after harry and his gf break up, there’s only one person who he’d call. who he’d been waiting to call.
based on -> this request
CW: emotionally disloyal harry, AGE GAP, oral sex (fem), p in v penetration (unprotected), heavy dirty talk, praise kink, daddy kink, and all things sexy! little plot mostly smut CURRENT 2026 HARRY
likes and reblogs sooo appreciated!
WC: 5k
You can’t say you were too surprised reading the headlines that morning.
It was a warm Saturday morning when you saw them. You were perched on the thick rim of your window, body melded into the corner as you looked out to the city that surrounded you. A glass of lemon water in one hand and your phone in the other—content.
Harry Styles Splits With Girlfriend After Year Long Relationship.
A Messy Break Between Two Global Superstars—Who is at Fault?
You couldn’t have been more unphased. It’s not like the two had a groundbreakingly amazing relationship. You knew they couldn’t. Not after you and him.
This was a matter of time, in your eyes. Before her, there was you. And you? You were all Harry had been looking for. And you knew it. So much so that at the start of his new relationship, you didn’t feel threatened in the slightest.
You went through your day as normal that Saturday, running some errands, grabbing a bite for lunch. Ignoring the string of texts from some friends asking if you’ve seen the news. Even a text from your own mother, only causing a large eye roll and a swipe left to dismiss it.
So when your phone rang at 10 at night with an endearingly familiar name, you decided it’d be the first notification you responded to that day.
“Hey,” you answer calmly and levelheaded, now resting on your mattress with a wide smile. Your stomach was pressed into your comforter as your feet swung back and forth behind you, rubbing into one another in smooth passing. You were adorned in sleep shorts a little too short for your own good and a matching cotton tank top that fell loose on your skin.
“Hi,” his voice rasped on the other line, “how are you?”
You have to hide your chuckle at his attempt at kind conversation. You’d rather he skip to the good part.
“I’m good, just in bed,” you sigh, “are you holding up okay? Saw the news.”
An empty ask that was fully forced out of you.
“I’d like to see you,” he says, and now you’re intrigued.
“Yeah?”
“I miss you, y/n,” and it wasn’t winsome, it was desperate.
“I know you do,” you nod, keeping your voice to a sensual whisper as you continue the quiet sway of your feet above you.
“Let me see you,” he pleads, “I need to see you.”
It was a naughty thing, him begging over the phone for you like this. He was wise beyond your years, big and strong and tall. You were his perfect little thing, young and perky and small enough to melt into his hold. You shuddered at the thought.
“You can come see me,” you nod slow, “if that’s what you really want.”
You knew it was. He knew that you knew it was.
“Yes, please,” the answer is quick, hopeless.
You honestly felt sorry for him. Listening to him pry for you like he needed you to breathe. You wondered how long he’d missed you, thought about you while fucking his girlfriend. Based on what you’ve heard, you can only assume it’s been a depressing amount of times.
“Ok, baby,” you bite back your smile, “come in when you get here. It’s unlocked.”
And with that, he hung up, pulling his shit together as quickly as possible to come see you. You just smiled to yourself on the bed, scrolling mindlessly as you waited for him. You were clean and freshly showered, slathered in a sweet smelling lotion and smooth all over.
You felt yourself wettening at the thought of him, of seeing him again after all this time. He was older now, chest littered in straggled hairs and pecs full and wide.
You thought of the photos you’d seen of him for Runner’s World Magazine—his stubbled beard and the ghosted bush of his happy trail. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t miss him just as much as he missed you, you were crying to taste this new version of him. Thick and stocky and strong enough to lift you with a hand.
And when he pushed through your door, disheveled as ever, it was everything you ever wanted and more. A thick black hoodie and a loose pair of pink cotton shorts, fabric ripped and torn at the bottom and hugging his quads perfectly.
Even through your distance—your stomach on the bed and him tall in the doorway—you were drowned in his scent. The heavenly mix of deep vanilla musk and all things manly. His phone was held loose in his left hand, looking interestingly small wrapped between his large fingers.
For a moment, there was silence. His eyes drifting to places they shouldn’t and your eyes watching him do so. He peered to the tight crevice that laid between your two legs as you laid against the mattress, ass up and feet gently kicking. You looked so innocently girlish in your pretty cotton pj’s that he nearly folded right there, watching your round ass move just the slightest with every shift of your feet.
“Hi,” You called to grab his attention. His eyes darted away from your body and up to your pretty face, round and doe eyed and clean.
“Hi,” breathless.
You roll to your back, sitting up straight now and throwing your shiny legs over the edge of the mattress. You pressed the palms of your hands against the bed on either side of you, staring up at him with a small smile.
“You look good,” you say.
“So do you,” he nods, taking slow steps closer to you now. Your heart pounded with every new inch he moved, and now you’ve truly realized how much you miss him. Missed this.
You just watch as he walks closer to you, keeping your eyes wide and locked on his. You suddenly felt small as he towered down at you, taking slow strides until he landed between your legs hung off the bed.
You were close now. Your knees grazing the hairs on his legs as his face drew all the way down to meet you gaze. Your neck was tilted back so far that it ached to hold the contact, but you didn’t mind. Not when he was looking at you the way he was.
“I’ve missed this sweet face of yours,” he whispers so low that you nearly miss it, bringing a finger to drag softly along the frame of your jaw.
Your eyes flutter at the hint of contact, basking in the smooth pass of his finger tip grazing against your face. His voice was low, deeper than it had been when you were together and a twang of something different in his accent.
“You did?” You ask innocently, blinking up at him with those big eyes that had him aching.
“I did,” he nods, bringing his finger to your lips now. He dragged against them, soft and swollen, watching as the pink skin pulled along with his touch and bounced back into place in recoil.
“Such a pretty, pretty little thing. So soft,” he seems to be talking to himself, grazing over new places on your face and neck with just the delicate touch of his finger. You were soaked. So soaked that you knew he’d taunt you once he got a feel.
He hooked his finger under your chin to tilt your head further back, bringing his face down until his lips were hovered against yours. You stayed like that for a moment, breathing hot breaths into one another with stuttering eyes.
“Y/n,” he breathed into you, as if he was setting himself up for his next line. But nothing came after, just desperate exhales and shifts of his finger.
“Hm?” You hum, lips grazing over his in a frustrating tease.
He pulled closer, rubbing his mouth against yours before pulling back with a breath. You leaned up to catch his lips again, failing as he pulled back and parted his lips further apart. He pushed forward again, breathing hot air into you as you waited to follow his lead. It was a wreck, the two of you sorting out how to start something so erotic. And then, through wide mouths and heavy breaths, he closed his lips around yours with a deep, long inhale. His finger released itself from your face and replaced it with the firm grasp of his palm, holding your face upright in a strong handle.
You flutter into the kiss that absorbs you, reeling in the taste of his tongue lapping up and down and around your mouth. You felt electric, trapped into the hold of his strong hands and the aggressive push of his tongue. He tasted delicious, minty fresh with a subtle hint of expensive whiskey that had your head spinning and thighs tightening.
“Need to fuck you,” he groaned into you, “missed this so much. Missed you.”
“Mm,” you hum in agreement, allowing your hands to find their place on his chest in front of you. You tug at the thick cotton of his hoodie and yearn for what’s below it, trying your hardest to take your time and follow his lead. You wanted him satisfied, to get everything he wanted from you and use you how he pleased. That would be pleasurable enough for you.
“You can take it off, baby girl,” he whispered into you, immediately pressing his lips back onto the moment he finished his sentence.
Your chest tightened and twisted into itself at his words and the familiar pet name that he’d used so tastefully when the two of you were together. You pulled the black sweatshirt up and over his head, allowing the fabric to pass through your kiss for just a moment before tossing it on the floor of your bedroom.
You were more than pleased to find that he hadn’t worn anything under, now exposed to his bare chest and chiseled muscles. It was even better than what you’d imagined; strong and buff and so so hard. Your nails trickled over the hills and valleys of his abs, feeling them squirm and tense beneath your touch. It was heavenly, the smooth surface that coated the swelling muscles.
He slowly pushed the two of you back through your disgustingly sloppy kiss, letting you fall to your back softly against your pretty pink comforter. You peaked an eye open through the kiss to glance at his shoulders as he did so, watching his traps swell and his shoulders round out in a gorgeously fit shine.
You let your legs wrap around his waist as he hovered over you, pushing his hips down into your center greedily. You both shuddered at the covered contact, the feeling so distant yet so familiar all the same.
He breaks his wet suction to your lips and shifts lower to your jaw, kissing down the sweet sensation of your perfume and down to your collarbone.
He was ridiculously needy, slopping his tongue around your smooth skin desperately as he failed to stabilize his breathing. He kissed every inch he could find, slowing his pace the lower he reached. Your skin was slick with his saliva by the time he reached the waist of your shorts, slowing down to nothing as he pressed slow deep kisses onto the skin.
You quivered as you watched him beneath you, green eyes staring up at you in challenge. His lips were soft and wet, kissing sweetly onto your sharp hip bones as his wide hands grasped your sides.
You started to wonder how you got here, Harry inches away from your pussy as your hand tangled through his hair. Yesterday, he was taken by a beautiful woman known worldwide by millions. Today, he’s falling undone for a woman a bit too young for his own good.
His fingers hook into the cotton of your tiny sleep shorts, tugging them down to reveal your wet slit. You hadn’t worn any underwear—having not expected him—and he growled low at the sight in front of him.
He laid a hot breath on the center of your tight, dripping wet pussy, sending goosebumps up and down your legs and tensing the muscles surrounding it. You were buzzing, high on the feeling of his lips back down where they belonged. You knew he missed your pussy, the way it gushed for him and swelled a pretty bright pink.
The second his tongue pressed flat against your slit, he moaned, loud and shameless at the sweet taste of you. He’d missed you dearly, dreaming of sugary sensation of your arousal coating his tongue for months on end. You were a honeyed petal for his lips to suckle on, framed by the precious scent of your cashmere lotioned thighs. He was on a cloud, lapping you up as your back arched in the beautiful way he remembered.
“Fuck, Harry,” you moaned, light and airy as your fingers twirled his curls harshly. His tongue worked miracles on your hot core, painting you up and down masterfully and you felt like you could cry at how much you missed him. No man has ever pleased you in the way he could, he knew your body like it was his own and was more generous than any man could dream of being.
“My baby tastes so sweet,” he groaned, pressing his tongue in and out of you and nudging his nose against your wet clit.
“Yeah?” You rasp out, “Daddy missed my pussy?”
His hands gripped your hips tighter at the line, shoving his mouth so deep into you that he had to be suffocating. Your back was arched up so high that it ached, your mind distracted in the pleasure that coursing through your blood on fire.
You quivered and gushed on his tongue, gentle moans rolling through you as his mouth moved to work your clit. He sucked hard and flicked your bud simultaneously, sending an aggressive vibration through your legs that locked Harry’s head in place. He was humming slow and steady against you, the mix of feelings comparing to nothing you’ve had before.
Your stomach felt hot and swarmed within itself, your head spinning against the mattress as your hair sprawled up and out. You were drunk on the man between your legs, opening your eyes every couple moments to watch the sensual sight of his face lodged between your thighs.
“You’re gonna cum,” he says, “cum on my tongue, baby, please.”
You clenched and tensed and squirmed, groaning at his words as he brought you up the latter and to your peak. You came fast and hard, soaking his tongue with your arousal as you clamped your legs around his head.
He nuzzled his head back and forth between your legs, blubbering against you as sopped you up and swallowed you down. His eyes stared up at you as he watched you collapse into your orgasm, the scene so provocative that he felt himself drip through his pants. Embarrassing, yes. But not between you two.
Your breaths slowed and your heart pounded as you came down from your high, pussy swollen and even wetter than before. He rose from his place at the edge of the bed with a wipe of his mouth, hovering back over you and taking in your red face.
“On your stomach,” he muttered stern, a demand rather than an ask that you will so happily oblige too.
You rolled to your stomach and shimmied to let your cheek lay against your pillow, wiggling your ass on the bed just barely.
He came to sit behind you, pressing his hands up the sides of your back and over the curve of your ass. He was taking you in, a sharp exhale slipping through his throat as he watched you shimmy around on the bed. Your ass was up and your slit was held tight together, dripping with the remains of your orgasm and puffy waiting for him.
You stretched your arm back behind you as you looked at him over your shoulder, slipping your fingers down past your ass until they landed on your center. You tapped the wet area twice, staring at him suggestively as you lifted your ass higher and used your fingers to split your hole open. You were putting on a show for him, displaying your little hole as he watched you intently.
“You wanna use your words?” He spits, rearranging his cock in his shorts at the sight of you teasing him.
“I can use my words,” you nod, continuing to touch yourself from behind. “You just tell me what you wanna hear.”
His jaw clenched at your response and his eyes shut for a moment too long, desperately trying to keep himself together.
“I want you to tell me what you want, and stop parading yourself in front of me like a slut,” he says low, running his hand up the back of your thigh.
“But I am a slut for you, daddy,” you whine, pressing a finger between your folds, “aren’t I?”
You watch as his lips part and his brows furrow, lost in watching you touch yourself so grossly as you spoke. You were an animal for him, stripping all of your self respect for the man behind you.
You press a second finger into yourself now, slowly stroking in and out as he watched closely. Your eyes shut in bliss and your pink lips fell apart at the pleasure you were providing for yourself, getting off to watching the man stare at you.
“Mmm,” you hum, “feels so good. Wish it was daddy’s cock instead, so big and hard.”
You watch him wince at the words, taking a thick swallow down his throat as he continues to eye you down. Your fingers plunged deep inside of you with every press, pulling out and soaking your skin with your filthy arousal.
“Stop.”
And you did. Hand out of yourself immediately, peering back at him with big eyes and waiting for the next instruction.
So you watched. Watched as he shrugged his shorts down and onto the floor, boxers following next and his cock springing to his lower stomach. Your thighs clenched and your jaw fell open, desperate for the throbbing length in front of you.
He was heavy and thick, so wide for you. His tip was red and swollen, soaked in the subtle drips that had been spilling out of him since he’d arrived. He looked glorious, like the most beautiful thing you had ever laid your eyes on.
When he shifted over top of you and lifted your hips up harshly, you could barely hold in your excitement as you bit back a smile. You’ve been thinking of this, this moment, his cock lined up behind you, for what felt like ages.
He pressed the head into your creamy slit so slow, so punishing. He stretched your tight pussy wide, pulling at the skin in a perfect mix of pain and pleasure. Your mouth fell open as you melted into the mattress beneath you, soothed by sweet sounds of Harry’s long groan behind you.
“Fuck, y/n,” his tone was low and his grip on your hips tensed, tugging at the skin until it reddened.
“Ohh, Harry,” your knuckles whitened as you tugged at your comforter, “fill me up, keep going.”
He slammed the whole of himself into you in one quick movement, bottoming out as his dense balls slapped against your throbbing clit. It sent a jolt of bliss through you as his tip pecked in deep, rubbing into your spongy insides rough and relentless.
He fucked you this way for a while, pounding in and out of you and watching as your ass jiggled and shook with every thrust. You were moaning loud, feeling too good to keep anything in as your skin slapped together. The noise was wet and sloppy as his hips melded to your ass, skin slapping and pussy gushing in a disgustingly pornographic manner.
“Shit, baby,” he groaned through gritted teeth, pressing a hand onto your back to press you further down into the mattress.
“My pussy feel good?” You whine, “tell me who feels better, daddy. Me or her. Tell me.”
“You, fuck— you!,” he struggles, “You.”
“Yeah? You missed this? Tell me how good it is,” you clenched around him tight, building to your orgasm as you taunt him.
“So good,” he breathes, “feel so good around me, baby girl. Best pussy I’ve ever had. So tight, shit.”
“Mmm,” you hum at his praise, legs trembling he thrusts into you even harder. You were jelly in front of him, being treated as nothing but a fuck toy for him and that’s how you liked it.
His tip slams into you relentlessly, over and over and over again until your stomach is boiling for the second time and your head is fuzzy. You were close, so close and he could feel it.
“M’gonna cum,” you murmur into the mattress, ass arching up as rams into the same sweet spot.
“I know, baby,” he rasps, “wanna feel this pussy cum on my cock. Give me what I’ve missed so much, cmon.”
You shook as your second orgasm rippled through you, hard and aggressive this time. Your moans were strangled and your face was red, gripping your walls around his dense shaft as you fell undone. You felt light and floaty as you came down from this one, falling limp beneath him as he rode you through it.
He pulled out, popping out of you as your stomach fell flat to the mattress. You were wiped, completely exhausted yet craving more all the same. A feeling only he’s given you.
“Y/n,” he rubbed up your back, “I know you’re tired…but I’ve been waiting to watch my baby ride me again for too long. Can you do that for me?”
He was insane to even act like you would say no.
“Yes, please,” you nod quick and flip to your back, catching your breath as he peers over you.
After a quick shift and some rearranging, you were perched on top of his thighs as he laid back into your pretty headboard relaxed as ever. You loved to see him like this, laid back and sprawled out for you to play with. To climb on top of and treat it as your little playground.
He tugged your top off in one quick motion, gawking at your perky breasts that fell in front of him. They bounced out of your top and displayed themselves beautifully for him, so hard and just what he needed to take him over the edge.
You smirk at his intense stare never leaving your chest, and lift your body up and over his swelling tip. It was pretty, so red and aching for you to sit yourself down where you belonged.
And when you finally pressed yourself down and let him pierce through you, your legs tensed harder than they ever had before. His hands guided your hips as they made their journey down, taking him in slow and steady as he stretched you for a second time. He curved straight up into your stomach, pressing a tent into the skin with every sudden movement.
“Oh, baby,” his neck reels back, “You feel that? We feel so good together, fuck.”
And you did. You were spinning, lost in the feeling that you brought upon yourself as you rolled your hips back and forth ever so sensually. It was tender but rough, slightly personal with a tinge of animalistic chemistry. Broken moans and heavy breaths littered the space around you as you rode him with your perfect mix of bounces and slides, soaking the hairs that surrounded his base with your slushy arousal.
“Did she fuck you like this, baby? Hm?” You spur on, quickening your pace as you find your rhythm back and forth.
“No, no, only you,” he spits out with no hesitation.
You grin, satisfied with his admission before lifting yourself all the way up, sliding him completely out of you as you kept him in place between your folds. You teased around the tip that slid between them for just a moment before swallowing him whole once more, sitting yourself down completely in one smooth drop.
At the sound of his deep, drawn out moan you shuddered, bouncing up and down and all around him as you watched his lips fall further apart. He looked heavenly, stubble shifting as his prominent Adams apple bobbed up and down with every groan. His body was strong beneath you and his big grown hands held you tight, gently guiding your movements but letting you keep control all the same.
“Shit,” you curse, “I fuck daddy so good, make him cum better than she did, I know I do.”
You’re rambling now, but you don't care. Neither does he. It’s all true, and right now it’s all so right. Just what he needs to hear falling from your pretty soft lips. He wanted to be reminded of his emotional disloyalty to his ex-girlfriend. He wanted you to know how often he thought of you while he fucked her.
“She was nothing. We were nothing. This is it, baby, you’re it, fuck!” he’s breathless, dick twitching inside of you and so close to his release.
“Please, miss your cum in me so much daddy, wanna be full,” you pick up your pace, bouncing so harsh that your tits were slapping against themselves with every drop. He was in a trance as he watched you, struggling to keep his eyes open but determined to not miss a second of the angelic sight in front of him. His girl, his little baby fucking him again just how he liked. Rough and desperate and one big mess for him.
With a loud and girthy groan, his hot liquid spurts inside of you in a warm blanket of comfort. His head tossed back and his mouth fell agape in total and complete ecstasy, legs trembling beneath you as he came long and hard.
Your hips rolled him through it until his cum was pouring through the crevices where you connected, mixing with your own as you came with him. It was ridiculously wet and weirdly therapeutic to hear, like a sound you forgot existed.
You both tensed and squirmed and vibrated within each other until your head fell forward and into the crook of his neck, laying there in heavy breaths as his hands instinctively wrapped to your back. He rubbed softly into your sweaty skin, catching his breath in sync with your own.
His cock stayed in you for quite a bit before you two parted, your pussy dripping with the two of you as it landed onto his lower stomach. You both giggled a bit at the burden, knowing now that you have to go run to grab him something to clean himself up with.
“Oops, stay here,” you couldn't contain your little laugh, meshing with his own muffled chuckles throughout the dimly lit room.
You ran quickly to your bathroom to grab him a fresh towel, returning fast so as to not leave him coated in his own cum for too long. You know how it feels, there’s definitely a lot of pressure to stay perfectly still until the towel appears.
You leaned over to wipe him up, leaving him dry and only slightly sticky. You were sure you two would shower soon anyway. You had to, you were both coated in sweat.
“Thank you,” he whispers to you as you toss the towel to the side, climbing back into bed next to him.
“Harry,” you push some hair out of his face, “I really miss you.”
“I dont,” he shakes his head, pushing his lips together as he turns to face you.
You freeze, lips parted and cheeks red. And all you can think to do is put a bit of distance between the two of you and bring one of your fuzzy pillows to cover your naked body.
“Hey, I’m joking!” he nudges you with the back of his hand and erupts into a fit of laughter, the sound so sweet but so annoying in the moment.
“Harry, that’s not funny!” you scold, tossing the fuzzy pillow at his head harshly.
“It was kind of funny, until you got all sad,” he mocks, “that was quite the pout, little miss.”
“I don't miss you anymore. You can go,” you cross your arms and swat him away, tummy fluttered and chest full.
“Y/n,” he pulls closer to you, “I miss you very, very much.”
“You do?” you ask, softer this time. You know it was silly, but for some reason you had always been under the impression that you were more into him than he was you. Maybe it was the age, the power dynamic, that had you feeling like he had much more important things to attend to than a cute little twenty something. But when you were reminded otherwise, it was more rewarding than anything.
“Very much,” he nods, “Bath?”
And of course you nod, as smitten as ever, before he kisses your cheek and hops up from the bed to run the water. You just sat there, fucked out of your mind and heart swelling, waiting for him to come back and swoop you up and into the bubbles.
if you enjoyed, pls like/reblog!
more importantly, please read my recent work on wattpad! Liminal- a smutty friends w benefits plot where harry and oc live across the hall from eachother
link to Liminal -> here.
masterlist
ask/request - ask anything! i usually only reply to specific requests once i’ve fully completed it so i can keep all unfinished requests in my inbox!! :)
originally posted on patreon as a one-shot, then later turned into a series
MAIN MASTERLIST
older!harry | dad's friend!harry
Summary: Your hyper sexual tendencies get you into a lot of trouble. You're trying to be good, but you never seem to be able to shut off the voice in your head that keeps telling you that you need attention from unavailable men. When you set your sights on Harry, your dad's friend, you have no idea what you're getting yourself into.
Word Count: 9.1k
Warning: Inspection k!nk, rough blow job, humiliation k!nk, anxious attachment and validation/attention seeking behavior, unresolved neglect, d0m/sub behavior, smut, forbidden relationship, spitting, nipple play, + Harry's quite a lot older.
. .
You couldn't say exactly what was wrong with you. Maybe you really were the insufferable attention seeker your dad always said you were. You knew you needed to screw your head on straight, but you didn't know how. Seeking older, married, off-limits men seemed to make you feel better. Temporarily, at least. Was it because your dad was so cold and you were certain he didn't love you? Was it because your mother would rather drink and shop, and sleep her life away than spend any time with you? Was it because you liked the drama, the fallout, the fight, the tears?
You stared at Harry, your dad's friend, sitting at the table, just off the lake dock, drinking his third beer as he chatted with the guys. But you saw his eyes on you when your dad wasn't looking. You saw all your dad's friends' eyes on you. But Harry's were the only ones you were interested in. The lakehouse was one of your favorite spots to be. You could escape reality while drinking alcohol and wearing bikinis all day. Your dad hadn’t wanted you tagging along but you wore him down like always, nagging, needling, whining… until he gave in, rolling his eyes and told you to keep busy and not ruin his guys’ weekend.
Well, he should have known better. Certainly, there was a reason he didn't love you after all. Ruining things was kind of your go-to specialty. And right now, you wanted Harry to ruin you. He was the kind of man who could set you straight. At least he wasn't married.
You pushed up from the edge of the dock where you'd been sunning, and sauntered toward the table, just shy of the zone where your dad would bark. On your way to the cooler, you gave Harry a small, private smile, then bent for a beer and let him have the view. Tits, ass, whatever he chose to take. You just needed his eyes on you.
The first swallow of cold ale carved a clean line down your throat as you stood right where Harry could watch. He glanced, but not too long. You tossed him another look, then drifted toward the cedar-and-stone house, slipped through the sliding doors, and let the air-conditioning lift the heat from your skin.
Even as your sweat began to dry, you were still heated from all the inappropriate thoughts about Harry. His arms were strong and tattooed, his shoulders were broad, he was tall, big hands… There wasn't a single thing you could find about him that wasn't appealing. He was even a little bit boorish, which you loved. You wouldn't call him mean, but he definitely wasn't nice. He'd never been rude to you, but you'd let him if he wanted.
And best of all, you were positive he had a huge cock. You'd seen the bulky line of him after pulling himself out of the lake, the way he plucked his shorts away from the heavy lump that swayed in his navy swim shorts. Plus, there was no way a man like that wasn't nicely endowed. You wanted to see it for yourself, though.
You took another drink of your beer, your forearms pressed over the granite kitchen island, just as Mark walked in and set his dark eyes all over your skin before he walked behind you. Rolling your eyes, you took another swig and turned around, propping your elbows on the island behind yourself to look at him. "Like the color green. Or you just like my ass?"
He laughed and reached into the fridge to grab out a few more of the special beers. The ones that didn't go in the cooler because they were too expensive to sit amongst the common lagers and ales that sat drowning in water and ice in the Igloo cooler. "You got some mouth on you, Y/n."
"I saw you lookin'. Don't pretend you weren't. If Darius finds out, he'd probably kill you, though."
"If your dad finds out what?" Harry's voice cut through from the sliding door as he stepped inside, eyes on Mark. There was tension.
"Nothin'."
"He was looking at my ass," you smirked and then took another drink of your beer.
"She's right. Darius'll kill you. So will I. Go back outside, Mark."
Mark scoffed and gestured toward you. "I wasn't looking at her ass, Harry. She's just a kid. Why would—"
"I'm 23. Full-grown woman," you corrected.
Both Harry and Mark looked at you and laughed. You rolled your eyes. Harry kept his sight on you as he spoke. "Go outside, Mark, before you do anything stupid."
You licked your lips and grinned at Harry, swaying your hips just a little as you shifted. His eyes grazed your thighs before he stepped in front of you, jaw set hard.
"Don't be playin' with Mark. He's going through a lot right now."
"I know. Poor thing," you mock-pouted. "Heard his wife left him. Probably desperate to get laid. That's why he was staring at me."
"You need to behave, Y/n. You're lookin' for trouble." Harry glanced out the window then back at you.
You fluttered, your lashes innocently. "Hmm… Not looking for trouble. Honest. Not from Mark anyway."
He shook his head and sucked at the front of his teeth like what you'd said was unbelievable. But you think he got the hint. "God help me."
And just like that, he walked away. Left you standing there in the air-conditioned kitchen as he stepped back out to the patio with his friends. All boring older men his age who he knew couldn't entertain him the way you could if he just let you.
.
The wifi sucked at the lakehouse. That was one of the only things you hated about the place. The rest was kind of magical. You sat on the balcony off of your room, a joint perched between your fingers as you watched the sun slip down, and one by one, your dad and his friends began to come inside. Bedtime for the old men. But that meant go-time for you.
Patting out your joint, you stepped back inside your room and checked yourself in the mirror. Your button-up shirt was unbuttoned, nothing underneath. You grinned and felt your nerves ramp up as you tiptoed from your room, down the hallway to the one off the shared bathroom. Harry's room.
None of the men had made it upstairs yet. You could hear them all down in the kitchen still. Once again, the thrill of doing something you knew you shouldn't was too big to pull back from. Just one night with Harry would cure you. Definitely.
His room was dark when you stepped inside and closed the door behind yourself. The rush of what you were doing made your heart race as you climbed into his bed and pulled the shirt off, dropping it onto the floor next. You turned your head to inhale the pillow he'd used the night before.
It was like a dopamine hit to your brain. Harry always smelled good, and now, lying in the bed, he'd soon be coming to… your insides were churning, and your skin was prickling with heat.
Look, you knew you were ridiculous. You knew it was dumb. But you really didn't care. You should have cared. You should have gone to therapy instead of going to older, unavailable men to fill in the gaps of whatever it was that was missing in you. But for you, rational thought rarely won. For better or worse. You were a walking disaster.
When footsteps began to hit the stairs and deep voices laughed and lulled, doors opened, and then closed, you pulled his blankets over your head and bit your lip in anticipation. You had a feeling he was going to kick you out of his room. Tell you that you needed help and that you were barking up the wrong tree or something like that.
The moment his door opened, you held your breath. You heard his footsteps, the door closing behind him, then locking. When the light came on, you could see it slip through the edges of the blanket, and then everything went silent. You slowly inhaled and blinked your eyes against the dark of the blankets over you and tried to listen for any single noise, but there was nothing. Not a footstep, nor a breath. Was he playing a game? There was no way he didn't notice the clear outline of your body under his blankets, and there was no way he didn't know it was you.
Just before you were about to pull the covers from your face to find out what was going on, all of the blankets were suddenly ripped from you and pulled to the floor, cold air hitting your bare skin. You gasped and sat up to see him standing at the end of the bed, an unreadable expression on his face as he trailed his eyes down your nude figure sitting right in the spot he would be sleeping.
He pressed his lips together tight and nodded before he crossed to the side of the bed to casually plug his cellphone in to charge it. You blinked, confused, and shifted to sit with your legs tucked under your thighs as you watched him. Why wasn't he giving you some kind of reaction?
"Um…" You said thinly. "You gonna say something?"
He slid his gaze to yours, and he sniffed before he sat at the edge of the bed and began to remove his shoes. "What do you want me to say?"
Shaking your head, you frowned. "I don't know. I thought it'd be funny. Maybe make you laugh."
He pushed out a laugh, but it was missing its edge of humor. "Funny? This is you being funny, Y/n?"
"Well…" You looked down at your lap and suddenly felt like escaping. You could just grab your shirt and dash back to your room, pretend you'd never done it.
"Well, what?"
"I don't know. I don't know why I did it."
"Not every day a man steps into his room to find a naked girl in his bed. Worse when it's his friend's daughter."
Biting your lip hard, you lifted an arm to cover your breasts and hook your fingers over your upper arm, suddenly not feeling like your usual bold self. Harry's reaction had not been what you'd expected at all. You were used to an extreme response. But this?
He brought a hand up and pulled at your lip, voice soft. "Don't bite it. Make yourself bleed."
You blinked slowly, eyes on his as you parted your lips where he pulled and grabbed his wrist, pushing your lips over his thumb and sucking around it. It was automatic when you did it. He didn't pull away.
"Fuck me," he muttered under his breath. But it came out sounding less like a man excited and more like a man with a conundrum.
You laved your tongue all around and moaned softly, pushing and then pulling your lips over his digit as he watched you. Shifting your hips, you scooted closer to him, his thumb still in your mouth. And you thought maybe it was just that easy. Show him how nasty you could be right off and he'd give in.
But he moved away and stood, your hand falling to your lap. He bent and grabbed the blankets, tossing them back over the bottom of the mattress. You watched him pull his wallet from his back pocket and place it on the dresser, with his back to you. You had no idea what was going on. But he wasn't kicking you out. Yet.
You were honestly used to one of two reactions from men when you pulled this kind of shit—not that you'd done this exact thing before, but still.
Men would either respond with a lot of enthusiasm in favor of getting to fuck you, or they'd freak out and leave (or tell you to leave).
Of course, your actual "body count" was not nearly as high as that makes it seem. You were no virgin, but you were also not really a "bop" either. Well, maybe you were a little bit, but you preferred thinking of yourself as a lover girl, really. Just a girl looking to be loved. Looking for something real, but probably in all the wrong places.
He turned to face you, bracing his hands against the edge of the dresser behind him. "Why are you here?"
You tipped your chin up to make it look like you had more confidence than you did, given that you were naked, in his bed, uninvited.
"I just wanted to see what would happen."
"To see what would happen," he repeated. You watched him nod and drag his eyes down your body to where your feet were tucked under your bottom.
"I think I already know what you want. But I need you to tell me first. Otherwise, you'll return to your room. This isn't a game. Tell me why you're here."
You swallowed and put your palms on your knees. "To see if I could get you to..."
He waited to let you finish your thought but when you didn't, he did it for you. "To see if you could get me to… what? Look at you? Pay attention to you?"
You nodded, your throat tightening. "Yeah. I wanted you to like me."
He huffed a quiet laugh. "You think I don't like you?"
Right then, you really wished you had some clothes on. "Hard to really tell."
He shook his head and looked up at the ceiling. "If I didn't like you, you would not be sitting here right now."
It was pathetic but the edge of your lip nudged upward at that admission. So he did like you. At least enough to keep you sitting on his bed, naked.
"Tell me why you're here."
God, you were so out of your depth with Harry. You slowly inhaled and sank your nails into the skin on the outside of your knee. "I wanted attention. Your attention specifically."
"Attention. Okay. Well, you got it. You realize I'm not much younger than your dad."
"I know. I just… like you."
He laughed and pushed away from the dresser, stepping next to the bed closer to you. "I can see that. Not very wise, though. Is it?"
You shook your head, looking up at him through your lashes.
"No, it's not." He blew out a slow breath. “How much have you had to drink?”
“Nothing since dinner. I’m not even tipsy. Well, I smoked a half joint before I came in here.”
His eyes stayed on yours long enough to make you feel naked in a different way. “A joint? And now you're sitting here without any clothes on in my bed? Your dad would be very disappointed in you.” He glanced at the door, then back to you.
Your heart thudded as you let out a humorless laugh. “He won't ever know unless you say something. Besides, he doesn't care about me anyway. Mom either.”
Harry reached down and took your chin between his thumb and middle finger, palm cradling the underside. "Darius doesn't give you enough attention? Is that what this is? You're desperate for someone to take care of you?"
You nodded, chin padded by his palm as you rounded your eyes on his. You reached up to grab his forearm, but he tsk'd at you and moved his hand away. "Hands back in your lap. You want attention from me, then we're doing this my way. Is that clear?"
"Yes," you spoke in a whisper.
"Good." His mouth twitched like he was fighting a smile he didn’t want to have, but you saw it. "Few rules first." He stepped away, moving toward the door to double-check that he'd locked it before he returned to your side next to the bed.
"You'll listen to me. You keep your voice down. If I say stop, you stop. That door stays locked until I unlock it. You'll go back to your room when I say. And in the morning, you are polite and distant, and you don’t make me a liar in front of your dad."
You nodded too fast, blinking your eyes as you swallowed.
“Understood?”
“Yes,” you said, throat tight. “I can do that.”
He lifted a hand toward your face, and you leaned into it. His knuckles skimmed your jaw, the heat of his palm cupping your cheek. The careful way he touched you made your bravado feel small and your want feel enormous.
“There can be no loud noises coming from you, much as I'd like to hear it,” he said. “Are you able to keep yourself quiet?”
“Yes,” you said plainly. You hoped you could.
"Good, because one peep too loud and you're out of here. I'm not risking my relationship with your dad so some spoiled, bored girl can get her kicks and play out her twisted fantasy on an older man. We're both adults here, Y/n. Let's call it what it is."
