference between a patient’s assessment of possibility and documented confirmation."

"Yes, but—"

Jack's phone vibrates again. He swallows. He knows it's you, and you're doing what he asked. Updating, but needing to focus on work first and foremost is getting to his nerves.

Shen blinks.

"You gonna get that? Could be mama-to-be..."

Shen shuts up at what Jack's glaring. He's got good enough stern eye contact that the guy probably doesn't realize he's also smirking.

Whatever. He'll get it. Not because Shen said that. Because he was going to anyway....well. Eventually.

He opens your message.

"I'll be right back—"

...The pitt ceases to exist when your body fills the screen.

"Jesus fuc..."

God fucking damn it, Sleepy. That's not what he meant by a fucking update.

Naked tits. Round stomach. Your thighs disappearing beneath the sheet, crotch visible enough with the bush he groomed. That's it. That's the picture.

The sleepy, satisfied upturn of your mouth is the cherry on top.

still pregnant

Jack locks the phone as fast as he can. He walks away from Shen as fast as he can.

He gets three steps before his body catches up to the image. Heat moves through him with a harsh force, straight through his chest. Then lower. Then lower.

"Fuck."

He opens up the message again. He sighs low.

Same thing. You're naked and smug with the visible proof that he filled you up.

"You unbelievable little shit."

Jack's probably hypertensive. He is. He's hypertensive as shit. Of course, he is. He's dealing with a professional crisis growing in fucking his scrub bottoms.

His pulse is too fast. This is what you do, kid. You take his body, which has been through a whole fucking lot, and reduce it to a badly managed response with one picture.

...He's standing in the bathroom trying to negotiate with an erection cause his pregnant wife answered a request for an at-home update by sending him her tits and a hint of her cunt. The bravery of the kid.

The phone vibrates. He eyes the text popping up.

is that enough information, doctor?

Yeah. You're gonna get it when he gets home.

[oxalaia-quilombensis]

give it to me, baby

wc: 8.7k

summary: Jack Abbot is many things; a loving husband, a phenomenal doctor, a decorated war veteran, an adrenaline junkie, a lower-leg amputee, and (possibly) a mind reader. But he is not a father. In 4 years of marriage you haven't been able to surprise him even once. But maybe, for his 50th birthday, you can kill two birds with one stone.

warnings: age gap (r is mid 30s, jack is 50), established relationship, afab reader, reader is an attending, brief reference to past power imbalance, minor undescribed medical procedures, IUD insertion and removal mention, gifting someone a used medical device (its sweet and not weird I promise), mention of pap smears, misuse of viagra, slight anxiety, keeping secrets, mediocre communication, BREEDING KINK DUH, trying to get pregnant, mentions of plan b, unprotected sex, creampie, multiple orgasms for everyone, doggy style, missionary, biting, reader is a little bit of a brat, cum play, so much love, fast and hard and then slow and loving, I think that's it but let me know if I missed anything

an: we are playing fast and loose with fertility and medicine here guys

I usually do not like writing multiple rounds of sex in one fic because tbh I find sex scenes a little hard to write and I worry that they get repetitive but I really pushed through for this one

Being married to Jack Abbot was a dream come true. 

He was kind, empathetic, passionate, patient, fantastic in bed, and (this is just a theory) psychic. 

Or you might just be easy to read. Either way, he almost always seemed to know what you needed or wanted at any given moment. 

God forbid you wanted to surprise him with anything, either. He could sniff out any sort of deception, even if it was well intentioned, like some sort of emotional or mental bloodhound.

Jack was also always prepared for almost everything. He had supplies and a game plan for almost every situation and scenario that could possibly come up. Mass casualty incident? Camo duffel in the coat closet by the front door. You had a hard day? Bubble bath kit under his sink in the bathroom. 

 Combine all of that together and you’d never been able to surprise him. Ever. 

Things were changing ever so slowly, though. Now, the two of you had been together for 7 years now, married for 4, so the playing field was starting to level out. You found yourself able to sift through his facial expressions and body language, deciphering some of the thoughts that crossed his mind. Some of it was the familiarity of your everyday routine, any deviation clueing you into something festering on his mind. Some of it was just knowing your husband so intimately in a way that could only come with time.

And even though you were as close to an expert as one could be in Jack Abbot, you still missed some of the more subtle things. 

But there was nothing subtle about this. You’d have to have been blind to miss the longing in his eyes anytime the two of you were anywhere close to a baby. It was impossible not to notice how his usually stoic and analytical hazel eyes softened at the sight of their tiny waving hands, the corners of his lips curving up when they cooed, his gaze instinctively snapping towards a crying infant while his shoulders tensed. 

Those signs had given you a rather obvious hint, but the final nail in the coffin had been when your sister and her wife had visited from Philly a few months ago. They had some sort of business to take care of in Pittsburgh, so you’d offered to watch their 6 month old son. Jack had been out running errands when he’d been dropped off. When he walked through the door, grocery bags in hand, you’d watched him freeze out of the corner of your eye. There you were, in your shared kitchen, balancing the baby on your hip, talking to the child about nothing in particular while you stirred a pot on the stove. 

Jack had unfrozen quickly, but you’d noticed. You noticed everything for the rest of the day until your sister came to collect her child. How Jack swallowed hard anytime you held the baby, how he nearly melted when you cooed and played peek-a-boo, how his eyes stayed locked for just a moment too long on the teeny tiny pair of shoes in his hands before he passed them off to your sister.

Jack Abbot wanted a baby.

And you wanted to finally be able to catch your husband off guard. 

 And now his 50th birthday was coming up, and you had a great gift planned. And if everything went according to your carefully crafted plan, you’d be able to give him an even better gift next year. 

Step 1: remove the biggest obstacle.

Being a doctor married to a doctor made the biggest part of your plan both easier and harder. 

You started on Monday. His birthday fell on Friday, and the two of you very conveniently had the following 4 days off. But not before working opposite shifts every day the rest of the week.

That was part luck, part planning on your end. You’d gladly agreed to cover Al Hashimi’s shifts while the ED was down a day shift attending since she was going to a conference. Jack had not been thrilled, but your sacrifice meant the two of you could enjoy an extra-long weekend staycation. He’d grumbled about it for a solid 3 days before finally settling down.

It also gave you time to make a trip upstairs to gynecology while your husband was fast asleep at home and none the wiser.

All it took was a quick lie to Robby about a routine pap smear and a favor called in from a friend upstairs and you were seated with your legs hiked up in stirrups. 

“You know, I really did not ever need to see your vagina,” Joan, your gynecologist friend, was grumbling as she completed the procedure. 

“You’re the only one I could ask who wouldn’t spill the beans,” your eyes stayed glued on the ceiling. “Everyone else is either a resident and not willing to bend the rules, or older and more loyal to him.”

“This is a hospital,” her expression was unimpressed. “There are no sides, no one is more loyal to him.”

“Yes the fuck they are,” you lowered your legs as she gave you the all clear. “Why do you think I told Robby I was getting a pap smear?”

“Becuase telling your husband's best friend, who is your boss by the way, that you were going to get your contraception removed so that said husband can fuck you six ways to sunday for his birthday is inappropriate workplace conversation,” she turned her back to you, depositing the device in a specimen jar before beginning to clean every thing up.

“That is true,” you conceded, “and Robby’s a snitch.”

“I still can’t believe you’re actually going to give him your IUD for his birthday,” Joan shook her head. “Isn’t that a little gross?”

“I’m obviously going to clean it!” You tugged your black scrubs up, wincing a little at the dull ache in your lower stomach. “Plus, it’ll be romantic. And shouldn’t you be more sex-positive? You’re a fucking gynocologist.”

“Romantic,” her voice was deadpan. “And I am plenty sex-positive. Especially unprotected sex. Creates more patients for me. Kinda like a dentist who recommends nothing but sugar.”

You couldn’t stop your eyes from rolling as you watched her move back to the counter. “Glad to see you are faithfully committed to your oath.”

“Here,” she handed you a little cup with two white pills, choosing to ignore you. “Tylenol. You don’t get anything stronger since you insisted on doing this mid shift.”

“Thanks,” you swallowed them dry. “For the pills and for doing this for me. I can’t have him figuring this out before. It’s supposed to be a surprise.”

“I know I always wanted a used medical device for my biggest milestone birthdays,” she grumbled to herself as she wrote down her notes on a sheet of paper. “I’ll wait to put this in your chart until after your insemination.”

“Now you’re making it gross,” your face scrunched up. “Most normal people refer to that as ‘trying for a baby’ you know.”

“Yeah sure. Now, get out of my department and go back to your zoo,” she waved her hand dismissively, fighting a smile the whole time.

Step 2: stay strong.

Now with the most important part of your plan complete, you simply had to make it through the next week without Jack catching on. Even with your separate schedules, that was easier said than done.

Monday night at shift change you were desperately trying to hide the cramps wracking your abdomen as you walked the night shift through handovers alongside Robby.

Jack noticed immediately.

“You ok, baby?” He’d pulled you aside the second the handover was completed, his hand resting on your hip as he guided the two of you into a semi secluded corner.

“Yeah I’m ok,” you couldn’t fight the grimace as another wave washed over you. You really shouldn’t have skipped that second dose of acetaminophen during the 4pm rush. “Just cramping.”

That was the wrong thing to say.

Jack frowned, his eyes sweeping over you more intently. His focus flicked between your lower stomach and your face.

“You’re not supposed to start your period for another 3 weeks.”

“It’s still a little odd that you track them so closely,” you tried to brush him off, shrugging.

“I’m a doctor and you’re my wife,” Jack cracked a grin as your eyes narrowed. “You’re my wife who is also a doctor. An amazing one.”

You gave him a kiss for that, quick and chaste and the most PDA you’d dare express in the ED.

 “My IUD is due for replacement in a few months,” you couldn’t beat back a rising smile, fueled by both his care and the knowledge of what you were planning. “It’s probably starting to go and make me irregular.”

“Get that checked out, ok?” His hands cupped your face. 

“I will, Jack, I promise.”

“Good we-” he swallowed hard, smile faltering ever so slightly. “We don’t want you to be… unprotected.”

The regret in his voice and the twinge of hope in his eyes as he said unprotected only reinforced what you already knew. He really wanted this. 

God, you couldn’t wait to tell him. You weren’t sure if you’d ever been more excited to give a gift before.

Warmth flooded through you at the thought of how he’d react. Would there be happy tears? Maybe he’d simply bend you over the nearest surface, eager to get started. He’d probably double and triple check that you were sure. Jack always did that, no matter how many times you reassured him that you wanted him, you needed him. Like he still couldn’t believe you were his just as much as he was yours.

Thankfully, his mind reading seemed to fail for a moment. Likely because of the cramp that gripped you midway through your rumination, hiding your true expression behind a grimace. 

“I’m ok, Jack,” with one more kiss, you were untangling yourself from him. “I’m going to go sleep for twelve hours. I love you.”

“Alright,” he followed you as you gathered your things and headed towards the ambulance bay. “Text me when you get home. If you forget again, I’m not making that pasta you like for a month.”

“Empty threats,” you pecked his cheek on your way past him. “I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow.”

“I love you,” the love written so plainly on his face as you walked away from him and out those doors made you almost want to run back and tell him everything.

Maybe that was why you were semi-convinced he was psychic. It was probably less about an alleged supernatural ability and more about your face being easy to read and your lips unable to keep a secret, combined with the fact that you had resigned yourself to your husband being all-knowing. 

In your defense, you’d seen Jack level patients and colleagues and even yourself with that look. Head titled, eyes narrowed, eyebrows lifted, that signature confidence combined with a small sigh of disapproval when he knew he wasn’t getting the whole story. It made everyone spill their guts eventually. No one held out very long.

But he hadn’t used that look on you since you’d been his resident years ago. You were all too aware that the bastard had long since learned that all he had to do was give you a soft smile and tell you he loved you and you melted immediately.

And normally, you didn’t have anything to keep from him. Normally, it was mildly irritating if he managed to figure out 

But you had to stay strong.

Step 3: final preparations.

Surprisingly, you did actually manage to hold out. All the way until Friday.

Jack had the overnight shift from Thursday to Friday, but you were done and clear. A full body shower and shave was followed by a few episodes of the trashiest reality TV you could find until it was officially your bed time. You texted him a simple “Happy birthday baby” at 12:01 am before grabbing what little sleep you could before he inevitably came home just as the sun was rising. 

At just past 7:30 am, your husband was crawling into the sheets, sliding up behind you and wrapping his arm around your waist as the heat of his bare chest warmed you from the inside out.

You were drifting in that blissfully in that half aware state between sleep and wakefulness as he pressed light kisses along the side of your neck available to him. A soft hum left your lips as you arched back into him, body already aching for him. 

But you couldn’t give in.

Not yet, at least. As much as it pained you to deny him the sleepy morning sex you’d grown to crave, especially on his birthday, you couldn’t let him fuck you until you’d given him your present. And you couldn’t give him your present until you had made him dinner and slipped on that beautiful white matching set you’d bought.

So you had to stall. Redirect. Get him to actually get a decent amount of rest for once in his life, so you could ride him off into the sunset.

“Happy birthday, handsome,” your hand reached back to run your fingers through his loose curls.

“Very happy birthday to me, indeed,” his grip on your waist tightened as his front pressed even more firmly against your back. You could just barely feel the faint beginnings of hardness through the thin material of his boxers.

“Uh-uh,” you twisted in his grip. Shifting until you were face to face, you pressed a long, slow kiss to his lips. He sighed into your mouth, allowing you to take the lead as his tongue swiped against yours.

 “You need to sleep. You’re exhausted.”

He grumbled as you pulled away, his half lidded eyes flipping between the exhaustion of a week of 12 hour nights shifts and pure desire as he looked at you wrapped in his arms.

Jack had once told you that this was when you looked the most beautiful. Sleepy, wearing just his t-shirt and a pair of underwear with your hair a mess, snuggled in the sheets of your shared bed. He had called the domesticity of it addictive, had said he couldn’t get enough of the quiet moments like this, tangled together with the outside world locked away. The two of you just existing in that warm, heady feeling of safety and security, wrapped up in each other for hours.

You’d always thought you understood. You’d agreed that the soft moments surrounded by his love in the home two of you had built were the best, but you were starting to think you never really got it until now. The idea of your family, of it growing beyond just the small, two person unit the two of you had become over these years, was electrifying. 

God, you wanted that. You’d already given him your heart. You wanted to give him everything.

“I’m not too tired to make you feel good,” his hand slid from your hip down to dip beneath the hem of your underwear.

It took every ounce of self control to grab his wrist, stopping him. 

“No,” you gave him one more soft kiss before you were pushing him back to lie flat. Throwing one of your legs over his, you curled into his side. He let out a sigh of disappointment as your head rested on his chest, but he was still curling his freckled arms around you to hold you close. “We are going to sleep now. And then, tonight, I am going to make you dinner. Then you get to open your present, and then you can fuck me. However you want, as many times as you want.”

“You’re so cruel,” you couldn’t see his face but you could hear the smile in his voice as he pressed a kiss to your hair. Already, you could tell he was starting to drift off. “But fine. As long as I get to have you for dessert.”

His voice, low and gravelly, vibrating through his chest had your panties growing increasingly uncomfortable. His sturdy thigh pressed between your legs certainly wasn’t helping, but you could do this. You were a grown woman, a doctor of emergency medicine. You had the willpower to make it 10 more hours without jumping your husband.

When you woke around 1pm, Jack was still dead to the world. His lips were parted, hair mussed, and his breaths deep and even. Despite the gray making his curls much more salt than pepper, he looked younger like this. 

