(I wrote this at 3 am because it wouldn’t get out of my head)
(I had originally seen a post saying that Lucanis would be affectionate once he was comfortable and I can’t stop thinking about it so here we are)
first up, how our Exec Chef regards affection:
Lucanis was surprisingly affectionate—shockingly so, if anyone had asked Rook in the early days of their relationship.
At first, it had been measured, careful. He wasn’t cold, not exactly, but he was precise, deliberate. The kind of man who kept his emotions folded tight, locked beneath layers of discipline and self-control. She had been patient with him, never pushing, letting him learn at his own pace what it meant to be with someone without the looming weight of expectations.
But once he got used to it—once he let himself have it—he was all in.
It started small. The brush of fingers against the back of her hand when he passed by, the absentminded way his palm would settle at the small of her back, thumb tracing slow, lazy circles. The way he would hover, not in an overbearing way, but just close enough that she always felt him.
Then, before she even realized it, he had become that partner. The one who reached for her without thinking. The one who draped himself over her on the couch, head on her lap, letting her play with his hair like it was the most natural thing in the world. The one who pressed lazy, lingering kisses to her temple when they were standing at the counter together, chopping vegetables.
The one who pulled her into his lap after service, ignoring the rest of the staff while she laughed at him, her hands settling against his chest like she had every right to be there—because she did.
For the way he would press his face into the crook of her neck, exhaling slow and deep like she was the only thing keeping him tethered after a brutal shift. The way his hand always found the back of her head, fingers threading through her hair when she was curled up against him in bed. The way he would touch her, constantly, like he needed the reassurance of her presence.
And when they were alone?
Lucanis would not let go. He would roll over in bed just to hook a leg over hers, to tangle himself around her like some kind of human knot. He would pull her into his space, hands gripping her waist, her wrists, anything that kept her close.
And he smothered her. In the best way.
Rook could barely get through a conversation without him pulling her in, burying his face against her shoulder, murmuring something in Antivan that she only half understood. He would kiss her everywhere—her hands, her shoulders, the top of her head—like he was making up for years of keeping himself at arm’s length.
And she let him. Encouraged him.
Because Maker, she loved this side of him.
The Lucanis who had let his walls down, who had let himself have her. The Lucanis who had stopped fighting the need for comfort, for closeness.
The Lucanis who loved her.
And if she ever teased him about it—if she ever dared to smirk and call him out on how ridiculously, sickeningly affectionate he had become?
He would just pull her closer, press his lips to hers, and say, “You talk too much, Rook.”
She wasn’t about to argue.