You frowned, brows pinching together.
"What? Did you think this was gonna turn into a love story? Honey, this is what you get when you play around with people you shouldn't."
You turned your gaze toward the edge of the room, your heart thundering so loud you could hear it in your ears. You just wanted to find a man to love you at the end of the day, but you knew the way you went about it was all wrong. The kind of men you went after weren't fit for that. Harry wasn't going to be your knight in shining armour and sweep you away to his city penthouse and take care of every want and need you had.
"I know," you said, your voice hollow like the space inside of you that you so desperately wanted filled.
The bed dipped when he sat down. "Hey. Look at me, Y/n."
Blinking, you shifted your gaze back to his. His clear rules were making you confront yourself in a way you didn't usually need to, and you felt very outmatched for it.
"Where'd all your sass go? Hm? Don't tell me you're this easy to break."
"I don't… Most men don't care about rules. I'm used to just…" You shook your head, picking at your nails in your lap.
"Most men? How many?"
"What?"
He raised his brows. "How often do you do shit like this?"
"Well, not like… all the time. Like a few."
"You usually go for older men?"
You nodded.
"Right. So this is a pattern. You could have picked any of the guys here this weekend, and you'd have been satisfied. Mark would probably already be fucking you if you'd picked his room."
"No. I didn't want anyone else. That's why I came here."
"And you're used to men not giving a damn about the consequences. Thought I'd be easy to seduce, didn't you?"
Shaking your head quickly, you spoke. "No. I honestly thought you'd just kick me out."
He tilted his head, a slow grin pulling at his lips. "You did all this thinking I was just gonna send you out of here? You like being humiliated, Y/n?"
You shrugged. "Just for attention. Even if you just yelled at me and told me to get out, that would've been fine. Take what I can get."
He blinked, eyes shifting between yours. "That's kind of fucked up. You realize that, right?"
You pushed out a breath of a laugh, embarrassed, and looked back down at your lap. "I know. I have issues that I should probably work out in therapy."
He slid his palm over your knee, and you flicked your gaze back to his. "Probably? Baby, this is a whole shit sandwich you got goin' on here."
You laughed, a little too loud, and covered your mouth quickly, eyes wide.
"Shh…" he smiled, shaking his head in disbelief. "Get on your tummy. Tush up."
Your face went hot immediately, and every inch of flesh burned as your vision went bleary from the sudden shift in his demeanor and the drop in his voice. But you quickly did as he said, moving to your side and then lowering your tummy to the mattress. You kept your neck turned so you could see him in your peripheral. He didn't move at first, but you could hear his breath.
It felt like minutes that he sat there and just stared at your backside. Like he needed to make sure he was ready for it himself. But when he finally touched you, a big hand pressing at your low back and tracing upward along your spine, you smiled and sighed a soft moan.
"Jesus, Y/n." His hand paused at your shoulder blade. "Acting like you never get touched. Need it that bad?"
You breathed out and nodded into the crook of your arm. You didn't want him to stop touching you. However he wanted to do it, you'd be happy. You just needed it.
He shifted, his hands pressing flat into the mattress on either side of your waist as he leaned over you, his voice next to your ear. "Bet you like to be spanked, don't you? Like to get smacked around just to feel a man's hands on you? Like it rough?"
You nodded, your eyes pressing toward the limn of your vision so you could see the outline of his face over you.
"Not happening tonight. Too much noise. Understood?"
You nodded again. "Mmhm."
When he pushed away, he didn't move far. He pulled your hands down and placed them on your tailbone. "Keep these here."
You threaded your fingers together to hold your hands still as he moved behind you. A shift of fabric, the bed tipped under his weight and then lifted when he stood. He was taking off his shirt. Maybe everything, you weren't sure.
He turned on the lamp on the side table and then walked across the room to shut off the overhead light. Then you saw him grab his cellphone. A few moments passed before you heard the sound of white noise coming from his phone. The pulse of waves and the soft lapping of water receding from a shoreline. The constant, gentle drone of sound that could drown out small noises while putting someone to sleep. Only tonight, the white noise wasn't for sleeping. It would serve as a disguise.
With your hands still exactly where he put them, you turned your head to see him walking toward a small suitcase on the other side of the bed. He'd removed his shirt and his jeans, but was still wearing a pair of black boxer briefs that hugged his thighs and glutes tightly. He pulled something from his suitcase that you couldn't see before he stepped around to the bedside table, and you turned your head again to watch as he laid down two condoms. Two.
"I'm on birth control," you said, your eyes following his movements.
"Oh, I'm sure you are, honey."
And that was all he said before he was kneeing back up onto the bed behind you, his hands moving up the backs of your thighs and pressing them apart. You squeezed your eyes closed, feeling more exposed and naked than you ever had.
Then he was touching you with purpose. His hands sliding over your skin and around the curve of your ass before he squeezed and pulled. You could hear his breath as he went. The warm span of his palm and fingers wrapped your sides and then he pinched gently. You rocked your hips and moaned softly.
"You let men fuck you without condoms?"
You swallowed. "Sometimes. Not usually."
"Is that why you told me you're on birth control? Want my cock bare?"
You nodded and lifted your head to look back at him, but your hands, being where they were, made it difficult to turn. "I'd let you."
"Lie down."
You lay back into the position you'd been in and waited. He took your hips and lifted gently and you heard him inhale through his teeth before his thumbs found your labia and he pulled. "Looks pretty. Would love to fuck you raw, but I don't think that's a good idea tonight."
Tonight. There it was again. Your heart beat picked up faster at just the idea. Not tonight, but perhaps another. Not that that was what he meant, but the way he said it…
His fingers prodded and pulled at your folds slowly. It was strange to be scrutinized so closely like that. You felt cool air hit your skin before his lips pressed against your pussy and you moaned, turning your mouth down into the blankets to muffle the sound.
"Good girl. You do know how to listen." He squeezed your ass again and yanked you up further, bottom higher in the air, knees digging into the mattress, before he shifted and you felt his thighs line up with the back of yours. You immediately rocked back against him and felt the line of him pressing into you.
He let you rub yourself against him, your hips pressing, swaying against him as you whimpered like an idiot into the blanket. His hands were light on your hips as you moved, like he enjoyed watching you do it. And given how hard he was under his briefs, you figured he did.
He pushed out something that could have been considered a moan when he tightened his grip on you and then rutted forward, his big dick pressing harder against your ass. But then he pulled back, and you felt his fingers on your crease again, sliding them through, up and down.
"Knew this ass would be cute."
The sudden press of two of his fingers inside of you had you gasping as you rolled against him. He groaned quietly and began to finger you with one of his hands, his other holding your hip loosely so you could still push back onto his digits.
"There you go. Fuck my fingers, honey."
You arched harder, letting your body rear back and shift forward so you could keep sinking down onto his fingers. The white noise coming from his phone did a good job of covering up the gushy, wet sounds your pussy made as you rocked. But then he moved again, his fingers were gone, and the mattress dipped.
"Sit up."
You released your hands and scrambled up quickly to face him, and he laughed at how obedient you were. He stepped onto the floor to the edge of the bed and pointed. "On your back, head at the edge here."
You moved right away, scooting your bottom until you were where he wanted you, head slightly hanging from the mattress, throat exposed. You looked up at him and just saw his tall frame, upside down, standing over you as he pulled his cock from his briefs. Long and thick… just like you knew it would be. You reached for him, but he swatted your hand away.
"Hands down by your side for now."
You pressed your arms to your sides and balled your fists tight as he grabbed your throat and bent enough that he could smear his tip against your chin and then your lips. You opened your mouth wide, and he huffed a quiet laugh.
"Love the enthusiasm. Stick out your tongue."
You jutted your tongue out as he reached over you, and his hands found your breasts for a quick squeeze before he took his cock in one palm and tapped it to your tongue. He ran his dick along your tongue and passed your lips a few times, wetting himself with your saliva.
He started off slow like that. Gently pushing in, not too far, and dragging himself back. He held his base as he went, working into you until you felt more relaxed with the angle and his girth before he snapped his hips down and thrust in past your gag reflex.
He chuckled darkly when he did it again, and you gurgled. His crown curved into your throat as he gasped and you swallowed around him with a quiet sputter. But you were determined to give him what he wanted and be the best you could be. Only when he moaned and reached forward to squeeze your nipples did you feel like it was a job well done. He liked it. You were making him feel good.
You'd had a couple of men fuck your face before and do it rough. You didn't mind because it felt like a reward when someone was enjoying your body. If he was having a good time, then so were you. And the small gasps coming from Harry, the salty precome dripping down your throat, the pulse in his thick vein, the way he was pinching your nipples… You felt like you were on your way to winning first prize.
"Fuck… That's it…"
Your face was numb, your throat was raw, saliva dripped down your temples and into your ears and hair, your eyes were blurry, and you could hardly breathe… But you were being enjoyed and that's all you wanted. It turned you on more than anything else.
Harry pulled out, his chest was heaving and he cursed under his breath. "Goddamn, Y/n."
You blinked tears from your eyes and moved your head to look up at him, still upside down from your vantage point. He walked around to the other side of the bed and you followed with your eyes as far as you could until you felt his hands on your ankles, pulling you to lie lengthwise on the bed before he climbed between your legs and pulled your thighs over his shoulders.
"Fuck, baby…"
Then his mouth was on you, soft, hot, wet… His tongue drew silent lines up and down your center before he sucked at your clit. You lifted your hips sharply with a gasp, throwing your arm across your mouth to keep as quiet as possible.
He moaned into your pussy and pressed in harder with his lips and tongue. But it was the way he slid the tip of his tongue quickly back and forth on your bud that made it hard to stop the noises from falling out of your mouth.
You reached down to stuff your fingers into his thick hair and rolled your hips up against his mouth. He didn't let up, and he didn't make you put your hands down. It was heaven being eaten out by Harry. It was like being loved on, which was something you craved constantly. Most men skipped foreplay with you because they figured you were just a slut who didn't need that kind of thing. But of course, you never asked for it because you figured they were at least partly right.
"Mmmm…" you moaned, mouth closed as your spine bowed from the bed. Harry pulled away and spat over your pussy and then looked up at you.
"Never seen a girl get this wet before," he said as he slid three fingers flat on your clit to rub his saliva in with your slick arousal. He kept his eyes on you as he rubbed your pussy, and then he reached up to your tit, wiping your wetness on your nipple and then then thumbing over your peak. He pushed his mouth against your hip and moaned before he sat back, pressing the insides of your knees further apart, pupils drawing through the space of your pussy and everything between your legs.
You moaned quietly and blinked up at him, your hands drifting up to your breasts as you lifted your hips in a silent plea.
"Shit." He shook his head and sighed. "Gonna want more of this." He traced his palms up your thigh and to your hips. "Which is dangerous. But I need to hear you beg til you're crying." He smoothed his hands around to your hips and then under to your ass as he squeezed. "Wanna take you over my knee and spank you when you make a mistake, when you mouth off. Can't do any of that here, can we?"
You swallowed and shook your head, a whisper of a no coming out as you lifted your hips again, impatient.
"Fuck. Hold on."
He reached over you, his strong arm stretching to the bedside table where he grabbed his phone and a condom. He laid the condom on your tummy and fiddled with his phone until you heard it ringing, speaker phone on. He put his finger up to his lips to signal for you to be quiet the moment a woman answered.
"Hi, handsome."
"Hey. Got a sec?"
"Sure, what's up?"
You blinked and pushed yourself up by your elbows as Harry laid the phone down next to your hip, glancing at you before he plucked up the condom and tore it open.
"Hate to do this on the phone, but it couldn't wait." He laid the rubber over his tip and began to roll it down as he continued speaking. "Can't see you anymore. Something came up and wouldn't be right to drag this out any longer. Really sorry."
"Wait. You're breaking up with me? What happened?"
"What happened is that something came up. I really am sorry. I just wanted to let you know before we took it any further. Okay?"
When the condom was rolled down as far as it could reach, he scooted closer to you and lay his cock over your tummy.
"Harry, I don't get it."
"Nothing to get. No hard feelings. I wish you luck."
He reached down and ended the call, the white noise returning with a soft crashing wave, and then he looked down at you, your brows pinched together.
"You had a girlfriend? I thought you were single?"
"She wasn't a girlfriend. Just someone I was seeing casually. Wasn't serious."
"So, why'd you end it with her if it was casual?" Your heart was racing.
He pushed out a laugh and dragged his hands to the underside of your thighs. "It was a courtesy. Was gonna break it off anyway. Least I could do was be a gentleman about it and break up with her before I fuck someone else. Shoulda done it before I laid my hands on you, but kinda forgot she existed there for a bit."
You smiled, a small laugh puffing from your lips. "You could've just texted. That's usually all the courtesy I get from men, and then they block me so I can't call back. Woulda made that a lot easier."
He stared at you blankly and ran his hands up your thighs to your hips. "You haven't been getting treated right, Y/n. Breaking up over text is for cowards. Not my style."
You bit your lip and ran your palms over your tits, pressing them together gently. It made you feel special that he broke up with some woman while he was there with you, sliding a condom onto his dick, fucked up as it was. "You're a lot nicer than I thought you'd be."
The smirk that worked its way up on his mouth was almost villainous as he brushed his tip through your crease and pressed it just to your opening. "Is that what that was? Nice?"
"Well… yeah. Wasn't it?"
He breathed out a laugh and shook his head. "Was it nice of me when I made you choke on my cock before the call?"
You opened your mouth, but your response was cut off when he pushed himself in past your tight muscle, your insides opening up for his cock as he went. Inhaling sharply, you reached to close your hands around his biceps as he nudged deep into you.
"But you liked it. That's all that matters to you, isn't it? Like taking men from other women. Spoiled brat behavior."
You whined quietly, your mouth still opened wide as he forced himself in further, taking the back of your knees and pushing your legs apart for him.
"Think she'd agree it's nice that I'm fucking a cute young thing with a pretty, wet pussy just minutes after breaking it off with her?" He spoke low, rocking into you. "Feels really fucking nice," he moaned under his breath. "But this is far from nice, Y/n."
You puffed out a breath, and he reached down, taking your breast into his palm, squeezing. "She loves nice guys, but you? You don't want a nice guy, do you?"
You blinked, shaking your head, the breath of a no falling out of your mouth as he pushed himself in and dragged back, your insides splitting apart for him when he drilled down into you. It was hard to answer the question when he was plunging in the way he was, when he had you bent in half under him, one hand gripping tight under your knee and the other over your tit to hold you in place.
"Hm? Tell me. You want a nice guy, Y/n? Or are you lookin' for someone to sort you out? Someone to fix you?" He spoke quietly as he fucked into you, pushing his dick to the hilt every time he bottomed out.
"Hnnhh—" You wobbled out some kind of noise and gasped. "Yes… Fff… Need to be fixed."
He moaned, hips pumping into you harder, making the bed creak under your back. He slowed his thrusts, and the mattress springs went silent again. You watched his eyes flutter shut and his mouth drop open as he released your breast and placed his hand back to the underside of your knee, holding your legs apart. He dipped his hips shallowly, and you were so wet that the sound of his cock dragging in and out of you couldn't be disguised by the white noise coming from his phone. But he kept going.
When he opened his eyes again and looked down at you, the expression on his face was tight, pained. You'd seen that look on men before. When they were getting lost in lust. Lost in the way you felt around them. He panted a breath as he pushed his big dick deep into your tummy and ground down on your pelvis. You both inhaled, your body clinging snugly around him.
"Oh, baby. Shame I can't fuck your brains out like you need me to. Hear all those pathetic noises you want to make, turn you into a slobbering little mess on your knees for me."
"I want it, please…" You moaned, stretching your neck out as you gushed around his thrusting dick. Suddenly, his palm was on your mouth, stopping the noise from escaping further. He rutted into you hard, your body jolting.
"What did I say? You want to go back to your room?"
You shook your head, eyes wide on him, his hand still covering your entire mouth.
"No? If you want to stay here, then you need to be good and keep quiet. Let me work, and you just lie here for me. Should be really easy for you."
Easy? You'd hardly call it easy. Harry's girth pushing into your guts, his strong, solid body, tattooed arms and chest, wicked green eyes, the way he was speaking to you… You pinched your eyes closed and moaned, damp, into his palm when he drove in deep.
Then you felt him squeezing at your cheeks, and you opened your eyes to look up at him just as he slid his thumb past your lips. You sucked around it as he pumped his cock into you slowly, being careful not to move too fast or make too much noise.
"Know how hard this is for me? Having to be gentle with you like this…"
You laved your tongue over his thumb and moaned, his dick nudging to your end. You wanted his lips on yours. You wanted to know what he'd be like with his tongue against your mouth, sliding softly over you. One kiss from him and you'd never ask for anything else again.
"Knowing you like it a little rough, just like I do. Knowing you need something I can't give you right now."
You whimpered around his thumb and he hissed when he bottomed out, stuffing his entire length into you and feeling the tight squeeze of you pulling him in. "Sucking my thumb like a proper baby, aren't you?"
There was a time when he just thought you were an innocent young woman. It had been easy to ignore how cute you were when he met you just after you turned 20 years old, his friend's daughter with sweet eyes and a nice ass under your jeans. He wasn't interested in innocent and cute, especially not when you were Darius's daughter. And especially not when you were so damn young.
But then, as time went on, he started to notice your attitude. The comments you'd make when he'd stop by to see his friend. The way Darius would yell at you and you'd roll your eyes at him but then smile at Harry with a kind of sultry smirk that had blood rushing through his veins. Eventually, it became clear that you weren't so innocent. You were seeking something risky, and Harry certainly couldn't get involved with any of that. So he kept his distance.
Until that night when he walked into his room and saw you naked in his bed… pretty tits, soft hips, dirty grin on your face. He should have kicked you out, like you thought he'd do. He should have sent you on your way and pretended it never happened. But there was something about you that he needed to uncover, and right then, as he was balls deep inside of your warm pussy, he knew he was fucked cause he was thinking with his dick and not his head.
It was a terrible idea to give in to you, but he couldn't seem to help himself. You'd been a bratty temptress earlier, and now here you were all pliable and submissive, needy. You had something he'd been missing in the women he'd dated over the last few years. It wasn't easy to find a woman who liked what he did. A little punishment. A little guidance. He'd pretty much given up, resigning himself to vanilla sex, which was still fun, but didn't fulfill his deeper desires.
"Christ. What am I gonna do with you, hm?" He drilled down into you, hips pasted to yours as you sucked his thumb into your mouth with a whine.
Suddenly, he pulled out, rearing back, and pressed both of his hands down on the bed by your hips, your legs falling flat. You watched him drop his head, shoulders rising and falling heavy like he was trying to recharge himself. Slowly, he lifted his eyes to yours, green irises nearly hidden under blown-out pupils.
He sat back and grabbed your calf, lifting your leg, and used his opposite hand to squeeze your ass, fingers pinching into your skin with a painful bite. You pressed your lips flat to stop the yelp from falling into the room, and he smiled at your restraint.
"Good fucking girl."
Good fucking girl… You would have purred if it were possible. He'd been mixing in little drops of praise between scolding words. You rolled your eyes to the back of your head at the praise and moaned, mouth still closed. Then he let go and his hands were on your hips and then your breasts, fingers pinching your nipples, rolling them between the pads of his fingers and you arched your back from the bed with a gasp.
When he moved over you, he ran his tongue along the edge of a nipple before he pulled it into his mouth, a hand on your other one, pinching. He sucked your bud softly, wetting, tongue swirling, and then you felt the sharp nip. You wiggled, and your hands flew to his hair.
"Harry, fuck…" You breathed his name into the room, focusing really hard to keep your voice quiet.
He moaned against your breast and went harder before he moved his mouth to the other side. The room was spinning as he pinched and sucked. But every time you felt his teeth graze your nipple, everything halted, and your vision blurred.
You couldn't stop rolling your hips up into him. It was involuntary, the way you needed more and more. Little whimpers bubbled from your mouth when he lifted his lips and began to dot wet kisses up to your clavicle, along the column of your neck and then… oh god… when his lips pressed over yours, you grasped onto the back of his neck with both hands and wrapped your thighs around his waist to get him closer.
He grunted, tongue sliding against yours as he closed his mouth over your lips softly. When he plunged his cock back into you, thick head bullying its way through your little opening, it felt different than before with his lips on yours. Like everything you needed. He thrusted in, pelvis grinding against your clit, and you moaned into his mouth.
"Oh, you like that, don't you?" He murmured against your mouth with a smile as he buried in as far as he could go. "God… You just need someone to take care of you."
You nodded, lips brushing his, still clinging tight to him as your thighs began to shake. He lifted his face to look down at you. "This is a disaster in the making," he said, shaking his head. "Open your mouth, Y/n."
When you opened your mouth and stuck your tongue out for him, he groaned softly at your obedience. He grinned and dipped down, licking your tongue, before you felt his saliva sliding into your mouth. Then he was kissing you again, making you swallow his spit.
You felt one of his hands smooth down your side to your hip and squeeze to hold you still, his other sliding under your neck as he worked his mouth against yours. He felt so good on you like that… his body pressed to yours, cock slid deep, pelvis pressed to your clit, lips smearing against yours…
Your insides were twisting, pulsing, gushing with every dip, every lap of his tongue. The muscles in your body began to tense as your orgasm slowly swelled in your tummy. And Harry seemed to notice it. He kept his pace and moaned, the bed squeaking quietly under the weight of his thrusts. But he didn't stop because your grip felt so good around him, tightly squeezing in little pulses that were making his cock throb.
And then your body gave in completely, limbs shaking, loud moan that he captured with his mouth, pussy shuddering and spasming around him with every wave of pleasure that leaked through your guts. Your nails carved the smallest little half moons into the nape of his neck as he pumped his hips, working you through it all the way until you went limp.
When it was safe, he pulled away to look down at your face, eyes closed, lips parted. He moved his hand around to brush his knuckles on your cheek. "Did good for me, Y/n. Gonna flip you over, okay?"
You knocked your head up and down, fluttering your eyes opened slowly as he moved, cock slipping out of you, his warm body lifting away. It felt so gentle the way he helped you to your tummy, hands gripping at your hips and waist and carefully laying you down flat as he whispered to you how pretty you were when you were coming, how good you'd done. Your heart was kicking hard in your chest at his words and the way his hands were holding you.
Then he squeezed the round of your ass and pulled you apart before you felt his cock dragging into you with a tight push. He inhaled as he went, lifting your hips up just enough that he could angle himself down into you properly and fuck into you a little harder. The plap of his skin against yours filled the room, and his moans were slowly getting deeper, breathier. You felt him faltering, hips jerking, breaths jagged.
He pressed a hand to the back of your neck and worked into you in deep, languid strokes. "Fuck baby… I'm coming… fuck…"
He slid his hand around to the front of your throat, lowered his chest to your back, and pressed his lips to the curve of where your neck and shoulder met as he pumped into his condom, cock throbbing heavy against your walls. You moaned into the blanket, a smile on your face. His release was your prize.
When he relaxed over you, he slowly kissed the skin at the back of your neck, and the weight of him pressed you hard into the mattress. You sighed, content. The sound of white noise from his phone filled the room again as you both quieted.
You could feel his heart pounding against your back, your own heartbeat racing with his. Your body felt like melty, gooey happiness as you closed your eyes and felt him lift off of you. He didn't kick you out of his bed and send you back to your room like you thought he might, which would have been totally fine given the circumstances. Instead, he slowly flipped you over, hands sliding over your skin before he wiped a clean t-shirt between your legs and then shut off the bedside lamp, pulled you into his arms, and let you drift off to sleep against his chest.
.
"Y/n. Wake up, honey."
You blinked your eyes open slowly and saw the shadow of Harry just above you. The room was still dark, and you had no idea what time it was or what time you'd fallen asleep as he shifted next to you.
"Gotta get you back to your room. Before Darius wakes up. Come on. Sit up."
You nodded, eyes fluttering shut and then open. He pulled your shirt over your back, helping you slide your arms inside, and then buttoned up the front for you. You were pulled to your feet, an arm sweeping around your low back to hold you upright before he walked you to your room quietly.
When he lowered you to your bed, you held tight to his forearms. "Gotta let go, Y/n. Can't have anyone seeing us."
You blinked up at him in the dark, suddenly aware that this was probably the last time you'd ever get to see him like that, and you sat up. "Harry, don't leave."
He sat down next to you. "I have to. You promised me you'd be good. Now let go."
"This is it, isn't it? Got what you wanted and now you're done with me."
"I shouldn't have even touched you, Y/n. But I did." He reached up to your face, thumb running gently over your cheekbone as you kept your hand gripped on his forearm. "And I should end it here. But I don't think I'm done with you yet."
You lifted to your knees, hands reaching up to his face. "Really? Don't lie to me."
He placed his big hands on your thighs and slid them up under your shirt to your hips. "Really, Y/n. Trust me. We'll talk about this later, okay? But your dad gets up early, and if he sees me in here with you, then there will be no later for us."
You wrapped your arms around his neck and grinned so wide your cheeks started to hurt when he had to peel you off with a huff. He gave your bottom the softest swat and spoke quietly into your ear, be good, before he got up and walked out of your room, closing the door behind him.
.
You rolled over to see the bright sun shining through your balcony doors and stretched your limbs. It was after 11 am so you were positive all the men were already up. You sat up and grinned, squealing quietly to yourself, throwing your body back down to the bed as you kicked your feet when you remembered Harry's promise of "later".
But you also remembered your promise to him—And in the morning, you are polite and distant, and you don’t make me a liar in front of your dad.
When you finally made your way downstairs in your little pink bikini, you could hear their voices in the kitchen. Taking a breath, you stepped in, eyes sweeping over everyone before you opened the fridge and pulled out a carton of orange juice to pour a glass for yourself.
"It's almost noon, Y/n. Do you really have nothing better to do than sleep the day away?" Your dad spoke.
You took a long drink of orange juice and put the carton away before you turned to look at your dad and sighed dramatically. "No. I don't. You guys are all boring, and WiFi barely works. My choices are limited to sleeping, drinking, and lying out by the lake."
"Just like your mother," his words cut through to your bones, and he laughed, looking at the other men.
Everyone laughed. Except Harry. You glanced at him quickly before quietly putting your glass into the sink and stepping past them to go outside.
“Beer's in the cooler, ready to go if you want one now. Or... later,” Harry said, casual. But nothing about it was casual. You understood it was an attempt to quell your dad's harsh words for you.
With your fingers on the sliding door handle, you turned to look at him and blinked, flicking your gaze to the other men and then back to Harry.
“Later,” you said, a small smile pulling at your mouth. “I’ll come grab it when I’m thirsty.”
You slid the door open and stepped into the wash of sun, the men’s voices dissolving into background noise. Outside, it was only the lake and the heat on your skin, but your insides churned with the sound of his voice. Later. It was a promise you were already restless to keep.
. .
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“Okay! All done,” she can hear the smile in his voice, and she instantly feels like a lecher. What the hell was she doing having a thought like that? “Would you get me?”
It’s no better, rubbing the sunscreen into his shoulders. Harry is so broad – he never wears clothes that show it off much, but Y/N had seen him in a workout tank top once and almost gasped. His shoulders are big; his back is sculpted – it’s the sort of thing you might see on an inspo page for working out. It leads into the shape of his biceps and triceps, and maybe it’s for the best that she isn’t that close to Harry? Because clearly, she’d been around him for like a day and a half and she can’t have a normal thought to save her fucking life.
Beneath her fingers, his skin is warm and soft. She doesn’t even realize that the sunscreen is gone until she’s been rubbing it on him for like two minutes.
“Ah, I used too much,” she lied through her teeth, patting his shoulders gently, “There you go, all done.”
or
Y/N has to room with Harry on vacation, and she can't be normal
(A/N: HI FRIENDS!!!! I just wanted to apologize that this took so long!! BUTTT HERE'S THE BEACH VACAY FICCIE I'VE BEEN PROMISING! I hope you guys like it! Even with the writer's block, I had a lot of fun writing it, so let me know if you want a part 2, or else I'll overthink and think you hate it hehe. LOVE YOU, THANK YOU FOR BEING PATIENT WITH ME! Also, guys, I have never been to this part of Japan that they're vacationing in, so I'm sorry if things are wrong, I was just doing research as I went!)
(16.7k+ words)
i.
Y/N has never been to a beach house.
She’s been to a beach, yeah, and she’s been to a house, obviously, but the mix of the two? That’s for people who own shares in oil companies and sleep on Egyptian cotton sheets that they can regularly afford to change. Owning a house in an area even remotely near a beach could be a hole in the pocket, but owning a separate house, away from where you live, just so that you have somewhere fun to spend a couple of weeks in the Summer? That’s a whole separate type of wealth Y/N has never once experienced; one that had been relegated to maladaptive daydreams where she’s famous and getting paparazzi photos taken of her near the ocean for a new single.
So when her friends suggested they rent one in Japan for a little summer vacation, she snorted and asked them if everybody had 3000 each to put toward it. But it turned out that Niall’s uncle’s friend actually owned one. His wife grew up in Minamiizu and wanted to be able to travel back easily now and then when she wanted to visit, but didn’t necessarily want a house there. There was a beach house in Shimoda for sale at the time of them looking, which directly bordered Minamiizu on the southern tip of the Izu Peninsula. It was roughly a two-and-a-half-hour train ride to Tokyo, so they could spend a couple of days in the city as well.
His uncle’s friend was offering them a cheaper rate than anyone would on Airbnb, so long as they promised not to do any gross damage that would need fixing afterward. Which meant, for half the price that a typical Airbnb would charge, they would have a week and a half at a beach house. And when they all managed to get PTO from their respective jobs, managed their other non-work-related commitments around it, and bought their plane tickets, Y/N realized that this was actually happening. They do a lot of talking and fantasizing about different trips that they want to take, but not very often do they come to fruition.
Y/N was excited, though, and a little nervous. It was her friend group, sure, but she had only travelled long distances with Niall (it was on a whim, in his pursuit to meet a man he’d been talking to in Spain, whom she thought they were about to bring back with them on some sort of spousal visa, but he ended up lowkey being a catfish). Y/N was unsure of what all of their travel types were – who was type A, type B, or (in Niall’s case) type C? Y/N knew Adam would be type A, because he’s type A in every other aspect of his life, but how many type As could be in a group without it being too many chefs in the kitchen? And how many type B’s can there be before they get nothing done because nobody has a set itinerary? And how many people were going to threaten to beat Niall for the state he often leaves bathrooms in after he’s done getting ready?
She isn’t sure. Niall, Adam, Mei, and Y/N have known each other since UNI, where they all got disgustingly close in their dorm the first year, when they all used the common room often because they hated their randomly assigned roommates. Then, for the next three years, they shared a four-bedroom flat just a block or two from campus and saw each other at various states of disarray. Then, Mei introduced them to Chris, who worked in the same cafe she did while she was looking for a job that pertained to her degree, and he slid into their group quickly and easily. Niall met Maeve during a mixer that they both happened to attend because they both thought they might be Bi (Niall is still on the fence; Maeve has come to realize she is), and while sparks didn’t fly in a relationship sense, Niall invited her to the bar, and they all hit it off well. And Adam met Harry in the lab where he works, and. . . .
The thing is – Harry is very sweet. He was the person who trained Adam at his job for the two-month period during which they were oriented to the new position. Apparently, lab politics could be sort of intense, and the drama that brewed there was as aggressive as the Bacillus species (whatever that means), and new people get eaten alive there. Harry, allegedly, wouldn’t let Adam get caught up in the drama and once took the fall for something he knew that he would be forgiven for, but Adam would never be able to live down. From that point on, Adam invited Harry to everything they did, and Harry fit in nicely.
But Harry didn’t fit in because his humor was the same or because he necessarily liked the same things as them. Chris and Maeve were as brash and crass as they all could be. Harry fit in because he was polite – he was tender and kindhearted, and very gentle. He didn’t speak much, but his eyes were always very sweet and soft, and when he spoke, it was thought-out and careful. Harry was the opposite of brazen; he cared plenty about how he came off to others, and she thinks that’s why he holds himself the way he does. Yet it was still genuine. His nature was just good, honestly. He was born to save kittens from trees, help kids cross roads, and load up groceries in the elderly’s cars.
For this reason, Harry also seems to have to do a lot of emotional labor for the group, which Y/N isn’t a fan of. It’s because he’s so kind and gentle that everyone is always bothering him with their problems. It’s one thing to express stress or feelings to a friend, but it’s another thing to know that Harry will listen, no matter if it’s the same issue a billion times, with gentle guidance and a soft suggestion. His feelings don’t get hurt when you don’t take the suggestion, though, and he’ll always act like it’s his first time hearing you complain about the same thing, though the little things he remembers tell you that he is intimately aware of every nook and cranny of the problem.
There were plenty of times that Y/N had to coax a drunk Mei or an overly disgruntled Niall away from Harry when they were out and he’d been trapped in their hot seat for a while. “Why don’t we let Harry enjoy some of his night too?” She’d suggested as she guided them away, then ended up lending her ear to the same problem that they were ignoring the answer to.
It didn’t help that Harry was ridiculously smart, too, in all the things that you’d need a smart friend for, so he’s always getting bothered with finance questions, medical questions, and even house-related issues (“Should I get a contractor or do you think I could do this myself?” “Well, do you know how to do it yourself?” “No, but I think I could watch a video on it or something?” “I mean. . .well, that is one option, and you’re welcome to try it, but I think it’d be smarter to get a contractor. I actually know a couple, I can get something scheduled for you?”).
It’s not always like that – they don’t keep him around just to use his brain – but it does happen quite a bit. Y/N thinks Harry might like it too. There’s always a pleased smile on his face whenever the conversation is over, and he never seems to be too annoyed when someone treats him a little like a search engine. He still laughs with all of them, still jokes, and keeps turning up, so he must enjoy them. Hell, Y/N thinks she gets more annoyed with it than he does.
She thinks maybe that’s why she and Harry had never gotten super close. They were friends, yes, but he was the only one she’d never hung out with one-on-one. Y/N isn’t sure why. . .maybe because she just never got an “in”, so to speak? Like, he helped Niall through a pretty difficult situationship debacle that Y/N’s only answer to solve was ‘burn him alive’, and now he and Harry routinely go out for coffee, trying new cafes together as one of their hobbies. He directed Chris to a trusted gutter guy who would quote him a reasonable price on a complete gutter overhaul, and for this reason, he and Chris got together to do house projects a lot with each other (Chris had even helped Harry build his sister’s gazebo – Y/N didn’t know either of them could operate a drill until that). Usually, it went like this: Harry helps a friend, the relationship opens, and Harry and the friend get closer because of it.
But Y/N didn’t want to bother Harry with her issues. She barely wanted to tell anyone when she was going through something because she didn’t want to be a burden. And that doesn’t really fit well with the order Harry does things in, so they just never got past the overly polite stage of their dynamic.
Still, Y/N has noticed that Harry stares quite a bit. She doesn’t know if he realizes he’s doing it, but if she feels eyes on her, there’s a 9 out of 10 chance that it’s Harry’s gaze. Almost like he was trying to figure her out or something? She doesn’t know. As soon as she locked eyes with him, he’d dart to look away with a blushing face, and Y/N never called him out on it because. . .well, that’s just not their relationship.
(She had brought it up to Niall in passing, who said something along the lines of, “Hate to break it to you, but you’re a pretty girl – he probably likes you, and it makes him awkward.”).