You gave yourself a moment to take him in before slipping out of the bed and his grasp.

It was time to make the last few preparations.

Your movements were as quiet as you could make them as you got dressed. With one last glance at his sleeping form, you slipped out the front door.

Grocery shopping went smoothly, the bakery passed off the small bourbon chocolate cake you’d ordered with little fuss, and the jeweler down the road didn’t even charge you for the little black velvet box. They had a million of them, she’d said, no big deal.

You were back home by 3:30pm. Jack was up and awake by then, making himself a cup of coffee when you strolled in, arms laden with grocery bags. For just a second, you let your eyes trail over him. He was facing away, giving you a beautiful view of the freckles dusting his muscled back. The sweatpants riding low on his hips, the right leg tied in a knot to stop the hem from dragging, hid the strength and shape of his ass and legs from you, but your imagination filled in the gaps. 

“Done objectifying me yet?” Jack just barely looked over his shoulder as he continued to fiddle with the machine before him.

“Never,” you set the bags down, giving his ass a slap as you moved past.

He laughed, reaching for his crutches as he moved to follow you back out to the driveway. 

“Let me help you with the bags.”

“Not a chance,” you blocked the doorway. “Go sit down and enjoy your day off.”

He looked like he was going to argue for a moment, but then he acquiesced. With one, chaste kiss to your lips, he moved back to the counter. 

Jack was stubborn, though, so he started unloading the grocery bags, placing ingredients in their rightful places.

You watched him move through the space for just a moment before you returned to your car to grab the last few bags and the box with the cake. The jewelry box was tucked into the back pocket of your denim shorts, hidden by your oversized shirt as you deposited everything else onto the counter, next to the first batch of empty bags. Jack had disappeared from the kitchen, but he walked out of the bedroom just as you began to organize the ingredients you needed, his leg fastened on.

“What are you gonna make me?” Jack had settled back against the counter after you swatted his hands away from the cake box, trying to keep his fingers out of the frosting while he tried to steal a taste. He was lazily sipping his coffee, eyes watching as you fluttered about, retrieving some of the items that you needed.

“Steak,” you held up the meat wrapped in butcher paper as you pulled it from the bag. “Cabbage,” his nose wrinkled and your eyes rolled. For a brief moment, you really considered throwing the vegetable at him. “Relax, you big baby. Cabbage au gratin. Lots of cheese and that cream sauce you like.”

“Hmm, ok,” he was smirking over the rim of his mug. “What else?”

“What else? What, that’s not enough for you?” 

He set the coffee down, closing the small distance between the two of you so his hands could rest on your hips, chest pressing into your back. You panicked for a moment as his lips met your clothed shoulder, hoping and praying that he didn’t notice the box in your pocket. It was still empty, but you didn’t want to give him any hints about your plan.

“I’m gonna need a lot of energy tonight, baby,” his hands slid underneath your shirt to rest against your bare stomach as he nosed at your hair, his breath brushing over your ear. “I’m pretty sure I was promised however I want, as many times as I want.”

You were so close to breaking. Your resolve was hanging on by a thread. 

“And,” his hand slid farther up, cupping your breast through your bra. You could barely restrain a whine. “My dear wife decided to swap shifts. We haven’t had any… quality time in a week. I’ve got a lot of plans for you tonight, baby.”

“Jack,” your voice was weak.

“Not to mention,” his fingers squeezed your nipple through the mesh of your bra. “I wouldn’t be a very good husband if I didn’t help you get your sleep cycle back on track. Gotta get you used to working all night, baby.”

“You’ve gotta wait, Jackie,” you were arching back into him, offering no resistance as his broad hand slid to lay over the span of your stomach.

Fuck. 

The feeling of that steady, callous hand laying against the smooth skin of your lower abdomen jolted you back to reality.

You needed to wait. It wouldn’t be fair or right to fuck him before you had a conversation, plus you’d put so much thought into planning the perfect night. You couldn’t let your incubus of a husband seduce you into ruining it now.

“Jack,” your voice was stronger now. “Patience.”

He huffed a laugh against the shell of your ear, his hands tightening against you just once before letting you go and stepping back. You could very clearly see the hard length of him straining through the fabric of his pants as you turned to face him, back braced against the counter. His hands came up to land beside your hips on the stone as he caged you in.

“I don’t know what you have planned, but I might die if I don’t get my hands on you soon,” his lips laid a kiss on your cheek before he was stepping back. “I’m gonna go shower before you torture me anymore.”

Step 4: the proposition.

Jack behaved himself all throughout dinner, his hand settling at a tasteful spot on your bare thigh, exposed by the dress you’d pulled on over the lacy white set he hadn’t seen yet. Entirely appropriate compliments coming from him as you laid the cabbage, the steak, and the salad and rolls he hadn’t let you tell him about earlier before the two of you on the table.

But dinner was done, leftovers packed away, the rest of the cake returned to its box while two half-eaten slices laid before the two of you.

While he was in the shower, you’d managed to retrieve your IUD (very thoroughly sanitized, thank you very much) and place it in the jewelry box. It fit perfectly. You’d tied the box closed with a short length of red ribbon you’d acquired from the Christmas supplies stored in the spare room. 

That box had been sitting on the counter while you ate dinner and dessert, but now it sat between the two of you on the table. For the first time all week, your confidence in your plan was starting to falter.

Jack was a great man and an amazing husband. That was undeniable. He was great at so many different things. The one area he fell behind in, though, was communication.

He wasn’t necessarily bad at it, but he definitely wasn’t the best. It wasn’t that he couldn’t or didn’t communicate with you. No, it was more that he held certain things back. He didn’t let himself verbalize things when he thought he didn’t deserve them, or when he thought he was asking for too much.

He hadn’t asked you for a baby. Sure, the two of you had talked about it before getting married, as all couples should, but the conversation hadn’t resurfaced since then. That conversation had been the first time he had truly been completely open and laid bare before you. He had told you he wanted kids, more than anything, but he worried about being too old, too broken, too unavailable.

You’d assured him he was none of those things, that you wanted to start a family with him. You could see on his face that he only half believed you.

It hadn’t been a possibility right when you got married, with you just finishing your residency and settling into being an attending, along with the both of you wanting time to really settle into your relationship before broaching that topic again.

But it hadn’t been brought up again.

Suddenly, the box sitting between you felt like a bomb. What if you had overstepped? Sure, you had thought the look on his face when he saw you with a baby was longing, but what if it wasn’t? What if you were about to blow up your marriage and ruin his 50th birthday?

“Hey,” Jack’s hand came to cover yours, jerking you out of your spiral. “You ok?”

“Yeah,” your throat felt full as you looked up at him. “Just… just nervous to see if you like your present.”

He smiled at that. “I’m sure I’ll love it, baby.”

“I really hope you do.”

You could barely breathe as you watched his fingers undo the red bow keeping the box sealed. The few seconds it took for him to unwind the fabric felt like years, the soft sound of the ribbon sliding against the velvet felt like the loudest noise in the world.

The lid blocked your view of the interior of the box, but you knew exactly what it looked like. That thin plastic ‘T’ sticking up out of the slot where a ring would normally go. Stark white against the deep red interior of the little black box.

Jack’s brow scrunched up for a second as he gazed down at the object in his hands.

“Is this your-”

“Yes,” your voice was quiet when you cut him off, your eyes searching his face. He looked confused, eyes fixed on the IUD, before the expression melted into shock as he looked up at you. 

“You-” he floundered over his words, gaze rapidly flicking back and forth between you and the box. “This- you took it- what-”

For a moment, you were concerned he was having a stroke. But then he took a deep breath, set the box down, and scrubbed his hands over his face. Your nerves crept back in, unwelcome and self deprecating as the worst case scenarios ran through your mind.

“I need you to tell me exactly what this means, baby,” his hand was grabbing yours again, squeezing tight. He still looked a little shocked, but you could see his eyes lighting up with what you desperately hoped was happiness.

“I-” your throat locked down, the words stuck as your eyes locked on his.

“Words, baby,” he slipped out of his seat, settling on his knees before you.

“Jack, your leg-”

“I don’t care, I’m fine,” his hands settled on your thighs, just above your knees. His fingers dug in as he looked up at you. 

Hope. That’s what you were seeing written plain as day across his features. Hope and love and yearning.

“Baby, please,” he sounded desperate. “I need to know exactly what you meant when you gave me your IUD.”

“I -” your breath faltered for just a second as his hands squeezed tighter as the first syllable left your lips. “I want to have a baby, Jack. I want your baby.”

“Fuck,” his voice was raw and gutteral, like the curse ripped out of him involuntarily. “I want it. So badly, you have no idea.”

You couldn’t help your laugh. The sound was wet, emotion curling in your chest as the worry and anxiety fled. “Trust me, I know exactly how much you want it.”

The confusion crept back onto his face.

“You’re not subtle, Jack.”

“I’m so subtle. I’m an unreadable pillar of strength,” he was smiling, eyes still full of love and adoration.

“You were anything other than subtle with this.”

“Maybe because I want to come home to you and our child everyday,” his words silenced your laughter, tears threatening to spill as he kept speaking. “I want to watch them grow up, teach them how to ride a bike, be obnoxiously loud and embarrassing at sports games.”

Jack was getting to his feet now, pulling you up with him until his forehead was pressed to yours.

“I want to teach them how to drive, cry at their high school graduation, move them into college dorms,” his own voice was thick with emotion as tears dripped silently down your cheeks. His hands came up to cradle your cheeks, swiping the stray droplets away with his thumbs. Your hands gripped his forearms as you listened. “I want it all with you. I want to be horribly, disgustingly domestic and in love, show our kid what love looks like. I want them to be safe and happy and healthy and so, so loved.”

“Jack,” your voice was shaky as you clung to him.

“I want it. I want it more than I’ve ever wanted anything. I want it with you. I want it all with you.”

His lips connected with yours. The kiss was tender and slow, every emotion leaking out as your lips and tongues moved against each other in your dining room. He tasted like the chocolate cake and something so distinctly Jack. It was addictive.

When the two of you parted to gasp for breath, his hands settled on your waist, yours coming up to tangle one in his hair, the other flat against his sturdy chest.

“You know,” you leaned in, tracing feather light kisses over the curve of his throat. “I promised you you could have whatever you want after dinner.”

His head dropped back and he let out a groan. His hands tightened on your waist.

“But do you know what I want?”

“What do you want, baby?” His voice was breathy. One of his hands drifted down to grab a handful of your ass, his leg slipping between yours to apply pressure where you needed him the most.

Your teeth caught the lobe of his ear between your teeth.

“I want you to take me to our bedroom,” your hand in his hair yanked ever so slightly. “I want you to take one of those little pills you keep for emergencies,” your fingers trailed down his chest slowly as his breathing picked up in pace. “And I want you to fuck me until you physically cannot any more.”

Step 5: success.

So maybe you weren’t as good at reading your husband as you thought.

You were so sure as soon as he got you into the bedroom and got an eyeful of the see through lace covering your body, he’d be inside of you immediately, especially with the promise of your uterus open for business.

But he held back, eyes tracing your form, sprawled out on the bed and still covered, barely, by your lingerie. He was moving through the room like he had all the time in the world.

You watched with bated breath as he slowly undid his belt and the button of his pants, leaving both still on. The buttons on his shirt were next, the fabric hanging open and untucked as he approached his nightstand. All you could see of his torso was a thin strip, could just barely spot the light dusting of still auburn hair disappearing in the waist band of his slacks.

His hand dug into the drawer for a second before he was producing the little orange bottle. He held it delicately between his fingers, eyes meeting yours.

“You’re sure this is what you want?” Everything in Jack’s eyes seemed to be begging you to agree, to not dangle this in front of him and then so cruelly rip it away.

“I want this,” you sat up, scooting to the edge of the bed to rest your hands on his hips, his legs between yours as he towered over you. “I want you to put a baby in me, Jack.”

He groaned, his hands fumbling to get the cap off the bottle and one pill in his mouth. 

He didn’t usually need those little blue pills, but between the anti depressants he regularly took and the stress of both your jobs, occasionally they came in handy. Today, however, the outline of his erection, right in front of your face, told you he definitely didn’t need it right now. But both of you knew that one round was not going to be even close to enough.

The temptation of that bulge in his pants was too much as you watched his throat bob while he swallowed the pill dry. Your hands drifted from his hips to the undone button of his slacks. Slowly, your fingers pulled the zipper down.

His hand caught yours before you could start sliding the fabric down his legs.

“Not now,” his fingers pressed into your pulse, your heartrate hammering as you looked up at him. “Take off your clothes and lie down.”

For a moment, you wanted to argue, wanted to insist that this was his birthday, you should be taking care of him. But the heat in his eyes and the rapid rise and fall of his chest as his eyes traced over your body had another idea popping into your head, wondering exactly how far you could push him tonight.

Your hands were a little shaky as you unclasped your bra, if the white scrap of barely there lace could even be called that. It fell from your body as you stood from the bed, crowding into Jack.

He took half a step back to give you some space as he watched. Your hands tossed your hair back over your shoulders, taking the opportunity to trail your fingers down your collarbones, loosely cupping and caressing your own breasts. Your lips parted on a gasp as your fingers tweaked your nipples. With half lidded eyes, you arched into him, almost touching as you continued to play with your breasts.

When you decided he’d had enough, you let your hands move on, dragging down your abdomen only to stop just above the waistband of your panties. You laid your hands over the smooth, bumpless skin. 

“Can’t wait for your baby to be right here,” you were laying it on thick. Eyelashes fluttering, teeth digging into your lower lip, breaths coming a little too deep to lift your breasts even more with every inhale.

Jack was getting impatient, you could tell. That fire burning in his eyes, his fingers flexing, all while you took your sweet time shimmying out of the underwear. 

By the time it hit the floor, he looked ready to pounce, but he was still keeping himself in check. You figured he probably wanted to take things nice and slow, make them tender. At least at first. He usually was attentive and giving, treating you gently especially when emotions were running high. Not like you would break if he didn’t, more like you deserved to be loved softly.

But there was time for soft later. Right now, the tension and knowledge of what he was about to do to you felt explosive. You wanted him to take you hard. To take out the sexual frustration of a week or so of abstinence on your body. To pin you down and have his way with you. Afterwards there’d be time for sweet and tender. And there definitely would be more than just one round tonight given the pill he’d just taken.

You were right about how close he was to snapping. The final straw seemed to be when you reached down, picking your underwear up from the floor. He watched the movement, a warning look on his face, but you didn’t stop. Instead, you took his hand, setting the soaking wet miniscule lace in his palm.

“Happy birthday,” with that, you turned around, crawling onto the bed on all fours, swaying your hips as you went.

You didn’t get very far before his hands were grabbing you by the waist, dragging you back to the edge. Your lower legs hung off the bed as he pressed his hips against your ass. He was burning hot, even through his clothes. You could feel the heat and weight of him as you ground back, smearing the wetness leaking from you onto his pants.

“I wanted to be nice,” behind you, you heard rustling as his shirt finally dropped off his shoulders. The clinking of his belt followed, thudding as it hit the floor next. “I wanted to make love to my sweet little wife, but I don’t think that’s what you want, huh?”

“I want you to fuck me, Jack,” you heard him drag his pants and boxers down, the thick length of his cock springing free to brush agaisnt you. Your hips pushed back, almost involuntarily, craving him inside of you. “Make love to me later, knock me up now.”

“Fuck,” his fingers found your clit, stroking through your folds and finding you oh so ready for him. He was making small, tight circles around the bud, sending small shockwaves of pleasure through you.

“Stop wasting time,” your words were breathy, slowly losing their bite. “At this rate it’ll be another 30 years before I get pregnant.”

“Shut up,” you could feel him lining himself up. “Let me make you feel good.”

“I’ll feel good if you- oh fuck!” 

Jack interrupted your whining by slamming in all the way. Usually, he was slow, guiding himself inside, taking the time to let you adjust. Not now, though, now he barely gave you a second to get used to the feeling before he was pulling out and pushing back in.

“Is this what you wanted?” His voice was strained, his hips working vigorously as he used his grip on your waist to drag you back onto him every time he thrust in. 

The sound was obscene. Wet slapping accompanied by your whines and gasps as he reached deep inside of you, bumping all the way up against your cervix with each push in. His own panting was nearly drowned out, but the groan that escaped him when you clamped down tight as he shifted angles was loud.

“Right there, huh?” Jack tilted his hips, angling towards that spot while one of his hands pushed down on your upper back. Your arms gave way, head meeting the sheets as he continued to pound away.

“Fuck, Jack, right there!” Your cries were high pitched and needy as he kept up the pace. His pounding was rhythmic, barely faltering even when his fingers found your clit again, and you tightened around him even more. The circles he was drawing were fast, matching the speed and timing of his thrusts.

Jack had long since learned to play your body like a fiddle and he was pulling no punches tonight. His hand not on your clit shifted, sliding down to press the heel of his palm right above your pubic bone. The added pressure had you crying out, walls pulsing as an orgasm washed over you unexpectedly.

It came in waves, your back arching and pushing your hips into his even more fervently as the pleasure grew and radiated out from between your legs. It was sudden, overwhelming, and seemingly never ending as he kept fucking you through it, his pace unchanging, his hands never moving from where they lay. 

“Fuck, baby,” he was panting, leaning halfway over you as you twitched. “God, fuck, I’m close.”

“C’mon, do it Jack,” you knew your voice was whiny and breathy, but you couldn’t care less as you begged him. “Please, do it. Cum inside me. I need it!”

This was far from the first time he’d fucked you raw. The two of you hadn’t used a condom since the early days of your relationship. After one broke and forced an incredibly awkward pharmacy run for Plan B, you’d gotten your IUD. Once it was effective, you had never had a barrier between you. Jack was well accustomed to coming inside of you.

But this was different. That protection was gone, sitting on the dining room table where he’d left it after dinner. And now you were begging him to cum inside you, not just because it felt good for both of you, but because you wanted to have his child. You wanted him leaking out of you, filling you up until you had no room left inside. You wanted the consequences of this action, the visible and physical manifestation of him left inside of you.

His hand on your stomach shot out, clutching the duvet beside your head as he leaned even farther over you. Jack’s rhythm grew erratic, faster than before as he folded over you. His fingers never stopped circling but they did hitch, that steady pressure faltering as he got closer.

“Fuck, oh fuck, you feel so good,” he was so close you could feel it. Feel him pulsing and twitching inside of you while his chest, damp with sweat pressed against your back. 

“Please,” the word was tangled with a moan as it left your lips. The orgasm that had seemed never ending was rising again, impossibly fast. “Please, Jack, want your baby, please.”

“Oh shit, fuck, fuck! Oh, I’m cumming, oh fuck!”

You felt the heat inside you, that warmth radiating out as he buried himself deep, hips rutting in grinding little thrusts as he came. It was overwhelming. Your own orgasm, much weaker than the previous one, jerked through your body as you felt him fill you.

The two of you stayed quiet, no words exchanged while you rode out the pleasure coursing through both your veins. Jack stayed buried as deep as he could inside of you, his hand finally leaving your clit when you stopped pulsing around him, only for it to find the front of your thigh, keeping you tightly pressed against him.

“I love you,” he whispered against your shoulder blade while he caught his breath.

“I love you, too,” you couldn’t really reach back to touch him in this position. At least, not without the growing ache in your lower back worsening. “I’m getting sore, Jack.”

“If I tell you to lay down and get comfortable, will you actually listen this time?” The smirk on his face as you peaked over your shoulder made you want to simultaneously punch him and kiss him. He slowly pushed himself up, lifting his weight off your body and pulling out.

“Yes, fine, I’ll listen,” you winced a little as his dick left your body, gasping a little when you realized he was still half hard.

“Shit, stop for a sec,” his hand palmed your ass cheek, stopping you from crawling forward to get comfortable. For a moment, you were confused. But then you felt it. His cum was dripping from you, spilling now that he’d finally pulled out. “Fuck, that’s so hot.”

The low groan in his voice had you clenching around nothing, pushing even more out of you.

“Gotta keep it all in there, baby,” his fingers came up, pushing it back inside of you. They curled downwards, brushing against the sensitive skin just behind your clit, your legs shaking as he repeated the motion. “Fuck you’re so wet. So full of me.”

“Jack, please,” you weren’t entirely sure what you were asking for, all you knew was that you needed him. Over your own panting breaths you could just make out the wet sound of his own hand dragging over his length.

“Ok, ok,” his fingers pulled out of you. “Get comfortable, I need you again.”

Your legs were weak and it took you a second to focus again as you made your way to the center of the bed, falling onto your back, your head resting among the pillows. Your eyes found him like a magnet, snapping into focus as he finally pulled his pants all the way down.

He was fully hard again, and you watched with blatant hunger as he sat on the edge of the bed, hastily unfastening his prosthetic before he was climbing over to you.

“Left your hips for me,” you followed his instruction, allowing him to slide a pillow below your ass to keep you propped up for him. “Good girl.”

He settled, kneeling, between your legs, length still glistening from just having been inside you. Jack dragged the head of his cock over your folds, taking in the way your body twisted and undulated, silently begging for him to be back inside you.

“Are you ready?” 

How kind and totally unnecessary for him to check in on you. You were mere seconds away from flipping him over and riding him.

“Yes, please Jack,” your hands reached down for him, trying to guide him in yourself.

“Ah-ah,” he tangled your fingers in his, leaning over you to trap your hands above your head with one of his. “I fucked you how you wanted, now we do it how I want it.”

“Just get inside me, please! I want you so bad,” you had a sneaking suspicion he might have wanted to tease you for even longer, but your husband had never been able to resist you for very long. You could see how much he wanted it, and your begging seemed to have won out over his desire to tease.

“God, you’re still so tight,” Jack buried his face in the crook of your neck as he slid inside. “How the fuck are you always so tight?”

“Made for you!” Your voice came out high and squeaky as he began to move. 

“Fuck yes you were,” his lips landed on the sensitive skin of your throat, sucking and kissing and no doubt leaving countless marks you’d be struggling to cover when you went back to work.

The pace he set this time was much slower than before, but somehow filthier. The slow, insistent grind of him withdrawing and pushing back in had your clit grinding against the neatly trimmed hair at the base of his cock. The sounds this time were quieter but no less salacious. The unmistakable sound of how wet you were filled the room every time he pushed in as deep as he could get, mixed with the whimpers and gasps of his name you let out as you clung to him. He was rather quiet the first time until he got close, but he must have been more sensitive now as his groans and curses vibrated against your neck. 

Those noises only built in volume as the two of you fell into a cycle, pushing each other even higher.

Every time you clenched tightly around him as he hit just the right spot, his teeth would scrape the sensitive skin on your neck or shoulder. In return, your fingernails would dig in tighter against the muscles in his back and his hips would press as deep he could, brushing against the spot that made you clench tighter.

“You feel so good around me, baby,” his movements were beginning to stutter as the two of you got closer again. His hand tangled in your hair as he pulled his head away from your neck, keeping your eyes locked on his.

Jack looked wild. His pupils were blown wide, eyes full of tenderness even as his skin was flushed, his mouth open as he let loose sounds of pleasure. 

“You’re all mine.”

You tried to nod against his grip in your hair, eyes slipping shut as he ground even harder into you. Everything was hazy. The pleasurable feeling of every movement sent zaps tingling up your spine.

“No, no keep your eyes open,” you gasped as he broke his semi-steady rhythm to thrust hard into you. Your eyes opened, locking onto his. “Good girl, that’s good.”

He was getting louder now, getting closer and consequently pushing you there as well. 

“Say it, baby,” you were tightening around his length uncontrollably now, impossibly close. “Tell me you’re mine.”

“I-I’m fuck!” You could barely get the first word out as his hand once again found its way between your bodies, rubbing against you as you squirmed. The pleasure was almost too much. “I’m your- fuck, fuck! I’m yours, Jack!”

“All mine,” his lips landed on yours while his fingers sped up. The kiss was sloppy, mostly tongues and teeth while you panted into each other's mouths. “Fuck, I’m gonna cum again, ohhh fuck.”

His hips snapped once, twice and then stilled as deep as he could get. Jack never stopped rubbing your clit, though, pushing you through to cum around him for the 3rd time so far as came inside you again.

You could barely feel the extra fluid. The space between your legs was already messy and your orgasm pushed every last thought out of your head as your body shook. Your legs tightened around his hips as your body arched up into him. One of his arms slid beneath your lower back, his hips burying his cock even deeper inside.

As your body trembled and the pleasure slowly faded, you realised he was speaking to you, the bussing in your ears finally fading enough for you to hear him.

“-love you so much, baby,” his head had dropped back down to the crook of your neck, but his lips hadn’t resumed their attack. The words were quiet. You knew he was talking to you, but the words almost seemed too personal. Like Jack’s filter had been fucked out of him, and the words spilling against your skin were his inner monologue. “Can’t believe you want to make me a dad. I swear, I’ll do my best. I’ll be so good. I can’t wait to hold her and love her-”

“Her?” You finally felt coherent enough to interrupt.

Jack jumped like he had forgotten you were there, even with his length still buried inside of you.

He hesitated for a moment, before lifting his head to look you in the eye. “I want a daughter,” his hand came to rest over your lower stomach. “One of the residents told me I seem like a girl-dad a year or so ago and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. And now, getting you pregnant… I hope it’s a girl.”

You were torn between laughing and crying. You remembered the off hand comment from one of the bolder first year students, along with the look of utter confusion on Jack’s face. He hadn’t understood the comment, simply telling them he didn’t have kids and to get back to work.

But the tenderness in his voice, the absolute love in his eyes as he looked down at you had a lump forming in your throat. 

“You know it’s not that quick,” your hand came up to cradle his jaw covered in that silver stubble you loved so much. “It might take a while for me to get pregnant. And there's no way to guarantee it’ll be a girl.”

His head turned slightly to press a kiss to your palm. “I don’t care how long it takes. I’m happy to keep trying.”

Your cheeks flushed at the insinuation, choosing to redirect. “And if it’s a boy?”

Jack lowered himself back over you, his nose brushing yours. “Then I’ll have a son. The only thing that matters is that the both of you are safe, happy, and healthy.”

“I love you,” the words were tight, barely getting out of your throat around the steadily growing lump of overwhelming emotion.

“I love you, too.”

[were--ralph]

good morning to fat men only

[pedge-page]

[buckslasagna]

Benedict coming out to Sophie ♡

[drsarcasticraspberry]

truly the wildest thing about all the Bridgerton discourse about "is Nicola Coughlan too FAT to be a convincing love interest???" is that in many ways she actually looks better in the period costumes than her thinner counterparts because she has the figure to really fill them out. those dresses are incredibly flattering on larger bodies because they emphasise the bust and cleavage whilst creating a very elegant silhouette. there's something unintentionally hilarious about hearing pearl-clutching in the distance over "idk is this FAT WOMAN sexy enough to be believable as an object of lust??" whilst Penelope Featherington's majestic heaving bosoms are almost spilling out of her dress in a category 5 titty event. if anything she's too sexy. they had to spend the first two seasons putting her in ugly dresses in a desperate attempt to conceal the fact that she's serving more cunt than the entire itty bitty titty committee combined

[raven-dor]

love in withdrawal

in which you avoid your desperately confused and in love husband

PAIRINGS: anthony bridgerton x fem!reader, anthony bridgerton x wife!reader

WARNINGS: flirty af, yearning af, pregnancy, meddling bridgerton siblings (specifically b,e, g, and h), angst, miscommunication, fluff sprinkled in, they love each other so much it makes me nauseous, fluffy ending

WORD COUNT: 4.1k

🎶 : would that i - hozier

AN: 🩵♥️💗 - god this one was so fun to write- it hurt me, but it was fun. please please please enjoy - and get hype for season four!!

Your laughter radiated off the pale blue walls as your husband, the lovesick fool that he was (his words, not yours) attacked you mercilessly with his kisses. His affection often kept you from starting your day, and this morning was no exception. “Anthony-”

“Yes?” 

“We must-” Your breath hitched when his horribly handsome eyes met yours. “We must go downstairs. Your family-” 

“Our family.” His lips caressed your skin as he whispered. “You are my wife. They are just as much your family as mine.” 

“Fine.” You shook your head endearingly. “Our family-” He hummed. “Will be hungry. We should break fast.”

“They can wait and allow me a moment to admire the stunning woman before me.” 

“Anthony-” You giggled. “You must contain yourself, or we shall never leave this bed.” 

He smirked, looking up from your clavicle, a horribly mischievous look in his eye. “Would that be so terrible?” 

You gasped, shoving him away and making your escape. Anthony couldn’t help but admire you as you pulled the duvet off the bed and wrapped yourself with it. Propping himself up on his elbows, his eyes filled with tenderness at the sight. He couldn’t help but adore how you made such a plain blanket look beautiful, an outfit made for a queen.

Donning your dressing gown and slippers behind your folding screen, you waltzed out from behind it, curtsying extravagantly to the man who still lay on your shared bed. “I shall see you downstairs, my lord.” 

“Yes, yes.” He groaned, falling against the mattress, a lingering smile still etched on his lips.

Your dressing room laid in your chambers, on the other side of the estate that you were supposed to be residing in. Your mother, the stickler for tradition that she was, was positively shocked when you told her you had no intention of staying in any room that your husband did not also reside in.

A love match was the best way to describe you and Anthony, because that is what it was. You had grown up around each other, had always known each other, and one day, when your eyes caught from across the ball room, you realized that perhaps you wanted to know him. 

The rest of your sordid love affair was history. 

You smiled kindly at the footman who opened your door, skirting past him to sit down in front of your vanity. “Good morning, Emma.” 

“Good morning, my lady.” Your lady’s maid smiled. “What shall I do today?” 

“Something simple ple-” Your stomach lurched, and Emma frowned. “I-” 

“My lady? Is something amiss?” 

“I do not-” The lurch soon grew to a low grumble, your hands growing sweaty as realization fell over you. “I- I need to-” Emma’s hands hooked under your arms, helping you out of your chair and ushering you to the chamber pot as you prepared for the inevitable. Bile rose into your throat, and your eyes squeezed shut, waiting for it to cease. 

“It is alright, my lady.” Emma held your hair back, rubbing a comforting hand on your back. 

You sat back, breathing hard. “I- I do not know what came over me.” 

“You must have eaten something that disagreed with you.” 

“Perhaps.” Your heart skipped, hand falling down to your stomach. “But I have not eaten today.”

“Then perhaps you have-” 

“Emma.” 

“Yes, ma’am?” 

“I have not had my course in some time.” 

“Oh, my lady.” Emma grinned. “That would be wonderful, truly wonderful.” 

“Yes.” You nodded, suddenly feeling nauseous all over again at the mere thought. “Quite wonderful.” 

You took a deep breath, hands clenching your gown in an effort to calm yourself before you rounded the corner, walking into the dining room. Your husband, seated at the head of the table, ceased talking to his brother, grinning brightly. “How good of you to join us, darling.” 

You smiled lightly, sitting to his right, across from Benedict. “It takes effort to look like this, my dear husband.” 