That’s why it’s just a little awkward when Y/N realizes that she and Harry are sitting right beside each other on the plane. It’s a long way to Japan to be sitting beside someone you don’t even regularly speak to. She was less worried about not knowing what to say to him and more worried about Harry realizing that she didn’t know what to say to him. Like, the last thing she wanted was for Harry to think that she didn’t like him, and she’s a grade-A yapper, so if she all of a sudden just didn’t speak, it would look a little suspicious, no? And Harry would be the person to notice something like that, because he notices things about everybody and everything – he’s very observant.
For that reason, she does her best to wipe any sense of hesitation from her face. She doesn’t want Harry to see it and feel like she was upset, because she wasn’t upset at all. At least, not with him, just at her complete inability to speak with him in a meaningful way that would make him comfortable.
“Looks like you and I are together!” Y/N smiled softly as they looked at their tickets.
Harry smiled too, but followed up his smile with, “Do you want me to switch with Niall or Mei? That way, you could sit next to a friend?”
And how he said it sort of made her feel sick to her stomach. It was a genuine suggestion and statement – he didn’t say it with any vitriol or spite, but it was the way he’d said it so nonchalantly that unsettled her. Like, he didn’t believe for a second that they were close enough to sit on the plane with each other forever, which, maybe, was true, but she didn’t like how it sounded.
“What? No! You’re my friend too.”
Y/N must have seemed as legitimately startled and unsettled as she felt, because his eyes widened: “Oh, I didn’t mean – I didn’t mean like, we weren’t or anything! I just meant so – you know, because you’re closer, and – I didn’t –”
“Well, Mei snores, and Niall is the worst manspreader in the world,” she told him, “So unless you don’t want to sit with me, then you’re stuck with me.”
“No, I do! I don’t mind sitting with you at all.”
So Y/N is in front of Harry as they make their way to their seats in the tight walkway between rows. When they are stowing their carry-ons overhead, Harry grabs for hers first and makes sure that it slips in easily before working his own on. Even though Y/N’s seat wasn’t technically the window seat, he ushered her in first and took the one in the middle, so he’d be sitting next to the stranger. Y/N is almost overwhelmed by the amount he had taken care of her in all of 5-minutes. Is this the same treatment he’s giving all of their friends?
“I hope this doesn’t come off as rude,” Harry began, pointing at his headphones, “But I have a few audiobooks that I downloaded for the flight. I was going to listen to one of them after we took off, if that’s okay?”
“Oh, no, that’s – that’s perfectly fine, don’t worry about me.”
It was as simple as that. Y/N had been all worried for nothing, just for Harry to be the one to shut her out. Hell, maybe he didn’t like her or something – not that she expected him to speak to her the entire flight. She’d just been panicking about not knowing what to say to him, but she does wonder if he would have put his headphones on for anyone else soon after takeoff. Or, well, Y/N wondered if anyone else would have given him the chance to. He’d said he’d downloaded the audiobooks for the flight, so maybe this was his plan all along.
God, why the hell is she overthinking this? It’s stupid, and she decides that she’s going to take her melatonin and try to sleep for as long as she can, as she’d intended to do no matter who was sitting beside her. Y/N chews the gummies thoroughly and swallows them, just as Harry is about to put the headphones over his ears.
“Just tap me if you need anything,” he offers before placing them snugly over his ears and letting his eyes flutter shut. Y/N stares at him for a little while; she’s able to without seeming like a creep. He’s got his glasses on, resting on the bridge of his nose. His hair is neatly styled like it always is, smoothed away from his face, but she thinks the headphones will muss it up a little. Y/N tries to think back if this is her first time seeing Harry dressed so casually, too – he’s usually a button-up kind of guy, but right now he has an oversized university tee on and soft linen bottoms that – with any of her other friends – Y/N would have just reached out and felt them between her fingertips. Instead, her fingers just itch to touch it where they lie on her thigh.
She turned her head forward again, then to the left so she could peer outside at the clouds that passed them with a soft sigh. She just needs to turn her brain off, probably. Vacations always make her sort of anxious, and her dynamic with Harry seemed to be a little source of anxiety for her as well. Everything she’s anxious about only exacerbates when she’s already nervous.
Y/N lets her eyes flutter shut.
She’s sure they’ll probably get closer during this trip, at least.
. . .
The plane ride wasn’t that horrible.
It was long- somewhere in hour three, she stirred from her melatonin, her legs felt cramped, and the urge to stretch them became so overwhelming that she was about to toss them over Harry’s lap. Y/N knew that with the type of person Harry is, he would have accepted it without a second thought – lifted the armrest between them and let her rest her legs there. Hell, he’d probably even start rubbing them too if she wanted. He’s always absentmindedly squeezing or feeling something, and sometimes that happens to be his friends', whoever's and whatever body part is closest to grabbing.
But she refrained. She only caught Harry looking at her once when she was wriggling, trying to lock her knees, and stretching her feet beneath the seat in front of them. When she met his gaze, she gave what she hoped was a reassuring “I’m totally good and not at all uncomfortable and moments from freaking out” kind of smile, which he returned softly – still looking concerned. A couple of minutes went by, then he showed her how to move the seat back. He didn’t speak, just carefully pointed at the lever on the side of the seat and showed her.
It did make it a little better, which was good. She didn’t love using the toilet on the plane either, but Harry went first, and when she asked him how it was in there, he told her it wasn’t so bad. “It’s more spacious than some I’ve been in the past,” he told her, so Y/N went after him. When she came back, Harry hadn’t put his headphones back in yet. Mei had reached out and squeezed Y/N’s bum from across the aisle, which made her gasp and jolt forward, and Harry all but jumped, prepared to catch her if she hadn’t caught herself on the seats.
Those were the only interesting things to happen, though; otherwise, the plane ride was just long and boring. They had coordinated their flight so that, by the time they arrived in Japan, it would be early afternoon. That way, they could land at their airport, take the train to Shimoda, and get acquainted with their Airbnb before going out to dinner. They didn’t necessarily count this in their days here, since most of it would be taken up by travel.
The airport was busy, and with immigration, customs, and security screening, it did take a bigger bite out of the day than they thought it would, but it wasn’t so bad. Y/N and Christopher made it to the other side far more quickly than anyone else. Harry, who had been beside her to start, had made his way to the back of the line so he could coach their friends on what to do. He was a good person like that, always making his own processes longer so he could benefit others. And it was then, from Christopher, that she found out Harry had actually traveled to Japan before. Though instead of staying in the countryside, he was in Tokyo for the duration of his trip. Which meant he was more familiar with this airport than any of them, even though he’d only been there once, so everyone was relying heavily on him.
The train ride was long but beautiful. Y/N stares out the window at all of the greenery – the further they get from the city, the brighter and clearer it appears. She feels like a dog, pressing her face against the glass with wide eyes, watching the trees and buildings whip past. Niall even petted the top of her head and asked if the “good girl wanted a treat,” but she batted him away. She feels excited and incredibly exhausted, and her belly is growling so intensely that she needs to eat soon or she will start getting snappy. Two hours fly by when you’re able to stretch your legs, and there’s so much scenery to look at that you’ve never seen before.
They (and by "they," she means Maeve) coordinated a ride service to pick them up in two separate cars and take them to the house. That ride was much shorter; the sun in the sky was still visible, but noticeably beginning to be painted pink and orange by evening. It smells like the nearby ocean when they step out of the train car. The sun is warm, but the breeze is cool and brushes across the sweat that has begun building on the back of her neck. Once more, somehow Harry is sitting beside her – before they’d gotten in the car, he started to reach for her suitcase to lift it into the trunk, but she grabbed it before he could. She felt bad because he’d already had to wrestle with her carry-on earlier, so she didn’t want him to do it again, trying to fit both her suitcases into the trunk with everyone else's.
Y/N felt that familiar burn of eyes on her, but when she turned around, Harry had tilted his head down, looking at his phone. Both Mei and Christopher studied Japanese at university, so one of them had to be with a group (if they split into groups) at all times to avoid looking like stupid tourists. Harry has the third most knowledge. Y/N can get by with the little she does know, certain questions she can ask, how to order food, and how to carry on at least a little bit of small talk. The driver knew English, though, so nobody necessarily got to practice their skills or anything.
The house is a good size. It isn’t massive, but it would comfortably fit all of them, even though they’d have to double up on rooms. There were three rooms: two had two people each, and one had three. They thought the best way to decide who roomed where would be to use a random generator, since all of them were close enough that the pairings didn’t really matter. Plus, it would be the fairest in choosing who had to be in the group of three, with slightly less space to work with.
Or, well, it would have been fine, but for some reason, the universe is just desperate to smash her and Harry together. So they do get a nice room for just the two of them, but that’s the issue, isn’t it? It’s just the two of them. If Y/N had been worried about the plane ride being awkward, then a week and a half of her and Harry sharing a space was probably going to be even worse. She could suggest switching too, but there’s a look on Harry’s face. . .well, she isn’t sure what it means. Y/N can’t tell if he hates it or loves it. He seemed indifferent as he heaved his duffel over his shoulder and dragged his wheeled suitcase behind him, going toward their room.
Niall slipped into the space beside her. “Do you think you two are going to cuddle?” He whispered in her ear, “Harry’s a cuddler, y’know?”
No, Y/N didn’t know because she doesn’t know Harry that well at all!
She is trying to be positive about this. Maybe this would actually encourage her and Harry to get closer? That would be nice, she thinks – there’s nothing like sleeping in the same room together during vacation to increase your bond. The first time she realized that Adam was repositioning her head in the middle of the night when she was lying weird, she was like wow, we might be best friends, so maybe something like that would happen. And she’d not felt as close to Mei as she did until they stayed the night in a hotel bed together when their flat was being fumigated (Adam and Niall were sharing the other bed across from them), when she woke up pressed back to back and was so warm and cozy she fell right back to sleep despite needing to pee.
Y/N and Harry could grow a lot from this, right? This could be really nice if it works out.
So hopefully it works out.
. . .
The first night wasn't so bad.
They go out to eat at one of the top-rated places, and they are all dressed relatively cozily for the occasion. The last thing anyone wanted to do after a full day of travel was get ready for anything. They all planned to eat, go home, shower (for the ones who hadn’t already), and get into bed. Y/N eats Kinmedai Nitsuke, which is their prized local speciality, and it’s so tender and delicious that she wonders how many things in the world are this good that she’s been geographically limited to. They do walk down to the beach to at least get a look at it, though nobody could necessarily hop in unless they wanted to soak their clothes.
White, powdery sand is what slips between her toes and coats her flip-flops. From what she could see, the water was a pretty turquoise as well – she was excited to do more than dip her toes in it tomorrow. They’d planned several full-blown beach days so they could truly soak up their time near the water. They take some silly photos, watch the sun set, and Y/N spots a crab that scurries away from her feet, then disappears into the sand – she squeals because it’s cute and also because she’s a little terrified of it.
When they go back to the Airbnb, Y/N is full, content, and ready to shower. Harry needed to as well, but he offered for her to go first. When she all but refused (because he was always putting people ahead of himself), he hurried to gather his towel, his loofah, and his soaps and shampoos. He might have taken what Y/N could only describe as the world’s quickest shower, because as soon as the water had turned on, it was on for maybe five minutes before it turned off. The door to their shared bathroom opened, and Y/N got more of an eyeful of Harry than she thinks she’s ever received before.
To be fair, she’d probably be seeing this much of him anyway tomorrow in his bathing suit. Only then would she know that there was something beyond a towel covering his prick. But right then, with him still dripping wet from the shower, he only had a towel looped around his waist, and it did very, very little to hide an incredibly impressive bulge. One that Y/N had only accidentally seen in a pair of too-tight jeans Niall had squeezed him into one night (and Y/N had to keep staring at his crotch, because he kept readjusting, and whining about how the button was digging into his bladder and wow – she had to try and ignore how cute he sounded when he was whining).
His cheeks are flushed, but so is the rest of his skin, like the water had been scalding. There was a lot of torso she was seeing too, tattoos mapped out on relatively tanned skin – she’d seen these a couple of times too. Harry definitely did not seem like the type to have tattoos, so when she had met him in the wintertime, all he ever wore was long sleeves, and she never suspected a thing. Then Spring came that year, with warmer temperatures and shorter sleeves, and she was finally exposed to Harry’s skin in all its glory. She’d seen bits and pieces but never all of them: how they decorate his skin, how they make absolutely no sense but for some reason fit him well.
“Sorry,” he apologizes, and Y/N yanks her gaze from his torso back up to his body, “I just – I rushed out of here and forgot to bring my clothes. I don’t think I used too much hot water.”
Y/N pressed herself up from where she was sitting beside her open suitcase on the floor. “And it would be okay if you did,” she told him, grabbing for her toiletries and the clothes she was changing into, “I’ll let you get dressed.”
So what if Y/N thinks about Harry’s body the entire time she’s in the shower? That’s her own business. He had a nice body – sue her! Y/N may not know much about him and may not be very close to him, but she can appreciate a nice body when she sees one. Hell, she’ll probably be oogling over all of her friends when they’re here together. It didn’t help that the little beads of water were dripping through the swell of his tits. Y/N shivered a little as she scrubbed herself down, trying not to take up too much time since Harry was in and out. This also cut off her “free-thinking-about-Harry’s-body” time, so it was probably for the best.
She washed her face, brushed her teeth, and put on her cute night set that she didn’t know she was going to be showing off to Harry first. Once she made it back into the room, Harry was sitting on his bed, and Niall and Mei were sitting on her bed across from him. He is still flushed, but this time with many more clothes – pajama bottoms and an oversized shirt. Mei cheered when she saw her, “This is so cute, what the fuck? When did you get these?”
“My Hangyodon nighties,” she grinned, the fish man with the red little octopus sidekick in the middle of his tank top and then speckled all over the pajama shorts, “You love them?”
“Do I love them? I’m going to steal them off you in your sleep!” Mei ran her fingers beneath the spaghetti straps, pulling them until they snapped. “Harry will help me sneak in, right, Harry?”
Harry shook his head with a soft laugh. “No, no,” he told her, “I’m loyal to my roomie.”
Mei grumbled, pulling Y/N into the bed, “Annoying,” she threw her leg over Y/N’s thighs while Niall pulled her head into his lap, “You’ve already bewitched him, hm? I’m cutting it off myself.”
Harry just watches, gaze pleased and soft from his side of the bed. He is leaning back on his palms, stretched out, his legs parted and. . .yeah, Y/N is looking a little, but nothing crazy.
Eventually, Niall and Mei leave, and Y/N gets up under her blankets and smells the gentle, citrus scent of the blankets. Harry’s voice is soft when he murmurs, “Goodnight, Y/N,” he tells her, “Let me know if you need anything, okay?”
She snuggles deeper into her blanket.
“Goodnight, Harry.”
. . .
On the first night of any vacation, Y/N never slept very well. She wakes up periodically throughout the night, checks her phone to see the time, realizes only an hour has passed, and then eventually lulls back to sleep. She isn’t sure why – it’s not like she wasn’t dog tired in the first place. A full day of travel always wore her down to the bone, but being in an unfamiliar space without her familiar comforts left her in a liminal state between consciousness and unconsciousness. Not to mention the time change was fucking with her too.
Y/N thinks the last time she looked at the clock was 4 AM at least, and then the next time she woke up, it was to Harry stretching, standing on the side of his bed. Sun poured in through the blinds, cutting through the curtains and filling up the room. She grumbled a little; the sound of her feet moving against the mattress pulled Harry’s attention over to her. His eyes are all sleep-swollen and soft – he smiled at her, then made his way to the bathroom. He was kind of cute when he woke up, but whatever. Y/N doesn’t care about that. She pressed her face into the pillow and huffed – the sun still looked like it might just barely be 7 in the morning. Of course she’d get paired with an early riser.
She flopped around in bed for a while, at least an additional 30 minutes to an hour, before she finally answered the call of her bladder and went to pee. The dire need to pee plus the pressing urge to see where the hell Harry had disappeared for 30 minutes after waking up is what drags her from the call of sleep. What could he possibly be busy with? And why would she care what he was doing? Her stupid brain just needed something to focus on, she thinks, when there were too many unfamiliar things and too many unfamiliar surroundings. But really, she should be fixating on their beautiful surroundings, the soft, flower-bloom scent that over takes the entire neighborhood they’re in, and the sea salt wind of the ocean nearby.
Y/N peed, then tiptoed out of the room. When she checked her phone, it was 7:05 AM, and she knew all too well that if Maeve and Adam didn’t get to sleep in, they would have two (surprisingly) very crabby adults on their hands. More crabby than Niall or Mei combined, because at least when they’re tired they get a little loopy and silly – Maeve is a bit scary, and Adam is just downright pouty the whole day. Paired with this, both of them are incredibly light sleepers, so something like a creaky floorboard could draw them from slumber in an instant.
Y/N found Harry in the kitchen, quietly making breakfast. When he spotted her, he was just about to flip the eggs. With the pan in one hand and the spatula in the other, he pointed at the table where there was a pile of French toast and fruit sliced already. One plate had already been made up. He works efficiently – how had he done all of this in 30 minutes? “I cut the crusts off that one already,” he told her, voice just barely above a whisper, “They’re still on the plate in case you want them, though.”
“You didn’t have to do that for me.” Her eyes were wide; she could feel them. How had he known she didn’t like the crusts on bread? Also, where the hell did he get groceries from? “How’d you get put on breakfast duty?”
“Oh, I didn’t,” he shook his head, “I just like to cook. Reckon if we are going to be out in the sun all day, we should have something in our bellies.” He nodded his head in the direction of the other rooms. “Niall and Mei came into my room last night to ask what I wanted from the grocery because they were having it delivered. I think they meant to ask you too, but got distracted by your pajamas.”
That made sense. She’d been wondering why they were in her room, but once she was accosted about her pajamas, she’d forgotten to ask.
Y/N made her way to the kitchen table, “Thank you, Harry.”
“No problem,” he told her, “I hope you enjoy it.”
When Y/N took the first bite, she held back a gasp. It was really good – she didn’t know how much of that was because Harry was adept in the kitchen and how much was because of the geographical ingredients. Either way, it was sweet and syrupy without Y/N needing to add any syrup onto her plate. The powder from the sugar covers her lips – she can feel it, tacky and sweet. Her eyelids flutter a couple of times, blinking rapidly before a presence suddenly looms over her.
Harry is there, sliding two eggs onto her plate. They’re over medium- another weird fact to know about how she liked her food. He looks absolutely chuffed watching her eat, his glasses slipping to the tip of his nose, “It’s good?”
“It’s great,” she tells him, nodding, “Thank you, really, this is – really yummy.”
The twinkles in Harry’s eyes are something different. Before the moment could linger any longer, Chris appeared at the doorframe with Mei in tow. “Oh, thank fuck,” he sighed softly, “I woke up like an hour ago, starving to death – I ate like ten of those jelly candies I got from the airport.”
“Loveeee Harry’s cooking,” Mei hums, eyes barely open, “Y/N, I’m sitting next to you. Someone get me scissors so I can cut this tank off her.”
Everyone wakes up pretty soon after that, because while Y/N and Harry are willing to tiptoe around, Mei and Christopher go by the beat of their own drum. And that drum wakes up the whole house when Christopher drops an egg on the floor and all but cries out, wondering what he did to deserve this from the universe. They all finish eating, brush their teeth, and get ready for the beach. They pack up all of their towels and sunscreen, Y/N fits a hat over her head, and she packs a portable fan for when Maeve inevitably starts sweating on the beach, but refuses to get in the water (she likes to swim for about 30 minutes at a time, with 1-hour intervals in between because she doesn’t like how the salt water feels on her skin and how pruny she gets). She also blows up a floaty with every last bit of air in her lungs, which will undoubtedly get stolen by Niall about ten minutes in.
By the time they get down to the beach, the sun is a little higher, but not too hot. The water glimmers and glistens beneath the rays; the water is crystalline blue and turquoise. Apparently, almost everyone had lathered up on sunscreen before they left the house, but Y/N had been distracted packing her day bag, so she waited too late. When she’d finally laid out her towel and peeled off her cover-up, though, there was nobody available to help her get her back.
Well, nobody except for –
“I can get your back for you?” Harry’s voice is soft, as gentle as he can be, holding out his hand for the bottle she is holding.
Y/N’s eyes darted to where everyone else was already splashing around in the water, excited, dropping down to their chins. She looked back to Harry, nodding softly – she felt bad, keeping him out of the water to help her. Harry probably would’ve already been in there had he not seen her looking around hopelessly.
“Yeah, that’d be nice, thank you. I’m sorry.”
He took the sunscreen, popping the cap. “Ah, what are you apologizing for?” Y/N turned away from her, hearing the spurt of the sunscreen into his hand, “I’ll need some help too, if that’s okay?”
It’s cold when his hands touch her – Y/N jumps, hissing from the temperature and Harry. . .well, it sounds like he almost coos, “It’s a bit cold,” he warns her late, “Sorry, I should’ve told you.”
His hands are careful as they massage the sunscreen into her shoulders, between them, and down her spine. They feel huge against her, over her, the back side of her sides and hips. When he rubs over the back of her neck, Y/N swallows thickly – it’s a little hard not to have a little pervy thought float through her. Because if he wanted to, he could probably press her forward and grab her hips, follow her down to the ground, and –
“Okay! All done,” she can hear the smile in his voice, and she instantly feels like a lecher. What the hell was she doing having a thought like that? “Would you get me?”
It’s no better, rubbing the sunscreen into his shoulders. Harry is so broad – he never wears clothes that show it off much, but Y/N had seen him in a workout tank top once and almost gasped. His shoulders are big; his back is sculpted – it’s the sort of thing you might see on an inspo page for working out. It leads into the shape of his biceps and triceps, and maybe it’s for the best that she isn’t that close to Harry? Because clearly, she’d been around him for like a day and a half and she can’t have a normal thought to save her fucking life.
Beneath her fingers, his skin is warm and soft. She doesn’t even realize that the sunscreen is gone until she’s been rubbing it on him for like two minutes.
“Ah, I used too much,” she lied through her teeth, patting his shoulders gently, “There you go, all done.”
She kicked off her shoes and all but stumbled over the little hills of white sand while she ran to the water because she couldn’t look at his face right now. Harry would probably be able to take one peek at her face and read that she’d been thinking something less than. . .morally pure. So she runs right over to the water, only slowing when she gets to the edge of the water, the waves pulling back, then sloshing over her ankles. Niall had already stolen the floatie, so he found it and flopped over, hooking her arm over the edge of the sparkly inflatable. She splashed Niall a bit, and he let out a silent scream, “Dick, you dick!”
“You were feeling Harry up a little bit.” Adam appeared behind her, reaching for her hand that was in the water and pulling it out, flipping it over so she was palm up. He places a big shell in her hand: “Hide this from MeiMei; she’s after it.”
“I was not feeling him up.” She grumbled.
Adam raised his eyebrows, “I mean, baby, I’ve got 20/20 vision and –”
“Mei! Look at this pretty shell!” Y/N hollers, and Adam gasps, grabbing the shell back from her and floating deeper in.
“Oh, evil, you’re evil!”
It was pretty, the water was cool on their skin, and the sun was warm but not oppressive today. Y/N had been prepared for intense humidity, but it wasn’t horrible. They swim for hours, get out to look for shells, take more photos, dig in the sand, and make a sad excuse for a sand castle. Y/N’s lips taste salty from the water, and her fingers are all pruned when they make their way to the beachside treat shack (it’s called Umi-no-le, Harry tells them). She eats a skewer and fries, then plucks off Adam’s edamame in exchange for letting him try some of the seafood off her stick.
Harry disappeared but returned with ice cream, somehow carrying four, keeping one between his index and middle finger and the other between his ring finger and pinky. Somehow, the cones are perfectly balanced because she thinks he could probably palm a basketball, squeeze it, and pop it in a single hand. She didn’t know he was going for ice cream – she probably would have ordered one too, but she didn’t know he was going for it. And maybe she would demand some of Niall’s, but he got Matcha, and she wanted to try the red bean. Actually, all of them had Matcha. . except for Harry.
Stupidly, she mentioned this to Christopher, who had offered her a lick of his cone. “Oh, Harry got red bean.” He turned to find him, “Harry! Can Y/N have a lick of your ice cream?”
Y/N blinked wide, “Oh, I don’t –”
“Yeah.” The cone was presented in front of her mouth almost immediately. Harry hadn’t licked it yet, it seems, and Y/N thinks it’s not fair that she gets the first lick, but when she opens her mouth, Harry says gently, “Go on, it’s okay. You can tell me if it's good.”
So Y/N does lick the cone, dragging her tongue over it slowly and trying not to focus on how Harry watches her. It’s delicious – she’d like to get another taste, sure, but she already feels bad. She’d prided herself on never needing to ask Harry for anything, and yet this entire day she’s had to bother him nonstop- it’s felt like. Even though she didn’t ask him for breakfast. She just wants him to be able to enjoy his vacation too, without having to worry about anyone but himself, yet it’s the first day, and it feels like she is using him 3 separate times.
“Thank you.” She nodded at him, “It’s really good, Harry; you’ll like it.”
He grinned, then licked it himself. He paid no mind to the fact that she had already licked the cone – Harry’s always been quite used to sharing, though. Which has always surprised her. From what she does know of Harry, he only has one sibling, and he’s the youngest, so he should probably be the worst at sharing.
Should she try to do things for him? What could she even do for Harry? The only thing she could think to do was what she had been doing: to be self-sufficient enough that he didn’t need to worry about her. Encourage him to take longer showers – maybe she should take hers first so that he won’t worry about taking the hot water. That’s like. . .all she’s got. She could offer to do things for him, but she knew he would refuse – she’d just have to do it. She could try tonight to put food on his plate or something – Y/N thinks they’re planning on going to a Yakiniku place tonight. Y/N could grill him some meat? Y/N doesn’t know. She just hates feeling like she owes someone something, even if she knows Harry wasn’t expecting anything from the help he gave.
“Do you want one?” Harry asks, waving the ice cream in his hands, “I can go get it?”
Y/N shakes her head, “No, no, I’m okay; I’ll go get it later.”
Harry pouts his lips a little, but continues to eat his ice cream.
. . .
It’s the third official day of them being there (not including the travel day) that Harry surprises her. Or – shocks her, rather.
Their mandatory Anime-level beach episode went swimmingly. They stayed out all day, alternating between playing in the water and playing on the beach. Y/N had fallen asleep briefly on the sand and woke up to an umbrella being opened above her, shoved into the ground. Through bleary eyes, she could make out that Niall was the one doing it, but it was nowhere near a selfless act, because he dropped down on the towel, pulled right beside her, and immediately closed his eyes.
(“Should we cuddle?”
“Too hot, Ni.”
“Ugh, you’re right, you’re right. Imagine me cuddling you right now though.”)
They eventually made their way back to the Airbnb around 3 PM, for those who didn’t take a nap on the beach to nap if they wanted to, to decompress, or to shower off the ocean before dinner. Y/N was sun-tired even after her nap, but she flopped down on the bottom of her bed, face pressed into the covers, the fan above her whipping a cool breeze around the room. Harry moved quietly around the room, but he didn’t stay in there for long.
When they went out to eat that night, Y/N did just as she said she would and did most of the grilling. By no means is she enjoying herself, and after a couple of times of her friends demanding which pieces to grill, she does threaten them to stuff it and take what she gives them before she grills them on the tabletop. Whenever Harry tried to take over grilling, she snapped the tongs in his direction and told him to eat. He only tried twice before getting the hint that she wasn’t going to let him.
That night, she showered first, as quickly as she could, before popping out of the bathroom, out of breath and slightly panting. “The water is still hot,” she told him. Harry seemed startled, like he hadn’t expected her to come out so quickly. So he gathered his things, went into the bathroom, and then showered. It wasn’t as long as she thought it should have been, but it was still longer than the one the night prior. When Y/N was about to fall asleep, Harry offered her a bottle of water, and Y/N shot up to go grab it before he could. She got one for both of them, set it at his bedside, then crawled back into bed.
The next day, they did some local shopping, trying street foods and spending money happily. Y/N doesn’t see much of Harry on this day, but she can feel him staring multiple times throughout the shopping trip. Though any time she turned to follow the feeling, his gaze had been pulled elsewhere. Honestly, she doesn’t even know if it was Harry who was staring at her, but that’s the only person she could think of who would be. Part of her almost inquired about it in a jewelry store, but Maeve distracted her with a beautiful jeweled hairpin.
They went back to the beach at sunset after eating, watching the pink and orangey hues that mottle the sky, and walking off their meals. That night, Y/N rushed to take her shower first again, keeping it brisk and forcing Harry in there sooner than he anticipated. Then she lied to him, told him she was doing some yoga and liked to do it without interruption, so she would stay in the shower a little longer than he normally would.
But it’s not until the third day that something truly shifts in the air between them. The morning was normal enough – everyone made their own breakfast because Harry and Christopher woke up early to work out, taking a run on the beach during sunrise. But he still slices fruit for everyone (he’s the only one who knows how to cut a pineapple appropriately). They have a little bit of a free day, because they planned to go on Perry Road that night, whose streets are willow-lined and beautiful. There were cozy bars and izakayas that they were all eager to discover.
Y/N, Niall, and Maeve lingered around the house, and Adam and Mei went on a trail to see if it was worth it, dragging the others out to it on a different day. Harry and Christopher. . .well, actually, Y/N didn’t know what they were doing. They went on their morning run together, and she thinks they went back to the shops today for whatever reason. Maybe there was something they wanted that they didn’t get yesterday or something. She didn’t know. All she knew was that she, Niall, and Maeve were watching a Japanese drama and wavering in and out of sleep for a lazy little day.
Later that night, Y/N experiences Perry Road in all of its willow-covered, canal glory. She loved the sound of their feet meeting the cobblestone and the water sloshing from rocks thrown. It’s gorgeous, and they go to a tavern and eat and drink to their heart’s content. Y/N is seated beside Maeve, across from Harry, but it isn’t like she’s only left to speak to them. Everyone is chatting about everything – plans for tomorrow, Adam’s situationship, the crab that chased after Mei and how she almost got Y/N pinched when she jumped on her back to get further from it.
“You’re much stronger than I realized,” Harry had noted as they reminisced on the event from yesterday, like it was from years ago, “You barely even stumbled when she jumped on you.”
“Yeah, isn’t it unsettling?” Adam inquired, “I thought I could beat her in a wrestling match, and she straddled and apprehended me in like fifteen seconds flat; it was outrageous.” He motioned toward her, “She hides her strength in her cute demeanor.”
Harry’s cheeks are pink, and Y/N doesn’t know why he’d be getting flushed thinking about it. It’s probably from the alcohol to some degree, Y/N thinks, but it was just so sudden. And like, it’s making her face feel hot too. Was he thinking about her apprehending Adam? Or maybe he’s imagining himself in Adam’s place?
Y/N doesn’t know. She wipes her brain clean of it. When Harry was pouring sake into everyone’s shot glasses, he would have had to reach over the table to fill up hers, so she took the bottle from him to fill up her own. And when he was offering everyone a taste of his karaage, Y/N told him that it was alright (before quietly ordering her own side of it – Harry noticed, definitely, but she avoided eye contact. And she wasn’t trying to be a dick either; it’s just there was barely any left after everyone else tried, and Harry clearly liked it – she wanted him to finish it off). But it was when Y/N had stretched across the table for the salt that Harry definitely could have handed her, but he was mid-bite of his burger – that Harry got upset.
She didn’t think about how it looked until he mumbled, “I could’ve handed you the salt.”
In their time here, Y/N has jumped through hoops so that Harry hasn’t had to do anything for her, and not once has he questioned her about it or commented on it. Y/N didn’t know if she’d finally just pushed him too far or if the sake was getting to him. Maybe both? Y/N isn’t sure. All she knows is that she isn’t expecting him to bring it up at the end of the night. After they finish walking up and down the streets, taking pictures, visiting the beautiful shrine (or as much as they could see with the sun having gone down), they make their way back to the Airbnb.
Y/N is about to grab her things and rush to shower before they all watch a horror movie in the living room when Harry appears in their shared room.
“Can I talk to you for a second?”
She pauses, arms full of her clothes and her towel, and looking at him with eyebrows raised and gaze widened. “Oh? Yeah, sure!” She nods, but her heart is sort of hammering. The face he’s making is not typical of his gentle features; it’s hardened, and he looks upset. . .almost irritated, actually. Harry had never looked at her like that before, and she finds that she really doesn’t like it. She’d actually prefer if he never looked at her like that again. “What’s wrong?”
There’s alcohol swimming in his gaze – he might have had more sake than she originally thought – and she could tell that his cheeks were flushed from his drinks now, since they had been for most of the night at this point. He doesn’t wobble where he stands, but his eyes are just glassy enough for her to see the pink bottle they’d been pouring from for most of the night. His lips were wet too; glossy and pouted from the spirits and the number of times he’s run his tongue over his mouth.
“You never let me do things for you,” he said with no preamble, hands clenched in each other, his thumb running over his knuckles – a nervous habit, despite him not looking or sounding it, “Every time I try to do something for you, you do it yourself. Anytime I offer, you brush me off. You make things more inconvenient for you just so that you can tell me not to. Why? Why do you do that?” His brows furrowed, “At first I just thought you were super independent, but. . .but I noticed things, y’know? You let the others pamper you – you practically begged Niall to grab the remote for you, but when I tried, you immediately scrambled up. You’ll eat off Mei’s plate, but rather order a whole side of something than try mine. You – you like, completely shut me out! Not just here, at home too,” he seemed flustered, frowning, “When we get drinks, you always order your own even if it’s my round to pay. Whenever I offer to pick you up from the store, you go out and get it yourself or go without. Hell, even little things – you know this is the 10th time you’ve reached across a table to grab something instead of just asking me to hand it to you?” Was he counting? “What did I do? Do you – is it something about me? Do you not like me? Do you think I’m gross, or – or –”
“Harry, no, that’s not it at all!” Y/N feels a bead of panic dribble through her. This was actually the opposite of what she was trying to do! She wanted him to feel unburdened by her, not like she was intentionally avoiding him or thought he was gross. She feels miserable that this is what he’s been thinking the whole time. “You – you do so much for everyone else, Harry; I feel like you rarely worry about yourself. I just didn’t want to. . .I didn’t want to be a burden or anything, was all. You’re – I never want to be one,” and maybe she was a little drunker than she thought, too. Her brain is swimming, creating a direct channel from her reasoning to her mouth with little regard for how much she wanted to admit, “Harry, like, you’re always doing stuff for people. You’re listening to their problems, you’re contacting services for them, you’re helping them submit paperwork, and all of that. I just don’t want you to have to like. . .have your brain on when it comes to me. You should just be able to relax sometimes.”
He seems no happier with that explanation than he seemed with her being disgusted by him. Still, he frowns, and it pulls his whole face down so sadly that Y/N feels like the worst person ever.
“But I like that,” he stresses, “I want that. I like when people. . .when people need me, and when I can help. It makes me feel good. I never feel put out or put off or like. . .or like anything bad from it; I just feel good.” He sounds close to whining, honestly, and it makes something twist in her lower belly, “When you let me help with your sunscreen and. . .and when you tried my ice cream, I – I was so happy.” He sighs, pressing the hair away from his face, “Please, it’s okay to let me do things. Please let me. I want to make you feel good too.”
Y/N is just. . .she’s dumbfounded, really. She wasn’t expecting such a reaction from him – not intense, nor this honest. Guilt sits like a heavy lump in her stomach, surrounded by all the sake, and she thinks that she has misread this situation entirely. Harry was definitely an acts-of-service kind of guy, as far as showing love goes, and she’d been curbing his every attempt. He probably thought she didn’t want to be friends at all. No wonder they had such a hard time getting closer.
Because it wasn’t like she didn’t know that he liked to do things for people. She did know that – she could tell by the soft, pleased smiles he always had when someone came to him for something. Y/N guesses she just really hadn’t noticed how much it was upsetting him so badly that she wasn’t allowing him to do anything at all.
“Harry, I’m so sorry,” her shoulders sink, lips pouting to match his, “I really – I just wanted you to have to worry about one less person, is all, but I. . .I definitely over did it, if you think that I don’t like you,” she shakes her head, rattles her brain, “I – seriously, I didn’t know it was upsetting you so much. It started with me just trying not to bother you with, like. . .my problems and stuff, but somehow it amassed into me not letting you do anything for me at all. That’s my fault.”
He sighs softly, “I just want to be helpful to you too,” he explains, then opens his arms, and Y/N doesn’t hesitate to step forward into his embrace. She’d always heard that Harry gives really, really good hugs, but she’d never gotten to experience one for herself. He smells good, even though it was the end of the night and they’d been doing things all day. There’s the barest hint of the smoky smell from the tavern they’d been at, but beyond that, she could smell his fabric softener and cologne. Harry always chose light, airy scents that were gentle and soft. Being near him always sort of smelled like being near a fresh pile of laundry. His arms were big too, wrapped around her, and in them she felt sort of safe and warm. As she tucks herself against him, he rests his cheek against her head, and he rubs his palm up and down her back soothingly. It feels good – really, really good. She can’t believe she’d been self-denying of such comfort without even realizing it. “You’re really fun, Y/N, and you’re amazing. I want to be closer friends, but. . .but doing things for people and helping them out are how I get close. You’re not. . .doing anything wrong at all. I just wanted to make sure that you didn’t hate me.”
“I don’t hate you at all.” Her words are a little muffled against his chest, and she’s almost hyperaware of how bulky it feels against her face, “It’d be impossible to hate you, really. I just. . .I don’t know. I guess I didn’t think this through as well as I thought I did.” She sighed, “But you have to let me do things for you too, okay? I’ll – like, not all the time- but I don’t want this to be a friendship where you give, give, give, and I take, take, take. You shouldn’t let people take advantage of you like that.”
He’s still rubbing her back, slow and soft, “I know, I will, we can. It’ll be good. I’m excited.”
That night, Y/N felt clean and dry after her shower, comfortable in her pajamas and snuggled up in a blanket on the couch while they watched Ringu. She’s not drunk, but she’s in that pleasant, hazy state where she’s still a little buzzed and she thinks the same goes for Harry. Mei lies between Y/N’s legs, her head resting on the inside of Y/N’s split thighs. Harry is to Y/N’s left, also in his pajamas, and one arm is thrown over the back of the couch while he leans into his corner. There’s a pillow between his hip and Y/N’s head, but she’s still tucked there, close enough that she can smell him, and close enough that Niall saw, wraggled his eyebrows, then promptly burrowed into Christopher’s side.
Typically, there is a rule that Y/N is not allowed to lie down during movies because she promptly falls asleep without fail. Adam, Mei, and Niall had started a “sleep-count” each week: how many times they’d put something on the telly and how many times Y/N would doze off during it. This extended into the rest of their friend group, and Y/N would get pillows thrown at her, or tickled, sometimes lowkey heckled until she pouted and woke up. Apparently, Mei was too drunk to really care tonight, and everyone else might have just been startled or confused by the sudden closeness of her and Harry. She can’t think of the last time she sat next to Harry when they watched a movie, let alone lay against him.
Long story short, she definitely falls asleep. She stirs once when Harry gasps at something that happens on the screen, but her eyelids feel too heavy to keep open, even when she peeks them open to see something terrifying. Mei’s head is so heavy on her thigh that she knows for sure she was knocked out. The warmth from either side, plus the scent of Harry’s clothes, is what ultimately put her back to sleep.
The next time she woke up, she was in bed. Y/N is unsure how she got there, but she had a sneaking suspicion it was the snoring lump in the other bed. Through her bleary eyes, she can see how he’s all rumpled, legs kicked out from the blankets, twisted around his body. Y/N doesn’t think she ever gets to see Harry asleep because he’s usually awake by the time she gets up. His mouth is hanging open, and his hair is a mess on his head. He looks cute – Y/N wishes she could press her face into his back and breathe in deeply. Or wiggle up under his bicep, see if he warps his body around to cuddle her.
She fell back asleep, smiling a little. That’d be nice.
. . .
Y/N thought she and Harry were due for only one breakthrough this trip.
It was good – not having this weird amount of negative tension between them. Harry didn’t start pouring his heart and soul into doing things for her, but he did pour milk for her cereal one morning, and he helped her with her sunscreen later that day. She even let him buy her an ice cream without being weird about it. In the same breath, Harry lets her do things for him too – there isn’t much, because he’s very self-sufficient and does everything before anyone could think to do it for him. But she tries her best! Sunscreens him right back, splits a sandwich with him when she caught him staring at it, and she even takes his side when he told them what music he listens to when he’s working out (she didn’t agree at all – Norah Jones is for cozy coffee mornings and gardening in Spring, not for lifting 200kg with your legs, and running with a 12% incline on a treadmill – but she defends him intensely). When they did go for barbecue, Y/N grilled him meat and piled his plate high with it. She even hoarded some of the cucumbers because she remembered they were his favorite from the first place they went to like this.
He still stares at her a borderline weird amount, but that’s never really bothered her. And she doesn’t mind how he swallows thickly when he watches her eat a popsicle, or lick whipped cream off her hand, or when Niall swats her bum in passing, and she gasps. Harry’s cute, and he’s sweet, and it’s fun to see a cute, sweet guy like him flustered about things like that. Especially with how pink he gets, how he fumbles over his words, and stumbles when he walks. She’d been trying to catch a peek of him adjusting or anything, but of course, he’s much too mindful to do something like that too obviously.
It’s the night before their Tokyo day that Y/N finds they will have two breakthroughs on this trip.
The day starts relatively normally; they wake up, they eat, they get ready, but nobody does makeup or anything because they planned to spend the morning at the beach, then the afternoon in the hot springs, and there was a bar nearby where they would get drinks. It was pretty close to where they were staying – a lot of things were within walking distance for them, which was really nice. They are at the beach early enough that the critters are out – birds are flying low, fish are closer to the shore than they are when it’s a little busier, Y/N and Mei hunt for shells while Adam and Harry swim. The others took their time getting down there, but when they show up, it’s a little less calm, and Y/N does get accidentally tackled into the water by a very rowdy Maeve. When Y/N popped back up with a gasp, Maeve apologized profusely. Harry appeared from where he’d been closer to the buoys, right at her side, all wet, with his hair slicked down the side of his head.
“Are you alright?” His brows were furrowed, and his head was tilted. He’s close enough that she can feel the warmth of his body beneath the water.
Y/N nodded, waving them off, “I’m okay, I’m okay.” She wiped the water from her eyes. “At least the water isn’t freezing.”
“You’re playing favorites!” Niall accused her, “I accidentally splashed you yesterday, and you almost drowned me.”
“That’s because Maeve is a precious angel and you are a little creature from the lagoon.”
“What? Lagoon!”
After the beach, they rinse the ocean water off and then head to the onsens. It was nice because the wind had picked up, so it was a little chillier than it had been before, the sun hiding behind the clouds. Sinking into the warm water was like a nice, hot bath. The heat soaked into her muscles, warmed her inside out, but the issue was that it was actually almost boiling. They rented a private one, so they spent most of the time cycling in and out of the heat. Y/N could tolerate about 15 minutes before she had to get out; then she’d cool down, then she’d stick her feet in. They had a cooling room, so after they were all done sweating half their body weight in water, they took some time to settle the temperature in their bodies.
They had showers on site, so they could rinse off once again (“We are going to be giant prunes by the end of the day,” Christopher whined), and they brought clothes to change into. Niall and Adam lost rock, paper, scissors, so they had to take everyone's wet clothes and towels home and meet them at the beachside bar. It was one they hadn’t been to yet, with a wider drink selection and a little bit more traffic than the others. There was a younger crowd, so it was far more rambunctious, and the music was louder.
Y/N felt Harry’s eyes on her all of the time, but she especially felt them on her tonight. And especially when someone at the bar took an interest in her.
The thing is, Y/N rarely gets hit on in public. Y/N used to question it and be bummed out, but then she realized the one thing that pissed her off more than anything was a drunk prick, breathing his vodka breath on her face, trying to get her to blow him in the bathroom. And then, when her frontal lobe developed, she realized that dating a stranger that she met in the bar, drunk, was probably not the best thing in the world for her. So she tried to find the bright side in it, rather than mope about how people weren’t showing interest in her and feeling ugly; she reveled in the fact that she didn’t have to worry about anyone annoying her.
All that being said, rarely doesn’t mean never. Tonight, two people had approached her — one who almost immediately suggested that they go somewhere to fuck, so she squashed it immediately. The other one was a little sweeter, gentler; he sort of reminded her of Harry now that she thinks about it. His name is Yuuki, but he tells her to call him Yuu. He ambled up to her when she was getting a drink with Mei and was normal enough that she hadn’t shipped him off immediately. How the bar was set up was that most of it was outside, and the “inside” was more like verandas with lights strung up around them. They had a table that they were all kind of staking their claim on, and Yuu followed Y/N and Mei back to it.
Truthfully, Y/N thought he was interested in Mei when he first walked up, but Mei is the sort of pretty that a lot of guys are scared of, so they chat up her friend in hopes they’ll be a wingman. That was the sort of situation Y/N thought she was about to experience. But when they got back to the table and they were all speaking, Yuu made it clear pretty quickly that his intentions were with her. Y/N didn’t realize it until he complimented how she looked tonight, and when she brushed it off, he doubled down.
“I mean it,” he assured her, “Like, you guys have been outside sweating all day, and you still look this beautiful? Isn’t that kind of unfair?”
Y/N’s eyes went wide. “Oh, wow,” she chuckled a little, “You’re forward, huh?”
“I try to be, if it’s someone I want.”
There’s a tingle on the nape of her neck, burning, hot. She tried to subtly turn to look, and she locked gazes with Harry, who. . .who is always looking at her. And he looks. . .well, she’s trying to decide how he looks. Upset? No, not really. Not angry either? But he does look put off. Not to the extent that he did when he confronted her, but still, he clearly wasn’t smiling as widely as he had been throughout most of the day.
Y/N could do a couple of things. She could politely decline Yuu because she really wasn’t planning on pursuing this beyond some friendly flirting. Or. . .she could see how Harry would react if she did actually pursue something. Now that Y/N thinks about it, she doesn’t think she’s ever pursued someone in front of Harry before, so she really doesn’t know how he would react. She isn’t sure why she cares how he would react, but it’s something that has suddenly piqued her interest. Does he like her? Niall at least thinks that he thinks she’s pretty and that’s why he’s always looking at her. But she thinks she’s. . .at least a little tipsy. Not really, but that’s what she’ll blame it on if someone asks her.
She just wants to know! It’s like. . .he and Adam do this all the time, right? The scientific method? She’s just testing something right now, creating a hypothesis and testing it immediately. It would be interesting to see his reaction, right? He’ll probably not care anyway, and Y/N would have strung this guy along for a whole lot of nothing. But it’s fun to flirt sometimes. And it’s fun to see how someone like Harry might react if he’s jealous. Heavy on the if, considering Harry might not even like her at all, so she was just wasting everyone’s time.
But that version of Harry she saw the other night, who asked to speak with her directly, who told her exactly what was on his mind, and confidently let her know what he wanted? That was nice to see! She just wondered what other ways she could make him speak his mind.
Still, Yuu is cute and not annoying, and he’s sweet with all the things he’s saying and calling her. It turns out that he isn’t a local, but his family summers here a lot, so he knows a lot of interesting facts and random shit about the development of the island. He also tells her that they need to check out the Shimoda Ropeway, a cable car that takes you on a ride up the Nesugata Mountain, and doesn’t insert himself into the plans like he’s trying to make a date out of it.
Y/N giggles more than she might normally, and she stands close to him. She touches him a little more liberally than she would typically, squeezing his arm when he mentions working out, pulling a fuzz off his top, leaning in close to see the pendant on his necklace. The burn of eyes on her stays the entire time, and whenever she looks up, Harry’s frowning a little, turned away like he doesn’t want to see it but can’t help but stare. Yuu goes to get them another drink, and Niall saddles up next to her, clicking his tongue and murmuring low in her ear.
“He looks like he either wants to cry or devour you,” he tells her, “Maybe both?”
Y/N’s heart starts to race. Is he really looking that way, or is Niall just being delusional? She doesn’t get an answer because Niall disappears just as soon as he’d come to her side, swayed by the call of Adam, clearly getting into an argument on the phone with a drink in his hand. Y/N briefly makes eye contact with Harry before Yuu returns soon after. She couldn’t read him, not at all.
It wasn’t until Yuu leaned in and whispered something in her ear that she heard something fall. Just a soft thud and a little gasp, and Y/N’s eyes followed the commotion, where Harry had dropped his drink in the sand. A little had splashed on his trousers, but nothing seemed broken or dangerous. She wants to get up – to tease him a little, and see if he’d smile about it – but she isn’t rude, and Yuu is mid-conversation with her still, even if it was guided in a more flirty direction.
And she’s able to give Yuu her attention for four more minutes before her gaze tries to find Harry again, only this time, he isn’t sitting where he had been most of the night. They were all scattered around, using the table as a sort of base point, but Harry had been sort of resting against the corner edge of the bar with his drink since Yuu came up to speak to her. He was still close enough that he could be a part of the conversation with Maeve and Christopher, but far enough that he was able to fade into the background if he wanted. Harry was good at finding spots like that when he needed them.
But he wasn’t there. Like a prairie dog, her head perks up, and she looks from left to right, searching for him, but she can’t seem to find him. Something is unsettled in her chest, a small pout forming on her mouth.
“Sorry,” she cut Yuu off, patting his thigh as she stood up, “My friend disappeared on me; I’m g’na go find them.”
“Take your time,” he waved to her politely, “While you do that, I’m going to catch up with my friends and make sure none of them are face down in the sand right now.”
Y/N hunts down Adam, who is frowning at his phone and texting what seems to be a multiple-paragraph-long text with random caps lock moments and exclamation points: “Hey, did you see where Harry ran off?”
Adam looks up at her, his frown soothing when he realizes it’s Y/N speaking to him, “Hm? He said he needed some air or something and went out toward the beach.” Adam made a vague motion with his hand. “Which is silly because we are already outside, but who knows. Would you go check on him? He sounded kind of sad.”
For a second time, guilt warps something ugly and inky in her chest. He sounded sad? That was not what she wanted at all! She – Y/N doesn’t know what she wanted exactly. She kind of wanted him to be – not angry, but irritated, maybe? The same sort of irritation he’d felt when she wasn’t letting him help her out, when he was blunt and to the point with his feelings, if he was feeling anything at all about the situation. Y/N thought maybe she’d get to see another side of Harry that she might not have been privy to. One that’s a little jealous. One that might like. . .do something, if he wanted to, with her.
But instead, she thinks she made him sad. Y/N all but stumbles further onto the beach, away from the bar. Thankfully, he must have just left because she finds him relatively close by, heading off horizontally to the ocean, in the direction of the Airbnb. His head is tilted down, hands in his pockets.
“Hey!” Y/N called out to him, starting forward, “Harry!”
He pauses, so she knows he heard her, but he doesn’t stop. Actually, he sped up a little even, and removed his hands from his pockets, reaching them toward his face as if he might be wiping away tears, and Y/N reached down to take her shoes off so she could move quicker. The little hills and valleys of sand are making her stumble pretty badly, and she almost falls flat on her face a couple of times from how soft it is, her feet sinking in, the little grains sticking between her toes. Her dress billows from the way the wind is whipping, and she almost gets tripped up a couple of times on that, too.
But she makes it to him with no injuries and reaches forward, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him back, “Hey, I called for you –” she starts to scold him until she sees his face.
His eyes are watery, rimmed red, with flushed cheeks and little stained tracks from what could only be tears. Y/N’s eyes go impossibly wide, mouth falling open, “Harry –”
He tilts his face away. “Don’t look at me for a second,” he fusses, hiding behind his hands, “I’m – I’m – don’t –” he’s flustered, she can tell, and beyond the ache she feels for making him sad, there’s a twitch somewhere else too. Somewhere deep and warm and confusing. Y/N is unaware of this bodily reaction to someone crying because she’s never experienced it before. She tries to stuff it down, though, for a second, in favor of focusing on the moment.
Because Harry looks so sad, with a pouted mouth, and a puffy face. Y/N doesn’t know if he’s drunk or not, but when she reaches up to gently touch his face, the skin is warm. “What’s this, hm? Why are you crying?” He goes easily with how she tilts him all around, this way and that, his chin up, down, side, side, like she’s searching for a notable sign of distress, like a scrape or a scratch. She had a feeling that she might know, but that would be kind of crazy, right? If it was what she was thinking, then she was a huge dickhead. He was even more softhearted than she thought he was.
“N-nothing,” he tells her, “There’s sand in my eye.”
He looks unfairly pretty like this, Y/N notes while she’s looking at him. Tear drops cling to his eyelashes, and the color of them is intense, even through the lens of his glasses. His lips are slick and wet, and he sniffles every so often, looking at her with the most pitiful gaze she’s ever seen. Y/N feels horrible and weirdly horny, and she wants to wrap him in bubble wrap and swallow him whole.
“Sand, hm?” She repeats, and he nods, “Nothing else?”
Harry’s quiet, and Y/N sighs a little, her hand falling from his face. What was she doing? This was stupid. . .she should just tell him straight out that she wanted to see how he reacted if she was flirting with someone else, for some reason. It just felt like. . .like she just wanted to know, okay? You can only see someone as hot and pretty as Harry shirtless in tiny swim trunks for so long before you have to start wondering things. And you can only stand for them to stare at you for so long without wondering if maybe they were interested. And maybe for the last two days you’ve thought about how he carried you to bed, and how strong he was, and how big his biceps are, and how he could probably squeeze you tight. How his stamina must be insane if he’s going on runs with Adam and only Adam is returning winded, while it seems like they only had to stop exercising for his sake.
Her fingers carefully loop around his wrist. “Well, I think I was the one to kick the sand in your eye by accident,” she tells him. “Come back with me; I wanna go back.”
“Are you sure? We – I’m seriously fine; I just needed a second to shake some thoughts out of my head,” he told her, “If you wanted to… to stay, I know you were – um. . .speaking with someone.” And though he tries not to, it’s spoken with just enough vitriol that if Y/N hadn’t been suspicious before, she definitely would have been now.
Y/N starts walking in the direction of the house again, fingers tightening around his arm.
“He’ll be okay,” she answers, “Text the others and let them know we’re headed out first.”
. . .
They really don’t speak much on the way back to the house. Harry eventually falls into step with her instead of her dragging him behind her, but Y/N doesn’t let go of his arm at all. She can feel the thundering of his pulse beneath her fingertips, and it sort of makes her salivate like she’s a vampire or a mosquito. What the hell is going on with her? The reaction she’s having to this sniffly, crying Harry is almost visceral. Has a guy ever cried because of her before? She doesn’t know – she’s certain she would remember if this were the reaction that came from it.
They get to the house pretty quickly. They kick off their shoes at the front door, and Y/N dips her feet into the bucket of water (that Harry has been routinely changing out) so that there’s no sand tracking through the house. She led them to their room, even though there was nobody home. It just felt wrong to be out in the open when they both have a room they share, and the others would be home every minute. If she were questioning him, and he started crying again, and in front of everyone? Y/N would feel like a monster. She doesn’t want them to see him crying because she can tell he’s a little embarrassed about it, even though it’s cute.
“Harry –” she begins, because she’s about to apologize and try to explain herself without sounding like a maniac, but Harry starts talking before she can.
“I think you look beautiful tonight,” he rushes to say, “And I thought it first, but I didn’t get the chance to say it. Then that man said it before me, and it just. . .upset me. I could tell he was whispering it in your ear, but I. . .I thought about it first. I know that’s stupid and childish, but –” he shook his head, “But that’s just how I’m feeling right now. I should’ve been the first to say it.”
Alarms are blaring in her head right now, but not bad ones. Good ones. Bright ones. Chirpy, twinkling, sparkling alarms that explode with sweets and whipped cream, cakes and pies. Confetti bursts from the speakers as they sound.
Y/N doesn’t think when she leans in; she just does what her body urges her to do, and it’s urging her to kiss him. Her heart is thudding rapidly when she grabs him by the face and presses a kiss to his mouth, sucking his bottom lip between her teeth and nipping. Harry makes a startled squeak in his throat at first, but accepts her readily, meeting her tongue outside of her mouth to flicker together. He tastes like fruity alcohol plus a hint of saltiness from his tears, and Y/N feels like her head is swimming. This is too much and not enough all at once. But this feeling that she’s been feeling, niggling at the back of her head – she had to satiate it right then and there. It was demanding that she do, actually.
Harry moves fluidly with her. He kisses like someone who definitely knows how to kiss, tilting his head, working himself into it, his hands finding her sides and squeezing. His tongue is feathery when it flickers into her mouth, touching hers softly before curling and rubbing against it. She pulses then flutters around nothing, walls coaxing something imaginary deeper inside of her. It feels good – so good that her eyes practically roll to the back of her head. The heat of his body against hers and the need to press closer and kiss deeper are what drive her. Plus the sweet noises that are leaving his throat, low and whiny, as his glasses get all screwed up, crooked and fogged between them.
Y/N takes a step forward, and her thigh comes in contact with his erection. Her heart was already racing, but it gallops when she feels that. Harry’s big. She’d already kind of clocked this because of his swim trunks and the couple of times she’s seen him in his briefs, but seeing is way different than feeling. Feeling him, she registers that he has a monster in there and it’s something that needs to be dealt with accordingly.
Her hands slid from his face, down his body, toward the belt around his hips, but before she could properly undo it, Harry reached down to stop her.
The sound that she moans against him is questioning, brows pinching together when she pulls away to see him. Was she reading this wrong? Maybe she shouldn’t have kissed him? But he’d been responding so eagerly to it; she wouldn’t have guessed that this was something that he didn’t want or was unsure about. His grip around her wrists is strong, and when she realizes that he’s only using one hand, she thinks she might just pass out.
“Sorry,” her words sound a little wet before she swallows, “Do you – did I – I’m sorry,” she doesn’t feel very drunk from her drinks, but she feels drunk with lust, and the flushed, slicked, and swollen look of Harry’s lips after being kissed. Hell, she could have been doing this every fucking night, couldn’t she have? If he wanted it, she could have given him a temporary lip stain just from pressing their mouths together. “I took it too far? You’re hard, so I thought –”
“I want to do you,” he murmurs, cutting her off and sinking to the floor in front of her. Y/N gasps when his nose drags from her belly button, down to her crotch, pushing his nose against her and breathing in softly. Her stomach does a hot little flip-flop from arousal, his hands slowly dragging from her ribs, down to her hips, and they feel so fucking massive against her, she feels herself getting wetter. “I don’t – I don’t care if I cum tonight, I want to make you cum before the others get here.”
And she definitely, definitely, definitely wasn’t expecting this. Y/N isn’t sure what she thought might happen if she flirted in front of him, but the last thing she imagined was that he’d end up on his knees in front of her. He makes a filthy sight – and an image that she thinks would do numbers on socials and probably inspire many blurbs and headcanons about needy boys who sink to their knees with teary eyes wanting to make you feel good. She can’t believe what she’s seeing or feeling when he starts to bunch the fabric of her dress up, shoving it over her hips and making her hold it so that he can focus on what’s underneath it.
Her panties, she could bet, were already damp, but Harry presses his face against her and sucks in a long, deep breath. Y/N twitches, jumping and giggling from the ticklish feeling, a soft moan tickling from her throat when she feels his lips graze against her folds. Harry guides one of her legs over his shoulder, letting it dangle and encouraging her to rest her weight on him as he tugs the crotch of the panties to the side and drags his tongue up from hole to her swollen, throbbing clit. They whine in unison – Y/N at the feeling of his wet, slick tongue between her, and Harry at her taste (or at least that’s what she’s guessing). He sucks the engorged button into his mouth for two little pulls before popping off, dragging his tongue against her again. She’s happy that her panties are flimsy, stretchy little things today so they don’t get too in the way of his tongue.
Harry eats like he’s starving for it. Like he’d been starved all day and Y/N finally let him have a taste. He laps at her like a needy mutt, desperate, hungry, flicking his tongue between her folds and slurping up what she has to give him. The gravity in how he’s eating her makes her drip directly into his mouth, and every time she squeezes or pulses, it drags him back to her hole like he’s going to suck it right out of her. Y/N’s tummy is so clenched, hips bucking into his mouth, fingers curling up tight in her dress. Her left hand is tangled in the fabric of her dress and also in his hands, where he has a firm grip on her, keeping her as still as he can so she doesn’t topple over. Y/N is wondering how many people he’s eaten out against a wall to have this down to a science, but those thoughts are silenced when he suckles her clit into his mouth again.
His eyes alternate between being blissed out and closed, and staring up at her. Gaze is still all swollen from crying earlier because of her; she’s pretty sure. Did he have a crush on her? Is that why he’s always staring and looking at her? Is that why he was so sad she wasn’t letting him do things for her? Was she reading too far into this?
His fingers dig into her flesh, pulling her closer, moaning against her pussy like he was the one being eaten out. Y/N would do that – she’d split him open and tongue his cute little hole too, if he’d let her. Y/N thinks she’d do anything for him right now if it meant that she could feel his tongue like this more often. There’s a burning coil tightening in her belly, ready to burst while he happily dines between her legs. Her folds feel slick, and her pussy feels a little sloppy, with how much she’s leaking onto his tongue, but he has never seemed so at ease. Even when they were soaking in the onsen today, he seemed ten times more relaxed with a face full of her cunt. His glasses push up against her when he moves closer, and for some reason that really does her in.
Y/N’s head thuds back against the wall, her throat extending with a moan when she starts to cum, thighs shaking hard. It’s intense, more than she’s expecting. She thinks it’s the fastest and hardest that she’s cum with someone else in her life, and it’s unknotting muscles that have been wound up for years and years. Y/N’s pussy contracts like it’s begging for something to be inside of it and Harry listens, letting her grind herself against his face while he wriggles his tongue inside of her. He makes these soft, pleading hums of “Mhm, mhm,” like he’s begging for more, telling her how okay he is with this, how pleased he is. Helping her helps him; he told her that, and she’s certain that extends to cumming.
Eventually, it’s too much. He drags her orgasm out for as long as he can before she’s twitching and sensitive, shoving against his forehead until he detaches from her with a wet pop. Her leg slid off of his shoulder, down to the floor uselessly. Honestly, she thinks his hands on her are the only reason she hasn’t toppled right over yet.
Harry looks lewd. His face was wet and blotched pink all over; his lips were swollen and fat from the kissing and from what he’d just done to her, glistening as he lulled his tongue around them to lap up every bite of her juices he could. His glasses are all fucked, still crooked since they kissed, so she reaches down and straightens them out. Even though he’s holding his body is lewd, on his knees, legs outstretched, his cock obvious and thick in his trousers and a clear wet spot that spreads with each little throb she can see.
Y/N feels crazed, almost, when she sees that. Her eyes wild as she blinks, “You’re – you –” she stutters, and Harry has the nerve to look sheepish.
“Yeah,” he answers delicately, “You tasted really, really good, I – I’ve been wanting to do that since you said nobody has ever made your thighs shake while they ate you.”
Still catching her breath, she asks, “When did I say that?”
“Two years ago, after the movies once.”
Y/N has no recollection of this, and that makes it even more steamy, for some reason. Has he just been thinking about that? For two years?
She moves her foot to the wet bulge in his bottom and presses the sole of her foot along the curve of it. The sound Harry makes is delicious and a little pathetic when he grabs her ankle tightly and rolls up into the touch before jerking away, “Ah, too much,” he whined, thudding his head against her thigh, “We need – we need to – come and lie down, I’ll clean you up.”
Y/N crawled into the bed, wondering what that could entail before Harry appeared at the bedside with a warm, wet cloth in his hand. He’s still in his messy bottoms, but he doesn’t seem to care, as he delicately strips her of her panties. He’s gentle while he wipes away the spit and her cum, before placing a soft, sweet kiss on her thigh before heading to her suitcase. She watches as he picks out the pajamas from her sleepwear packing cube and brings them over to her, along with a new pair of panties.
“Thank you for letting me,” Harry tells her as he lies them carefully beside her, then leans down and places another wet, sucking kiss to her thigh, “Your skin tastes so sweet.”
She is still breathless, mouth opening and closing like a fish, “That – Harry, your tongue is insane – thank you,” she says, instead of asking the million other questions she wants to ask. Neither of them has the capacity for that right now. They just had two very big revelations in the last 72 hours, and Harry has cum cooling and drying probably very uncomfortably in his pants right now. The others would be back sooner rather than later, and at least Mei and Niall will probably tumble into the room, if not to catch them “in the act,” then to see if they are okay. Harry had messaged them that they were feeling dehydrated from sweating all day, and they were going back to get some rest. “I’ve never – I’ve never cum like that before.”
He grins sweetly. Like a switch has been flipped, he’s got that sweet, gentle look in his eyes again.
“That makes me happy. I’ll be right back, okay? I need to clean up.”
Y/N watches him disappear behind the door with a pair of briefs and his own pajamas in his hands. She hears the sink faucet turn on and the gasp of someone who just put a wet washcloth on their softened, sensitive cock. Her mind is reeling.
CW: harry is a hot shot ceo, and y/n is his shy, new PA! minors please dni!!! enjoy!! longer an at the end!
WC: 13.1K
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He made the familiar walk to his office, hand stuffed into his pocket and phone secure between his fingers. The lights were on, from what he could see from the outside, and the blurred glass made way for a figure standing right by his desk. Confusion lurked in Harry’s head as he wondered who could possibly be in his office without his permission. Without a second thought, he threw the door open and walked right in, “who are you?”
His voice was gruff and cold, a complete opposite to the sugary sight before him. Stood by his desk was a girl— a very pretty one, in fact. Big, round eyes looked at him, resembling a deer, and a plush mouth was left agape as she eyed him up and down. She was wearing a sweet ensemble; a pretty pastel blue dress that fell just past mid-thigh and had a tiny slit on it. Her hair was swept back over her neck, tamed and neat.
He lingered his gaze on her as she straightened up from where she was bent over his desk and cleared her throat, “hi, Mr. Styles, it’s nice to finally meet you,” she extended a hand for him to shake, “I’m Y/N. Your new assistant.” The slight rise and fall of her chest gave her nerves away but her eye-contact never faltered. Her hand was warm and soft when he took it, and only then did the last-minute text from Mitch come back to him.
By the way, you’ve got a new assistant starting this week. Be nice to her.
This was her. Of course. He gave her a firm handshake, “Harry.”
Y/N never thought life after university would be like this. When she first pursued her bachelors in business degree, she had dreamt of a future where right after graduation, she’d be offered all these hot-shot jobs and she’d go on to become a big, powerful business woman. Some might think this dream of hers was far-fetched and unrealistic, but when you graduate from a highly prestigious university, first class with honours, well, it’s at least a little bit fair to have such expectations.
She worked her ass off when she was still in school— nailing every exam and assignment, doing summer internships and for a moment she thought about applying for a masters degree, but that was quickly shot down when Y/N checked in on her accruing student debt. She might pursue it some time down the road, but for now, her main goal was to get out of this shit-hole of a cafe where she worked and get her ass to a big firm, just like she was promised by all the career counsellors at university.
She was applying consistently to a million different firms, and at this point, she’d be happy if she could even be a receptionist at one of them. She had exhausted all of her connections made in university in hopes of anyone linking her to a decent job, but she turned up with no luck as of yet.
She had been working at Bluebird cafe all throughout her degree and she was working there even now, seven months post graduating. Disappointment welled deep in her guts every time she saw herself in that same old uniform and cap, greeting the same customers and making do with the same lousy cheque.
It was another dreadful morning at said cafe when Y/N was preparing a humongous order for at least twenty six people. She assumed it was for an office or corporation, judging by the jittery young man who placed the order at the counter. He read carefully off a piece of paper every single order and made Y/N recite it back to him to ensure the drinks were perfect. He ended up handing the paper to Y/N so she could once again make sure everything was according to the requests, and it was on the paper Y/N recognised the prestigious navy logo stamped on the top right.
Grapejuice Inc.
One of the biggest textile corporations in the world, run by the famous Styles’ family. Y/N could only dream of a job there. It was suddenly understandable why the young man was nervous before her. The drinks must probably be for a big, senior meeting or something.
Y/N took her time perfecting them, writing the details of each order on the cups to make it easier for the man to allocate them. She slowly placed them in six separate paper cartons, stacking them on top of each other carefully. The man sighed graciously and took the bag from her hand ever so slowly before walking out of the cafe. She sighed, wiping her hands on her black apron. Behind her, Niall enthused out loud, “how much d’ya think they pay the poor boy to get ‘em their morning drinks?”
Y/N turned to face him, watching him rinse out the alternate milk blender, “probably thousands. It’s a huge company.” Niall hummed, “maybe. But usually such prissies have a hard time paying their employees well.”
Y/N was distracted by an order that pinged on their little UberEats tablet, and started prepping the two drinks and almond croissant. She hummed at his response. “Prissies or not, they’re one of the most influential corporations in the world.”
Niall nudged her shoulder and smirked, “don’t go around licking their asses already. They haven’t hired ya yet.”
”Ha. Let’s all make fun of my inability to find a proper job, now,” she mumbled sarcastically. She took her anger out on the oven door, slamming it shut after she put the croissant in there to warm up. Niall wiped his hands on a towel and rubbed them up and down her arms, comforting her, “hey c’mon, babe,” he said gently, noticing her frustrated frown. Seeing that man working for such an amazing corporation made her slightly jealous. It was a sour, unpleasant feeling which Y/N hated. Niall pulled her into his chest in the empty cafe, save for another employee, Mina, who wiped down the tables.
”They’re missing out on the biggest brain in the city,” he flicked her cap playfully, “the right job will come along, I know it. Don’t worry your pretty head over it.”
Y/N appreciated the comfort, leaning into him. She was grateful for his presence, and for his reassuring touch that grounded her. He pulled back and pinched her cheek playfully, “cheer up, buttercup. We’ve got lattes to make for abusive boomers!”
Y/N sighed. She only prayed that Niall's previous words had some truth to them.
-
That night when she got home, Y/N followed her usual routine of feeding her cat Pebble and then turning the shower on, waiting for it to warm up. In the meantime she prepped for dinner and picked out her pyjamas. Once she was all showered and fed, she climbed into bed and pulled out her laptop to do her nightly job search. Numerous sites were searched, Linkedin was scowered and her CV was passed around like a blunt at a party.
She might have applied for a position at Grapejuice Inc, in her sleep-driven haze. It might have been an assistant position for one of their senior management… could have been the Secretary… or the CEO. She doesn’t remember, as she passed out in front of her computer screen, the light glowing and illuminating her peaceful features.
-
When Y/N was in high school many years ago, she met a boy named Landon. They were both in the same Art History class, and the teacher paired them up for a project where they had to analyse and present on a popular period piece. She ended up spending long hours with him during the week, and Y/N being the hormonal teenage girl she was, fell for Landon’s shaggy blonde hair and toothy grin. He was sweet and caring, taller than her and called Y/N ‘sweets’ and four months after they first met, he asked her to be his girlfriend and took her out on her first date.