“You look just as beautiful as you did when you woke, I assure you.” Anthony’s words had a horrible effect on you. His warm smile and his handsome eyes combined with his compliments were enough to reduce you to mush.

“If you say so.” The food before you, which normally made your mouth salivate, now made your stomach twist with distaste. You hand clenched once more. Anthony placed a cup of tea before you, no doubt made just the way you liked it. 

“You look as if you’re going to be sick.” Your husband murmured, reaching out to hold your clenched fist. 

Benedict, who had the hearing of an owl, scoffed. “One second, you compliment her, the next you insult her. You are quite the juxtaposition, brother.”

Hyacinth laughed, leaning forward in her seat. “I must confess, brother, I am quite confused. You say that you are a gentleman, and then you proceed to call your wife ghastly.” She frowned. “It is quite rude.” 

Anthony huffed. “I never said-” 

“I must agree with Hyacinth, however much it pains me to do so.” Gregory smirked. “That is a rather ungentlemanly thing to-” 

“Shut it, all of you.” The viscount hissed. “My love?” 

His touch brought you back to life, the nausea subsiding as he rubbed your now relaxed hand. “I am fine.”

“Are you quite sure-” 

“Anthony.” You smiled. “Believe me when I say that it is nothing.”  

“They’re despicable.” Anthony shook his head at his siblings. “Little hellions, the lot of them.” 

You simply nodded, taking a small sip of your tea. 

“Let us be glad then, that it is just us.” He squeezed your hand reassuringly. The action was nice, the statement however, caused anxiety to roll over you in waves, your mind going to dangerous places. Anthony had not wanted children right away, of course he hadn’t. Now here you were, most likely with child, about to ruin his peace.

It was then that you decided you would not tell your husband the news just yet. He already had so much to tend to, why add another issue to the docket?

The rest of the week had been notably uneventful, leaving you to spend your time worrying about Anthony’s reaction. Emma, in her wisdom, had called a doctor for you, reassuring you that he was very discreet. 

And so there you waited, grateful that Anthony had been out on business. He would lose his head if he saw a doctor in his home, his mind instantly going to horrible places. If he were to learn that the doctor was there to see his wife, who knew what he would do?

It was not worth telling him on the small chance that you were in fact with child. Then, not only would you worry him, you would also disappoint him in one fell swoop. “My lady-” Emma’s voice rang out from the hall. “He is here. Shall I send him in?” 

“Yes, please.” You straightened your posture, trying to calm your thoughts while you braced yourself for news. Whether that would be good or bad news was yet to be determined.

“It is wonderful news, my lady.” The doctor smiled.

You gulped, your voice weak as you spoke. “Wonderful?”

“Yes, my lady.” He stood, dusting off his coat. “You are with child.” 

“Ah.” You nodded slowly, taking it all in. “How wonderful.” 

Emma stepped forward, walking the doctor toward the door. “My lady thanks you for your assistance, sir.” 

“Of course, anything for the Bridgertons.” 

God help you. It seemed as if time itself stood still as you sat there, pondering your future. You were with child, Anthony’s child.

“My love!” 

Your eyes widened, standing quickly. “Anthony.” 

“Is something amiss?” He tilted his head, and you tried your best to play ignorant. 

“Not at all.” 

“Ah.” Anthony opted not to tell you he had seen the doctor leave the house just as he had arrived. “How was your day?” 

“Wonderful.” The word had lost its meaning to you now, its repetition dulling its desired effect. “It was wonderful.” 

You hadn’t meant to avoid him. Initially, that is.

Really, it had come naturally, given your far-off state. You’d accidentally sat just far enough away from him that he could not touch you, hold you, or slip his arm through yours. Then, you’d realize that if you kept it up, he would not find out about the child, and you would have more time to plan the announcement. 

Anthony had noticed your cold shoulder almost immediately. Of course he had, there was nary a moment the two of you were not attached in some manner. When you attended balls, he was either holding your arm or the fabric of your dress. When you were with the family, playing games or simply enjoying each other’s company, he was either whispering sweet nothings in your ear or placing his arm around your waist. 

Today, however, you sat at such a distance that if he had tried his normal behavior, it would have looked odd and highly awkward. 

So of course he had noticed. 

The family, however, was oblivious to the separation of the couple. 

He’d tried to reach out, smiling ever so sweetly. Your eyes had simply flitted over, so quickly dismissed he’d hardly even realized. 

Then you’d gone to dinner, and you’d sat beside him, but you had not reached out for him, you had not laughed at any of his quips, and you had not looked at him, truly looked at him, the way that made his heart sore with adoration. 

He tried to reason with himself that perhaps you were in a sour mood, that you felt unwell. 

Then the family decided to play a game, and you paired with his mother. That was the final straw. Not once in the entirety of your courtship, engagement, or marriage had you and his mother paired together for a game. Heavens, you’d even partnered with Eloise and Benedict on occasion, but never the dowager Viscountess.

And so, as he miserably watched you from afar, he decided he had to ask what it was he had done to make you pull away in such a manner. 

You’d gotten ready for bed in silence, neither of you willing to break the peace, if you could call it that. Anthony sat against the headstand, watching you closely as if that would somehow show him the answer, and you sat in front of your vanity, brushing your hair to distract from the inevitable. 

“May I ask what has happened?” 

Your heart skipped, setting the brush down gently. The brush, you remembered, had been a gift from Anthony. One of many during your courtship. “What are you on about?”

“You know what I mean.”

You scoffed, pushing out of your chair to face him. “Well, it would seem that I haven’t the faintest-” 

“You have been distant. Do not try to deny it.” He crossed his arms, and while his face might have been stern, his eyes were anything but. They were desperate for answers, desperate to put an end to this so you could both return to how it had been, how it should be. “Why?” His voice broke.

“Anthony-”

“What have I done, truly?” He stood, walking toward you slowly as if you were a wild animal, skittish and afraid of being backed into a corner. In a way, you were. “Tell me, my love, and I swear to you, I will fix it.” 

“My lord-” 

He felt as if he was floating, outside of his body, unable to avoid the disaster before it erupted. Unable to understand you for the first time. “Please, do not call me that.” He begged, hands now reaching out for yours. You had never in the entirety of your time together, called him that without a teasing smile on your lips.

You stepped back, eyes to the ground. “I wish to-” A small sliver of hope grew in his chest. “I believe that I would like to sleep in my chambers tonight.” 

“You believe?” 

“Yes.” 

“But these are your chambers.” 

You shook your head. “My chambers, my lord. On the east wing.” 

He had to have been in a nightmare, fully pinching himself as if that would bring him out of it. It did not, making him all the more horrified. “I-” He realized, as he stared at you with heartbreak etched on his face, that there would be no solving this tonight, no understanding it while you were in this state. While he was in this state. “If that is what you wish.” 

You hadn’t even addressed him, stalking toward the door and slamming it behind you. 

It was a perfect day, the sky void of clouds as far as the eye could see, the slight breeze causing the flowers to rustle lightly. Their perfume danced through the air, and you couldn’t help but let out a content sigh, leaning your head back to bask in the sun. “I could sit and lounge here for hours.” 

“Yes.” Violet smiled, humming as she embroidered yet another handkerchief for you. “The gardens have always offered me comfort. I am glad to see you have followed suit.” 

“Did you spend much time out here whilst the children were little?” 

“Oh yes.” The Dowager Viscountess smiled warmly. “Edmund and I spent much time out here with the eldest, in particular. Anthony and Benedict always managed to dirty their clothes in minutes.” 

“He never told me.” You frowned.

“Yes well,” Violet’s voice softened. “He has always had a hard time reliving the past.” 

“Speaking of my dear repressed brother-” Eloise looked up from her novel. “Where is he?” 

You shrugged, ignoring the jolt of melancholy that shot through your heart. “I do not know.” 

“You do not know?” The younger girl shut her book, sitting forward in her seat. “Do you mean to tell me you have no idea of his daily schedule?” You nodded slowly. “Are you two not attached at the hip?” 

“Eloise-” Violet let out a warning murmur. “She cannot keep track of your brother’s whereabouts at all times.”

The horrible thing you realized as the two continued to quarrel, was that Eloise was right. Since your argument only four days ago, you and Anthony had yet to have a conversation beyond simple greetings. It brought about a whole other wave of sadness, thinking of how your fear to disappoint him had driven him away, how you had driven him away. Your heart pounded, eyes watering as you clenched your skirts tightly, hoping they would bring you out of your mind. 

Eloise groaned, her face animated as she argued. “I am simply asking-” 

You stood up quickly, your head light from the sudden movement. “I think I shall go inside.” 

“Are you quite well-” Eloise’s voice softened, reaching out as if to steady you. 

“I’m fine.” You spat out. “I shall see you both at dinner.” 

She watched you walk away with a frown, waiting until you’d turned the corner to question her mother. “Was it something I said?” 

“What truly troubles you?” 

You jumped, whipping around to face your mother in law. “Violet, forgive me, I hadn’t noticed you.” 

“Do not apologize.” She sat beside you, your swings swaying in tandem. “Something is troubling you, and I assume it did not begin with Eloise’s comment.” 

“I-” 

“You know you can tell me anything.” 

“Violet, I-” Your hand instinctively fell to your stomach, rubbing it gently. “I am with child.” 

“That is wonderful-” 

“Anthony does not want it.” You looked up, Violet’s face now pale. “I know he does not-” 

“And how do you know that, my darling?” 

“He said so.  At breakfast just the other day, he said he was glad that it was just the two of us. And I-” You swallowed. “I agree, but now that I am-” A tear fell down your cheek. “I’m scared that he will not be pleased, and so I have been-” You sobbed into your hands, hiccuping. “I have been pushing him away.” 

“Oh my dear girl.” Violet caressed your back gently. “You must tell him.” 

“I know.” You nodded, sitting up. “I know I must, but I am horrified by it. Of the thought of telling him the truth. He will- he will be so terribly angry.” 

“He will not be angry.” Her voice was still soft, but firm, confident in her son and the way she had raised him. “He loves you, he could never truly be upset with you.” 

“But he said-” 

“He said that he liked it was just the two of you, I know.” She smiled, pushing a stray hair behind your ear. “My darling girl, he will be elated when he learns of this precious news.” You nodded, knowing that what Violet said was the truth. “I understand the hesitancy, and you must know that I will support you, whatever you decide to do.” 

“Thank you-”

“But, you must also know that my son loves you terribly.” She squeezed your hands gently. “And he will be so very excited to learn of the news.”

“My love.” Anthony’s voice, wavering from fear of your avoidance, caused chills to run down your spine. Not just your spine, you lamented, but your arms, your very soul. “You look stunning.” 

You smiled kindly, the wall you had so meticulously built crumbling to ash the longer you went about not confessing. “Thank you, Anthony.” 

“Anthony, eh?” He smiled, stepping closer so his siblings would not barge their way into your conversation. “I have missed your voice.” 

Your smile grew, reaching out to grab his hand. “I have missed-” 

“Bridgerton!” Basset’s voice echoed through the entryway. “It’s wonderful to see you.” 

Anthony almost looked dejected as he turned to his friend, bowing ever so slightly. “Basset. It’s been too long.” 

You curtsied, hugging your sister in law tightly. “Daphne, you look well.” 

“I am well.” Daphne’s smile illuminated the whole of Grosvenor Square as her hand drifted down to her stomach. “Very well, indeed.” 

Your eyes widened, and you couldn’t help but wish and celebrate along with her. “Are you quite sure?” 

“Very.” The Duchess leaned into her husband’s side. “I do hope it is a boy.” 

“As long as the babe is healthy, I do mind what it is.” Basset looked down at Daphne like she was the center of his universe, like there was no one else. “You are glowing, my darling.” 

Anthony’s hand to reach out and hold your hand in his. “Congratulations, sister.” Your eyes drifted over, taking in his expression, happy, but almost empty. Like something was missing, and you couldn’t help but think that perhaps he would benefit from learning the news of his own wife being pregnant with his first child.

You slipped your arm through his, leading the way to the dining room. “Anthony.” 

“Yes, my darling?” 

You swallowed, willing yourself to be brave. “There is something that I wish to-” 

“Sister!” The dining room burst into utter chaos, all the siblings jumping out of their seats to hug Daphne and the Duke.

“Perhaps-” You frowned. “Perhaps another time then.” 

Anthony frowned along with you, an uneasy sort of knot twisting tight in his stomach. “Another time.” 

The carriage ride was smooth, the car itself silent as you and your husband waited to arrive at the Hastings Ball. Daphne and Simon, while attending dinner just three nights ago, announced that they were hosting a ball to not only declare the imminent arrival of their third child but also to celebrate a last hurrah before they retreated to the country for some respite. Very last minute, but they knew their estate would still be filled to the brim with the eager-minded mamas and their ever more eager-minded daughters.

You had decided that tonight would be the night you confessed the truth to Anthony, the night you would finally conquer your fear of him being less than enthused. If he reacted the way you had had nightmares about, at least you would have a good support system in his family. 

But, you told yourself as you admired his handsome face, you knew that would not be the case. “Anthony?” 

“Yes?” His voice was tight, strained. 

“I must tell you something rather delicate-” 

“Stop.” He stared at the ground. “Please don’t.” 

Your heart stopped. “Sorry?” 

“I know.” 

You raised a tentative brow. “You do.” 

“I had a suspicion.” 

“Ah.” You nodded slowly. “What gave it away?” 

“Well,” He dared to look up from the floor of the carriage car, eyes full of fear, of heartbreak. You were entirely confused as you watched his hands tremble. “It began when you confined yourself to the opposite side of the estate.” 

“Yes.” You nodded slowly. “I am sorry about that-” 

“May I ask you one thing?” 

“Anything.” You muttered much too fast. “Anything at all, you know that.” 

“How long?” His voice broke as he stared into your very being. “How long have you been in love with another man?” 

“What?” Your voice grew an octave higher. “I’m sorry?” 

“I swear to you-” You had never seen the man you loved become such a shell of himself. “I will not be angry. I am difficult to deal with, I know. If you-” His eyes began to water as he fell to his knees in front of you, as if he were begging for you to stay. “If you have fallen out of love with me, it is alright-” 

“Stop talking this instant.” You gasped. “Anthony Bridgerton, I am not-” 

“I still love you.” He cried out, on the verge of tears. “I love you desperately, you are all I breathe for, all I live for. I fear I cannot let you go, cannot let you leave. I will-” Your breath stopped as he straightened his posture, his lips just below yours. “I will fight for you to stay with all I have. And soon-” 

“Anthony, I am with child.” You slapped a hand over your mouth, shocked at the sudden nature in which you’d confessed the happy news. “I am with your child.” He was horribly still, eyes wide. You took your hand away from your mouth, caressing his cheek gently. “Are you quite alright?” 

In an instant, he leaped forward, pinning you against the wall of the carriage. You gasped, moaning into his kiss, your body melting in his touch. “Anthony-” 

“How long?” He’d been peppering your entire face with kisses when he’d asked. “How long have you known?” 

“Only two weeks.” You replied in between his attacks of passionate, breath stealing, kisses. “But I am almost three months along.” 

“Three months?” He grinned. “This is wonderful, simply wonderful.” 

“You are pleased, then?” You whispered. “I so hoped you would be-” 

“How could I not?” He pulled away, and you found yourself almost following after him. He was grinning, eyes now bright. “The love of my life is pregnant with our first child. I am overjoyed, truly.” 

“I am glad.” His hands loosened their grip on your wrists. “I am so sorry, Anthony.” 

“Is this the reason, then?” He almost laughed. “Is this why you have been avoiding me as of late?” 