Landon had taken most of her firsts. He was the only boyfriend she ever had and the only person she ever kissed, but that was it. They never did anything beyond that. The most they ever dabbled in was maybe a hand on her ass or slipping under her shirt to touch her tummy while they made out, but it was never anything more. Y/N blamed the distance for that.
After high school, both Y/N and Landon had big dreams for university. They both wanted to go to one of the big schools, but the problem was that the one Y/N wanted to go to was ten hours away from the one Landon got into. Education was something that was important to both of them, so compromising it for the sake of their relationship was out of the question. They decided to make do with the distance and promised to each other they would remain loyal despite the land that separated them.
It was hard at times, especially in university when all of Y/N’s friends were able to go out and bring whoever they wanted home, date different people and have new experiences while she sat feeling lame because she missed her boyfriend. They still made an effort to try and see each other— oftentimes during semester breaks Y/N would visit Landon and Landon would try to visit Y/N. It was those fleeting days that kept Y/N sane during the course of their relationship.
She spoke to him everyday still, texting him little updates of her day, and he’d text her his. They called every couple of days, though they were pretty short since they were out of words to say thanks to their texts.
Y/N knew that Landon was currently working at his new job as a junior editor after he graduated with his English degree. She was happy for him, of course, but his new commitment meant she was hearing less and less from him. Although there were the daily ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ texts, these days she was seldom seeing those as well.
It was her day off today, a quiet Tuesday afternoon where Y/N decided to go to the farmers market a little ways from her apartment. She was sitting down at a small restaurant, a cold drink battling the summer heat resting in her hand, but her attention was somewhere else. Her lip was abused under her teeth as she typed up a message to Landon. She missed talking to him, and was penning all her frustrations and thoughts in a long paragraph when she was interrupted by her phone ringing.
The phone number was unfamiliar, making Y/N’s eyebrows furrow. She answered it cautiously. “Hello?”
”Good morning, am I speaking with Miss Y/N L/N?”
Confusion crept upon her. “Yes, this is her.”
”Hi, Miss L/N. This is Mitch Rowland calling from Grapejuice Inc, how are you today?”
Now that rendered Y/N speechless. Her heart dropped and her mouth fell open in surprise. The sound of a child shouting nearby shook her from her thoughts as she regained her consciousness and straightened up, “I’m well, how are you?”
”Pretty alright. Listen, we saw your application for senior assistant to the Chief Executive Officer and loved your CV. How are you placed for an interview sometime this week? Say, Thursday at nine?”
Y/N could not believe the words she was hearing through the phone. She wanted to scream and dance and hug this Mitch guy all at the same time. Her cheeks heated up and a big smile spread across her face, “yes! Thank you for calling me, of course, Thursday at nine is perfect.”
”Great! I’ll text you the address. You can come straight to the reception. Sheila will have your name and will let you through to the interview room. I look forward to meeting you.”
Y/N wished him a confident ‘me too’ and said goodbye, her heart still racing. She took a moment to bask in the reality of the situation. It felt so surreal— Y/N only ever dreamed of getting to work in such an amazing corporation, that too at such an amazing position.
Suddenly, the sun wasn’t harsh like before and her drink was sweeter. The chatter of children nearby made her feel peaceful instead of irritated. She didn’t even find it in herself to care about Landon’s lack of communication as she excitedly dialled Niall’s phone and screamed the news into his unsuspecting ear. An unfamiliar sense of hope filled her heart. Maybe things would finally start to look up for Y/N.
-
The two days leading up to Thursday were the longest ever. Y/N was nervous and excited at the same time, jittery while she was at the cafe serving customers. Niall hyped Y/N up, mumbled a million ‘I told you so’s and tried to ease her nerves when she went on and on about what she should say at the interview.
She asked Mina to cover her Thursday morning shift and ran to the mall the night before to browse for a new blazer, wanting to dress professional but also cute. It was also a million degrees out, so she would probably only wear the blazer indoors for an hour or two, depending on how long the interview was.
She still hadn’t texted Landon about it. Maybe once the job was secured she would, but she didn’t want to get his hopes up just to shatter them if things somehow did not work out.
The morning of, Y/N was too nauseous to eat anything. She usually got that way when she was nervous or anticipating something, so her lack of appetite didn’t come as a shock. The top she wore clung to her body nicely, a light pink colour which matched the kitten heels she had on. The blazer and skirt were of the same dark grey colour, complementing each other nicely. She felt pretty with her hair done neatly and makeup light. Hopefully she made a good impression on Mitch and whoever she met.
Driving to the office was somewhat of a dream. Y/N never thought she would be in this position, especially with how things were looking the past few months. Constant disappointment almost rendered her hopeless, but she was proud of herself for sticking through it. Now, she prayed that she got the job and could finally stand on her own feet, with a job she rightfully earned. She felt giddy thinking about what it would be like if she got the job. She would hand in her notice to the cafe immediately. Then she’d call her mum and Landon. They would be so happy for her, she just knew it.
The place was gigantic— an intimidating building that loomed over her jittery body. Y/N stared up at it. It had to be at least forty storeys. She took a deep breath and mustered up the courage to walk in, a smile gracing her features. Following Mitch’s instructions, Y/N went straight up to the lavish reception and caught Sheila’s attention. Sheila, who was gorgeous; long brown hair cascading down her back, and adorned in a baby blue dress. She flashed Y/N a friendly smile. “Hi! How can I help?”
”Hi, my name’s Y/N. I’m here for an interview. Mitch called me,” Y/N said. a look of recognition came across Sheila’s face as she grinned, “of course. It’s nice to meet you, Y/N. Just follow me through here.” Grapejuice Inc was just as grand on the inside as it was on the outside— immaculate architecture and wide, open spaces. There were large windows on all walls allowing sunlight to filter into the space, brightening up the area. Y/N followed Sheila to the elevator, “it’s the twenty second floor, fourth door to your right,” she informed Y/N easily.
Doing as she was told, Y/N soon found herself outside of a large room with double doors. The hallway she was standing in was mostly empty, littered with artwork on both sides. It felt like no one was even on the floor, silence flooding the area. As soon she thought about knocking on the doors, they swung open and she was met with a tall, brunette man.
He had long hair which was tied back neatly, and he smiled warmly at Y/N, “you must be Y/N,” he said, “my name’s Mitch. We spoke on the phone a couple of days ago.”
Y/N grinned and held out her hand, “right. Nice to meet you in person.” His handshake was solid— professional and perfected as he guided her into the room. It was a large room with a long conference table in the middle. On one side a bunch of papers were scattered. That was probably where Mitch was sitting. He motioned for her to take a seat across from him. A jug of water rested on the table along with a paper and pen. Y/N bit her nails into her palm to ground herself.
“Sorry about the mess. I’ve been doing these interviews all morning,” he started sheepishly. Y/N waved him away, “that’s okay. Don’t have to apologise.” Mitch cleared his throat, “let’s get started then…”
-
The interview ran for about an hour and a half. Y/N felt like Mitch was eating away at her brain, throwing a million questions at her at such a fast rate. She tried her best to answer diligently, taking her time to really think through what he was saying to give the best possible response. Y/N knew such opportunities were hard to come by, and she wanted to make the best of it.
The job he was describing was mostly administration stuff; keeping track of the CEO, Mr. Styles’, meetings, planning his trips, scheduling, filing, invoicing, organising. All the things she had mastered at school and during her internships. Mitch wanted Y/N to meet Mr. Styles in person, but he was away for a business conference in Japan.
“Well, all I can say right now is that I’m really glad I called you, Miss L/N,” he said, resting his hands on the table, “this has been great.”
Y/N felt her face heating and smiled gingerly, “thank you.”
“I know we spoke about this plenty, but keep this job description,” Mitch slid a piece of paper her way across the table, “feel free to familiarise yourself with it. I’ll have a chat with the team and let you know about the outcome of this interview latest by Monday.” He got up and held the door open for her, “thanks for coming in.”
Y/N shook his hand again and bid him goodbye, giddy as she walked out of the interview room and into the elevator. The sheet of paper was clutched between her fingers and she let out a deep breath. Although the interview was tiring, she was feeling hopeful about the job. Mitch was great and helpful, answering all of her questions easily and explaining the role to her in depth. She waved goodbye to Sheila and made her way out of the building, and when she was finally in the confines of her car, she squealed to herself; everything was slowly falling into place, and she couldn’t be more grateful.
-
Friday at three PM Y/N was at the cafe, mindlessly wiping down the counter. A startled Niall walked in from the back, “Y/N your phone was ringing. T’was an unknown number but I think they left an email or something.”
Y/N turned around in confusion. She saw as Niall stared down at her illuminating screen and tried to take her phone from him, “what? Who is it?” He furrowed his eyebrows, “it’s from someone called Mitch Rowland. I think… I think you got the job.” Her eyes widened, “you’re joking. Show me.”
He passed her the phone, and there it was. An email from Mitch. She read it over and over and over. Tears brimmed in her eyes as she realised she wasn’t dreaming. Y/N was going to be working at Grapejuice Inc. They wanted her as soon as possible.
Niall saw her dazed face and squeezed her tightly, his arms near suffocating her, “I told you! I knew you could do it, so fucking smart you are,” he kissed her hair, “I’m so happy for you, pet. They’re gonna love you.” She peeled back from his chest and looked at him with her tear-soaked face, “I can’t believe this is actually happening,” she laughed in disbelief, “this whole thing feels like a dream.”
-
If Harry didn’t know any better, he could probably be convinced that this was what heaven felt like.
The way he jabbed into the back of the pretty girl’s throat had him throwing his head back and moaning uncontrollably, and he felt like an angel was personally taking his hand and leading him to eden. His palm came down on the kitchen counter in front of him, the other hand weaving into her hair to pull her further on his cock, “oh, fuck me.” The girl beneath him, Sophie, gagged around him loudly and then popped off of him, strings of her saliva connecting her to him. She smirked up at him, twisting her hand over his length as she gave her mouth a break.
“Yeah? You like the way I suck your di—”
He didn’t bother to hear the end of her poorly executed attempt at dirty talk and groaned, shoving her back on his cock. The action took her by surprise, and a wet filthy sound came from her throat as she swallowed around him desperately. Harry whimpered a little, head falling back on his shoulders. He held her there for about twenty seconds, throbbing in her mouth and letting his hair tickle her nose. When he saw tears prickle in her eyes, he decided to let her off for a bit. He loosened his grip on her hair and opted to softly scratch his nails against her scalp as she returned to bobbing her head.
It didn’t take much longer after that to make him come, a train of curses falling from his mouth as he held onto the counter tightly and whined, “fuck, fuck— Sophie, fu—” Hot, white ropes of his come spilled into her mouth which she took in willingly, eyes screwed shut and tongue out. He came for a while, and he came a lot; some of it dripping down the side of her mouth and on her chin. When he was finally done, his hand in her hair slipped to her jaw which he held tightly, prying her lips open.
Harry let a glob of his spit fall into her mouth, mixing in with his come on the well of her tongue. Sophie whined highly as he did, and moaned when Harry slapped her right cheek, soft enough that it didn’t seriously hurt her but hard enough that the zap went straight to her clit. He pushed her cheeks together and closed her mouth, “swallow.”
She did so obediently, before Harry backed up and let her stand to her full height. His eyes raked shamelessly over her figure, adorned in nothing but his office button up, legs bare and chin spit-slicked. Her blonde locks were a mess as she put her hands on his chest and giggled, “did you like that?”
Harry pulled her wrists off and thumbed at her cheek, “mhmm. I have to go to work,” he told her. Sophie pouted, “can’t you take one day off? You must be so tired after such a long flight…,” she ran her clean hand through his curls, “don’t go today? For me?”
He could have laughed in her face for that. If she thought she was anything more than an easy fuck for him, she was sorely mistaken. It didn’t matter that he had known her for over a year now— Harry didn’t date or commit. He hadn’t for a couple of years now. One night stands and fuck-buddies were more than enough to satiate his needs.
Sophie frowned when he stepped away from her and pulled his pyjama pants back up over his hips. He sighed, “I can’t stay, Sophie, I’ve a company to run.” She huffed and stomped her foot like a child, “but I missed you so much, H.” Her voice was nasally, suddenly annoying him to no end, especially when she tried to wrap her arms around him again. Harry dodged her and picked up his phone instead. “This was nice, Soph, but you have to go. I’ll call you a car and have Jared drop you off,” he patted her hip, “talk soon.”
He didn’t wait to hear her response and slipped upstairs to his large bedroom, shutting and locking the door in case she tried to follow him up. He really was tired and jet-lagged after the twelve hour flight. A couple of days off might do him some good, but as much as he hated to admit it, he was a workaholic who would choose a productive day at the office over a day off ninety percent of the time. He took a quick shower and got dressed, tugging on a crisp, dry-cleaned navy blue suit. His eyes flitted about his room as he sprayed on some cologne.
The sheets were awry and there were silk ties hanging off his headboard. Memories of the past night flooded his mind as he put on his cuff-links and gelled his hair. The way she felt around him, wet and soft, gushing on his cock. The way she tasted and writhed beneath him, coming over and over until Harry had to tie her down and force her to take what he gave her. Fucking her over and over again, bruise marks on her round ass, a warm mouth wrapped around his cock. It really was a lot of fun.
After making sure he had his phone and wallet, Harry rushed down the stairs and was glad to see that Sophie had left. At least he was safe from another awkward goodbye where she would whine about her feelings for him and he would have to let her down gently. She kept saying Harry was leading her on, but he didn’t see how.
He told Sophie from the beginning that he only wanted sex and she was fine with it. The first time she alluded to any sort of feelings, Harry told her he wasn’t interested in that way. She was hurt and she cried a bit, (which was Harry’s worst nightmare because he really had no idea how to react in situations like that), but she still showed up the next time he called her. He just assumed she was over him. Harry was a huge perfectionist, and if he wanted a relationship, he would have to put a lot of time and effort into it for it to be the sort he was looking for; time that he unfortunately did not have, since he was so busy making sure Grapejuice Inc ran smoothly.
As he left, he made sure to leave a note on his fridge for his cleaner letting her know that his sheets needed changing and the clothes on the floor needed to be dry cleaned. He put down what he wanted the chef to meal-prep for and called the elevator to go down to his car. He lived in the top floor penthouse apartment of a luxury accommodation in the middle of the city— a location which was convenient for him in more ways than one. It was close to where he worked, and he enjoyed the hustle and bustle of the city below him. The large windows in his place were his favourite since he could people-watch all he wanted (and he enjoyed the occasional fuck against it when it was dark enough).
He greeted Tomas, his driver, as he pulled the door open and let Harry into the car. They made small talk and Harry asked Tomas about his son who just started high school and his wife who was battling an illness. Tomas was Harry’s father’s driver as well, and he watched Harry grow up in front of him. He would drive Harry to daycare when he was a baby, soccer practice when he was a schoolboy, concerts when he was a teenager and now here he was, driving him to the same office he used to drive his father to. Harry felt oddly connected to Tomas, and couldn’t let him go no matter how much his age persisted.
They reached the building pretty quick and Harry thanked Tomas as he stepped out. Sheila smiled and greeted him as he walked in, and every cubicle he passed on his way to the elevator mumbled a ‘good morning, Sir.’
He made the familiar walk to his office, hand stuffed into his pocket and phone secure between his fingers. The lights were on, from what he could see from the outside, and the blurred glass made way for a figure standing right by his desk. Confusion lurked in Harry’s head as he wondered who could possibly be in his office without his permission. Without a second thought, he threw the door open and walked right in, “who are you?”
His voice was gruff and cold, a complete opposite to the sugary sight before him. Stood by his desk was a girl— a very pretty one, in fact. Big, round eyes looked at him, resembling a deer, and a plush mouth was left agape as she eyed him up and down. She was wearing a sweet ensemble; a pretty pastel blue dress that fell just past mid-thigh and had a tiny slit on it. Her hair was swept back over her neck, tamed and neat, perfect for an office atmosphere.
He lingered his gaze on her as she straightened up from where she was bent over his desk and cleared her throat, “hi, Mr. Styles, it’s nice to finally meet you,” she extended a hand for him to shake, “I’m Y/N. Your new assistant.” The slight rise and fall of her chest gave her nerves away but her eye-contact never faltered. Her hand was warm and soft when he took it, and only then did the last-minute text from Mitch come back to him.
By the way, you’ve got a new assistant starting this week. Be nice to her.
This was her. Of course. He gave her a firm handshake, “Harry.”
She smiled at him softly, a strand of her hair falling over her eye. Harry itched to tuck it behind her ear, maybe feel how soft her skin might be under her jaw, but he refrained. “I was just sorting out some of your files. I know you’ve been away so I—”
“What did you touch?”
He spoke sharply, eyebrows furrowed as he set his phone down on his desk and sat on his chair. “Just the documents in the filing drawers. I didn’t touch your desk, don’t worry.” Harry hummed. He watched as she stood in the middle of the room, twiddling her hands behind her back, “I… I colour coded and arranged them alphabetically. Cleaned up your schedule and added the reminders feature to your Teams as well,” she trailed off. She took his silence as her queue to continue. “I also re-recorded your voicemail for the phone and—”
“You can clean whatever you want, just don’t touch my desk. I take my coffee at nine, black, no milk and no sugar. Nine-fifteen, you’ll be in my office with my schedule. You will take orders from me and me only, and I should not have to buzz you twice if I need to see you. You’re off when I say you’re off, and don’t worry about lunch breaks, I tend to have them outside.”
He explained all this sternly, eyes sturdy and fixated on her. She let out a quiet breath and nodded, firm, “Noted. I’ll…” she glanced at the clock above his head. 8:47AM. “I’ll go and get your coffee, sir.”
With that, she smiled once again and scurried out of the room. Harry could tell she was a sweet little thing, just eager to please. Maybe it would be nice to have a pretty face in the office. His days might become less dull. He knew she was getting paid a lot for this job as his assistant, so he had a lot of expectations from her too. Hopefully she could bring a little warmth to his frigid reputation.
-
As the days passed with Y/N acting as Harry’s senior assistant, he had come to realise she executed the role much better than most of his previous assistants. The instructions he gave to her on the first day she seemed to have tattooed on her heart, and she stuck to them diligently. His coffee was at his desk everyday at nine sharp, she had a printed schedule she would read to him and then leave with him once she was done, she would organise some new cabinet of his or folder in his emails everyday and she was on top of his meetings and notes. Harry thought he might have to take Mitch out for a drink or something for managing to hire such an efficient assistant for him.
On top of all that, she had a pretty face which Harry occasionally enjoyed to ogle at. Though he wasn’t one to mix business and pleasure, he figured a little eye-candy never hurt anyone. It was not like he would ever act upon it, no matter how badly he wanted to bend her over his desk and fuck the life out of her.
Today was one such day as she came in wearing a tiny little red dress and matching heels. It was like she walked right out of a hot office fantasy, pencil in her hair and glasses on her nose. She was wearing a blazer on top earlier, but she took it off soon after arriving at work.
When she was reading out his schedule and setting his coffee on his desk, Harry struggled to not stare shamelessly at her figure which filled out the dress just perfectly. A few minutes in, she dropped a pencil on the floor and Harry felt like a teenage boy seeing boobs for the first time as she bent to pick it up.
Unsurprisingly, her pretty face didn’t go unnoticed by many. He realised that when they went into the monthly Senior Leadership Team meeting today, and most of the managers and team directors said hello to her tits first and then her face. It wasn’t even like the dress was provocative in any way— it was summer and a gazillion degrees out, Harry didn’t expect her to walk in wearing a wool jumper and sweats. Plus, the dress did cover most of her skin, it was just her legs that were bare, and that was only a little before her knees. Although Harry did think she was gorgeous (particularly today) he didn’t stare so blatantly and deliberately make her uncomfortable.
Once they said their greetings to everyone, Y/N settled in next to Harry with her notebook and pen on the table before her. He could smell her since she was right beside him, warm vanilla and caramel, a sweet scent that could put him to sleep. She was really testing him today, and the worst part was that Harry didn’t think she knew she even had that effect on him and almost everyone she met.
She asked him if he was okay when he didn’t move for a bit, to which Harry clenched his jaw and nodded tightly. Willing away his scandalous thoughts, Harry cleared his throat and pulled open the meeting notes Y/N prepared for him beforehand, “I hope you’re all having a good morning,” he looked around the room, “we’ve got a couple of important things to go over today, so make sure you’ve got your ears open. I need fresh ideas on the table…”
He listed off the BAU for the week and they went around the table to hear monthly updates from each of the department heads. Y/N penned every important detail vigorously with her lip between her teeth, but one particular discussion had her ears perking up. “I think it’s better if we stick to our suppliers in China and Bangladesh. It’s cost efficient and we’re meeting all of our KPIs,” one of the team members spoke up. Harry watched as another retorted, “I understand that it’s cost efficient, but we have to draft our yearly financial report in two months where we have to talk about our suppliers and sustainability. Large shipments of textiles every year is anything but.”
Next to him, he could feel Y/N’s nervousness wafting off in waves as she sat up straight and cleared her throat. Her soft voice quietly followed, “I… I think we can try switching to internal suppliers instead of external,” she glanced around the room looking for reassurance and settled her eyes on Harry who nodded at her. Although it wasn’t in her exact line of work to advise on this matter, she was still a valued member of the team who brought new input to the company. She continued, “it would be good for our brand image and we won’t have to fabricate our annual report. It’ll be ethical and sustainable, and that’s what consumers are looking for nowadays. We can even market it a—”
“Who are you?” Jerry, one of the team heads, suddenly cut her off. His eyes dug daggers into hers as he raised his brows. Y/N stuttered, “Y/N…I—I’m Mr. Styles’ senior assistant. I just had a few ide—”
“Save it,” he raised his palm, dismissing her thought, “I was thin—”
Harry’s loud voice cut Jerry off, “I believe Miss L/N was saying something before you so rudely interrupted her, Jerry. I do not permit anyone but me to give orders to any of my personal staff. Next time, I suggest you learn how to respect your peers in a meeting before walking into an esteemed room such as this.”
Y/N’s chest rose and fell nervously as she watched the exchange with wide eyes. Jerry immediately dropped his shoulders and darted his eyes away from both Harry and Y/N, now looking down at his notebook, “apologies, Mr. Styles.”
“Don’t apologise to me. Apologise to her.”
Now it was Jerry’s turn to have wide eyes as he looked at Y/N, “but she’s a—”
“We don’t have a lot of time here.”
A few moments passed as Y/N twiddled with her hands and looked at Harry before looking back at Jerry who didn’t meet her eyes as he quietly mumbled, “sorry.” She smiled softly. “It’s okay.” Harry could feel the heat radiating off of her; her face had gone pink and she was squirmy under the attention of the whole meeting room. He decided to close the chapter, “good. Keep these etiquettes in mind next time you walk into another meeting. Y/N, draft your initiative and send it to Analytics. I want to see the pros and cons of switching to internal suppliers by next week. You’re all dismissed.”
-
The whole exchange at the meeting had Y/N’s heart beating like crazy as they left the conference room. “Are you okay?” Harry checked in on her as they walked to his office. “Yep.”
She didn’t want to bother Harry with her anxious thoughts and worry him more than he already was as a CEO of such a big company. Her heart was still racing, “I’m gonna go for a quick walk,” she told Harry before grabbing her phone and heading to the elevators. Hopefully a little fresh air would do her some good. As she stepped outside into the bustling city, she took a deep breath and began walking to the courtyard where there was a big water fountain. She liked sitting by it and hearing the pitter-patter of the water. Her phone pinged when she sat down. It was Landon. The notification made her heart drop just slightly. Ever since she told him about her new job, he had been very distant. There was an initial excitement, but then he asked her how much she was getting paid. That’s when things went downhill. Grapejuice Inc was a big firm, and she had an important position. Her bank account was going to fatten up a little, but his reaction just had her a little disappointed.
Plus he kept asking her all these questions about the people she worked with, and not in a cool, interesting way. It was very stalker-ish and accusatory. She didn’t like it one bit. With a sigh, she ignored the message and shut her eyes, feeling the breeze against her face and trying to forget what happened in the meeting today.
-
About a week later, Y/N finally began feeling more comfortable in her role. She was getting to know Harry’s needs better and better as the days passed, and she tried her best to exceed his expectations as much as she could. Ever since he stood up for her in the meeting, she felt like she owed him that at least. It had been a long week at the office, with Harry slipping in and out of meetings which Y/N had to join him for, so she was particularly happy today as the week ended and the weekend approached.
She set her stuff down on her desk when they walked out of the last meeting of the week, “I’m just gonna get a coffee really quick. Did you want anything?” Harry was distracted by his phone, his eyes never straying as he walked past her.
“I’m alright, thanks,” he replied. Once he was in the confines in his office, Y/N let out a deep breath. Her hands slid down her skirt as she made her way to the office kitchen on the third floor, walking in to see a handful of people heating up lunches and waiting for the coffee machine. She reached up to get a cup and was startled when she suddenly felt a presence behind her.
A very unladylike yelp left her mouth as she turned to see the same guy she saw at Bluebird cafe a couple of weeks ago. “I’m so sorry, I didn't mean to startle you!”
She held a hand to her chest and closed her eyes, a long breath escaping her lips, “you scared the living daylights out of me.” The man chuckled and backed up giving her space to lean back against the counter. “Sorry… though the sound you made was quite funny.” Y/N rolled her eyes and faked a dry laugh.
He grinned as he looked at her, before she saw his eyes narrowing, “wait, you’re the girl from the cafe a while ago. You made those twenty six drinks for the annual conference.” Y/N watched as realisation dawned upon him and he examined her like she was a bug under a microscope, “yeah. I remember you, mister so-nervous-I’m-shaking.” She watched as his cheeks turned pink. He looked down, making his dark hair flop over his forehead, “yeah. It was a big meeting, but they all really liked the drinks, so thank you for that.” It was then Y/N noticed how tall he was, towering over her with his brown eyes peering down at her.
“No problem. It was kind of my job at the time so…” Y/N turned to use the coffee machine, leaving him still blushing and staring at his shoes. She followed the prompts on the machine until her desired coffee poured out of the snout. “You’re Mr. Styles’ new assistant aren’t you?” He asked from behind her. Y/N hummed and nodded. “What’s your name?”
He giggled again, “oh right. I totally forgot to introduce myself. I’m Logan, I’m an administration coordinator.” Logan held out a hand for her to shake which she took, smiling, “nice to meet you, Logan. I’m Y/N.”
“I heard about what happened in the meeting last week,” this had Y/N turning around fully to look at him, an eyebrow raised, “word travels surprisingly fast in an office like this.”
“Oh.” She didn’t know what he expected her to say after making that statement. She kind of hated that the first thing he associated her job title to was the speck of drama that went down in the meeting. Her heart hurt a little— she wanted to be recognised for more than just some petty spectacle.
Next to Y/N, another girl stood by the second coffee machine. She must have been listening to their conversation because she spoke up first, “we all heard what happened. Not gonna lie, it was a little bit shocking to hear that Mr. Styles told Jerry off for talking down to an assistant. He usually loves Jerry.”
Y/N’s lips parted, “he didn’t tell anyone off, he just… told him to somtimes let other people have the floor in meetings. It’s common manners.”
The girl smirked, “Mr. Styles doesn’t do that for just anyone. He’s very… cold.” Y/N furrowed her brows, “I don’t understand what you’re trying to say to me.” The blonde only scoffed and flicked her hair over her shoulder, “oh, I think it’s very clear what I’m trying to say. One doesn’t just score a job like yours and become Mr. Styles’ favourite little pet,” she raked her eyes up and down Y/N’s body, “compensation has to be… paid, somehow.”
What she was implying had Y/N’s stomach churning. Not only did she feel utterly disgusted at such an accusation, but she was hurt beyond belief. The words were disrespectful and not true. Y/N did not work her ass off to get into Grapejuice Inc just for it to be reduced to nothing by some employee.
Just as she was going to retort back with something fiery, a deep voice beat her to it, “I hope this little party is about the new marketing strategy your team is implementing, Becca.” Y/N turned to see Harry standing in the doorway of the kitchen, arms crossed over his chest. The blonde girl— Becca’s eyes widened, “Mr. Styles! Yes, I was just asking Logan ab—”
“I hate a fibber.”
Becca stammered over her words. “Sorry, Mr. Styles. I was just getting back to my desk.”
“Good,” Harry said, stopping her in her tracks, “I also hate petty gossip, especially in my office. If I hear another word of false accusations about anyone from anyone’s mouth, you’ll be hearing from HR.”
Y/N raised her brows at his comment and saw how Logan passed her a look of surprise as well. Becca mumbled a ‘sorry’ and left the kitchen soon after, scurrying past Harry. He didn’t even spare a glance her way as he looked at Y/N. “Get back to work.”
“Yes, Mr. Styles.” She told Logan goodbye before leaving the kitchen. Her coffee was clutched tightly in her hands the whole way to her desk as she wondered what the fuck her day had been.
-
It was later on the same day as Y/N sat at her desk with her head in her hands. She had a long tiring day running around in meetings and scheduling appointments for next week. Plus, Becca’s earlier comments still weighed heavy in her mind. The words affected her more than she would like to admit. On top of all of that, Landon was still being cold over text. He gave her one-word answers after leaving her on delivered for ages. She was wracking her brain trying to figure out why he was acting this way— was it jealousy? Or did he just miss her? She hoped it was the latter.
Her head was pounding and she glanced at the clock to see it was six PM. Way past her home time. She just had so much to do. The pressure got to her head as she dug her fingers into her scalp, trying to relieve some pain. Things only got worse when she felt tears prickle her eyes and spill past her waterline. She just felt so stupid.
She felt pathetic crying at her workplace and letting her tears stain her to-do list which was littered with a bunch of little tasks. Taking a few breaths to contain herself, she didn’t even notice when Harry stepped out of his office for a breather. Her sniffling caught his attention. “Miss L/N? What are you still doing here?”
She quickly wiped her tears and straightened up, “I was just finishing a few things up,” she mumbled. She kept her head low but Harry saw right through her. The whole building was dark and quiet as everyone had gone home. The only light on her desk was from her lamp. Harry leaned against it and looked down at Y/N. “Y/N,” he called her by her first name, “what’s wrong? Are you… are you crying?”
A dry chuckle left her mouth. Her wet eyes met his and his shoulders deflated. This was his nightmare situation. He was the worst at comforting people. His hips shifted nervously. “A—are you alright?”
“Clearly no.” She shook her head and looked down into her lap, cheeks heating up. Harry didn’t want to overstep any boundaries but he also couldn’t just leave her sobbing at her desk. “Do… you wanna talk about it?”
She shot him an incredulous look. Even if she did want to talk about it, her boss was not the ideal person. Y/N tried to dismiss him without hurting his feelings. “I’m fine, really,” she sniffled and wiped one more tear. Although Harry was terrible with emotions, he wasn’t an idiot. Clearly something was bothering her to the extent that she had to cry at her desk. He sighed, deciding to ask one more time, “are you sure?”
If it was him in her shoes, he’d probably tell the other person to fuck off and mind their own business, just because he was terrible at being vulnerable. But this was Y/N— sweet Y/N who brightened up his mornings with her pretty smile. He might not know her too well, but he knew she had a good heart.
A long breath escaped her nose as she shut her eyes and held a hand on her forehead, “I just… it’s just been a lot recently.”
Harry’s eyes widen, “is it the workload? You can tell m—”
“No! No, it’s not that. Things have been shaky in my personal life and I… I can’t stop thinking about this morning with Becca a—”
“Did she say something again?” He cut her off, stern. Y/N’s head snapped up, “not after you warned her, no. But before you came she said some nasty things which obviously weren’t true and I can’t get them out of my head. It’s stupid.”
She sniffled and Harry frowned. He heard the conversation just as he was approaching the kitchen. Becca’s words were sharp enough to hurt someone, especially someone as educated and well-performing as Y/N. Harry knew what it was like when people tried to blame your success on things like sex and connections, having been from a big family. Older CEOs and managers often under-estimated him, assuming he was where he was because of his family. That just wasn’t true. He worked really hard to be where he was. It wasn’t like his father made it easy on him.
He took a step closer and hesitantly put a hand on her shoulder. The touch was awkward but he wanted to offer her some form of comfort, “what she said was obviously not true,” he watched as she winced, realising he heard the conversation, “it shouldn’t matter what she says. Or what anyone says. You can’t get hung up on petty things like that if you want to go far in this line of work. People will always talk down and project their failures on you but you can’t let that get you. Unless you want to get walked all over.”
Y/N’s shoulder burned where he touched her, his palm almost electric. Physical touch was something she rarely got since Landon was so far away, and really, how clingy could she be with Niall before he got pissed? She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes, “yeah,” sniffle, “yeah. You’re right.”
Harry watched as she closed her eyes and composed herself. He slowly took his hand off of her, noticing how she deflated with… disappointment?
A few moments passed and he heard her tummy grumble loudly. The sound brought a small barely-there smile to his lips as she blushed furiously, “sorry, I—”
“Why are you apologising? For having normal human functions? Have you not eaten yet?”
Y/N shook her head, twiddling with her hands. Not only was she embarrassed that she cried in front of her boss, but her stomach’s loud protests had her all red. She didn’t have time to get lunch today since she was so busy, running on coffees all day. Harry sighed, “c’mon. We’ll go get something to eat.”
Her eyes widened, “wh–what?”
Harry raised his brows, “let’s go.”
She couldn’t say anything after that as Harry left to grab his coat and phone from his office. Y/N watched as he shrugged it on, admiring his biceps bulging against the button up. The soft, dim lighting of the area wasn’t making things any easier. He cleared his throat, snapping her out of her thoughts, “I’ve called for Tomas, my driver.”
Nodding, Y/N grabbed her purse and phone. They took the lift together. There was an odd tension as they stood silently, stealing glances at each other occasionally. Y/N played with her fingers in the oddly long ride, filling the silence by humming quietly. Harry smiled to himself upon hearing her.
When they reached, he led her out and towards the car Tomas brought out front. Tomas smiled at both of them and Y/N shook his hand. His stare lingered on her puffy eyes but he didn’t say anything. “I hope you like Italian,” Harry murmured. He opened the door and let her sit first and then followed. There was a whole seat empty between them where Y/N settled her purse. She still couldn’t process what was happening as she nodded at his words.
“La Vita Vino, please, Tomas.”
“Yes, sir.”
A couple of beats of silence passed. Harry’s face was illuminated by his phone as he scrolled. In the meantime, Y/N’s lip faced the wrath of her anxiety. She decided to speak up, “you really don’t have to do this, Mr. Styles. I—I’m very grateful but I hate putting you through so much troubl—”
“It’s no trouble.”
He shut his phone and glanced at her. Just the look had her skin burning. Y/N blamed the nerves.
“Okay.”
A car honked.
“Thanks though,” Y/N said.
“You’re welcome.”
The rest of the drive was silent. Y/N saw how Tomas spared glances at the two of them, eyes lingering on the empty seat between them. She might have seen him smile, but that could be her imagination. She was feeling quite out of it, especially after that cry.
They soon arrived at a beautiful restaurant. It had soft, yellow lighting and an outdoor patio. It was oddly romantic for a CEO-personal assistant dinner, but Y/N bit her tongue. Just the fact that he bothered to take her out meant so much to her. She didn’t want to ruin the moment with anything. She said thanks to Tomas as he held the door open for her.
When they walked in, Y/N couldn’t help but look around in awe. It had a gorgeous interior with intimate seating. She watched as Harry walked up to the hostess and requested his ‘regular’ table. The hostess smiled, “of course, Mr. Styles.”
Y/N saw as Harry followed the waitress, looking back at her, “c’mon.”
She was snapped out of her daze, allowing the hostess to lead them to a small table around the back. Thankfully it wasn’t candle-lit. That would make the dinner look like something it most definitely was not. The hostess pulled out a seat for Y/N and then Harry. “Can I get you started with some wine, sir?”
Harry glanced at Y/N, “any preferences?’
“Oh, I don’t drink,” she bit her lip. His brows dipped just slightly but he didn’t say anything. “I’ll have a serving of Masseto, please.”
“Of course, sir. Perhaps water for the missus?”
Y/N’s eyes almost shot out of her skull when she heard the hostess. She stammered over her words, “Oh, we—I’m not—”
“Yes, please.”
The hostess smiled and left, promising to come back with their drinks. As she left, Y/N turned to Harry, still flustered, ‘“sorry! I don’t know why she said that.” He looked at her like she was crazy, “why are you apologising?” He repeated for the second time that night, “it’s not like you told her to say that.”
Her mouth shut at that. She relaxed into the seat, still unable to meet his eyes, “yeah… I guess you’re right.”
Harry hummed approvingly. He slid a menu towards her to have a look at. Wordlessly, she picked it up and scanned the items. They were all crazy expensive— almost a week's worth of her wages for one dish. Plus, she could barely even read some of these names. Nervously she glanced at Harry, “what do you usually get?”
“I like their Agnolotti del Plin,” he said, not looking up from the menu. She put hers down and sighed. His eyebrows furrowed as he met her eyes, “what’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I’ll get what you’re having. The agnal thing.”
“Agnolotti del Plin?”
“Yes.”
“Hmm.”
The waitress came back to their table and asked them if they were ready to order. Y/N let Harry do the talking, afraid to mispronounce anything. She watched in awe as the Italian rolled off his tongue so easily. The waitress nodded and told them she’d be back with their dishes soon. When Harry turned back to her, his brows were still furrowed.
“Have you… ever had Agnolotti del Plin?”
“... yes,” she lied.
“Oh. Right.”
It was silent again. Their dynamic was so odd that Y/N didn’t know how to make conversation with him. What would they even talk about?
“Do you feel better?” He referred to her earlier breakdown. A breath escaped her mouth, “yes. Thank you Mr. Styles.”
“I don’t want to pry, but if there’s anything you want to talk about…” Harry said. Getting the sentence out was a feat. He was smart enough to know that talking about your feelings helped you feel better but he didn’t know what he would do once she started talking. Should he be touching her shoulder again? Rubbing her arm for comfort?
“I don’t want to bother you with my problems.”
“It’s no bother, otherwise I wouldn’t have asked. But I understand if you don’t want to talk.”
“Thanks,” she said for the millionth time that night. She wasn’t quite ready to spill her guts in front of her boss yet, no matter how vulnerable the crying made her seem. They remained quiet until the food was placed before them.
The dish was amazing— ravioli packed with smoked pigeon and covered in truffle sauce. It was when she smelled it that she realised how truly hungry she was. Once it was presented to her, she had her head down, engrossed in the food. Harry could understand completely. He himself was starving when he walked out of his office earlier. The only reason he really left was to go see if there was anything in the office fridge he could snack on.
About midway through their meal, her phone pinged. She ignored it when it went off once. But then it pinged again and again and again. Ignoring it for the sake of having good manners, Y/N turned it over and tried to continue with the meal, except it began pinging even more. “I’m sorry,” she sighed, putting her fork down and picking up her phone. It was Landon.
Her eyebrows furrowed as she stared down at the texts. He demanded to know where she was since she hadn’t texted him in a couple of hours. She couldn’t believe the audacity of the man; he didn’t respond to any of her texts all day and still expected her to continue texting him even after he made it clear he didn’t want to speak to her. Her irritated expression didn’t go unnoticed by Harry.
“Is everything alright?”
“Yeah… yeah, it’s just my boyfriend.”
His eyebrows shot up. “You have a boyfriend?” He blurted out.
Y/N met his rounded eyes. “Yes. We’re long distance.”
“Oh.”
“He’s been weird ever since I started working at Grapejuice Inc,” Y/N continued. “I don’t know. It’s just stressing me out, I guess.”
Harry hummed. It wasn’t his place to say, but he knew that if a relationship was stressing someone out, then it probably wasn’t healthy. He bit his tongue when he saw her furrowed brows. She huffed and put her phone on silent, not bothering to respond as she went back to her food.
They finished eating soon after. Y/N insisted on splitting the bill but Harry looked at her like she had grown a second head, snatching the bill from her hands. He slid his platinum card inside and gave it to the waitress who found their exchange amusing. After she brought them the receipt, Harry called Tomas to come up front. “Where do you live?” He looked at her expectantly and held the door open for her.
“Oh, just down nine and fifth avenue. It’s the house with the purple mailbox.”
Tomas nodded at her words and began driving. This time, Y/N had her purse in her lap. Her hand was resting on the middle seat. Harry was looking out of the window as they sat in silence. She admired him for a little while, appreciating the cut of his jaw and his plump lips. It was almost aggravating how pretty he was. His hand, ringed and tattooed with a cross by his thumb, rested on the middle seat as well.
His eyes never wavered from where they looked outside at the passing lights. Y/N shut her eyes and rested her head back against the seat. It had been an insane day and she couldn’t wait to go home and get under her covers. She must have relaxed a little too much, though, because a few moments later she felt her pinky collide with his. Surprisingly, neither of them jumped at the feeling. His hand was warm and her heart was racing.
They grazed each other again. For a second, Y/N felt his pinky rest completely on top of hers, though he didn’t stop gazing out the window. They both jumped as Tomas suddenly sneezed, pulling their hands away. Harry cleared his throat and Y/N told Tomas ‘bless you.’ The whole interaction had her breathing erratic and lip worried.
She finally recognised her street when they turned around the familiar corner. A grateful smile graced her features. She thanked Tomas first and then turned to Harry. She was immensely thankful for his comfort and for providing her with a full belly by treating her to such a luxurious meal. “Thank you, Mr. Styles. I had a great time and I feel so much better.”
He met her smile with a small one. “It was my pleasure. Have a good night, Miss L/N.”
“Night.”
-
Y/N relayed the night's details to Niall the next morning over coffee. He gasped dramatically and went on and on about how this was Y/N’s ‘romcom’ moment and that she was the main character who had a hot CEO boss obsessed with her. Y/N only laughed at how ridiculous he was, smacking his head when he wouldn't shut up and began narrating detailed, graphic, office fantasies that he most probably saw in some cheap porno.
“It doesn’t matter, Ni. I have a boyfriend,” was what she told him, trying to brush him off. “A boyfriend who lives a million miles away and doesn’t care if you live or die.” Those words did make her frown a little bit. Maybe Landon was a little bit weird and possessive, but surely he would care if Y/N dropped dead out of nowhere. She tried to give no weight to Niall’s words. She had enough on her plate to worry about.
When she finally decided to confront Landon, he demanded she tell him where she was last night. Y/N lied and said she was having dinner with Niall, but Landon didn’t even like that response. Any friend of Y/N that was a male was automatically disliked by Landon. It was a stupid habit of his, but then Y/N put herself in his shoes and thought about how she would feel if he began hanging out with a bunch of girls. It would leave a sour taste in her mouth but would she really react like he did? So dramatic and accusatory?
She tried her best to ignore the pestering thoughts as she walked into work the following Monday. She wondered if the air between her and Harry would be any different now that he had seen her in such a vulnerable state. But then again, he was known for his cold exterior, so maybe not. She took a deep breath as she walked in with his coffee in hand at exactly nine AM. He was busy on the phone and typing something on his computer at the same time, sparing her a glance and a small nod.
Whispering a small ‘good morning’, Y/N set the coffee down on his table. It was then she realised how dark and stuffy it was in his office. He probably forgot to open up the windows again on Friday before leaving. Deciding to open them up to encourage some air circulation, she walked behind Harry’s desk. The blinds were behind his chair and Y/N tried to squeeze herself between the small gap to open them up. Harry was too preoccupied on the phone to notice her.
The space was quite narrow so she had to really get in there to get the blinds open, stretching slightly and getting on her tippy-toes. Behind her, she heard Harry put the phone down. Suddenly, she felt as she lost her footing, a yelp escaping her mouth as she prepared to collapse face-first on the floor.
Except she didn’t collapse.
A firm, warm pair of hands settled on her waist, preventing her from face-planting into the floor. She was standing in between Harry’s legs, leaning over him so his breath washed over her face. Her hands were planted on his broad shoulders, fingers digging into the muscle there and he held her waist tightly. Her breath was stolen from her lungs.
“You okay?”
For some reason, she struggled to tear her gaze away from his mouth as he spoke, mesmerised by the way his lips moved. She almost relaxed into his hold. “Y–yeah. Thanks.” Now it was Harry’s turn to stare at her mouth. He met her eyes, then her lips, then her eyes, then her lips. They were painted pink and parted, practically begging Harry to kiss them. It was like he couldn’t help it as he leaned in closer— like her lips personally called to him to be tasted.
His thumbs dug into her ribs. She made a small sound which sounded awfully close to a whimper. That was ultimately what pushed him over the edge as he threw all resolve out of the door and caved in to the taste of her mouth. He had been thinking about what she might taste like for the longest time now, the night at the restaurant not making things any easier as her mouth plumped up in constant pouts.
Now, though, Harry was in heaven. She was sweet, like mango juice as he kissed her more firmly, letting her relax in his hold. His grip on her waist was all that was holding her up now as she suckled on his bottom lip and grabbed his shoulders harder.
This was so, so wrong. It was so inappropriate for him to be making out with his assistant in his office, lost in the taste of her and the sight of her in that little floral sundress. He groaned against her when she slid her tongue into his mouth. Her movements were bolder than he expected as she bit his lip softly.
The shrill sound of his phone ringing was what made them part, a filthy sound resounding when they pulled away, and strings of spit connected their mouth. He looked into her eyes as she wiped his mouth with her thumb and finally stood up. She looked flustered and fucked out— cheeks flushed and lips spit-slicked. Her dress had ridden up but she quickly pulled it down. Harry tried desperately to will his hard-on away, eyes never leaving hers despite the sound of his phone ringing in the office.
She was a little out of breath, “you… you should probably get that.”
He nodded, snapped out of his daze. “Yes. Yep. I’ll, uh… I’ll get that.”
“Cool.” Cool?
Turning on her heel, she left his office. When the door shut behind her, Y/N slid a hand through her hair and bit her thumb. She just made out with her hot CEO boss. In his office.
Although the kiss was amazing and her heart was racing, she couldn’t help but feel a little guilty. She had a whole boyfriend who trusted her to remain loyal and this was what she decided to do? Her heart sank a little in her chest, but she realised it didn’t outweigh the giddiness in her body and wetness between her thighs, all because of a little kiss. She groaned.
Y/N was fucked.
-
It was nearing lunch-time and Harry was still hung up on that fucking kiss. He felt so stupid for letting himself slip like that. How could he have made such a big mistake? Getting hot with your employees was one of the biggest no-nos of being in-charge of running a whole company.
But he just couldn’t deny how good it felt.
How nice she tasted, how she felt under his hands. The sounds she made and her confidence as she slipped her tongue into his mouth. She was exactly how he thought she would be— addicting. He couldn’t stop thinking about her; not as he went about his day to numerous meetings, attended a morning tea and interviewed an important client.
His every thought started and ended with her ever since she cursed him with that fucking mouth. Soft, warm, wet… he could only imagine how she felt in other places. Running a hand down his face, Harry sighed heavily. This wasn’t healthy. He had to either stop thinking about her or figure out a way to deal with this situation head on. Somehow the latter seemed easier.
He thought back to a couple nights ago when she was stressed and crying right in front of him. He knew the poor girl had a lot going on in her life, and with her boyfriend being long distance, he assumed she didn’t have a lot of means to release some of her frustrations. Plus, from what she told him, her boyfriend sounded like an absolute shit-bag so Harry automatically assumed he wouldn’t be able to give Y/N the satisfaction she needed anyway.
Pacing in his office, a crazy idea popped into Harry’s head.
Since just buying her dinner made her so happy and stress-free, Harry wondered what else he could do for her to make her feel good again. He wasn’t just thinking about pleasuring her anymore. He wanted to spoil her. He wanted to make her feel special. Not only would it help with her frustrations, but it would be a good outlet for him as well. It was not like he had plans to marry and start a family soon and he had heaps of money just sitting in his bank accounts. Money that had no use apart from paying for his bills and groceries.
Money he was willing to spend and that would probably be appreciated more elsewhere.
He wanted to propose an arrangement to Y/N, like the business-man he was. He’ll spoil her to the ends of the world, till her heart’s content— till he pleases. In return he would request her time and affections. In the way he craves, like a starved man. It was crazy to think that just the touch of her lips was driving him to take such steps— he felt like a spell had been cast on him. He had to see her. He had to tell her.
Finally deciding to grow a pair, Harry threw his door open and strutted out of his office, hair messy thanks to his fingers and eyes wide. However, his stomach sank when he turned to see if Y/N was at her desk.
The good part was that she was there like he hoped, looking all pretty in her sundress and hair left down. The bad part was that there was a blonde man standing before her, handing her a bouquet of flowers and pulling her in for a kiss.
The same lips he kissed mere hours ago.
The same waist he caressed was being hugged tightly as the boy lifted her off her feet and she smiled into his mouth, blinded to the shattering of Harry’s heart as he stood there by the door, disappointment overcoming his hard features.
-
Kissing Landon was very different to kissing Harry.
Whereas Harry met Y/N gently, like she was made of glass, puckered his lips tenderly and pressed sweet little pecks against her pouty mouth, Landon was quite… harsh. His arm slithered around her waist the same time he kissed her; rough, oddly possessive and a little painful, if she was being honest. He smashed his mouth into her teeth too hard, and paired with the grip he had on her waist, Y/N almost felt like she was being punished for some horrific crime.
And well, now that she pondered over it, maybe she deserved a distasteful kiss. She wasn’t really the ideal girlfriend these past couple of days which she spent daydreaming about her hot CEO boss, wondering what his soft words and lingering touches meant. Then when he kissed her mere hours before Landon surprised her, for those couple of minutes, the fact that Y/N even had a boyfriend slipped her mind completely. All she could think about was the strong, caring man in front of her, kissing her with so much passion and his hands on her sides, which pressed into the warm skin, bunching up her dress, and maybe if the phone didn’t ring and they didn’t have to stop, he would have pulled her onto his lap and slipped his fingers beneath her dress—
She was truly a terrible person.
She was a horrible, nasty, disgusting person for cheating on her poor unsuspecting boyfriend and kissing another man behind his back. The moment she stepped outside of his office, breathless with swollen lips, guilt swarmed her belly and made her insides turn black. Like she was rotten. And she felt rotten, but that wasn’t the worst part. Something else dug into her whirlwind of a brain, rattled her bones and made her breath tremble.
Despite the guilt that ate away at her heart, Y/N couldn’t deny that she liked it.
She liked the way he latched onto her bottom lip, and she liked the way he held her like she was going to slip away if he loosened for even a second. She liked the sounds he made and she liked the look in his eyes when she pulled away— hazy, like he couldn’t tear his gaze away from her spit-slicked lips. And perhaps she liked all of these things a little too much… perhaps they outweighed the guilt in her tummy.
God, she was just an awful human. She spent the next three hours following the kiss internally fighting herself over this dilemma, going back and forth feeling guilty and then feeling horny. Her panties were uncomfortably soaked and she had to make an embarrassing trip to the mall by the office just to grab a new pair of underwear— over a fucking kiss.
A kiss. That was literally it. They didn’t do anything further, he didn’t slide his hands between her legs, didn’t kiss down her neck— just showered her in honeyed purses of his lips and she was such a fucking mess. In her defence, she hadn’t been touched in any way in a long, long time. With Landon living ages away, Y/N often had to go months upon months without any physical affection. Even when they did get to spend time together, he didn’t let their kisses get too frisky. Didn’t let it progress to anything further, no matter how much she wanted.
She asked him about it too, but he would always go on some long spiel about how he was saving it for marriage and how amazing their first night together would be once they were husband and wife and they could finally have sex. Outwardly, she’d agree. Landon was always sort of sentimental— someone who was sensitive and wanted everything to have some deep meaning they could uncover together.
But Y/N was only just a girl. She had needs. Needs which her boyfriend was not meeting and needs for which her vibrator was just not enough anymore! That was why she was so ready to take things further with Harry. She wouldn’t have minded if he yanked her on his lap and grinded her against his bulge. She wouldn’t have minded if he touched her ass and pushed her dress up, tucked his fingers into her panties an—
This was becoming a problem. Her fucking boyfriend was standing right in front of her yet all she could think about was what Harry’s palms would feel like on her thighs.
Her fucking boyfriend was standing right in front of her and— wait. Why was he standing right in front of her?
Her jaw dropped when he stepped out of the elevators and came into her view; tall, beaming, blonde hair pushed back and a bouquet of roses in his hands. Her jaw stayed dropped when he sauntered towards her, one arm stretched wide like he was presenting himself, “surprise!”
And then:
“Oh my god! Landon!”
She stopped lagging and forced herself to a stand, watching as he jogged towards her and engulfed her into his chest. Landon felt familiar. He was warm, sturdy, built with strong muscles and broad shoulders which she wrapped her arms around. Citrus and musk invaded her senses; a scent which usually brought her comfort. Usually reminded her of home and date nights, cuddles and walks in the park.
Now it made her sick. Nauseous. Her stomach had been churning ever since she left Harry’s office that morning and his harsh cologne was not helping. Her nose was squished into his neck and his arms were wrapped around her like cling-film, nearly smothering her. She felt like she was suffocating, and she would have, had she not put her hands on his chest and gently shoved him off of her. Then came the initial shock, “wh–what are you doing here? How did y—”
“I wanted to surprise you, sweets. I missed you and I barely heard from you. Are you not happy to see me?”
Now, how could Y/N ever tell him she was anything but?
AN: BHHEHE GUYS SORRY I COULDNT HELP MYSELF WITH ALL THE TOUR CONTENT AND THE BUSINESS CASUAL VIBE IT WAS DRIVING ME NUTSSS!!! I HAD TO PULL TIS ONE OUT OF THE BAG!!! I THINK IMMA CONTINUE THIS SERIES I HAD SM PLANNED AND IT IS ONE OF MY FAVS!!!! HOPE U ENJOY!!! LET ME KNOW UR THOUGHTS!! also i know my fic plans are ALL OVER THE PLACE just trust im waiting to be done with uni and IM LOCKING INNNNN
Summary: When habit compels you to get on top, Harry drops everything to show you what you really deserve.
Warnings: new relationship, first time together, steamy make-out sesh, mentions of a past relationship, oral (f!receiving), protected sex, this is very intimate and sweet, aftercare and pillow talk
Based on: this ask!
A/N: thanks again anon for requesting this, hope i've done it justice. my inbox is always open! enjoy lovelies x
Word Count: 3,088
...
The flat is quiet except for the pitter-patter of rain against the windows and the soft crackle of the candle on the coffee table. Harry's place always smells faintly of freshly done laundry and whatever tea he's brewed; tonight it's chamomile, untouched in two mugs because you're both too comfortable to disrupt the peace.
Your legs are draped over his thighs, his hand splayed wide at the small of your back under your sweater. The kiss started slow when you first walked in, but has deepened into something hungrier, tongues lazy but deliberate. His other hand traces slow, absent circles over the bare skin of your upper arm where your sweater has slipped down.
He hums against your lips, pleased, and tilts your head with his palm so he can lick into your mouth slow and thorough. His hand slides up your side, thumb grazing the underside of your breast through the thin fabric of your bra. You arch instinctively, and he groans low in his throat, the sound vibrating where your chests touch. When he breaks the kiss to leisurely trail his lips along your jaw, you tilt your head to give him more room. His teeth graze your pulse point, light, teasing, then his tongue soothes the spot, and heat coils low in your belly.
He nips gently at your earlobe, voice rougher now. ''You're a little tense, baby. You okay?''
''Cold,'' you lie, even as your fingers tighten in his hair.
He chuckles, breath hot against your skin. ''Liar.''
You turn to catch his mouth again, and his hand slips higher under your sweater, palm flat and warm against your bare back.
When you finally need air, you pull back just enough to rest your forehead against his. Your breathing is uneven, lips swollen and tingling.
He studies you for a beat, his thumb stroking the apple of your cheek. ''Really, though, you're unusually quiet.''
You bite your lip, suddenly shy despite the way your body is still pressed flush to his. ''Just remembering something I said before.''
He tilts his head, curious but patient. ''Yeah?''
You trace the collar of his shirt with one fingertip, following the line of ink that disappears under the fabric. ''Remember that movie night at my place, when you had your hand up my shirt while we were kissing on my bed, and I pulled back because I said I get tired after... you know.''
Harry's hand stills on your back. He nods slowly, eyes never leaving yours. ''I remember.''
Your cheeks heat. 'It's been that way since my first time. I only dated one guy before you, y'know. We were together for almost three years. He was my first... everything. And sex was always the same. I'd always end up sore the next day, like my body had run a marathon.''
He exhales through his nose, thumb resuming its slow stroke along your back. His expression is soft, but there's a flicker of frustration in his eyes.
''Three years,'' he repeats, almost to himself, brows lifting. ''And he never once made it feel good enough that you weren't sore after?''
You laugh, short and a little self-conscious. ''I guess not. Maybe I'm just sensitive. Or bad at it.''
Harry's mouth quirks like the idea is ridiculous, but his eyes stay serious. ''That's not how it's supposed to be, love.'' He leans in, brushes the tip of his nose against yours. ''At the risk of sounding conceited, I'm sure I could make you actually feel good, if you'd like.''
''I'd like that,'' you whisper. ''With you.''
He studies you for a moment, then leans in and kisses you, deep, unhurried, tongue sliding against yours in a way that makes heat pool low in your belly. ''Then let me show you how it's supposed to feel.''
He stands first, offering his hand. You take it, fingers lacing together as he leads you down the short hallway.
The lamps in the bedroom are on low, warm gold spilling across the navy sheets and the dark wood floor. The rain sounds softer here, muffled by the heavier curtains. He turns to face you at the foot of the bed and cups your neck with both hands. His thumbs brush the corners of your mouth before he kisses you, and you feel the shift in him, the restraint giving way to something much more urgent.
His hands slide down to the hem of your sweater, gathering the fabric inch by inch until he pulls it over your head. Your hair tumbles free; he smooths it back with one palm, eyes tracing the lace of your bra.
You reach for the buttons of his shirt in return. One by one they slip free, revealing warm, flushed skin adorned with ink. When the shirt falls open, you push it off his shoulders, letting your palms glide over the firm lines of his chest, down the ridges of his abdomen. He shivers under your touch, a quiet groan catching in his throat.
He walks you backward until the backs of your knees meet the edge of the mattress. He follows, crawling over you, caging you with his arms but keeping most of his weight on his elbows. His mouth finds your neck first, trailing open kisses along the column of your throat, then lower, lips pressing to the fluttering pulse just below your jaw. You tilt your head, offering more, and he gladly takes it, tongue flicking out to taste your skin, teeth grazing lightly enough to make you gasp.
He lifts your hand, turns it palm-up, and kisses the delicate skin where your pulse races. His tongue traces the vein there, slow and deliberate, before he sucks gently. The sensation shoots straight between your legs, and you have to press your thighs together, already aching.
''Harry,'' you breathe.
He hums against your wrist, then lowers your arm and moves over your body. He kisses the inside of your knee, first one, then the other, nosing the soft skin and letting his breath fan hot over it. When his mouth drifts to the inside of your thigh, you tense, anticipation curling tight in your belly. He doesn't rush. He kisses higher, higher, lips brushing the crease where thigh meets hip, then finally settling between your legs.
But he doesn't touch you where you need it most.
Instead he crawls back up, hands sliding to the clasp of your bra. It falls away, and he tosses it aside without looking. His mouth closes over one breast, tongue circling the peak until it tightens under his attention. His hand cups the other, thumb rolling maddening circles over the nipple, pinching just enough to make you arch. You thread your fingers into his hair, holding him there, hips lifting instinctively.
He switches sides, giving the neglected breast the same thorough worship, sucking harder now, teeth grazing the sensitive tip, then soothing with his tongue. Your breathing turns ragged; every pull of his mouth sends sparks straight to your clit. You're wet already, embarrassingly so, the ache between your thighs building.
When he finally trails kisses down your stomach again, he hooks his fingers into the waistband of your underwear and tugs them down your legs. You lift your hips to help as he kisses every inch of skin the drag of fabric reveals: hip bone, your lower belly, the tops of your thighs. Then he settles between your legs, shoulders spreading you open, eyes dark and focused as he looks up at you.
''Can I taste you?'' he asks, voice rough, lips glistening from earlier kisses.
You nod, heart hammering. ''Please.''
He lowers his head, and the first drag of his tongue is flat and warm, exploring your folds. You jolt, hips lifting off the bed. He groans against you, the vibration pulling a whimper from your throat.
Harry slides one finger inside you, curling it just right while his mouth stays on your clit. The combination is overwhelming, pleasure coiling tight and fast. He adds a second finger, thrusting in time with the rhythm of his tongue. You're trembling, thighs shaking around his head, moans spilling freely. He doesn't stop until you shatter, back arching, vision blurring, his name torn from your throat on a broken cry.
He works you through it, then kisses your inner thighs, your hip bones, your stomach as he crawls back up. His mouth is wet, lips swollen, and he kisses you so deep you can taste yourself on his tongue. You moan into him, hands roaming his back, tugging him closer.
He reaches for the nightstand, rolls the condom on with steady hands, then settles between your legs again. He kisses you once more before lining himself up, the head of him nudging your entrance.
You move on instinct.
Pushing at his shoulders, you roll so you're straddling him, knees bracketing his hips. Harry freezes beneath you. His hands are still on your waist, his eyes wide with confusion.
''Hey,'' he says softly, thumbs stroking your sides. ''Baby, what are you doing?''
You blink down at him, suddenly uncertain. ''This... this is how I've always done it. I get on top. That's... that's how it works.''
His brow furrows deeper. ''Who told you that?''
You swallow. ''My ex. He said it was easier for him. Better view, or... I don't know. He just always wanted it like this. So I thought...''
Harry's jaw tightens, frustration flickering in his eyes. Not at you, of course not, but at the years you spent thinking this was the only way. At the way your body was used instead of worshipped.
''Baby,'' he says firmly, voice rough with emotion. ''That's not how it should be.''
He sits up slowly, arms wrapping around your waist to keep you close. His forehead rests against yours for a moment, breathing steadying.
''Let me show you how you should've been treated,'' he murmurs. ''Let me take care of you properly. Please.''
You search his face: earnest, tender, determined.
Then you nod.
He kisses you once more, soft and promising, then gently maneuvers you back down onto the sheets. The navy fabric is cool against your overheated skin as he settles between your thighs again, the thick head of him nudging your entrance. His eyes lock on yours, searching.
''Still okay?'' he whispers.
You nod, breathless. ''Please, Harry.''
He rocks forward in one smooth glide, patiently letting your body open for him inch by inch. The stretch is full and perfect, your walls fluttering around him as he sinks deeper, deeper, until his hips press flush to yours and he's buried to the hilt. A low groan rumbles from his chest. You feel every ridge, every pulse of him inside you, and for the first time it doesn't feel like a chore. It feels intimate, romantic.
He stays still for a long moment, letting you adjust, forehead resting against yours while your breaths mingle. Then he starts to move.
His hips roll in long, fluid waves, pulling back until only the tip remains, then sliding home again with a slow grind that drags his pubic bone perfectly against your clit. Every thrust presses that sensitive bundle of nerves exactly right, sending sparks shooting up your spine. The rhythm is steady, unhurried, but deep enough that each stroke fills you completely. Your thighs tremble around his waist, and you couldn't stop the quiet, needy sounds spilling from your lips if you wanted to.
Harry laces his fingers with yours and lifts your joined hands above your head, pressing them into the pillow. His palm is warm and slightly calloused, the pads of his fingers sliding between yours until they slot together perfectly. He squeezes once, using the grip as leverage to rock deeper. Your knuckles brush the headboard as his thumb strokes the back of your hand in time with every roll of his hips, a constant, grounding point of contact that makes you feel even more connected.
His free hand is everywhere else, stroking, worshipping. It cups your breast, thumb circling the stiff peak before pinching gently. It trails down your side, fingers splaying wide over your ribs, then lower to grip the supple flesh of your hip, guiding you into his rhythm. It slides between your bodies, finding your clit and rubbing tight, slick circles. The sensation of his cock dragging inside you while his fingers work your clit has you arching off the bed, a broken moan tearing from your throat.
Harry watches your face the entire time, studying your reactions. When your lashes flutter and your lips part on a gasp, he angles his hips a fraction higher, grinding harder against that spot that makes stars burst behind your eyelids. When your brows draw together and a whimper escapes, he slows just enough to draw it out, making the pleasure crest and crest without crashing. When you moan his name, long and needy, he curses softly under his breath, voice wrecked.
''Fuck, that sound,'' he rasps. ''Say it again, love.''
''Harry—'' It comes out desperate, almost sobbed.
He rewards you instantly with a deeper thrust, fingers pressing just right on your clit. Your walls clench around him; he feels it and groans, the sound vibrating through his chest into yours.
''That's it,'' he murmurs, lips brushing your temple, your cheek, your mouth. ''Let me hear everything. You're doing so well, love.''
The pressure builds fast, coiling tighter with every smooth roll of his hips, every stroke of his fingers, every squeeze of his hand laced with yours. Your free hand clutches at his shoulder, nails digging into the muscle. His name falls from your lips over and over, mixed with breathless pleas you don't even realize you're making.
He feels the way your thighs tense and your breathing turns ragged. His pace stays exactly the same, steady, relentless, but his voice drops lower. ''Come for me, baby. I've got you. Let go.''
You shatter. Pleasure crashes through you in waves so intense your vision whites out at the edges. Your back arches hard off the bed, walls pulsing around him in rhythmic spasms. A cry rips from your throat, his name, broken and raw. He keeps moving through it, grinding against your clit to draw every last pulse from you, hand still laced tight with yours, fingers never loosening their grip.
Only when you start to come down, limbs trembling, chest heaving, does he let himself follow. Three more deep rolls of his hips and he buries his face in your neck, groaning your name like it's the only word he knows. You feel every throb, every pulse inside you as he spills into the condom, his hand squeezing yours tightly.
For a long moment he stays exactly where he is, still buried deep, body covering yours, breaths hot against your neck. Then he lifts his head, eyes soft and glassy, and presses the gentlest kiss to your lips.
''You okay?'' he whispers, voice hoarse.
You nod, too blissed out to speak yet. He smiles, small, proud, a little awed, then carefully pulls out. He disposes of the condom with quick, efficient movements, retrieves a warm, damp cloth from the bathroom, and cleans you with tender strokes between your legs. When he's done, he climbs back into bed and pulls you into his chest, arms wrapping around you. His fingers trace along your spine, the same hand that was laced with yours the entire time now stroking circles over your skin.
The rain is still falling outside. Inside, the only sounds are your slowing breaths and the quiet beat of his heart under your cheek.
You're tucked against Harry's chest, one leg slung over his thigh, his arm wrapped securely around your waist. one hand resting over yours on his stomach, thumb stroking the inside of your wrist where your pulse has finally started to calm.
Neither of you speaks for a long minute, just relishing the warmth of skin on skin, the steady rise and fall of his chest under your cheek. The sheets are tangled around your hips. He kisses the top of your head, then your temple, then the corner of your mouth.
''You alright?'' he asks quietly, voice rough from everything that just happened.
You nod against him. ''More than alright.''
He exhales a soft laugh, relieved. ''Good. Because that was... fuck, love. It was incredible.''
Heat creeps back into your cheeks. You hide your face in the crook of his neck for a second, breathing him in: sweat, remnants of cologne, that familiar smell that's just Harry, before lifting your head enough to meet his eyes in the low lamplight.
''I've never... come like that before,'' you admit, voice small but steady.
His expression softens, something tender and almost pained flickering across his face. He lifts your joined hands to his mouth, kissing your knuckles one by one.
''I'm glad it was with me,'' he murmurs. ''But I'm sorry it took this long for you to feel it.''
You swallow, throat suddenly tight. ''I just thought that was normal. Being on top, doing all the work, feeling tired and sore after. He never really asked what I liked. Never went down on me. Never even tried to make it last for me. It was always quick, always the same position because that's what he wanted. And I let it be that way because I didn't know it could be different.''
He shifts so he can look at you properly, rolling onto his side so you're face-to-face. His hand cups your cheek, thumb brushing away a tear you didn't realise had slipped free.
''That's not your fault,'' he says firmly, voice firm yet gentle. ''He just didn't know how to take care of you. Or he didn't care enough to try. Either way, that's on him. Not you.''
He kisses the tip of your nose, then your forehead, then your lips, soft, lingering. When he pulls back his eyes are serious again. ''I want this to be different for you. We figure it out together. What you like, what feels good, what makes you come so hard you forget your own name.''
A small laugh escapes you, and you nod, throat too full to speak right away. Instead you curl closer, tucking your face into his neck again. His arms tighten around you instinctively.
You close your eyes, listening to the rain and the steady thump of his heart. For the first time in years, you drift off feeling safe, satisfied, and utterly wanted.
...
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I had an idea and it spiraled! It was meant to be a blurb but it turned into a one shot, and it's smutty <3 I know I've been light on that lately but more is coming.
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Y/N and her newly established boyfriend had yet to be properly intimate.
Harry was a gentleman on all counts. He paid for their outings without question, he walked her to her door every single time, held every door open- car and building alike. The man knew the sidewalk rule and abided by it every time, he had his impeccable manners while talking to her, pulled out her chair when they went out to eat, he didn’t call her after midnight, and most of all- he hadn’t pushed for anything sexual.
The extent of it had been kisses that got heated enough for her to be pressed against the passenger door of his car before he’d apologized, fixing her lipstick with his thumb and told her with a slight blush on his cheeks that he’d ’gotten carried away’ and apologized for not controlling himself, but he was very enamored with her. Even if it left her with damp panties and a second heartbeat between her legs, the tenderness in which he treated her had been the stand out of it all.
It was the exact opposite of every man she had ever been with. There had been no hint of even daring to suggest a hook up, or bypass the dates to get to the ‘fun stuff.’ Granted, she had asked him what his intentions were when he’d asked her out originally and he’d seemingly honestly told her that he wanted a real relationship and connection- but Y/N had been a bit cynical.
So many times she had gone out with a man who said they were looking for something real but they’d attempt to speedrun the first date to get her alone, or see her a few times, fuck around and then suddenly ‘not feel the spark’ before moving on to another woman to do the exact same thing. Take, take, take without receiving. Literally, in some senses, considering an alarming amount of men didn’t know where the clitoris was located.
The dating scene had been fatigued for her for a long time, and despite the hopes she’d had for Harry, she hadn’t allowed herself to hope. That itself had been hard when it felt like her personal dream man had been laid out in front of her, with pretty seafoam green eyes and dimples she wanted to indulge in poking, so she had told herself that no matter how much she liked him, she would try to hold herself back.
Funny, that was. It hadn’t been that long into dating when she had realized how incredible he was. How intelligent and kind he was, how he had most of the qualities she’d put down in her journals at 3 am when she needed to dream a little bit. Harry was what she wanted, and allowing herself to want it openly had been hard- but she’d been met with a warm reception.