You felt so foolish, twiddling your thumbs to distract from the shame. “It is.” 

“My darling girl-” He held your hands tightly in his, leaning his forehead against yours. “Please do not ever think that I would be disappointed by this news. I can’t bear to think that you thought I would be displeased.” 

“Anthony-” You couldn’t help but sob. “I have been so inconceivably horrible to you.” 

“No-” He shook his head. “Do not say that-” 

“I have.” You continued on, fighting the urge to fall into his hold. “Anthony, you must know that I was so scared. So terribly scared.” 

“Do you know-” He kissed your lips so gently you’d hardly felt it. “Do you truly know how maddening it has been not to touch you?” Another soft kiss, this time, on the corner of your mouth. “To kiss you, to hold you, and admire you for hours and hours on end?” 

“Anthony-” 

“My beautiful, beautiful girl-” His hands drifted up, cupping your face in his hands. “I love you desperately, and I cannot wait for this child.” 

“I love you too.” You sobbed. “It hurt me to be away from you.” 

“It hurt me much more, my darling.” He laughed. “I do not think my heart could take it, being apart from you.” 

“I promise I will never do this again.” You whispered, leaning forward so your lips grazed against his as you spoke. “I shall never ever-” 

“You will not be able to.” He whispered back. “Because I will not let you go.”

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[scarletjohansson]

Mr. Darcy walked so that Benedict Bridgerton could run (x)

BRIDGERTON S04E5

[crowley-anthony]

[beentainted-deactivated20260723]

pairing: joel miller x reader

summary: when big bad joel miller can't find the guts to ask you out, he jumps to the obvious next best option: threatening every other man who would dare to do so.

warnings: fluff; 1 mention of joel being taller but that man is just big; so much bantering; idiots in love.

word count: 1.4k

"What is your goddamn problem, Miller?!"

You barely registered the few heads that turned at the sound of your voice, barely registered that you were all but shouting in the middle of the street, your mind only focused on the two familiar figures you rushed to like a woman on a mission.

Tommy's head snapped towards you from where he stood, previously talking to his brother. His eyes went wide as you approached, drifting to where your boots stomped towards him with enough force to kick snow. His relaxed expression shifted to one way too similar to the one kids make when they're in trouble.

"Not you, Tommy." You blurted once you were close enough, then turned to his brother, one sharp finger pointing directly to the center of his chest. "I'm talking to him."

Joel's eyebrows lifted, almost high enough to touch his hairline, a puff of air forming around his lips as he let out an annoyed huff. Tommy released a sound that might be a choked laugh, then raised his hands in mock surrender, already starting to move backwards like he was stepping away from a bomb.

"Alright, I don't wanna be around this." He said, then whistled innocently as he turned to walk away. You noticed that he didn't go far, though, slowing his steps just near enough to still be able to hear you. Nosy ass.

You turned back to Joel. Pure, blinding rage turned your veins to lava. You almost didn't hear yourself above the blood rushing in your ears.

"Don't bother acting surprised. Dina already told me everything." You seethed, faintly recalling the girl's nervous confession just a few minutes earlier.

You loved Dina, you really did, but if there was one thing she wasn't any good at, it was keeping secrets. And as if the universe couldn't form a bigger coincidence, she was exactly the person who crossed your path this morning when the realization that something was wrong finally crept into you.

It had been happening for weeks now. The cute guy from Tipsy Bison who you had been flirting with the past nights suddenly starting to avoid your gaze from across the room. Bill from the flower shop only reponding you with a curt nod when you commented on the weather. Christ, yesterday some guy you looked at while walking past immediately turned to cross the street like you were infected.

And when you complained about it to Dina, she just lowered her head and tried to hide the slightlest curl around the corner of her lips, like she was really fighting back the urge to say something funny. The second you noticed it, you were on her.

It took you some interrogation to get there, but Dina eventually gave in once she realized you weren't going anywhere before she told you everything she knew. A few minutes holding her under your glare like you were the fucking FBI, and the poor girl didn't stand a chance.

Joel's expression shifted into realization at the sound of her name. He didn't need you to tell him what exactly did Dina let out, he already knew what crime he was being charged of. There was no need in denying it now.

His chest rumbled with a groan as he crossed his arms across it. "That fucking big mouth."

"Yeah, so now here's what's going to happen:" You stepped closer, your breaths mingling in the chilling morning air. "You will apologize to those poor, innocent men that had done nothing but be kind to me and take back whatever threat it was that you held over their heads. And, for whatever reason you though you had to, you won't try to mess with my personal life ever again. Do you get it, Miller?"

Once you were done, your heart pounded so loud inside your ribcage you were afraid Joel was going to hear it. For the first time, you grew aware of the fact that you could hardly look any intimidating to him right now. His eyes traced down at your burning cheeks from where he towered over you, arms still crossed over his stiff chest, shoulders so broad they blocked your view from the street behind him.

You tried to keep your composure, spine straightening a little, your finger moving back up from where it had lowered to press against his chest. You gulped around the lump forming in your throat, and his eyes slowly followed, stopping at the spot where your skin moved.

"I said, do you get it?"

"I get it just fine, sweetheart." His voice came out almost too low, like he was in a trance. "Might not hear as well as I should but I'm not deaf just yet.

Joel's eyes finally drifted back up to yours, and you managed to even your breath a little, chest heaving a little less frantically now. He held your fiery gaze then, and you saw a flicker of a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.

"I have a condition, though."

That took you off guard. You didn't know why, but you didn't expect Joel to fight you on it. Probably because you didn't think much about it before you made the decision to confront him on sheer impulsivity.

You eyebrows knitted together as you silently urged him to continue. You almost wished you didn't let him finish, such was the force that the words hit you when they left his mouth.

"I want you to go on a date with me."

You choked on air. The coughing fit that followed had tears gathering in your eyes, your chest fighting to bring air back into your lungs. Joel's arms fell to his sides, almost like he was going to reach out to touch you. You lifted your palm to keep him where he stood, trying to gain yourself a minute to process what your just heard.

"I—" Your voice came out hoarse once you could finally speak. You cleared your throat and tried again. "I'm sorry, you what?"

"Don't act like you didn't hear me." Joel retorted. He went on like the words were already on the tip of his tongue, like he was dying to get them out. "You go on a date with me, and if after that you still wanna go back to those chicken, lazy assholes then that's fine. I'll take back every word I ever said to 'em. But you're goin' out with me first."

You blinked once. Twice. Your feet were glued to the ground, your lungs gasping for air as if your body suddenly remembered to breathe. Your brain scrambled to find something to respond, stumbling on the first dumb thing you put your mind on.

"Well, I also have one condition, then."

That smirk deepened then. Joel took a step closer, head tilting like he couldn't dare to miss what you were going to say next. "Yeah? What is that?"

"I'm choosing where you gonna take me."

It sounded more like a threat than anything else. You struggled to hold onto what you did best when it came to Joel: bickering the shit out of him. The next option was to let him see how you really felt inside—startled and boneless and so fucking content with where this was heading—, and you weren't ready for it just yet.

Joel scowled like you personally offended him.

"You ain't choosing shit." He chuckled like it was the most dismissive thing you ever said. "Might've been a while, but I still know how to fucking date. Just be ready at seven."

You flinched in surprise, though it was something Joel would so obviously say. No, you were surprised with the reaction it got from you. Your stomach flipped with what could never be mistaken with anything other than excitement. You needed to get away from Joel before you did something stupid like kissing his goddamn mouth.

"Alright then." You clipped. "Fine."

"Fine."

"Fine."

A muffled snort sounded from somewhere around you, like someone was trying to hold back laughter. You thought it might be Tommy. You didn't care.

"Don't be late. God knows you like to do that." That goddamn smirk. Hanging from the corner of his lips like it dared you to do something about it.

"Now you just made me want to do it more." You said as you turned to walk away, your defensive posture never faltering. "I'll see you later, then."

His smirk grew into a full on grin. "See you later, sweetheart."

"Stop calling me that." You hissed back from behind your shoulder, just to have something to get back to him.

But if anyone that passed through you on the street as you walked back home were to say something, they would tell you all about how the smile twitching at the corners of your mouth might as well just lightened up your whole face.

[shadowqueen2024]

Pairing: Joel Miller x f!reader

Word Count: 2.8k

Content Warnings: Explict, 18+ MDNI, p with minimal plot, unprotected pinv (wrap it before you use it), creampie, dirty talk (love some filthy talk Joel), baby fever, multiple orgasms, mentions of pregnancy, breeding kink, oral (f! receiving), fluff tone in the beginning (I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself🤣), aftercare, let me know if I miss any!

Summary: When Joel sees you taking care of Benji, he couldn't help but think what it was like having your own kids. And once he knew it's what you've wanted, he was going to make sure it happens.

A/n: Guess who finished her fic early?? This is my first attempt at something kinky, probably not the best, but I figured I'd give it a try. As part of @time-for-my-weekly-spanking's 2026 kinky Challenge found here, I hope this is good, and thank you for letting me join 💖 Any feedback for improvement is always welcome!

AO3 | Main Masterlist

When you and Joel started your relationship, the subject of kids was a tough one to get through, given how it had ended with Sarah.

But when Benjamin was around - when you'd babysit, he grew to love you. Joel couldn't deny the effect that the sight had on him. Seeing you take care of his nephew and get along with the kid, it made his thoughts trail to places where he wasn't expecting.

How your body would change - how your stomach would adjust and change to make room for his child growing inside of you.

The child he put there...

It did something to him that he wasn’t going to admit out loud.

Today, the family was gathered for a meal with one another as a way to catch up with each other, and with what’s been going on around Jackson. Family dinners in Jackson were normally loud in a way you learned to love. They weren’t the kind of loud that came from chaos or fear - not anymore - but from a place of pure joy that the others were alive and together. From overlapping voices, the clinking of cutlery, and laughter bouncing off the walls, the house was livelier the more the family spent time together.

Joel sat beside you at the table, shoulder warm where it pressed against yours. He looked relaxed, at ease in a way that still sometimes surprised you to see. You had grown used to the gruff and serious look that was practically glued onto his face - that seeing him calm and not tense under the weight of keeping everything around safe… it was a pleasant change. The lines of his face were softened when he laughed at something his brother said, head tipping back slightly.

And then there was Benji. The little boy had made his way over to you, his small hand tugging at your sleeve, his eyes bright and smile wide, like you were the most interesting person in the room. And right now, you were.

“Can you read this with me?” He asks, holding up the picture book he has in his free hand.

You couldn’t help but smile at his adorable question. He could’ve gone to his mother, his father, or even his uncle. But he chose you, and how were you going to say no to him? “Of course, bud,” you say, making space for him on the couch, which he hopped on and made himself at home on your lap, and all you could do was laugh at his quiet insistence to sit on your lap before you began reading to him.

While you read to him, Joel was just admiring you. The way you weren’t tense around the boy, and how your lips moved as you pronounced each word from the pages of the book. Occasionally, your gaze would flick up to him, and you caught him in his staring trance. You saw the look of pure affection, and maybe a hint of something else. Longing? But not in like you were used to.

“You okay?” you asked softly, gently nudging his knee with your elbow.

He blinked slowly, like he was being pulled out of his wandering thoughts, before nodding, “‘m fine, darlin’.”

You could tell he wasn’t being fully truthful with you, but you didn’t push the subject much. Not with his brother, young nephew, and Maria in the room.

Once the book was finished, Benji was already falling asleep against you, and that’s when Maria and Tommy got up to take him back to their house for his bedtime.

“Goodnight,” he muttered to you as Tommy picked him up from your lap, his head resting against Tommy’s shoulder. “Night uncle Grumpy,” he says to Joel, and none of you could hold back the smile that made its way on your faces. And Joel just gave a playful eyeroll and a single nod, “Night kiddo.”

Maria and Tommy exchanged goodnights with the two of you before you closed the door behind them and turned to Joel, leaning against the doorframe, “You’ve been awfully quiet tonight. More than normal.”

“Just been thinkin’,” he mutters, looking down at his chipped coffee mug, giving a small shrug.

“About?” you pressed, tilting your head to the side as you watched how his shoulders tensed ever so slightly with the questions.

“You’re good with him,” he admits, bringing his gaze up to yours, and you can see the hint of uncertainty that settles in them. Like he was debating whether to bring it up or not. “I tried not thinkin’ ‘bout it, but it’s just gettin’ harder.”

“Thinking about what?” you asked softly, slowly making your way back to the couch before sitting down on the cushion beside him. “About kids?”

His breath slightly hitches as you hit the nail on the head. He reluctantly nodded, “Yeah.”

You studied him for a moment, really looking at him. The man you loved never let his vulnerability get the best of him. The subject of kids has been a touchy one. The two of you had briefly talked about it when your relationship was getting serious, and he never said he’d never want to have kids. You understood he was just hesitant about it all - understood that, though he’d deny it as much as he could - he was scared of losing another kid he loved.

You felt it too. The strange pull when you saw families together through the community. With how your body reacted when you thought of a mini replica of you and Joel running around.

“You wanna have a kid?” you asked, a small smile on your lips at the thought that he did, in fact, want to have a baby with you. “You’re sure about this, hon?”

He took your hands into his, giving them a soft squeeze, his gaze finally meeting yours, “‘m sure, darlin’. I wanna watch you grow our baby. I wanna start the rest of our life with you.” He brings a hand to your cheek, gently cupping it, “Do you want that?”

You placed your hand over his that was against your cheek before shifting onto his lap, your legs on either side of his, and your hands cup his cheeks, “I’d love to have your kids, Joel. I want all of your babies.”

Joel exhaled heavily, like he’d been holding his breath for years, as he leaned his head into your palms, his hands going to your hips. He then kissed you - gentle at first, like he was testing the waters. But as soon as you lightly pressed your chest against his, a hand gently gripping the hair at the bottom of his neck, his hesitance instantly melted away as he gently tugged your hip closer to his.

When he finally pulled back, he exhales heavily through his nose, his head dropping to your shoulder as he muttered, “Damn.”

“That bad?” you asked teasingly, lowering your head to place brief pecks against the side of his neck.

He quickly shakes his head, his lips moving to your collarbone to place a kiss before he grumbles, “That damn dangerous.”

You giggled at the grumble, and before you could protest, he shifted to the edge of the couch, wrapping his arms around your waist as he got up. You squealed softly at the sudden movement, your legs instinctively wrapping around his waist and your arms going around his neck.

When you and Joel reached the bedroom, his lips were instantly back on yours, your breaths heavy as he gently lowered you onto your back on the bed. You undressed each other slowly, your hands running along each other’s bodies in a familiar pattern.

“Lay down, baby,” Joel whispered once he was down to his black boxers and you were bare. He placed a kiss against your forehead, temple and then your lips, “Wanna taste you.”

He gently guided you to lie back before he settled between your thighs - his broad shoulders pushing your legs wider. The rough calluses on his hands contrasted sharply with the gentle way he traced the sensitive skin of your inner thighs, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. His beard scratched deliciously against your skin as he lowered his head, the sensation alone sending shivers through your body. And Joel caught on.

“I know, baby. You’re getting all worked up for me,” he muttered with a chuckle, lowering his head down between your legs and closer to your core. He pressed his lips against your folds, a soft closed-mouth kiss against your most sensitive skin, and your body immediately trembled.

Then his tongue swept out, a broad, flat stroke that parted you slowly. He took his time as his tongue traced your outer lips before dipping inside to taste your slick heat.

“Christ,” he murmured, voice muffled against your core. “Already so wet for me. So fuckin’ perfect.” You let out a soft moan as your hand instinctively went to run through the strands of his hair, not guiding, but as a form of stability. He pulls back just enough to look up at you, the evidence of your arousal glistening on his lips, “This all for me, darlin’?”