Being a very successful man in business with multiple companies and hats he had to wear, Harry could be seen as a bit stiff, but she’d been able to see past that because he was letting her. She’d seen him laugh and dance a little bit to music he showed her, and just because he was wearing a suit a lot of the time didn’t mean he was what she’d probably have shamefully assumed of a man like him at first glance. Harry wanted to be good, he wanted to give her what she wanted, and for once in her life, she had let go a little bit and let him.
God, she wanted to fuck him. He hadn’t budged on that, and she hadn’t pushed too hard, but thankfully she hadn’t been made to wait an excessive amount of time.
It had been 7 official dates, 3 coffee dates on their lunch at work and 2 times meeting for drinks until he’d asked her to be official. The meticulously prepared candlelit dinner at his place was where he’d gotten her favorite meal prepared, gotten her favorite eclairs from the bakery down the road, and had curated a playlist of artists she’d mentioned liking before he’d asked her on his couch if he would be able to have the ‘honor of being hers’ and vice versa.
It had been the easiest yes of her life, considering the man had put in more effort than she had thought possible. For once in her life she had felt cherished and looked after. He’d sent her money for her nails earlier in the day as well; which she had never asked for but he had said was ‘a man should look after a woman he cares about, even if they are more than capable of taking care of them selves’, and she had decided in the seat while getting her feet scrubbed and the cucumber lotion slathered onto her that she would stop at nothing to lock this man down.
Turned out he was one step ahead. He’d always been one step ahead. And it also turned out she had misjudged him, even if only just.
He had a lot of charisma that was disguised as something else; a big energy that had let her think that he had to be good in bed. That feeling had only been slightly challenged with how quickly he had calmed things down when she had wanted more a few times. In short- she had assumed that maybe the energy he put off was a facade and perhaps his one flaw would be he wouldn’t be very adventurous in the bedroom. Maybe a missionary with the lights off type of guy which, hey! It wasn’t the worst thing in the world. She could fix that.
Harry was a teachable man, considering how brilliant he was. He hadn’t been suggestive and she had sat back and had the self conversation about being willing to show him what she liked, to give him a crash course in dirty talk and how to fuck her how she liked because with everything else he had, sex was something she knew could be adjusted.
It was very, very clear, feeling his large hands on him and her bare tits exposed to the cool air of his bedroom that she had been sorely mistaken. Nipples swollen and sensitive from the way he’d sucked and let his teeth graze them, dress tossed to the side leaving her splayed out naked on his bed, he’d been unable to keep his hands off of her after she asked him if they could ‘do more’ now that they were an official item.
He’d taken the challenge very literally.
“Look at that little clit.” He murmured, brushing his thumb over the swollen nerve. Sitting on his knees between her spread, wet thighs, he looked more comfortable than she would be with hardwood digging into her knees, but it was most likely because of the distraction in front of him. “Poor thing. All sorts of worked up, aren’t you?”
Y/N let out a soft sigh, nodding her head as she bit back a moan. The smallest touches were setting her off. Harry had turned her body into a live wire. With him circling over her clit and the hot wash of his breath as he spread her cunt open for him to see, it was becoming difficult to breathe. Life, and Harry apparently, had come at her fast. So fast that her head was spinning, showing her just how dirty the proper man could really be.
“Yeah, I bet you are. I’ve been thinking about this for a long, long time. Did Y’know that?” Eyes looked up at her, dark and hungry as she shook her head in response. Words escaped her, but she managed to get out a strangled “N-No…” as he hummed under his breath.
That was in fact, news to her.
“I have been. Since the first night we’ve met. I tried very hard t’be good. To not think about you in such a filthy way, but it was difficult. Talked to you for a bit… admitted how absolutely incredible you are… how beautiful… and I knew you had to have the prettiest little pussy. I was wrong, though.” He turned his head just a bit to kiss her sensitive and slightly sticky inner thigh, letting out a chuckle when she jumped just a tad. “It’s even prettier. Most gorgeous cunt I’ve ever seen.”
It was unnerving to feel his gaze on her, to know he was well and truly up close and personal with perhaps the most vulnerable part of her, but she could see the admiration and hunger in his eyes. She couldn’t even pretend not to see it as he let his slippery thumb glide up to her mound of soft flesh above her cunt and back down to her entrance, spreading the slick around.
“Can’t believe how wet you’ve gotten for me. I won’t lie to you, my sweet girl… I’ve been dying for this to be mine.” His voice rumbled against her thigh as he laid a line of kisses, wet and slow up the sensitive skin. She’d have burn from his mustache on her thighs, surely, but Y/N didn’t care. It felt so good, her poor clit was throbbing underneath the passes of the pad of his thumb, and she wanted more.
“Please…” She croaked, lifting her hips. It felt hard to think, let alone speak, but he seemed to like that. Revel in the effect he had on her. “Please, Harry.”
“Please? Please what, sweetheart?” He murmured, pulling back from his kisses to spread her thighs open with his forearms. “What do you want me to do to my pussy, hm?”
Y/N bit her lip to bite back the scream, because what the fuck? How did he do that? How did he command her body so fucking easily that she could feel the trickle of arousal drip down her ass from the soft rasp of his voice and the intensity of how he spoke. Soft spoken, but meaning every syllable he let pass his lips.
His pussy. That was something he’d obviously been dying to say- but she hadn’t realized how much she’d wanted him to own it.
“Because, sweet, precious girl…” He sighed, spreading the lips open as he got a good look at her. “I’m not sure m’quite done admiring my pussy yet. So I think you can sit there and be the cute little thing you always are for me while I get better acquainted with her, and then I’ll give you what you want.”
It was hard not to let her hips jerk up as he tapped his fingertip over her clit, letting another breath wash over her as the heat of it made her stomach tingle. He was staring, admiring, analyzing her like she was art at a museum and that had never been anything close to what she experienced- so who was she to tell him no.
“Yeah I can… I can sit. I can wait.” Her throat felt thick as she spoke but she managed more than two words, and that was a feat in itself.
The smile on his lips was her even bigger reward.
“Thatta girl.” He praised, leaning up a bit to kiss her lower tummy- very close to where she wanted him to be. “I’ll always treat you well. Make it worth your while for letting me see what you’re letting me own, hm? Suck that pretty clit and make you stain the sheets… give you anything you want. Just need to stare a bit longer before I get her all puffy and wet… ruin her a little bit.”
She was already ruined, but she had vastly underestimated the way it would feel to have a man she desired so intensely to coo and stare at her body like it was his favorite thing.
Honestly, she had no idea how long it had been of his sweet and filthy words. His knees had to be numb as he dragged her to the edge of the bed, chuckling at her squeal of surprise as he pulled back for a moment to run his hand down her body. From her collarbone all the way to her cunt, cupping it in his large palm as she let out a strangled moan. “The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Seeing you spread open for me… You have no idea what that does to me, little treasure.” Clicking his tongue, he momentarily removed his hands to roll up the sleeves of his button up.
The always impeccably pressed and starched button ups, rolling the sleeves up his forearms as he began to look undone himself. The hair he gelled back tousled from her hands, a curl draped over his forehead and the 5 o’clock shadow was getting darker from when she’d first arrived. It was a brand new side to him.
“I’ve tried very hard to behave, Y/N. I’m a gentleman, and I will treat you as such… but something has clued me into the fact that it may not be what you want in this scenario, hm?” He shifted on his knees and she could hear the metallic clinking of his belt, but it was hidden from view. “I have to admit to you that I’ve never felt such unadulterated hunger in my life as I have with you. I don’t feel passion to this level. But you’ve brought something out of me, and I have to tell you that I’m becoming obsessed with you.” Lifting her leg, he planted a wet kiss to her calf. “With your voice.” A kiss to her knee. “With how you look at me, your intelligence…” he rounded up her thigh. “And now, this body.”
He audibly groaned as he spread her lips open with his fingers again, pursing his lips- and surprising the hell out of her- spitting on her clit. His eyes didn’t stray as she gasped, watching it slide down her pussy before he rubbed it into her already soaked skin. “So let me show you just how crazy you’ve made me. How obsessed I am with you. And most of all… how grateful I am that you’re letting me own you.”
Harry did more than that.
With his mouth on her, Y/N felt like she was floating. Again and again, he made her cum. Like a man starved, he’d barely pulled away from her pussy- save for letting his tongue run over her other hole which had her shuddering from the touch she wasn’t used to- and she had to wonder if he’d ever be able to be pulled away.
“You have no idea…” The usually well put together man whined against her pussy, trying to get her to cum a fourth time. It almost hurt, tingly and sharp, but she loved the pain as he sucked over her clit and sloppily spit back down over it. Webs of her arousal and his saliva stuck to his chin as he worked his fingers inside of her, the other hand keeping her down by pressing over her stomach. “No fucking idea what trouble you’ve just started.”
Y/N only hoped she could get more of it.
“It feels…” Y/N was finding it hard to breathe for an entirely different reason now. “God, it hurts but it feels so good. You’re r-ruining me. Like you said… oh, fuck.” Her hips tipped up as he curled his fingers, a deep chuckle vibrating against her clit. The sounds were pure filth. The squelch of his fingers fucking her deep and practiced, his mouth sucking on her cunt, his groans and her weak whimpers and whines as she tried to keep her head on straight bounced off his maroon walls. “H-Harry I’m gonna cum. I’m gonna fucking cum a-again and… fuck, I’m gonna make a mess.”
She’d only been able to do it twice before, and she’d done it herself. Truthfully, the reason she didn’t go for it more often was because of the mess squirting made- but that didn’t deter the older man.
If anything, it spurred him on further.
“Make a mess then, treasure.” He panted, nosing at her clit. “Make a mess all over my hand and my face. I don’t give a fuck about the sheets.” One of the first true curses she’d heard from him had her clenching around him, but more than that was seeing him so undone. Wrecked by her alone, his new fascination with her pussy. “You’re going to give it t’me now. Alright?” His hand on her stomach came down to smack at her clit, the light, sharp sting making a gasp rip from her throat.
Fuck, that was good.
“You’re almost there. I can feel it. M’not stopping. Give it to me, Y/N. Let me see what my pretty pussy can do. Want the mess, want you to soak me. Be good for me, give it.” He was commanding it, keeping the pace just as he had it as his mouth went back to her clit.
Her body liked to obey.
With a scream that startled herself, she slapped her hand over her mouth as she came. Squirting on his fingers, she felt him moan against her pussy as he pulled his mouth off her clit and rubbed it frantically instead with his hand. “Give it t’me, give it baby- yes, yes, thatta-fuckin’-girl…. That’s what I want, give me what I want, let me give it to you- Fuck.” He snarled, tongue lapping over his fingers to taste her.
Writhing on the bed, she let out a little sob as she fell back flat on the bed instead of sitting on her elbows, body jerking as little bursts of her squirted over his fingers and surely soaked his hand. Never had she heard him so unhinged as he lapped her up, thanking her in between and telling her she was a good girl, that she was perfect as his fingers slowed until they stilled inside of her, kisses pressed to her thighs and belly as she got over sensitive.
It felt a bit fuzzy as she whined at the emptiness, a brief recalling of him saying to sit still before he was back, stroking sweaty hair out of her face and a warm washcloth gently cleaning between her thighs.
“There you are.” He murmured, voice warm and smile soft as he swiped his finger over her cheeks. “M’sorry baby. Got overwhelmed, hm? No more tears.”
Y/N hadn’t even realized she’d been crying. It just felt so good, she felt so safe, and she’d drifted away. Coming back to his smiling face felt very good, especially with his tender touch. “Hi.” She peeped, reaching up for him. There was no fight from him to come down, balancing on his one hand as he gave her the kiss she wanted.
“Hello, beautiful girl.” He murmured with an amused smile. “Let me take care of you, okay?”
“Mm… ‘Kay. For how long?” She asked without meaning to, but his answer was what she wanted to hear regardless.
“As long as you let me. I take care of what’s mine.”
Please do write an angsty, make up sex oneshot (husband!H) where he’s busy promoting KATTDO era and the wife feels a bit neglected (she’s a strong woman and a professional also maybe a lawyer or a doctor or a marketing professional — but doesn’t work in show business) so she doesn’t really get the long hours !!! ANGSTY AND ROUUUUGH 🥵 and lots of dirty talking…. My soul needs it
💜 Quiet*
Summary: Harry and his fiancée hit a rough patch while he’s in NYC for his Together, Together Tour.
CW: Smut (MDNI — dirty talk (slight degrading, pet names), oral (f!rec), penetration (p in v), safe word system, soft!dom Harry, rough sex) Angst, long distance relationship, strong language use.
Word count: 5.1k
Pairing: Current!Harry x Fiancée fem!reader
Location: London/NYC
POV: fem!readers / Harry’s, third person
💌 A/N: This is SO long overdue! I am so sorry to the anon who requested this. I apologize for not getting it out sooner but I really hope you like it!! I did change a few things up since we're around tour time now! 🙂↕️💜 let me know what you think! Please share & comments because I love to hear your thoughts.
(Reader's POV)
It was quiet before the storm. Recently, it seemed like everything and everyone had been practicing to not make a sound, a notice, a movement even.
As if the world was full of quiet, cold rooms that lacked affection and warmth. The quiet was everywhere and it was overconsuming.
Quiet in the morning, only the hushed sound of the coffee machine calculated to make a single cup for one. Quiet in the evening when her food grew cold, left uneaten due to her lack of appetite. Quiet in their bed, only the soft rumble of sheets when she tossed and turned at night, missing the warm body she’d been longing for.
Everything had been too quiet, it seemed as if loneliness had occupied her whole existence. She told herself she wasn’t really lonely. She had friends, people who looked after her when Harry was away. She had her family around to help fill the void but the noise only lasted an hour or two. Then, it was back to quiet.
Even with Harry, he silently demanded quiet too. After making loads of noise on stage, listening and interacting with screaming fans — by the time he called, he grew quiet. He grew distant, maybe not by choice but by occupation. He simply couldn’t be his loud, affectionate, happy self when all his energy was drained by their early morning call (midnight for him).
She knew this.
She understood it.
It didn’t make the quiet any easier though.
It only caused her to want to make noise, an attention seeking, selfish noise that forced him to be loud. Not because she wanted to weather the storm and she certainly wasn’t prepared for it but she needed something other than quiet.
“Why’d y’go quiet on me?” Harry asked, his chin rested against his dark blue jumper. The light brown stubble on his face made him look a little older, wiser and properly spent. Through the screen, his green eyes still held the same intensity and questioning like he was curious. He had to know something was up. Probably just afraid to ask and not mess up their only few moments together.
“Just not much to say,” she shrugged, shifting her position to get more comfortable on their bed. Her body felt tired, not just from the time difference but from everything. The distance was weighing between them and time was just another current that pulled the wave higher against the shore.
Now, her favorite part of the day was failing her too. Her call with Harry usually perked up her spirits. He’d tell a funny joke or explain a silly fan story but she couldn’t fake it anymore. The awkward pauses were becoming too loud for her to handle.
Harry let the quiet flow between them, a sea-parting distance filled them in more ways than physical. She was counting down the days until she’d be visiting Harry in the States but worried filled her heart that their time would be just as quiet together as separate.
“Tell me about your day,” Harry asked softly, treading lightly on the parted sea that held their conversation.
“Not much to tell really,” she told him, the passive tone of her voice carried heavy through the call. She could tell by the way Harry straightened up on his mattress, focusing his attention.
“Nothing exciting happened, love?” She heard Harry pause, waiting for her to carry on. Instead the silence filled again. The tidal wave building.
“Not anything news worthy,” she sighed. “What about you?” She attempted to perk up, rubbing her tired eyes to focus.
“I saw a couple of girls dressed as tomatoes,” Harry chucked, attempting to lighten the mood. “Oh, and there was a whole frenzy when I played kiwi tonight,” he smirked through the screen but it fell quickly when he saw his fiancée’ face didn’t change. “But that’s the same as always,” he whispered into the air followed by a heavy sigh.
“Baby, talk to me… What’s going on in that pretty head of yours?” He said after a few more minutes of silence.
“I don’t know, Harry.” She frowned, drowning in a sea of silence. After a few seconds, she spoke up again. “It’s just been really difficult lately,” she confessed. “It’s been so quiet here without you and I thought I’d be used to it by now,” she added, sounding more disappointed in herself for allowing the miles to spread between them.
Just as Harry was about to speak, she heard a knock coming from his end. His eyes flickered off the camera before he let out a sigh. His attention shifted back towards the door as another knock rang through.
“Just a second love,” Harry promised. Suddenly, her screen filled with the image of Harry’s high rental home ceiling as he fell into conversation with who she presumed was Jeff by the sound of his voice.
Tired and emotionally exhausted, she tuned out the chattering noise that filled the background as they talked schedules and whatnot. As her phone rested on her pajama top, a tension headache hit her hard. She attempted to soothe her pain with the tips of her fingers like Harry used to but it was no use.
When a couple minutes turned into a few, the same lonely feeling returned with Harry nowhere in sight. As she heard his familiar, comforting laugh crackle through the phone, she grew frustrated and envious that their precious time was being interrupted and his energy was carefully utilized elsewhere in conversation. Before she could stop herself, jealousy flooded her veins and she hung up then placed her phone on silent. It rested face down against her wooden nightstand, forgotten as she turned away in frustration.
There it was, the quiet filled the air once again.
Harry’s fiancé woke a few hours later, groggy but well rested. Her phone buzzed nonstop throughout the morning but her sleep was not interrupted. When she reached for her phone, the first thing she saw was a string of notifications from Harry.
Harry ❤️
I’m so sorry, baby. Jeff came to ask me about the schedule and we ended up sidetracked.
Missed Call
Harry ❤️
Harry ❤️
I tried to call you again but you must be asleep. We’ll talk tomorrow morning. I’m sorry it’s been tough on you. It’s been hard on me too.
Harry ❤️
I love you.
As much as she wanted to be upset, she couldn’t ignore him. She wasn’t necessarily upset at him but the situation was tough and he was having a hard time too. So, she sympathized and time went on. The quiet stayed, grew more eerie as their reunion day approached.
“You have everything packed?” Harry asked, double checking while on facetime.
“Yes, I packed two days ago. I already told you that, baby.” She exclaimed gently, a soft smile on her lips. “I won’t forget a thing.”
“Ok, just wanted to be sure,” Harry picked at his lips. A familiar nervous habit as he glanced off camera for a second. “I think… I uhm,” he began to say something but then stopped. “Jeff scheduled a private car to come pick you up from the airport. I have soundcheck when you land,” Harry explained as he packed something away.
“Okay,” she tried her best not to sound disappointed. She knew realistically that Harry would be busy during their in person time together too. He had 17 more shows to work through on his Madison Square Garden residency and that didn’t account for interviews, and television appearances. Harry kept a strict schedule and rarely made exceptions but she figured this time would be different.
As she sat in the quiet blacked out SUV that idled through the busy New York streets, she day dreamed about their time together getting reacquainted.
“Oh, lovie!” Harry beamed, delighted to see her, to touch her once again. He’d scooped her up in his arms, planting wet, sloppy kisses all over her face. “I missed you,” he’d breathe into her hair. Her body would automatically relax and sink into his calming scent of vanilla and sandalwood. Harry would dare to sneak her away into a private area, needing to feel every inch of his body pressed against her own. He’d be gentle, caring and never miss an inch of her skin to cover with his fingertips or lips.
But that perfectly painted picture came to a dying halt when she arrived to his soundcheck. Instead of an excited, cheerful greeting — she got very a stressed, checked out Harry.
“Hi,” his features softened as he saw her walk by the crew members and elongated wires with ease. Their reunion lasted a matter of seconds. Harry gave her a brief hug before getting whisked away with a whisper of a promise to “be back soon.”
As his partner, she knew Harry or at least she thought. Granted, this was their first tour of his during their relationship but she picked up on a few things during his European leg. There were six rules that he followed closely to keep his physique, mental health and focus in order.
1. No drinking or drugs.
2. No after parties or clubbing.
3. Train everyday except for “off days”.
4. Clean, wholesome diet only.
5. 8 hours of sleep per night.
6. No useless distractions — social media, excessive phone usage or anything that brings his attention too far away.
Harry’s fiancée was beginning to feel like she fell into the last category. It was well past soundcheck when a crew member from Harry’s team rushed her from backstage of the venue to her private car that dropped her off at Harry’s rental home. She figured he’d be back in under an hour but after two, it was cutting it close to Harry’s show time.
(Harry's POV)
Utter exhaustion clouded his head as he closed his eyes on the way back to his rental home. He only had about an hour to spare until he needed to be back at the venue for dress rehearsal, makeup and hair. Unfortunately Harry couldn’t give his fiancee the warm welcome she deserved due to an urgent meeting Jeff forgot to mention. It was some stupid miniscule topic that could’ve been an email. As soon as the meeting ended, Harry told his driver to send him back home so he could properly greet his partner before his stage appearance. As he walked through the secure area and into his home, he noticed how quiet it was.
“Hello?” He called out, placing his keys around the hook. “I’m back, love. I’m sorry that took so long,” Harry announced a little louder as he walked through the corridor. He saw his beautiful fiancee with her arms tucked around her, a defensive look on her face as he spoke up again. “I – I know it’s not an excuse but Jeff got the dates wrong for this urgent meeting and –,” her voice cut him off.
“Am I a distraction for you?” Her tone was harsh, her posture the same, playing defense.
Harry frowned, opening his mouth to respond before his phone buzzed persistently in his hand. He quickly clicked it off without glancing at the caller ID. He walked around his sofa and sat across from her, keeping his distance. “What are y’talking about, baby?” He asked, his voice gentle. “You’re never a distraction.” He wanted to say more but she began to argue, obviously frustrated and maybe even hurt.
“Then why do I get only two seconds of your time when I flew six hours to see you?” She snapped.
The question didn’t make sense to him. He knew that in the next coming days, he’d finally get a well deserved break and be able to spend time with her – quality time. He missed being with her or at least, he thought he did. He was beginning to second guess himself. Relationships while on tour weren't exactly his strongest connections but in the past, he successfully maintained them. So, he began to explain what he told his partners in the past —
“You are a priority of mine, that will never change,” but as he said it, the words fell out funny. “Work is just a lot right now, and it's important too. I have hundreds of thousands of fans demanding my attention and –,”
“No. I get you have to do your job, Harry.” She interrupted again, putting up a defensive hand to stop him. “You're busy but you could’ve told Jeff like… Five or ten minutes? Actually came to properly greet me? Instead, you just sent me here to be alone again!” Her voice slightly raised, anger that had been brewing finally spilled over.
Harry let out a breath, gathering his thoughts before he said anything rash. He pinched the bridge of his nose, a tension headache forming. “First of all, I didn’t send you here.” Harry spat out, shaking his head. “I don’t know why they didn’t just let you wait at the arena but I never gave that order.” His tone carried a slight dismissive edge as he spoke next, “I’ll be better next time.”
Harry was good at this, making empty promises. He didn’t necessarily not mean them but between his schedule demands and requirements - promises rarely followed through. It was a boundary issue on his end that he needed to work out fixing. Unluckily for him, his partner caught onto his half arse promise quickly.
“You’re just saying that,” she continued. “Ever since the tour started, the tour has been the priority, not us, not our relationship.”
Harry was hanging on by a thread now, completely sidetracked by her words. “Well, this is quite the warm welcome,” his tone was harsh as he stood up from his seat, reaching for a bottle of water to calm his nerves.
“Why do you do that?”
“Do what?” He questioned, bringing the rim of the bottle to his lips.
“You’re always so dismissive when I voice a problem in our relationship.”
“Dismissive? Me?” Harry pointed at his chest, a humorless chuckle escaping his lips. “That’s real rich coming from you.” He argued back, shaking his head as he guzzled some water down.
“And what is that supposed to mean?” She rose from her spot, brows pushed together as she held herself with her arms wrapped around her chest.
“It means that this whole time we’ve been long distance I’ve been trying to connect with you and you’re barely there! You don’t tell me about your day, you’re never happy on the call anymore, you barely even fucking crack a smile or laugh at my jokes.” Harry exclaimed, his green hues boring into her own.
“You’ve been trying to connect?” She laughed, a genuine laugh. “Sorry Harry, didn’t know I was only there for your entertainment!”
“No, no, no. You don’t get to do that.” he barked, stepping a bit closer into her space. “This isn’t about me, this is about our relationship.”
“Well, maybe we shouldn’t have a relationship if we can barely connect.”
There it was, the tidal wave washing over.
Harry stared at her for a few seconds, locking in every angry, hurt emotion that ran across her skin. “So, that’s it, huh? You’re breaking up with me because I didn’t have the chance to properly greet you, is that it?” Harry’s tone grew darker and harsher than he wanted but he continued.
“You don’t get it, do you?” she asked, a small pout crossed her face.
“Guess, I don’t.”
The silence fell between them as Harry shuffled around the room.
“Fine,” her tone matched his but broke at the tail end. When he glanced over at her as he passed by, he saw the tears begging to fall from her eyes. She mirrored his movements, grabbing her belongings along with her phone. “All I wanted was for you to give me a minute's worth of proper attention, hold me for more than a few seconds, actually seem overjoyed that I am here…” she clarified as she walked past him.
“I am overjoyed! Fucking hell,” Harry cursed. “There’s nothing I want more in this world than to… to be with you, don’t y’know that?”
“Knowing and feeling it are two different things, Harry.”
His shoulders dropped, giving in.
“Just stay for the concert and we can talk afte – ,” he tried, his voice filled with a whisper of hope.
“No! I can’t have another quiet conversation where we don’t say the things we really mean.”
“Then we don’t have to talk!” Harry whipped around, his body towering over her own.
“What do you mean by that?” He could practically hear the disgust in her voice.
“We can just…” He lets out a defeated sigh, invading her space. “Wonder if we just… filled the quiet with something else?” His voice was a lot less pensive and held a suggestive tone.
“Something else?” He watched her frown before a scoff filled the air. “You think sex will fix this?” She laughed, beginning to step around him. Harry gently reached out, placing his hand on her waist to halt her.
“Fix it? God, no. Only a proper talk will do that,” he said with certainty. “But I know you really miss me and I miss you too.”
“Okay, so?” He could tell some of her resolve was peaking through. The way her body inched towards his own as she shifted her weight was telling enough.
“I don’t want to argue and I don’t want you to lose you,” Harry told her deliberately. “It’s been a really long day for the both of us, and it’s going to be a really long night.” His fingers hooked under her chin, forcing her to look up at him. “But I want to come back to you, my home, here in this space,” he gestured around the temporary home. “Can we please, start over?”
“How?” She asked, almost hesitantly.
“By me giving you what you want and what you need,” Harry's voice dipped an octave lower. He followed it up with a simple question, one burning in the back of his mind for ages – “Can I kiss you?” His fingers stilled on her chin, holding her in place. For a second, he was sure he’d either be slapped or rejected but a small smile curved on her lips. He could tell she was hesitant but desperate for his touch.
“Just one.”
“Just one?” Harry frowned, already pressing a soft, quick kiss to her lips.
Then seconds later, “See? Not nearly enough,” He said as he pulled back. “Can I have another? A proper kiss? I’m a greedy, sorry bastard.”
Their eyes locked as she contemplated.
“One proper kiss.”
Harry wasted no time, he kissed her with complete certainty. His lips covered her own, dominating at a slanted angle for a short millisecond before she began to kiss back. Her plump lips mushing together with his own — so perfectly, so needed. He felt his heart rate quicken as he naturally pulled her firm against his chest, his fingers spreading up her spine. One hand cupped the side of her flushed cheek and the other wrapped around her to keep her steady. His lips were wet, sloppy against her own, claiming her. The soft sound of their saliva mixing together echoed throughout the room as his tongue traced her bottom lip, asking. When she opened her mouth to accommodate, his composure fractured slightly. Harry kissed her harder, feral about the taste of her mouth on his. Her tongue met his in an instant - earning a soft moan from the contact. Harry’s grip on her back tightened as he pulled her square against him. He worked his tongue in her mouth, tasting all the corners he had been missing. Her tongue explored too, swallowing his involuntarily groans and escaped breaths. A shiver tingled down his back as he felt her claw at his cotton shirt, demanding him closer. For a second, he thought they would stay in this - lost in the quiet rejoining of their lips but the kiss broke.
Panting, his fiancee asked – “How much time do we have?”
“Enough,” Harry barked. His body naturally stumped back, pulling him with her. His lips fell to her neck, nipping and sucking to create a mark. At the same time, his hands fell to her waist. He pulled her body flush against his own as he felt her hands go to his hair. The sheer tug alone made him groan out in approval. He abruptly switched their position so her front was against the credenza. With his chest flush against her back, he whispered into her ear.
“This is what you want, isn’t it?” His hands steadied on the hem of her skirt, letting his fingertips brush against the back of her bare thighs. He felt goosebumps running along her skin as he touched highly over the curve of her ass. “Beg for it.”
“Please, Harry. I need you to fuck me,” her voice whined as her palms rested against the old wooden surface.
“Needy thing you,” Harry tsked, hooking his fingers around the waist band of her underwear and yanking it down her thighs. “Always wanting attention,” he spat out as Harry gripped a hand full of her ass as the other wrapped around her front. “Fucks sakes,” he cursed as he felt her cunt absolutely soaked for him. “Gonna make a mess all over my cock, hm?
“Yes, please. Take me right here,” she begged.
Harry almost gave in, his trousers were strained and extremely uncomfortable but he wanted to keep the anticipation for a few minutes longer.
“But you’re not a very good girl f’me, always talking back.” Harry purred in her ear, massaging between the folds of her vulva slowly. He felt her jolt as a gasp echoed across the room, a sound he missed for far too long.
“I’ll be quiet, I’ll shut up, please.”
“Oh, will you?” Harry smirked, “keep that pretty mouth of yours shut.”
Harry dropped to his knees, his hands drawing her hips back. He positioned her just enough that he was eye level with her bare ass. With her skirt bunched around her hips, he practically was salivating at the looks of her.
“Look at you, filthy thing. So wet f’me, pussy begging to be eaten.”
“Harry, please.” He heard her whine out as he gently spread her from the back, getting a deliberate look at her precious vulva. His breath was warm against her as he spoke.
“Can I taste you?” He barely could process words but consent was extremely important to them both.
“Yes, please, Harry.” She begged, clearly desperate. Harry didn’t make her wait any longer, he couldn’t wait any longer. Her scent alone was drawing flashbacks and he could practically taste her on his tongue. He needed to taste her. So, he did.
His tongue swirled around her entrance before flicking her clit and giving the small but mighty bud a good suck. He could feel her squirming and hear her moan out but Harry stayed focused. As much as he was prepping her, he wanted to overestimate her as much as he possibly could. It didn’t take much, she was just as touch starved as him. He kept his head angled, munching on her clit with skilled precision. His lips wrapped around her clit as he sucked then soothed her with his flat tongue. The air became thick as he continued tasting her sweet, tangy arousal. When her legs began to shake, he finally pulled back, equally as breathless as her. He quickly stood, working his belt as he whispered, his hot breath against her ear.
“That was just a taste, not finished with you yet.” His hands worked fast, stripping himself of his trousers and briefs just enough to free himself. His cock bounced in the air, thick and hard, painfully red. His hand stroked twice to relieve a bit of pressure before he lined up with her entrance.
“Colour check?” A little system they had whenever they engaged in intercourse. “Green” was good to go, “Yellow” for a pause or check in, “Red” for an immediate stop. Harry particularly valued the colour system to keep his partner comfortable and safe during all types of sex.
“Green,” she said with enthusiasm.
“Good.” Harry buried himself inside her with one smooth thrust, halting once their hips were flush together. He gave her a small chance to adjust, savoring the feeling of her walls clenching around him.
“Oh God, I missed this, missed you,” his words were soft and gentle as he whispered against her hair.
“Y’know I respect you, right baby?” He asked, propping his head up to glance into her eyes. He watched as she nodded her head, a bit confused.
“For the next while, it may seem like I don’t, okay? But I do, I need you to remember that.”
“I’ll remember,” she whispered, biting down on her bottom lip.
He felt her relax a few seconds later as his hands pressed into her sides. He positioned her to arch her back, his chest flush against her spine. Harry a few seconds to collect himself, flipped a small switch in his brain.
“Move please,” she mumbled into the quiet air.
“So demanding,” he hissed, drawing his hips back to give her exactly what she needed. He wasn’t gentle when he began to move, he bucked forward causing the credenza to squeak against the floor. His partner gasped into the open air, gripping the wood with her hands.
“Fuck, baby.” His hands helped angled her body up, hands wrapping around her clothed chest. He continued to draw his hips back, plunging back into her at a steady speed. Her moans filled the air, ragged as the intoxicating, pleasure sensation filled her body. Harry’s breath was hot against her as he pounded into her.
“Silly girl, thinking I’d leave this pussy, hm? This perfect, pretty pussy.” He praised, breathing hitched as he pulled out of her completely just to drive back in. “Don’t ever fucking say that to me again, understood?”
“Y– Yes, fuck, yes.”
“Who’s pussy is this, hm?” Harry encouraged, increasing his pace. When she didn’t answer right away, only moaning louder, Harry continued on. “Don’t go quiet on me now. Go on, whose pussy is this?” he pulled out of her completely, breathless and leaving her walls clenching around nothing.
“Yours, Harry. Just yours.”
“Good. Don’t go dumb on me now.” Harry teased, fixing their position again as her legs were nearly giving out. “Hands, please.” Harry helped gently draw her palms back behind her, making her hands interlock to steady her.
“Just like that, perfect.” Harry whispered to himself, inspecting her position. He held his large palm over her interlocked fingers, suspending her chest in the air. He caught her looking back over her shoulder, desperate for relief and a quick glance his way. “Eye’s forward,” he demanded firmly before pushing the tip of his cock against her entrance once again.
When he pushed forward, he wasn’t so forgiving. Immediately his partner cried out, overwhelmed by his sheer force.
“Attagirl, just like that. Just feel.” He instructed her as he sent an intoxicating, thought stealing pleasure her way. He could feel her pulsating around him, nearing her peak after a few strokes. Harry’s free hand left her hip and snaked around her front. His fingertips added a gentle pressure against her clit, rubbing sure circles to urge her on.
“Harry! Har –, shit! I’m gonna…” she gasped, panting as he continued at a vigorous pace.
“I know, I know, baby. Ask permission first.” He grunted out, a bead of sweat rolling down the corner of his brow.
“Can I? Can I cum, please?” His fiancée whined out, moving back against him.
“Go on, darling. Cum f’me. Milk my cock,” Harry’s words surprised himself but he couldn’t help his filthy mouth.
His head fell back as his fiancée convulsed around him. He let out a deep groan, cursing under his breath as his grip tightened around her hands.
“Fuck, good girl, my good fucking girl,” his voice was full of rasp as he pumped his hips twice more and felt that burning, bubbly feeling deep in his stomach. “Agh, I’m gonna cum,” he pulled out the second he felt himself twitch inside her.
“Yeah? Cum for me, baby. I’m your little cum slut.”
Harry’s face broke into a wide smirk as he heard her words. She pleasantly surprised him.
“My little cum slut?” His voice cracked, giving in to the pleasure. His hand moved to his cock, pumping once before he released warm, milky white cum all over her ass and lower back, close to their joined hands.
“There you go, there you go baby,” he panted, breathless as he looked at the mess between them. “Fuck, we got a little messy.” Harry helped her stand properly before grabbing the shirt off his back and wiping the mess he created off of her. “You okay?” He asked, still panting hard as he pulled his trousers up.
“I’m okay,” she smiled softly, a warm flush rising to her cheeks, fixing her clothes. “It’s just — I wasn’t expecting that.” He watched as her eyes roamed his chest and lower abdomen.