You couldn’t help but nod, your breath hitching, and he blew a cool stream of air against your heated center. “All for you,” You muttered, and Joel returned his mouth to your center. He let out a low groan at your taste, one of his hands leaves your hips to rest against your stomach – fingers spreading across your lower stomach, holding you to him as his mouth worked on your core.

His other hand slid from your thigh to between your legs, where Joel’s mouth was residing. He slowly slid two of his thick fingers inside you, curling them just right to make you cry out as his mouth began focusing on your clit. You feel the heat pooling even further in your lower stomach, and you know you couldn’t handle much more. The dual sensations had you arching your back and your fingers tangled in his hair as you ground your hips against his face, searching for more of that devilish tongue of his.

“Joel…” you panted, your voice barely recognizable. “‘m close.”

He responded with a soft groan, increasing the pressure of his suck on your clit, his tongue working relentlessly as his fingers pumped in and out of you. “C’mon sweetheart,” he grunts, pulling his head back just enough to look up at you from between your legs, “Wanna feel you come on my tongue.”

His words were your undoing as your body tensed, waves of pleasure washing over you. Your thighs clamped around his head as you cried out his name, and Joel didn’t stop, working through your orgasm until you were slumped down on the mattress, panting and spent.

When he finally lifted his head, his mouth and chin were glistening with your arousal, a satisfied smirk playing on his lips, “I could die a happy man between those legs.”

You huffed out a laugh before taking his hand into yours, tugging him up to meet you before pressing a kiss against his lips, tasting yourself on his tongue, and you couldn’t help but moan. You slide your hands down Joel's body before reaching his boxers. The hard length of his cock straining against the fabric couldn’t be more obvious than it is right now. Reaching inside, you wrapped your hand around his length, giving it a few slow strokes before focusing your palm on the head. He groaned at the contact, attempting to keep his hips still, but failed as it shifted closer to your hand regardless.

He slides the boxers off and tosses them aside. He was long and thick, and his tip was an angry red, curving up toward his stomach. “Fuck me, baby,” you whispered out, “I need your cock inside me. Filling me up.”

“Damn it, woman,” he grunts out, shifting down your body before settling between your legs, this time with his cock between your folds, gathering the combination of your release with the mess his mouth made. “Got a fuckin’ dangerous mouth on you.”

“Please…” you whimpered, shifting your hips in an attempt to take him inside of you.

“Not yet,” he says gruffly, running a hand along your breasts, rubbing the sensitive nipples, drawing out a whine from you. “Been thinkin’ ‘bout this for so long. ‘bout makin’ you a momma, watchin’ you grow with my seed inside you.”

He positioned the tip of his cock against your entrance, applying a small amount of pressure before he breached your entrance. He lowers his head against the crook of your neck as he slides in deeper and slowly, inch by agonizing inch. The stretch was incredible, and both of you moaned at the sensation. The aching fullness was familiar. When he is buried to the hilt, his hips flush with yours, he rests his forehead against yours.

“Fuck…” he chokes out, his voice strained with an effort of remaining still to allow you to adjust. “Always feel so damn tight. Like you were made for my cock to stretch.”

You wrapped your legs around his waist, inviting him deeper inside you once you adjusted, and Joel began moving - his strokes deep and measured. Each thrust sent waves of pleasure through you, building slowly but steadily toward another orgasm. "You like that?" he growled, his pace quickening. "You like how I fuck this tight little pussy?"

"God, yes," you moaned, your nails digging into his back. "Harder, Joel. Fuck me harder."

He obliged, his thrusts becoming more forceful. His hips snapped against yours, the sound of skin on skin echoing through the room, followed by your moans, his heavy grunts, and the bed creaking under the exertion.

"Gonna fill you up," he panted, his voice strained. "Gonna make sure it sticks so you'll be all round 'n full with my baby. Tits fillin’ up to feed our lil’ one. God darlin’.”

Your body is humming, alive with sensation. Every nerve ending is on fire. Joel knew you were getting close; he could feel how you were tightening around his cock. And you could feel he was close just by how his cock was throbbing and twitching inside you, followed by the frantic pace he began taking

“I’m close,” you murmured, one of your hands running through his hair, and he buries his head against your neck.

“Let me feel it,” he pants against your neck, a grunt escaping his lips, “’m close too. Gonna come inside you. Gonna make you a momma.”

“Fill me up baby.”

He reaches between you, his thumb finding your clit, rubbing it in tight and quick circles. And that was all that it took to throw you over the edge. Your orgasm took over you, a tidal wave of pleasure that ripples through your entire body in powerful waves, leaving your body limp and shaky.

Joel follows just moments longer, letting out a long moan of your name, his body shuddering against yours as he finds his release. You could feel the warmth of him spilling inside you before he collapses against you, his weight steadied on his forearms, his face still deeply buried against your neck.

Both of you were a panting and boneless mess, but neither of you made the effort to move. For a long moment, you just lie there, tangled together with your bodies slick with sweat, and your breathing slowly returning to normal. After a minute, he shifts; he hadn’t pulled out just yet, keeping the two of you connected. He brushes a stray strand of hair from your forehead, his touch impossibly gentle. “You alright?”

“More than alright,” you respond, a smile on your face that you were able to contain, and he huffs a soft laugh. “Couldn’t think of a better way to practice.”

He places a kiss on your lips, then your forehead, before he slowly pulls out of you, your body protesting the loss. He gets up from the bed, walking to the bathroom. You hear the tap running, and he returns with a rag in hand.

“Open for me,” he says, and you open your legs. He gently wipes the rag over your entrance and thighs, cleaning you before setting the rag aside and lying back down beside you, pulling you against his chest with the blanket wrapped around the two of you.

“We’ll be doin’ this ‘till it sticks, sweetheart,” Joel suddenly says, and you tilt your head up to him. “You better prepare your throat for a lot more moanin’.”

You couldn’t help but chuckle at his words, wrapping your arms around his neck as you settled against him. “Practice makes perfect.”

Taglist: @kokoluwie, @cozymochaa, @picketniffler, @christinamadsen, @harriedandharassed, @rosharanfiction, @xfanficluvrx, @isabellaboo2025, @kirsteng42, @missadangel, @bishtrouille, @death-in-a-tar0t-card, @mystickittytaco, @missladym1981,

Tags WIP Wednesday post: @aurorawritestoescape, @ess-evo, @time-for-my-weekly-spanking

Divider credit: @/bonnieknowsbest

[gutsby]

okay, kinda gross. But what about dads bestfriend! Joel and he comes in while you’re showering. Accidentally slips his clothes off to join you, accidentally lets his eyes linger to long and then accidentally slips inside your pussy. The excuse is water makes everything more slippery. 🤷‍♀️

YOU HAD ME AT “okay, kinda gross” HAHAHAHA

I MISSED WRITING DBF!JOEL SO BAD AGH 😭 Imagining this as part of the Waiting Game ‘verse, maybe three weeks after the events of the last chapter, but y’all can definitely read this one as a standalone, too!

Different

Pairing: dbf!Joel x Reader

Warnings: 18+. Unprotected p-in-v. Shower sex 🚿. Breeding kink (…but Reader’s already pregnant LOL). Descriptions of dryness due to hormonal imbalances—father-to-be-Joel knows how to improvise, though!! ;) Looooots of daddy/mommy talk. Sprinkle of sex ed stuff thrown in for the sick fucks (me) who are into it.

“This isn’t normal.”

Your hand rested flat over your stomach—which itself hadn’t begun to swell yet at all—and you stared ahead.

Seven weeks.

If you and Joel had done the math correctly, you were seven weeks pregnant, and it already felt like everything about your body was changing. From the way that you ate to how you fell asleep at night, your nausea in the mornings and the noises you made when you finally sat down and sighed with relief. You were always sleepy. And, as unfair as it seemed, while you were worn out all hours of the day, your sexual arousal was unwavering.

Inexorable.

And yet, you were completely dry.

With your other hand, you felt between your legs.

You let out a low, resounding groan.

“Come ON!”

A second later, the bathroom door crashed open.

“What?! What’s wrong?” Joel hurried out.

You were standing in the shower, water pelting your front and running every which way down your body. Swiftly, you slid your touch away from the apex of your thighs, and you blinked through the mist hanging before you.

“I—I’m alright,” you answered, quiet.

Joel appeared at the glass then. He opened it a crack.

Peering inside, and meeting your gaze, “Yeah? You OK?”

“Yup. Now go back to—”

“And our baby?”

Always “our baby.” Scarcely twenty-one days since the two of you came to learn of your pregnancy, and Joel was always, always referring to this tiny mix of your DNA and his as that—which it was. You just weren’t quite able to fathom it, still. What, with all the fluctuations in your hormones, the sense that everything was different but nothing yet visible, the highs and the lows and wildly overwhelming moments where you swore you couldn’t handle any of it—I’m just really fucking scared, Joel—and he’d never failed to reassure you through it. It just wasn’t easy believing him all the time, well…when it felt—

“Fine,” you managed, smile tight. “Our baby’s fine.”

You’d let both your hands fall to your sides, and now you were trying your best not to worry Joel any more than he clearly already he was. You shifted your weight from one foot to the other, and you reached for the shower valve.

Just a little warmer, maybe…

You could stay here awhile, get more relaxed…

“Not feeling dizzy?” Joel pressed, eyes serious. “Anxious, lightheaded, tired, tender, uh…sensitive?”

You couldn’t help a little huff of laughter at the last.

Those same, soft, chocolate-colored irises had invariably skated down your form and scanned you naked and wet, and of course, there was a flicker of intrigue. Marveling.

How do you think you got knocked up in the first place?

“It’s just, like…I think it’s insomnia or something. Apparently super common in the first trimester,” you answered, only half-way telling a lie in saying it.

It was true, you were tired all the time and somehow tossing and turning all night when you tried to sleep.

The fact you were also dry as a desert and impossibly sexually frustrated because of it was a separate issue.

Joel’s look continued its descent down your body, and he hummed. You could just hear the cogs turning inside his head and imagine the thoughts accompanying that path, viscerally aware yourself that everything he was seeing would only get bigger over the next eight months.

You turned and grabbed a bar of soap.

“Go back to sleep, Joel. I mean it. Gotta be up at six to catch our flight, and you know if we’re even five minutes late, Tommy’s gonna personally castrate you, guaranteeing no more babies for me. So…”

Forcing your voice to sound lighthearted and fine, you could still hear it shake as you spoke. One meager attempt at lathering your chest, and your grip slipped embarrassingly quick, sending the soap flying and then skittering across the shower floor. You bent over to get it.

In a blink, a larger, calmer hand intervened.

It snagged the bar swiftly and, at almost the same time, helped you straighten again. Joel stepped in the shower.

“Oh, babe—”

That was you.

Grimacing, this time not due to any pain or embarrassment but simply realizing that Joel was in his boxers—he was still partly clothed and he had walked under the water’s spray, and it was getting all over him.

“—oh, Joel, don’t do that. You’re gonna be soake—”

“I’ll skip the whole wedding, darlin’. I don’t care,” Joel interjected, ignoring your palms pushing him backward. “That’s my brother, sure as shit, but it ain’t—he ain’t—”

“You’re being ridiculous,” you hissed shrilly.

“And you’re carrying our baby. So what if I miss out on some trip to the beach and don’t see Tommy and Maria swap rings? You know they’re gonna film it all anyhow.”

But it wasn’t just some trip to the beach, and this wasn’t merely a matter of exchanging rings and calling it a day—this was a wedding on the French Riviera, for fuck’s sake. You and Joel were spending the night at a hotel right by the airport so you wouldn’t have to wake up as early, and it was all so nice. You already felt terrible for ruining what was meant to be a romantic evening for the two of you before going to see this huge, beautiful occasion overseas, as you’d been puking half the day. Then you’d had to go and take a shower at two A.M. because you couldn’t sleep. It was a never-ending thing.

Slowly, you took a breath and felt your ribs ache. Your fingers curled into fists on Joel’s chest, and you stilled.

“Oh, sweet pea—”

That was Joel.

You interrupted his speech in a halting, pathetic sob.

Then your features crumpled, and you had to fight tears.

Joel held you. There was no pretense or pause or any need for explanations in the moment; he just set the soap aside, wrapped you up, and pulled you to him.

“I hate doing this,” you whispered, teeth gritting.

“Doin’ what?” Joel murmured back. “‘S’a matter, baby?”

“All of me’s just…changing! I— I’m— I’m—”

Gingerly, you drew back and gestured to yourself.

Though steam crowded the space, Joel could see every inch of you. It drove you half-crazy to think that so much could be different, and you still looked the same, for now.

“I’m exhausted all the time, and crabby, and emotional—” As if to emphasize your point, moisture started to pool at your waterline, and you blinked furiously. “—and I yak whatever I eat. All my favorite foods disgust me, but for some fucking reason, you can bet your ass I’ll be craving Doritos and Nutella at four A.M.! I’m insane!”

“Baby—”

“And don’t you fuckin’ say I’m not. I’ll bite your dick off.”

You regretted saying it instantly. You winced a bit.

Perhaps out of instinct, or else just a half-cocked attempt at humor, Joel moved to shield his crotch with his hands. The fabric of his boxers sagged, drenched.

A laugh burst out of you—loud and nonsensical.

Unlike the last one, you really couldn’t contain it.

And who would blame you in the state you were in? Naked, nauseous, and craving the touch of someone other than yourself. Wanting to feel like yourself but knowing that that might not be the case for months yet.

Joel pushed a big, wet clump of hair out of his face—he’d been growing it long, and the grays seemed to appear more prominent every day. Even soaked, it was silver.

Just screaming ‘soon-to-be DILF,’ you thought with a soft flutter in your stomach, watching him watch you.

“Listen, if cravin’ all kinds of funny food and bein’ a little moody makes you crazy, you might as well call me batshit, ‘cause I’ve been an asshole with awful taste longer’n you’ve even been alive,” Joel said, chuckling.

You rolled your eyes. “I’m serious, Joel.”

“I am, too.” Then your old man lifted his hands, as if in surrender. Still smiling. “Probably the fact you’re carrying my nutty genes in your belly s’got you feelin’ a little, uh…”

He trailed off, gaze wandering with it.

His eyes settled on your tummy, and at the same time, he stepped closer. He placed his hands on your sides.

“…different,” he finished, kissing your forehead.

Your insides stirred again at the sound. That word.

Different.

If you hadn’t been perennially hunched over a toilet, you would’ve been reveling in this touch the last four weeks, no doubt. Just being here, seeing the man handle you so delicately and without a modicum of judgment in his look or his tone, made you liquefy from the inside out.

Made you happy to be carrying his baby, even if the kid was keeping you sicker than a dog most of these days.

You sagged slightly, sighing. “Well. I am different.”

“Different’s good,” Joel countered.

“But I’m…cranky and mean.”

“Still my little sweetheart.”

Joel kissed your nose now, and you crinkled it.

“Tired, and hot, and dizzy…”

“Gives me reason to baby ya.”

You frowned. Joel grinned back.

“Don’t forget about my sore feet.”

“Good thing I love givin’ massages.”

For each one of your chief complaints, Joel had a solution, plain and simple. You could keep rattling through the list, and you knew he’d only get more creative with it. Instinctively, you softened even more.

You couldn’t give up on this that easily, though.

“And I can’t…get wet,” you confessed, quiet.

Joel gave you a once-over, brows knitting.

“I dunno, sugar, y’look pretty drenche—”

“I’ll kill you.”

Referring to the fact the two of you were soaked under the shower’s stream was doing Joel no good, evidently.

Smothering another smile, he kissed your left cheek.

And up your jaw. Along your neck, in miniature pecks.

Apologetic and sweet, before mumbling: “I know.”

“You…know?”

“Darlin’, I may be clueless sometimes—but I ain’t plum stupid,” Joel started, voice soft as ever. Peppering kisses across your collarbone. “Know y’aint been in the mood…”

True.

Joel’s lips descended further, cruising all the way until his stubble grazed one nipple, and you let out a breath. Nudged back to the wet tile wall and pressed against it, you had no choice but to accept those same lips enveloping the pebbled flesh and sucking. A hand moving to palm your other breast while they did.

“I—It has nothing to do with you Joel. I p-promise.” For whatever reason, you still felt the need to explain. Compensate for an area that you deemed lacking.

Again, he said, “I know.”

Joel was still soft, still smooth, still licking and sucking and squeezing you in between those murmured words. When he stepped closer and pushed a knee between your legs, you gasped on instinct. It just felt so good.

“Reckon if I was losin’ my food half the day, I wouldn’t be too keen on gettin’ busy. Don’t blame ya one bit, darlin’.”

Before relief could even begin to flood your chest at hearing that, still, a jolt of pleasure coursed through it. Joel flicked his tongue against your nipple and, at the same time, maneuvered his leg in just the right way.

“Baby.” You fisted soft, silver, sopping locks and pulled.

Joel groaned against you.

He proceeded to slide his hand from your other breast down your waist and eventually, tenderly, between your legs where his own thigh had them parted open wide.

“Y’know I love it when you say that t’me,” he muttered.

Two fingers touched your folds and rubbed between.

…Still, nothing.

Not even a little moisture to aid him.

You could feel how dry you were despite the immense amount of desire bubbling beneath your skin, the need, and the water all around you both to boot. It didn’t make sense, and you let out another sound of frustration then.

“Seriously, what the fuck?” you griped, half a cry.

“Patience, honey. Patience,” Joel cooed back at you.

The man may as well have been the picture of pure composure himself: from his steady hands to his gentle lips, the cadence of his movements, and how deliberate he always seemed to be when it came to your pleasure.

He prodded your clit, and your knees turned to putty.

Circled it, really. Those practiced rings never failed to find their target, your most sensitive bundle of nerves, and gave you all of what you’d needed and more. Joel boxed you in against the shower wall with his body, back and shoulders shielding you from the hot spray of water.

He teased you with just his fingertips for the longest time. Turned your cries into keening then to light, soft whimpers and didn’t budge when you leaned in further.

“I-I-I’m sorry, Joel. I don’t know why—” you started.

“Don’t got nothin’ to be sorry for, sweetheart.”

Without a word more being said, Joel already seemed to know that you were trying your hardest and feeling embarrassed by your body’s lack of cooperation.

He kissed your right cheek, then kissed the left.

“Close your eyes. Stay right here, OK?” he said.

Before you could protest, you felt his warmth retreat.

“Go on now. An’ don’t open ‘em ‘til I say so, hear?” Joel’s voice boomed across the space, warm and rich and deep

You weren’t sure why you listened so fast, but you did.

It was almost force of habit by then—one of you speaking, the other following without a thought.

Like you were one and the same person now.

Your eyes fluttered shut.

And when they opened again, it was only because Joel said. Scarcely a minute or two had passed and he was back by your side, closing the glass door behind him and humming under his breath. Fumbling with something.

“Now, up at me, sweet pea. Don’t look nowhere else.”

When your gaze adjusted to the light, it was on him.

Soft, sweet, steady brown eyes again, watching you.

Joel’s whole body couldn’t have been more than a few inches away now, his hulking frame all but swallowing up the warm, yellow light overhead and his expression relaxed. You inhaled, and a wave of familiar scents filled your lungs: bergamot and woody notes, some Old Spice deodorant, and an overwhelming sense of Joel. Moisture dripped from the tips of his hair to his cheeks and through his beard, then down the column of his throat.

Need chewed you from the inside out almost painfully. Waiting for just the right moment to reach out and—

“Where’s my girl?” Joel murmured presently. Smirking.

You blinked once. Another half-second lapsed.

Then, something cool and smooth between your legs.

Joel’s grin grew bigger when you let out a gasp.

“There she is,” he beamed.

“Joel!”

“‘S’mine right here, ain’t it?”

At almost the same time your center filled with a frigid pang, there was the heat and the heft of Joel’s fingers—the index and the middle, together—slipping in past your opening. Slick as ever, simply one push and sliding in.

Joel’s cheeks shone with a rosy flush, nearly as bright as the smile that was painting his face in that very moment. Lips curled, skin hot, body drenched from head to toe and dripping gently over yours with every heave of his big, hairy chest, the man was like a furnace before you.

It might’ve escaped your notice how he managed to slide right in without a hitch if you hadn’t heard a little schlick when he dragged his fingers out. And in. And back again.

Joel was stretching you open, and it felt perfectly fine.

Your eyes widened and instinctively tried to look.

Stopping you, but not halting his movements:

“What’d I say now, sweet pea? Eyes on me.”

“But Joel, I—”

Deeper, suddenly.

“—oh, fuck. Fuck. Fuck me.”

Shortly, your words were supplanted by whimpers, and Joel’s efforts only increased. He pushed thick, callused fingers inside your heat like they were light as air, stuffed you full of him, and crooked them up. Slipped them out.

“Ain’t that how we got here, darlin’? Us fuckin’?” he said.

Smug bastard loved to talk while he turned your insides to mush, his free hand finding your hip and holding you still while he proceeded to move in and out, in and out.

“Daddy,” you moaned reflexively. Toes curling when he found that sweet and special spot and stroked over it.

“Yeah? Ain’t that what you made me, sweet girl?” Joel cajoled you even more. “Made your old man a—what?”

And as if to ensure you wouldn’t, or couldn’t, answer, Joel slid in a third finger, amazingly. Stretched your precious little hole like it was nothing and kept going.

“Joel.”

“Jus’ said the word f’me a second ago. Say it again.”

“It feels s-so—”

“No.”

Almost as fast as he came, he was gone.

Fingers leaving you as cold and derelict as you were before Joel ever stepped into the shower, they retreated.

The man easily dodged the daggers your eyes shot him.

And before you could even start to protest, he was lifting your leg. Tightening his hold on your side while he freed up his other hand to reach behind your head somewhere.

You were up against the wall, so that only left—

“—anatomy lessons. Birds an’ the bees?”

Joel was basking in it now, voice light and teasing as he waited for you to do what you’d do—what you always did—and moved your leg higher still. Hooked your foot around his thigh and yanked him closer, all while you fumbled around with the fabric of his boxers and nodded

“Birds and the bees,” you repeated.

It was weird, admittedly. Being so deep and down into the concept of Joel marking you, claiming you in a way that no one else had ever gotten to do, and now that you were actually real parents-to-be, well, it made it…unique.

Different.

“Daddy,” you mumbled without thinking, stroking the full, hardened length you’d tugged out of Joel’s shorts.

“Yeah, honey?” Joel answered in half a breath. “Daddy?”

His cock twitched as you slid your palm from root to tip, desperate to feel more of him. Your fingers wrapped around him, almost protectively, and you nodded again.

When you peered up to meet his gaze, you found Joel’s expression as soft as you’d ever seen it. The hunger was there, but it was obfuscated, to a degree, by the sheer tenderness in his eyes. The longing to hear those words.

“I—I’m gonna make you a daddy soon,” you said softly.

And just as you tilted your hips—right as you guided him toward your center, where it’d only be natural for his shaft to slide in—Joel stilled. He sucked in a breath.

His cock twitched again, and you whimpered for it.

Then the hand he’d had planted on the wall behind your head lowered, going all the way down to find your center.

Joel was holding a tiny bottle of lube.

“I didn’t wanna…assume nothin’ comin’ here, y’know,” he started slowly. Squeezing the plastic tube until a little pearl appeared, then moving his other hand from your hip to catch the liquid in his palm. “Know you’ve been hurtin’ something awful ‘cause of me, and what we…”

Again, an icy sting between your thighs—but it was good

“…what we did,” he tried again. “Gettin’ ya queasy an’ all.”

So that was what he’d used to work you open before. Just like they had then, your insides twisted, and a soft sound caught in your throat, half-breath and half-moan.

Joel had scarcely gotten the chance to slick a hand over himself when you were taking his length again, angling yourself, and moving by force of unadulterated impulse.

You couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment he broached your needy, aching hole, but all at once, he was there—pressing, stretching, stuffing you wall-to-wall until no space was left inside your pussy. He filled you completely

Your breathing picked up, and his did, too, albeit with a touch more control. Having already kicked his boxers off at his feet, Joel walked you back until your spine was flat against the tiled shower wall, and then he sank in deeper.

“‘S’my girl.” Joel spoke through his teeth, swallowing a groan. “Jus’ needed this pussy filled nice an’ tight, huh?”

You couldn’t answer in complete words; you had to hum.

“Mhm, D-Da—”

“Yeah? Been missin’ daddy’s cock in this little hole?”

Like clockwork, Joel withdrew to the tip and then plunged back in. Your hands jumped to grip his biceps, and you took it. All of him in, in, in, until he was balls deep again and that never-trimmed thatch of silver hairs was kissing your lips. Water pelted you both from the side, hot and unrelenting, and your moans echoed throughout the space. Your body opened for him.

Here he was—this man, and your man most importantly—filling you to the brim. Shifting his hips and then kissing your temple before finding the most comfortable rhythm for you both. It must’ve come like second nature to him now, much like the thought to buy you lube, and take you slow, and remind you over and over again just how special this was to him. How damn lucky he was—

“—and now we got a little piece’a you an’ me growin’ inside ya every day. Ain’t that the most special thing?”

Out of instinct, you glanced down.

Just as Joel drove home again, glistening cock disappearing into your pussy, you drew a breath.

You wouldn’t be able to see that for long.

Your toes curled and your walls clenched tighter, and at the same time, a broad hand came to rest on your belly.

Joel didn’t stop thrusting, but he did slow considerably.

Pressing his forehead to yours, and not letting you look up from where you were both watching your bodies join again and again, he paused a beat. Then, he spoke softly:

“Who put that baby in your tummy, sweet girl?”

At the sheer intonation of those words, paired with Joel’s slow, slick, measured thrusts going in and out of your pussy and his hand over your stomach, you got a feeling sharp and direct to your center. Pressing, and primal.

Like it suddenly clicked, and you were no longer just fucking but fusing together in a much, much deeper way

Joel could probably feel you constrict around him, choking his cock from base to tip as you soaked in his words, but evidently, he wanted to hear you speak, too.

“C’mon, darlin’, know you wanna say it.”—Another grin, sly and sugar-sweet that you couldn’t see—“When a mommy and a daddy love each other very, very much…”

Fuck.

A new influx of warmth left your body, and this time, you knew it wasn’t anything but yourself; you were wet now.

Drenching Joel’s length and giving it an even louder, more obscene sound as he fucked himself in and out.

His fingers flexed gently over your stomach.

A coil tightened beneath it.

“J-J-Joel, please…”

“‘M’sorry, sweetheart, your old man’s hard of hearing.”

Pretending to be leaning closer to listen, Joel canted his hips upward. His cockhead grazed the edge of your cervix, and it felt like your entire body convulsed.

You let out a cry. You couldn’t help it.

“So who got you pregnant, sweet pea?”

“Y-You—You did, daddy! Fuck!” you shrieked.

Your peak was swift to follow. Nails digging, vision blurring, slurred sounds of daddy, daddy, daddy were likely all either one of you could hear for the longest time after it, alongside the grunts and moans clawing their way out of Joel’s throat as he chased his own release.

His spend painted your walls in ropes, one pulse after the next, and flooded your womb. You could feel him fill you.

The silence that ensued from there was punctuated only by your heaving breaths and the water streaming overhead. Joel pulled you even closer to him.

Against his chest, you felt totally secure.

Still a little bit terrified, but secure.

“Everything’s gonna be different, isn’t it?” you mumbled.

Joel nodded. Probably grinning, “I think so, sweet pea.”

“You think different’s good?”

“Different’s perfect.”

NOW LET’S GET THESE LOVEBIRDS TO THE SOUTH OF FRANCE & FUCKING NASTY AGAIN LMAOOOOO

#emilyinparis #JOELINPARIS #ouioui

[whocaresstillthelouvre]

I Can See You Masterlist

DBF! Javier Peña x Female Reader

Rating: Explicit. 18+ (Minors DNI) Summary: It's a steamy summer, and Javier, your dad's best friend, has returned from Colombia after years away. Warnings: dbf, age gap (reader is in her mid 20's, javi's in his 40's), smut, pining, secret relationship, drinking, smoking, post s3, ranch life things, reader is in vet school. Chapters will have individual warnings.

Chapter 1 - Up Against The Wall Chapter 2 - Down The Hall

[isabellaboo2025]

Hair Trigger - Part Twenty One

Pairing: Joel x Reader.

Chapter summary: Joel sits by your bedside and it all comes tumbling out.

A/N: 18+only.

Masterlist

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Time doesn’t move in the clinic – not the way it should. The world outside might be turning – snow melting, horses stamping in their stalls, Maria swearing at some jackass who’s come back from patrol minus a weapon because they dropped it in the river – but inside this room, time has stopped.

It’s you. The rise and fall of your chest, the faint bleep of a monitor, the bubble of the chest drain hooked to your side. Every sound is louder for the silence around it. Every second stretches so thin Joel thinks it might split.

He’s sat in the chair pulled right up to your bed, elbows on his knees, hands clasped so tight his knuckles ache. He doesn’t move – barely breathes. Just watches you. The bandages at your ribs that he knows will be stained through, the tubing down your throat, your cheeks pinked with fever.

Alive.

But only just.

Dr Vee had told him, after they’d stabilised you, that you were lucky – a hair’s breadth from not making it. That if you hadn’t got back here when you did, you’d probably be dead now.

He’d nodded like he understood, but inside he’d felt like something had split down the middle.

Now he sits and watches and prays. Not the kind of prayers he learned as a boy when his parents dragged him and Tommy to church on Sundays. These are raw, ugly things, dragged from a heart that stopped believing in a higher power a long time ago.

Don’t take her.

Not her.

Anyone but her.

I’ll do better.

I’ll say the things I should’ve said.

Just let me have the chance.

Please.

But the prayers only circle back to silence, and the silence makes room for Toby’s voice.

“She kept mumbling this guy’s name over and over – Nick, I think – I couldn’t quite make it out.”

Joel doesn’t know what to do with that. It’s not a name he recognises, not one he’s ever heard you mention. But you were bleeding out, half gone, and it was the name you’d clung to. So now, on top of the fear that he might lose you forever, he carries jealousy.

And jealousy is a cruel companion.

He tells himself that it has to be the man in the Tipsy Bison that night because he’s never seen you look relaxed with anyone else. But he wants his name to be the one you whisper when everything else is stripped away. He wants to be the one you cling to, even in the dark. And the thought that a part of you belongs to someone else feels like a damn blade striking him over and over.

He stretches, muscles protesting at having been sedentary for so long, but keeps his eyes on you and curses himself, over and over, for all the things he hasn’t said. And now here you are, torn open, tubes in your body, his words left sitting like ashes in his mouth.

What if the last thing you ever hear from him is I can’t – better not to give it the chance.

What if you never get to hear the truth – that you’re everything. That he thought there was nothing soft or kind or gentle left for him, and now the idea of losing you is worse than the thought of dying himself.

The hours drag and he doesn’t leave your side. He presses water to your lips when Dr Vee says to because there aren’t enough folk there to give you one-to-one care and they're low on IV bags. He wipes your forehead with a cool cloth and counts your breaths – sometimes steady, sometimes rattling against the tube – until he thinks he’ll go mad from it.

He speaks sometimes, the words barely carrying, but loud enough that he can only hope you hear them.

“You’re tougher than this, I know you are. Don’t quit on me now.”

When you don’t stir, he whispers softer, quieter – words that are only meant for you.

“I need you.”

And when even that doesn’t move you, he bows his head into his hands and lets the prayers come raw again.

Please, don’t take her.

****

Day passes and turns into night again without him properly realising.

It’s only when there’s a soft knock at the door and Ellie slips into the room, shoving her hands in her pockets, sneakers squeaking against the floor that Joel remembers there are other people in the world besides you.

“Hey.”

He turns, startled. “Hey kiddo.”

“Wasn’t sure exactly where you were.”

At that, guilt hits him hard and fast. “I’m sorry. I should’ve…I ain’t been…” He stops and starts again. “I should’ve come home – should’ve told you what was happenin’.”

“It’s okay. Tommy and Maria gave me the basics.” Her eyes dart to you. “How is she?”

He pauses, unsure what answer to give. Unsure what answer is appropriate for a fifteen-year-old girl – albeit one who’s seen more than most. “She’s uh…she’s holdin’ on.”

“What the fuck happened?” she asks, moving closer to the bed. “Tommy said she fell through a floor?”

He takes a breath, his mind flitting back to all the little things he’s tried not to think about since this happened. Like the fact Tommy had told him the houses on the north trail hadn’t been swept for years and that they were dangerous, even back then. He hasn’t forgotten, but it’s a conversation for another time.

“Yeah,” he supplies finally. “Looks that way.”

“Fuck…” Ellie breathes. “Is she gonna make it?”

“I don’t know.” The words come out flat, but at least they’re honest. “But I still should’ve come home. You deserve better than bein’…”

“What – neglected?” She rolls her eyes. “Newsflash – I’m not five. I can feed myself, I can dress myself, I can get my ass to school, and I can do my chores. You don’t need to babysit me.”

He meets her gaze. “It ‘ain’t about babysittin’. It’s about bein’ your…your family.”

Ellie pauses, and he waits – suspended in time. Because things have been difficult between them lately – times that make his heart thud faster and his palms sweat with the fear that she might somehow know – and he’s not sure where she even sits with the notion of the two of them being anything akin to a family.

Then, she steps forward and puts her hand on his shoulder. “You are my family - for whatever family means. You don’t gotta prove it by making me soup or bugging me about homework or whatever. Just… be here for her. She needs you. I’m fine. And I like her – so I want her to make it.”

He blinks, throat aching. “You sure?”

“Positive. Besides, it’s kinda nice not having you breathing down my neck every time I sharpen a knife or turn on a light switch.”

“Smartass.” He huffs a laugh, small and broken.

“Takes one to know one.” She smiles. “Just promise me one thing.”

“What?”

“That you’ll tell her.”

He falters slightly. “Tell her what?”

“That you want her to be family too.”

And with that, she slips out, leaving Joel staring after her, guilt eased but not gone and overtaken by something else entirely.

****

Later, Tommy comes by, leans against the doorframe, arms crossed, his face carved with worry that’s not only for you.

“She holdin’ on?” he asks.

Joel nods. “Dr Vee says she’s strong. But she…” He trails off, unable to finish.

Tommy steps closer, eyes softening. “You need a break?”

“No. I ain’t leavin’ her.”

Tommy sighs but doesn’t push. Instead, he pulls a chair up beside his brother. “Then at least talk to me. What’s rattlin’ around in that head of yours?”

Joel hesitates, unsure if now is the time to get into what’s bugging him about the patrol. He wants to know why you were sent that way, why you were asked to sweep houses considered to be unsafe, why the rota was changed at the last minute. But these are all questions that he feels you should know are being asked, answers he feels that you should hear. And anyway, they’re not what’s at the forefront of his mind.

“Nick.”

Tommy leans back, brows knitting. “Nick?”

Joel nods, staring at the floor. “The name Toby said she was sayin’ on the way back here. I don’t know who he is, and I don’t recall her ever mentionin’ anybody by that name before.”

“You ask Dr Vee? Maybe it’s someone from town?”

“Already did. Got given a half dozen possibilities.”

“Someone from before?”

He rubs his hands over his face, groaning low. “I don’t know, I just… I know it sounds stupid but…I wanted it to be me. If she was that close to…” He exhales, and it stutters. “I wanted it to be me.”

“It don’t sound stupid – sounds real. But you can’t control what people say when they’re starin’ down death,” Tommy says softly. “It could’ve just been delirium talkin’. What matters is what a person says when they wake up.”

Joel looks at you again, pale and still and his chest aches so sharp he thinks it might split.

“If she wakes up,” he whispers.

“When,” Tommy corrects firmly. “You gotta think positive, Joel. She needs you to – otherwise she ain’t got nothin’. Besides, you said it yourself, she’s strong.”

“She fell through a fuckin’ floor, Tommy,” he says, fighting back the tears because he doesn’t want to cry in front of his little brother. “She fell through a floor and broke her ribs and punctured her lung. Not to mention she’s got a fuckin’ gapin’ hole in her side…”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t fuckin’ know!” He rounds on him, vision blurred. “You don’t know anythin’! She might die and then that’s it and if she lives…if she lives then I might have lost her already anyway!”

Tommy doesn’t say anything, and Joel can hear the cogs turning in his head as he tries to work out whether it’s worth continuing to argue or whether it’s better to walk away. He fears the former but hopes for the latter, because he’s not sure exactly what might come out of his mouth if really pushed.

“Okay,” his brother says finally, getting to his feet again, choosing the option of least resistance and laying a hand on his shoulder. “Okay, Joel.”

After Tommy leaves, Joel sits back in the silence, your hand in his, tracing the lines of your palm with his thumb, trying to memorise you even when you weren’t moving.

“I don’t care who Nick is,” he murmurs. “I don’t care if you like him, I don’t care if you’ve been with him, I just…I just don’t want you to love him. Because you’re here now – with me. And I…” the words stick in his throat. “I ain’t plannin’ on givin’ you up. So, if I gotta fight him, if I gotta draw swords or pistols at dawn or whatever to win you, I will.”

Your fingers suddenly twitch faintly in his hand, and he freezes, heart hammering, eyes locked on yours.

You don’t wake. But it’s enough to keep him waiting, enough to keep him praying – praying that this won’t end up like another night, a different night, a different dark, a different place. A soldier shouting orders. The graze of a bullet to his side and the way it didn’t matter. The weight in his arms going limp. Sarah’s breath leaving in a sound he’ll never been able to describe because it wasn’t a sound so much as a subtraction.

Every time your breath stutters, that subtraction flashes white-hot behind his eyes.

Dr Vee comes in, checks the monitor and changes your dressing with the crisp moves of someone who knows there isn’t extra to waste. “Pressure’s holding,” she says, like a weather report. “She’s stubborn – like you.”

He clears his throat. “That supposed to be a compliment?”

“That’s me being kind.” She squeezes your hand and leaves him the room again.

He waits until the silence settles. Until it’s just you and him and then he shifts forward in the chair until the wood groans, gentling encircling your wrist with his fingers, thumb to the inside of your wrist where a pulse hides shy and steady.

Because he’s ready now. Ready to tell you all the things he couldn’t before.

“I was wrong that night,” he says, voice low. “I was wrong when I told you I couldn’t, when I told you it was better not to give it...us... a chance, because I know exactly how much it costs to love somebody and then have the world take ‘em anyway.”

He lets out a ragged breath.

“I lost my daughter, Sarah. And after that…I made myself into somethin’ that just…wasn’t meant to love or be loved. Just…a machine. And I did…I did bad things, baby. You wouldn’t have liked me if you’d known me back then. Fact is, you might even have been scared of me. I hurt people – and I didn’t care who they were or what they needed I just…just made sure that I lived for another day. Even though livin’ another day wasn’t livin’ at all.”

He swallows.

“And then I met Ellie, and it was different because…because it was somethin’ else to begin with – cargo, not love. She wasn’t family, not then, though God only knows she is now, and I could…I could deal with that, with her. And there was a time when I almost lost her, and then I got her back. I saved her because it took me fightin’ and shootin’ and that’s what I’m good at – all I’m good at. But then – you…”

A lump rises, hard and full in his throat.

“Bein’ here – where it’s supposed to be safe? I thought it was enough to keep you at arm’s length – to train you as best I could so that you could take care of yourself, So that you could be someone that…that I could say hello to in the street or in the canteen and not care about any more than I cared about anyone else. Because I thought…I thought that if I didn’t take all of you, then maybe the price would be smaller when the world came to collect. Because it always does. Only that didn’t work because I fell so hard for you – before I even knew it and now…now I’m sittin’ here with you and all I can think about is everythin’ I should’ve told you when I had the chance.”

He slides his fingers down, lacing them around yours, squeezing gently.

“I should’ve told you how I felt that night instead of runnin’ away. Should’ve just said that I love you. Not the careful kind of love, but the dumb kind. The kind that gets people killed. I should’ve told you and let you decide whether you wanted to risk it with me. But I thought if I didn’t say it, if I kept it in my mouth like a secret, then maybe I’d be okay. Maybe I’d be able to breathe if somethin’ like this happened.”

He laughs once, short and mean.

“But guess what. I can’t. I fuckin’ can’t. Because not havin’ told you makes this whole thing a million times worse, and I don’t wanna lose you only for you to never have known.”

Your eyelashes flicker. Maybe it’s the draft, maybe his hand, but he holds his breath like a child, counting to ten – waiting.

Nothing.

He feels the tears on his cheeks and doesn’t care. “I love you – and I don’t know what life you had before Jackson and maybe I don’t need to know. Maybe it’s alright for me just to know that you had a life before, and I had one too, and we both deserve an after if you’ll just keep breathin’.”

The door creaks and one of the nurses appears – older, wrinkled face, kind eyes. The type who’s probably seen a thousand men sitting crying at the bedside of the woman they love over the years. She looks at you, long and hard as though she can somehow see through you, then turns back to look at him.

“I’m Ruth. Can I get you something?” she asks softly. “You’ve been here so long. Coffee, maybe something to eat?”

He scuffs his hand across his face but doesn’t look away from you. “A time machine.”

She pauses for a moment, as though weighing up what the right response to that is. “We’re fresh out of those I’m afraid. But I do happen to have a collection of good coffee beans stashed away in a drawer.” She taps him lightly on the shoulder. “I’ll bring you a cup.”

He waits until the door closes behind her again.

“And I don’t have much to offer you, but – it’s yours. I’m yours. So, I want you to pick me,” he says. “Whoever he is, I want you to pick me.”

****

Night rolls its shoulder against the window.

He dozes for minutes at a time then wakens like he’s fallen off a porch. Every waking comes with the same buckshot thought – what if she stopped breathin’ while I was out? – and the same relief when your chest stubbornly rises again.

Somewhere in the early light of dawn, his old man hips beg for mercy, and he ignores them. He talks instead – not a stream, or a babble, but little true things he can set down without breaking them.

“I fixed the leaky valve in the canteen kitchen. It’ll probably start again, but for now it’ll keep quiet – keep Geraldine quiet too, ‘cause I know how she likes to bitch and moan when shit ain’t right.”

“Patched some fencin’ round the perimeter too. There was a weak spot at the east corner, and we don’t want infected gettin’ any ideas.”

“Was thinkin’ that we should do some more rifle trainin’ together again – just you and me. Not because I think you’re not capable because, you are. Just figured that there’s probably more that I could teach you – maybe even about the guns themselves, you know, takin’ them apart and stuff – how they work. If you’re interested that is. Hell, it’ll give me an excuse to keep my hands busy while I’m lookin’ at you.”

He doesn’t notice when dawn becomes day, because that isn’t what breaks the dark for him. Rather, it’s your mouth making a sound that isn’t a machine. Not a word, but the kind of noise a body makes when it decides to stick around.

He rises to his feet quickly, leaning over the bed, taking your hand in his. “Hey,” he says, more a plea than anything else.

Your eyelids drag, eyes glassy beneath, mean with pain and you flinch, hard.

“Don’t,” he says quickly. “It’s okay.”

You chase his voice, gaze finding his mouth and then his eyes – sticking there.

“Hey,” he says again, because there aren’t better words for the miracle of a person deciding to exist and he’d all but given up hope of seeing those eyes of yours again. He kisses your knuckles gently. “You’re in the clinic and I’m right here, baby.”

You try your throat, and it makes an ugly sound around the tube.

“It’s okay,” he says again. “You got a tube down your throat to help you breathe. Just relax.”

Your eyes dart from his to the tube and then back again, like you have a hundred questions you don’t have breath for yet.

He has a hundred answers ready, but he wants to give you the only one that matters first.

“I know you’re just wakin’ up and…and everythin’ probably feels strange but…there’s somethin’ that I gotta tell you…”

Your hand suddenly tears away from his, fingers rising to your throat.

“Hey, no it’s okay…”

Eyes widening, you start scrabbling, fingers closing around the tube, trying to pull it from your throat.

“No baby – don’t! Hey! Hey, she’s awake!” He turns towards the door, yelling frantically. “Hey! She needs help! Baby, it’s okay…you’re okay…”

But you’re not hearing him. You’re choking, gagging, hands clawing, chest heaving against the bandages, against the drain. He lunges forward to catch your wrists, but you fight, eyes wide and rolling.

“Don’t pull it! Jesus, no!”

He tries to hold you, tries to anchor you, but panic’s given you strength and with one savage tug you rip the tube free from your throat. You gag again, blood and spit bubbling, hacking like you’ve split your lungs apart.

Then your hands go for the drain tube in your side.

“No! No, baby, please!” He grabs for your wrists again, but it’s too late. The drain tears free with a wet pop – and then you start screaming.

He flinches like he’s been stabbed, like it’s his ribs tearing, not yours, as the monitor beside the bed starts to shriek in protest.

The door suddenly bangs open, and Dr Vee and three others barrel in, shouting orders, hands everywhere. But Joel stays locked on you – your bloodied mouth, your gasps, your wide eyes brimming with terror.

“Get him back!” Dr Vee snaps.

“No!” He roars, shoving against the hand on his shoulder. “She needs me!”

“She needs to breathe! Move!”

Two of the nurses back him toward the wall, gently but firmly and he stands pressed against it, his whole body straining toward you, desperate to put himself between you and the hurt. Your eyes roll to meet his and he can see the desperation there, the fear – as though you’re begging him to help you – and it’s all he can do to stop himself from running forward and throwing himself over you, protecting you – even though he knows they’re trying to save your life.

“Stay with me,” he rasps, hoarse, his voice too small against the chaos, too quiet for you to hear. “Please, baby.”

They work over you, quick and merciless, voices hard and clipped. Then your eyes flutter, lashes stuck together with tears and fever sweat. Your head lolls as your screams turn to moans, then wet gasps and then nothing. Whatever they’ve given you, whatever they’ve done, it quietens you.

“Okay…” Dr Vee says, voice shaking with effort as you still once more on the bed. “Okay, we’ve got her. Let’s re-intubate and I’ll get that chest drain back in.”

He feels the ground give way beneath him, legs no longer capable of supporting his body and he sinks to the floor, shaking, head in his hands, not caring now who might see or hear his cries.

“I love you,” he says, choking on it now – because he couldn’t get it out in time.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Part Twenty Two

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