“I wasn’t either, just happened…” he shrugged, “guess we just…needed it to release some frustration.”
“Yeah,” he noticed the little shift in her voice as she cleared her throat.
“Hey,” his tone flattened to something much more subtle. He reached out, cupping her face in his hands. “I’m sorry I was a prick earlier, I should’ve greeted you properly. I’ve been stressed but it’s not an excuse. I love you and I’m really, really happy you are here.”
“I love you too but I feel like we should talk about this properly, the whole… long distance thing isn’t working.”
On que, Harry’s phone vibrated on the table urgently but he didn’t move towards it.
“We will, I promise, we will. We’ll sort it out because you are my priority and I don’t want you to feel so… alone.”
“Promise? After the show?”
“Yes, I promise with all my heart. We’ll talk.”
The quiet filled the space once again as Harry pulled her into a hug. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled against her hair.
“It’s not okay but you stink so, I’m going to say it’s okay.” she teased, trying to break free from his embrace.
“Hey,” his voice dragged out, his dimples showing as he smirked. “I always smell good.”
“Absolutely not.” She teased back, a small laugh breaking the silence. He grinned at the sound, booping her nose with his finger.
“Alright, wee, shower then head out together?”
“Okay.”
“Come here,” he pulled her close, his arm wrapping around her shoulder as he led them through the corridor.
While in the shower, Harry washed his fiancée's hair with a pensive look on his face.
“What are you thinking about?” She asked, a small smile breaking through.
“Alone is a quiet place to be.” He said slowly, massaging her scalp.
“It is.” She confirmed, letting out a sigh.
“No more of that,” her eyes locked with his. “Promise.”
You became his sugar baby to survive, but Harry’s possessiveness soon turns into something softer. The black card pays the bills, but it’s the unexpected love that threatens to ruin you both.
A/N: So happy you're all excited for chapter four! BUT, please remember I’m a med student with night shifts. Last night was beyond busy, just two of us on the service, so I came home, crashed, and literally just woke up after sleeping all day. Thank you for understanding!
Also, a quick reminder: I will be posting ALL THE CHAPTERS HERE.
Rating: Explicit. 🔞 content. reader discretion is advised.
Slicing through the gaps in the blackout curtains like a knife, the sharp, aggressive Saturday morning grey hit Harry straight in the eyes. Flinching, he buried his face in the leather cushion of the sofa, but the movement only sent a jackhammer of pain through his skull, a throbbing reminder of the bottle of scotch currently sitting empty on the bar.
He hadn't made it to bed. He hadn't even made it up the stairs. Instead, he had passed out right here, fully dressed, legs tangled in the throw blanket and cheek pressed against the cold leather.
Groaning, Harry pushed himself up to a sitting position, mouth tasting of stale alcohol and regret. His shirt, the black silk one she had grabbed, the one she used to pull him close, hung off his frame like a shroud, wrinkled and unbuttoned.
He blinked, waiting for the room to stop spinning. Once it finally settled, the carnage came into focus.
Last night, in the dark, the shattered crystal had looked dramatic. In the cold light of day, it just looked like a mess.
Thousands of shards of antique glass glittered innocently across the hardwood floor. The heavy crystal bowl, an eighteenth-century piece bought at auction for the price of a small car, was now just expensive dust. On the far wall, a gouge in the plaster marked the point of impact, a white scar against the grey paint.
Harry stared at it and felt nothing. No relief. No catharsis. Just a dull, hollow ache in the center of his chest that had nothing to do with the hangover.
Glancing at his right palm, he saw a dried line of dark red blood cutting across his lifeline where a shard had sliced him. He flexed the hand, letting the skin pull tight. It stung. Good.
Click.
The heavy turn of the deadbolt.
Harry stiffened. For a fraction of a second, his heart leaped, maybe she came back. Maybe she realized she forgot something.
The door slid open. But it wasn't Y/N.
It was Mrs. Higgins, his Saturday housekeeper. A stout, no-nonsense woman who had cleaned up after his parties for a decade without blinking an eye, she stepped in carrying her caddy of supplies only to stop dead.
"Good morning Mr. Styles. I..."
Her voice trailed off. Her eyes swept over the floor, taking in the twenty-foot radius of shattered glass and the overturned papers on the coffee table before finally landing on Harry. He sat there disheveled and bleeding, looking like a deposed king.
Her eyes widened. "Oh my god. Sir? Are you alright?"
"I am fine," Harry croaked. His voice was ruined. Clearing his throat, he stood up, swaying slightly. "I am fine, Mrs. Higgins. Just a mishap."
"A mishap?" She bustled forward, setting her caddy down with a clatter. "It looks like a war zone in here. Did someone break in? Should I call security?"
"No," Harry snapped. The volume hurt his own head, so he lowered his voice. "No one broke in. I dropped a bowl. That is all."
"You dropped a bowl," she repeated, eyeing the debris field that clearly indicated the bowl had been thrown with the velocity of a missile.
She didn't argue. She knew better. Sighing the sigh of a woman paid very well to deal with rich men's tantrums, she reached for the broom on her cart.
"Well, go get yourself some coffee, sir. I will have this cleared up in a jiffy. You do not want to step on this barefoot."
As she began to sweep, the sound of stiff bristles dragging glass across wood, scrape, scrape, clink, sent a sudden, irrational surge of panic through him.
She was erasing it.
She was sweeping up the violence, cleaning away the evidence of the only real emotion that had happened in this room in months. If she cleaned it up, the room would return to being perfect. It would go back to being a museum. And if it was a museum, then Y/N had never really been here at all.
Mrs. Higgins swept a pile of glass toward the coffee table, reaching down to pick up the scattered papers, the contract.
"Leave it," Harry barked.
Mrs. Higgins froze, hand hovering over the document. "Sir?"
"Do not touch the papers," Harry said, stepping forward and ignoring the glass crunching under his boots. "And do not sweep under the sofa."
Mrs. Higgins looked at him like he had lost his mind. "Sir, there is glass everywhere. It surely skittered under there."
"I said don't." His voice was low, cold, and leaving no room for argument.
He knew what lay hidden in the dust bunnies under the sofa, the brass key. He had knocked it there last night in his rage. If Mrs. Higgins swept under there, she would find it, pick it up, and place it on the hook by the door. She would treat it like a common object.
But it wasn't a common object. It was the only thing Y/N had left behind. It was the heavy, tangible proof that she had chosen to walk away, a shrine to his failure. He couldn't bear the thought of anyone else touching it.
"Clean the open floor," Harry commanded, running a hand through his messy hair. "Leave the area around the sofa. Leave the papers. Leave the table."
"Mr. Styles, I cannot leave a pile of broken glass in the middle of your..."
"You can if I pay you to," Harry cut her off. Pulling his wallet out of his back pocket, uncomfortable after sleeping on it, he extracted three fifty-pound notes and dropped them onto her cart. "Clean the kitchen. Clean the bathrooms. Change the sheets. Do not touch this room."
Mrs. Higgins looked at the money, then at Harry’s bloodshot eyes. She nodded slowly.
"As you wish, sir."
Taking her broom, she retreated to the kitchen.
Harry stood alone in the center of the living room, looking down at the contract splayed open on the table like a dead bird. He looked at the spot under the sofa where the key was hiding in the dark.
A wave of nausea rolled over him. He was safe. He had done it. He had successfully driven her away, protected her reputation, and secured her future. He had won.
Walking over to the bar, he picked up the empty bottle of scotch and dropped it into the recycling bin.
Clank.
He needed a shower. He needed a shave. He needed to go to the office and make a million pounds to remind himself that he was Harry Styles and that he didn't need anyone.
He turned his back on the mess and walked toward the stairs. But as he climbed, his hand brushing the railing where hers used to rest, he realized with a sinking horror that the silence in the house wasn't empty.
It was screaming.
The smell hit her first.
It wasn't the rich scent of expensive leather or the crisp fragrance of eucalyptus. It was the damp, cloying odor of wet towels and burnt toast, underpinned by the chemical tang of Lynx body spray.
Y/N rolled over in the narrow single bed, wincing as the springs screamed in protest. A sharp, metallic grating that tore her from restless sleep.
Staring up at the ceiling, she traced the familiar water stain in the corner, a map of a nonexistent country. Above it, a spiderweb swayed gently in the draft from the window that refused to close.
It had been two weeks.
Two weeks since she had dropped the heavy brass key on the glass table. Two weeks since she had walked out of the elevator.
For six months, her life had been a tale of two cities: Monday to Thursday, a student in a shoebox. Friday to Sunday, a princess in a Mayfair castle. Now the castle was gone, leaving only the girl in the shoebox.
A crash from the kitchen, followed by a burst of raucous laughter, shattered the quiet.
"Oi! You stepped on my charger!"
"Mate, watch where you are going!"
Josh. Her roommate.
At twenty-three, Josh was perfectly nice. He was studying sports management and possessed the energy of a golden retriever that had just consumed an espresso. And Y/N hated him.
She hated herself for it, knowing it was unfair. But every time Josh laughed at the television at 8 AM or left his sneakers in the middle of the hallway, a physical tightness constricted her chest.
God, she missed the silence.
She missed the fortress-like solitude of the townhouse. She missed the way Harry moved through a room like he owned the air inside it. Harry didn't leave sneakers in the hallway. Harry didn't yell about chargers. Harry was a man. Josh was a boy.
Dragging herself out of bed onto creaking floorboards, she shuffled down the narrow hallway to the bathroom. The tiles were cracked and cold under her feet.
She turned on the shower, waiting as the pipes groaned before spitting out a stream of lukewarm water. The pressure was pathetic, barely enough to wash the soap off her skin. Standing under the drizzle, she closed her eyes, trying to conjure the memory of the rainfall showerhead, the steam, the heated towel rack.
She had walked away from it. She had chosen the sticky floors and the freedom. But freedom, it turned out, felt a lot like being cold and tired.
Half an hour later, she sat at the wobbly kitchen table, her laptop screen the brightest thing in the room.
Josh walked in, wearing nothing but boxer shorts and a t-shirt that read Beer Me.
"Morning Y/N," he chirped, opening the fridge to swig milk directly from the carton.
A wave of irrational nausea rolled over her.
"Morning Josh," she mumbled.
"You look rough," he noted helpfully, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Rough night?"
"Something like that."
"You should come out with us tonight. Me and the boys are going to Wetherspoons. Pitchers are two for one."
"I am busy," Y/N lied.
"Suit yourself. More cheap booze for me." Grabbing a slice of toast, he wandered back to his room.
Y/N turned her attention back to the screen.
Thank you for your interest in the Assistant Editor position. Unfortunately, we have decided to move forward with other candidates. We wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors.
Delete. Delete. Delete.
The rejections were piling up. Despite the honors degree and the dissertation praised by her professors, the real world saw her as just another twenty-two-year-old with zero experience and no connections.
Harry could have made a call.
The thought intruded before she could stop it. Harry knew everyone. One word from him, and she would be sitting in an office at Bloomsbury right now. He would have handled it. He would have smoothed the path.
Opening her banking app, she stared at the number on the screen.
It was large. Six months of allowance saved diligently. It was enough to pay rent in this dump for two years, to buy a new wardrobe, or to book a holiday to Bali.
She hadn't spent a penny of it. Once a high score, a safety net, it now felt like a bomb.
It was the only thing keeping her alive. She had quit the café to focus on finals because Harry had told her to. Focus on your studies, he had said. Let me handle the finances. So she had.
Now she was unemployed, relying on the money of a man she had dumped. Every time she bought a carton of milk or paid the electric bill, she felt like she was stealing. It was blood money, and she was terrified of the day it would run out.
Closing the app, she looked around the messy kitchen. The sink was full of grey water and Josh’s cereal bowls; the window looked out onto a brick wall and a row of overflowing bins.
This was reality. This was the "normal" life she had screamed at Harry that she wanted.
She wanted to cry.
She wanted to call him. She wanted to tell him that she was sorry, that the light he talked about was actually just fluorescent and flickering, and that she missed his darkness. She missed his protection.
Harry hadn't just been a lover. He had been a shield, standing between her and the ugly, difficult parts of the world. Now the shield was gone, and she was exposed.
Y/N picked up her phone again, opening their message thread. The last text was from April.
I am not hungry.
Her thumb hovered over the text box.
I miss you. I made a mistake. Please come get me.
She typed the words out, staring at them. They looked pathetic. They looked like defeat.
She erased them.
Placing the phone face down on the table, she took a sip of the bitter black coffee. She hadn't bought milk because she was too scared to dip into the savings for luxuries.
She had made her choice. Now she had to live with it, even if living with it meant watching Josh drink from the carton while her heart broke a little more every single day.
The restaurant was quiet. The kind of quiet that cost three hundred pounds a head.
The air smelled of truffles and old money. In the corner, a harpist plucked at something unrecognizable while waiters moved like ghosts across the plush carpet, terrified of disturbing the peace.
Harry sat at the best table in the house, wearing a Tom Ford suit that fit like armor. He had shaved, styled his hair, and curated an appearance worthy of a Forbes cover.
Across from him sat Victoria.
Victoria was perfect. Forty-two years old, the daughter of a Viscount, and the ex-wife of a hedge fund manager, she was a study in elegance. Her blond hair was blow-dried into submission, her teeth were blindingly white, and her pearls were tasteful.
She was appropriate.
She was exactly the kind of woman a man in Harry’s tax bracket was supposed to be with, a partner whose presence at a board meeting signaled stability, a woman fluent in non-dom statuses and offshore accounts.
Harry wanted to scream.
"And then Charles said that the merger with the German firm was dragging on simply because of the unions," Victoria was saying, taking a delicate sip of her white wine. "Can you imagine? Holding up a billion-pound deal because of pension disputes. The working class is becoming so entitled."
She laughed, a light, tinkling sound like ice hitting glass.
Harry forced the corners of his mouth up. "Terrible."
"Exactly," she beamed. "So I told him to just liquidate the subsidiary and be done with it. It’s cleaner on the balance sheet."
She paused, looking at him expectantly. She was waiting for him to agree, to talk shop, to discuss the ruthless efficiency of capitalism.
"Liquidation is certainly efficient," Harry said, his voice sounding flat to his own ears.
"It is," she agreed. "Speaking of efficiency, I saw the quarterly reports for your firm. Your aggressive acquisition of that tech startup? Brilliant. Ruthless, but brilliant."
Harry picked up his wine glass and drank half of it in one swallow.
Looking at her, he acknowledged the facts: she was beautiful, smart, and successful. She spoke his language, the dialect of money, assets, and liquidity.
But she was suffocatingly boring.
His gaze drifted to her hands. Her nails were manicured in a pale, perfect pink.
Instead of admiring them, he remembered Y/N’s hands. He remembered the ink stain on her thumb from taking notes in the library, the way she gripped a pen like a weapon, the way she tapped her fingers on the dashboard when a song she liked came on the radio.
"Harry?"
He snapped his head up. Victoria was frowning slightly.
"I am sorry," Harry said. "I was miles away."
"I asked if you play tennis," she said. "The club has a mixed doubles tournament next month. I need a partner who can actually serve. My ex-husband had a wrist like a wet noodle."
"I don't play," Harry lied. He played very well, usually every Sunday with his banking friends.
"That is a shame," she pouted. "You have the build for it."
The waiter arrived with their appetizers: a single scallop sitting in a pool of foam.
Victoria looked at it with delight. "This looks divine. I love this chef. He keeps the portions so... manageable."
Harry looked at the scallop.
The memory hit him instantly: Y/N forcing him to eat a kebab at 2 AM on a street corner in Soho. The grease on her chin, her laughter when he dropped garlic sauce on his five-thousand-pound coat, her voice saying, It’s not food if you don’t need a napkin, Harry.
Victoria cut a tiny piece of the scallop and chewed slowly.
"So," she said. "I heard you’re looking into buying that property in the Cotswolds. The estate next to the Beckhams?"
"I am thinking about it," Harry said.
"You should," she nodded. "It’s a good investment. Land is the only thing that holds value these days. Besides, you need a place to escape the city. London is becoming so... crowded. Don't you think?"
She gestured vaguely to the window, to the streets below where normal people lived.
"Crowded," Harry repeated.
"Yes. Too much noise. Too much grit. I prefer the quiet."
Harry stared at her.
Y/N loved the grit. She loved the noise, the sticky floors, the mess of life. She made him feel alive because she dragged him into the crowd, not away from it.
Victoria was offering him a sterile, quiet, perfectly managed life where scallops were small, people were "manageable," and no one made bad decisions.
It felt like a coffin. It felt like death by small talk.
If this was the "appropriate" life he had sacrificed his happiness for, then he had made a terrible mistake. He didn't want the quiet estate in the Cotswolds. He wanted the argument. He wanted the passion. He wanted the girl who challenged him on literature and stole his t-shirts.
He could not do this. He could not sit here for another hour and pretend that he cared about property values or pension disputes.
Harry signaled the waiter.
"Check please," he said.
Victoria looked stunned. "Harry? We haven't even had the main course."
"I am not hungry," Harry said, pulling out his heavy titanium black card and dropping it on the table.
"Is something wrong?" Victoria asked, her smile faltering. "Did I say something?"
"No," Harry said. He stood up and buttoned his jacket. "You were perfect, Victoria. You were absolutely appropriate."
He looked down at her.
"That is the problem."
He didn't wait for the receipt. Turning on his heel, he walked past the harpist, past the maitre d', and out into the cool London night.
The air smelled of exhaust and rain. It smelled real.
He was alone, miserable, and definitely going to die in his big empty house with his millions in the bank. But at least he didn't have to talk about tennis.
The wifi in the flat was a test of patience, buffering constantly as Y/N sat on the bedroom floor.
She leaned against the radiator, hoarding its meager heat, wrapped in a crew neck sweatshirt she had stolen from Harry months ago. It no longer smelled of his expensive cologne or the unique warmth of his skin; now, it just smelled of her cheap laundry detergent.
With one final, agonizing refresh, the page loaded.
It was a grainy paparazzi shot taken from across the street, but the subject was unmistakable.
Harry.
He was walking out of that Mayfair restaurant with the three-month waiting list, wearing the charcoal suit she loved—the one with the silk lining. Even in low resolution, he looked devastating.
But he wasn't alone.
Beside him was a woman. Tall, blonde, and draped in a cream coat that likely cost more than Y/N’s entire student loan debt. She was laughing, head thrown back in an elegant display of joy.
Harry Styles, Chief Executive Officer, Vanguard Holdings, spotted dining with Victoria St. Clair, heiress to the St. Clair shipping fortune.
The caption was simple, yet it felt like a slap: New Power Couple?
A cold stone dropped into Y/N’s stomach.
It had been only three weeks.
Three weeks, and he was already out dining with heiresses, slipping back into the world of cream coats, pearls, and tax brackets that matched his own.
Victoria St. Clair looked perfect. She looked like someone who knew exactly which fork to use for the fish course and had never eaten instant noodles in her life. Y/N looked down at herself, sweatpants with a hole in the knee, toast for dinner, unemployed.
Zooming in on Harry’s face, she searched for a sign. He wasn't smiling. His expression was the unreadable mask he wore when closing a deal, but the context was clear. He was there. He was moving on.
She closed her laptop and pulled her knees to her chest, feeling incredibly, stupidly small. She had walked away to save herself, but looking at that photo, she realized she hadn't saved anything. She had just vacated the seat for someone who fit the mold.
Across the city, 9:00 PM found Harry still sitting in his office long after the cleaning crew had come and gone. Below him, the city lights of London sprawled like a circuit board, cold and distant.
He ignored the view. He ignored the merger documents on his desk. His attention was fixed solely on his computer screen.
A secure window was open. One requiring two-factor authentication and a biometric scan to access. It was the portal for his personal accounts. And hers.
He hadn't revoked his access. He told himself it was an oversight, a forgotten administrative task after the contract ended. But that was a lie.
He scanned the transaction history for Y/N’s account.
Tesco Metro - £12.50
TfL Oyster Top Up - £20.00
Pret a Manger - £3.50
Rent Payment (Theo Miller) - £600.00
Harry stared at the name. Theo Miller.
A flare of irrational, burning jealousy scorched through him. Who was Theo Miller? The landlord? A boyfriend? The guy with the nose ring from the pub?
He looked at the amount. Six hundred pounds. In London, that bought you a closet with mold on the walls and drafty windows.
Yet, the balance remained high. She hadn't touched the bulk of the allowance from the last six months. It just sat there, accumulating interest. She was living in a shoebox with some guy named Theo, eating Tesco meal deals while sitting on a small fortune.
Why? Why was she punishing herself?
Harry moved his mouse, hovering the cursor over the Transfer Funds button.
He could double it. Triple it. He could send enough right now to buy her a flat of her own, making her life easy again with a single click. His finger twitched over the mouse. He wanted to play the hero. He wanted to fix it, because throwing money at a problem was the only way he knew how to show love.
But then he remembered her voice.
I don't want a normal life! I want you!
She had rejected the money and the ease. Sending funds now wouldn't be a gift, it would be an insult. It would be a declaration that he didn't believe she could survive without him.
He couldn't do that to her. He had to respect her choice, even if watching her struggle felt like physical pain.
Closing the browser tab, the screen reverted to his generic landscape desktop background.
Swiveling his chair around, he faced the window and the city beyond. She was out there somewhere eating cheap food, living with Theo Miller, probably hating him. And he was up here in his glass tower, safe, rich, and completely empty.
He picked up his phone, scrolling past photos of potential real estate investments and art pieces until he stopped on a photo from six months ago.
It was accidental, blurry, taken in his kitchen on a Sunday morning. Y/N was wearing his t-shirt, laughing, her hand coming up to block the camera as the sun hit her hair. She looked happy.
Harry stared at the photo until the screen dimmed. He missed her so much it felt like bleeding out.
But he stayed in his tower, and he let her struggle. Because that was what she wanted.
The music wasn't just sound. It was a physical sensation. A relentless, thumping rhythm shook the floorboards and rattled the bottles on the bar, thickening the air with the smell of spilled lager, sweat, and cheap vanilla body spray.
Standing by the bar, Y/N lifted her boot, grimacing at the audible peeling sound as the sole separated from the layer of dried alcohol coating the wood. Her feet were literally stuck to the floor.
"Chug! Chug! Chug!"
Nearby, Josh stood on a stool, tilting a pitcher of something neon blue into the mouth of a girl Y/N didn’t know while Sarah cheered him on.
Y/N took a sip of her vodka cranberry. It tasted like rubbing alcohol and sugar syrup, warm and watery because the ice had melted twenty minutes ago.
She checked her phone: 11:15 PM.
In her old life, 11:15 PM on a Saturday meant sitting on the velvet sofa with Harry. It meant a glass of Pinot Noir that cost more than her rent, quiet conversations about books or politics, and the weight of his hand resting warm and heavy on her knee.
Here, it meant getting jostled by sweaty strangers in a room that smelled like a locker room.
"You look like you are at a funeral."
The guy sliding into the space next to her was cute enough, floppy hair, a nice smile, and a t-shirt that was a size too small. He smelled of vape smoke and Lynx.
"I am just tired," Y/N shouted over the bass.
"I’m Liam," he shouted back, leaning in too close. "I’m Josh’s mate from uni."
"Y/N."
"I know," he grinned. "Josh said his roommate was hot. He wasn't lying."
Y/N forced a brittle smile. Six months ago, this would have been flattering. A cute boy her age hitting on her in a bar. This was supposed to be the dream, the "normal life" Harry had insisted she needed.
"Can I get you a drink?" Liam asked. "You look like you need something stronger than that."
"I am okay."
"Come on," he insisted, signaling the bartender without waiting for her answer. "Two tequila shots! The good stuff!"
The bartender poured two shots of the house tequila, which was definitely not the good stuff. Liam handed her one, clinking his glass against hers so hard that liquid sloshed over her hand.
"To being young and dumb!" he cheered.
Y/N stared at the sticky liquid coating her knuckles.
Harry never spilled. Harry moved with a grace that bordered on supernatural. He would have handed her a glass by the stem, toasting to her eyes, her intelligence, or her future.
"Cheers," she mumbled, throwing the shot back. It burned all the way down.
Laughing, Liam wiped his mouth with his sleeve and leaned his elbow on the sticky bar.
"So," he yelled. "Josh says you just graduated. English lit, right?"
"Yeah."
"What are you gonna do with that? Teach?"
"I want to work in publishing," she said.
"Publishing," he nodded, glancing around the room as if already bored. "Sounds intense. My cousin tried to get into that. Said it pays peanuts."
He pulled his phone out of his pocket, checking a notification while she was still talking.
"Anyway," he said, shoving the phone back. "You wanna dance? This song is a banger."
He reached out and grabbed her waist.
His hand was sweaty. His grip was clumsy.
Y/N froze.
The memory of Harry’s grip crashed over her, the size of his hand, the way his thumb would stroke the sensitive skin of her hip bone, the heavy, possessive weight of his touch. It felt grounding. It felt like he was anchoring her to the earth.
Liam’s touch just felt clammy.
She pulled away sharply. "I can't."
Liam looked confused. "What? Why?"
"I have to go."
"Go? It’s not even midnight. The night is young!"
"I am not," Y/N said.
She pushed past him. She pushed past Josh, who was now wearing the empty pitcher on his head like a hat. She shouldered her way through the wall of bodies and noise, stumbling out of the club and onto the pavement.
The air outside was cool and wet. It was raining again.
Y/N leaned against the brick wall of the club, burying her face in her hands.
She was ruined.
Harry had ruined her. Not with malice or cruelty, but by being perfect. He had shown her what it felt like to be treated like a woman, to be listened to, cared for, and touched with reverence. Now, every other man on the planet felt like a child in comparison.
Looking up, she watched the boys stumbling out of the club. They were loud, messy, and exactly who she was supposed to be with.
But she didn't want them.
She wanted the silver hair. She wanted the lines around the eyes. She wanted the man who drank scotch, read Jane Austen, and made her feel safe.
"I hate you," she whispered to the empty street.
Wiping the tears from her face with the back of her sticky hand, she started the long walk back to the cold flat with the screaming roommate and the empty fridge.
The tray was heavy, loaded with flutes of cheap prosecco trying very hard to pass as champagne. Y/N balanced it on her left hand, feet throbbing in the cheap black flats she had bought at Primark only because the gallery manager insisted all temporary staff wear "sensible black footwear."
She was not an assistant editor. She was not a writer. She was "Event Staff."
It was a temporary gig. Two nights a week, ten pounds an hour plus tips. It barely covered the cost of her travel card, but it was money that didn't come from Harry’s bank account, so she took it.
The gallery in Soho was a white box with concrete floors and track lighting bright enough to perform surgery. The art on the walls was incomprehensible, a collection of red squares and twisted metal that cost more than most people earned in a decade.
Y/N moved through the crowd, keeping her head down, trying to make herself invisible.
Then the room went quiet.
It wasn't a total silence, but a shift in atmospheric pressure. A sudden drop in volume that started at the front door and washed over the crowd like a cold wave. Heads turned. Whispers started. The energy in the room shifted instantly from bored pretension to electric alertness.
Y/N looked up. Her heart didn't just stop, it plummeted through the floorboards.
Harry was standing in the doorway.
He looked like a weapon in a bespoke suit. Dressed entirely in black—shirt unbuttoned at the collar to reveal the tops of his tattoos, blazer with sharp lapels, his hair was pushed back, and his rings caught the harsh gallery lights.
He wasn't looking at the art. He wasn't looking at the frantic gallery owner buzzing around him. He was scanning the room, his eyes dark and predatory. He was hunting.
Y/N froze, hugging the tray of glasses to her chest like a shield as she stood near the center of the room, surrounded by people in furs and tuxedos.
Harry’s eyes locked onto her.
He didn't blink. He didn't look away or check to see if anyone was watching. He just started walking.
Cutting through the crowd like a shark moving through water, he ignored the people stepping out of his way, the whispers, and the pointing fingers. He walked straight toward her with a terrifying, singular focus.
Y/N’s breath hitched. She felt exposed, like a deer in the headlights of an oncoming train.
Harry stopped less than a foot in front of her.
He was so close that his scent, tobacco and expensive wood, overpowered the smell of the cheap wine, creating a sudden intimate vacuum in the middle of the crowded room.
The gallery owner hovered a few feet away, looking nervous, but Harry ignored him. The guests were staring openly now, watching Harry corner a waitress.
But when Harry spoke, he lowered his voice so that only she could hear him.
"Put it down," he murmured, a low vibration she felt in her chest.
"I am working," she whispered back without moving her lips. "I can't put it down."
"You are not a servant, Y/N," he rasped, eyes furious.
"I am tonight," she hissed. "People are staring, Harry."
"Let them stare." He took a half step closer, invading her personal space completely and forcing the world to disappear. "I don't care if they stare. I don't care if they take pictures. Look at me."
She looked up at him. His eyes were wrecked.
"You look thin," he accused quietly. "Are you eating?"
"I am fine."
"You are lying," he whispered. "I checked your account. You haven't touched the money. You are living on pennies and paying rent to some idiot named Theo Miller."
Y/N felt her face burn. "Harry, stop it. Not here. Theo is Josh's first name"
"I drove across the city because I saw the shift roster for this event," he confessed, voice raw and aching. "I came here to see you. Not to see art. Not to drink bad wine. Just you."
"You can't do this," she pleaded softly. "You can't just walk in here and act like you own me."
"I don't own you," Harry said. "But I am responsible for you. And seeing you like this... serving these people... it is killing me."
He reached out.
In full view of the room, he lifted his hand, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers lingered on her cheek for a heartbeat. A gesture that was possessive, tender, and told everyone watching that they knew each other. But the words remained a secret between them.
"Come home," he breathed into the space between them. "Please."
Y/N looked at him, seeing the desperation in his eyes. She saw that he had broken every rule he had ever made about privacy just to stand here and ask her that question.
"I can't," she whispered. "I need to do this."
Harry’s hand dropped. The rejection hit him hard. Stepping back, the bubble burst, and the sounds of the room rushed back in. He looked around as if remembering where he was.
He turned to the wall beside them, staring at the massive black canvas with the red dot.
"This is garbage," he announced. His voice was loud now, carrying clearly over the murmuring crowd.
"It is titled The Void," Y/N said automatically, falling back into her role though her voice shook. "It is fifty thousand pounds."
"It matches your mood," Harry muttered low enough that only she heard it.
He looked at her, a dark humor flashing in his eyes.
"If I buy it," he asked loudly, "do you get a commission?"
"No," she said. "I am just the help."
"Pity."
Harry turned to the gallery owner, who was watching with his mouth open.
"I will take it," Harry said, pointing at the black painting. "Wrap it up. Send it to this address."
Pulling a card from his pocket, he scribbled something on the back and handed it to the owner. Then he looked back at Y/N, holding her gaze one last time.
"Don't let them work you too hard," he said softly.
He turned and walked away, cutting through the crowd that parted for him, leaving Y/N standing in the center of the room with a tray of champagne and a heart beating so hard it hurt.
The next morning.
Y/N was sitting in the kitchen eating dry toast. Josh was playing FIFA on the sofa.
There was a knock at the door.
"I'll get it!" Josh yelled.
He opened the door.
"Holy shit," he said.
Y/N walked into the hallway.
Two men in blue coveralls were standing there. They were holding a massive crate.
"Delivery for Y/N," one of them said.
"For me?"
They carried the crate inside. It barely fit in the hallway. It took up the entire living room.
Josh grabbed a screwdriver. "What is it? A fridge?"
They pried the lid off.
Y/N stared.
It was the painting. The black canvas with the red dot. The fifty thousand pound garbage.
There was a small white envelope taped to the front.
Y/N pulled it off. Her hands were shaking. She opened it.
Inside was a note written on heavy cream cardstock. The handwriting was messy and all caps.
IT IS PRETENTIOUS GARBAGE. HANG IT OVER YOUR WALL. - H
Y/N looked at the painting. She looked at the note.
"What is it?" Josh asked staring at the black canvas. "Is that art? It looks like a spot."
"It is," Y/N said pressing the note to her chest.
The painting was a problem.
Physically, it was a problem because it was four feet wide and six feet tall. In a gallery, it looked imposing. In a hallway that smelled of damp carpet, it was a monolith. It blocked the bathroom door. If you wanted to pee, you had to turn sideways and suck in your stomach to squeeze past it.
"We should sell it," Josh said for the tenth time.
He was standing in front of it, eating a bowl of cereal. He pointed his spoon at the red dot in the center of the black canvas.
"I Googled it, Y/N. The guy who painted this? Some Danish dude. His stuff goes for insane money. We could put it on eBay. Or Gumtree."
Y/N sat on the floor, her back against the peeling wallpaper, staring at the canvas.
She looked at the pretentious red dot. She looked at the aggressive black void. She remembered Harry’s face in the gallery. The way he had looked at it with such disdain, only to buy it ten seconds later just to make her smile.
He hadn't sent flowers. Flowers were cliché. Flowers died. He hadn't sent jewelry. Jewelry was a transaction.
He had sent a fifty-thousand-pound inside joke.
He had sent a massive, inconvenient, ridiculous object just because they had shared a moment of snark about it. It was the most absurd, excessive, "Harry" thing he could have possibly done.
A bubble of laughter rose in her chest.
It started as a giggle, then bubbled up into a full, wet laugh. She covered her mouth, her shoulders shaking.
"What?" Josh asked, looking at her like she had lost her mind. "Why are you laughing? It’s just a spot."
"It’s not just a spot," Y/N gasped, wiping a tear from her eye. "It’s a love letter."
"A what?"
"It’s him," she said, shaking her head. "He’s insane. He’s absolutely insane. And he squeezed this giant thing into my tiny life just to remind me that he’s there."
She stood up. The laughter settled into a warm, glowing resolve in her chest. The coldness she had felt for three weeks evaporated.
Harry wasn't trying to buy her. He wasn't trying to starve her out. He was trying to flirt with her. He was poking her from his ivory tower, waiting to see if she would poke back.
"I’m going out," she announced.
"Where?" Josh asked. "To sell it?"
"No," Y/N said, grabbing her coat. She checked her reflection in the hallway mirror. She didn't look tired anymore. She looked like a woman with a plan. "I’m going to return the receipt."
"The receipt?"
"I’m going to negotiate, Josh," she said, a wicked smile spreading across her face. "Don't sell the painting. I think it really ties the room together."
The building was a fortress of glass and steel.
Vanguard Holdings occupied the top ten floors of one of the tallest skyscrapers in the City of London. It was a building designed to intimidate. The lobby was three stories high, filled with polished marble and security guards who looked like they were ex-SAS.
Y/N stood outside the revolving doors.
She looked down at herself. She wasn't wearing an interview suit. She was wearing wide-leg jeans rolled at the ankle, a crisp white tank top, and a long, structured black coat. A black baseball cap was pulled low over her hair, and a leather crossbody bag was slung across her chest.
She looked young. She looked like the kind of person who didn't belong in a place like this, which made her stand out even more.
She pushed through the revolving doors.
The air inside was cool and smelled of expensive sanitizer. The noise of the city vanished, replaced by the hushed murmur of commerce. Men in blue suits walked with purpose, checking their phones. Women in heels clicked across the marble.
Y/N walked straight to the reception desk. The receptionist was beautiful, intimidating, and wearing a headset.
"Can I help you?" she asked, not looking up from her screen.
"I am here to see Harry Styles," Y/N said clearly.
The receptionist stopped typing. She looked up. Her eyes swept over the jeans, the baseball cap, the trainers. It was a look of dismissal.
"Do you have an appointment?"
"No."
The receptionist gave a small, pitying smile. "Mr. Styles’ calendar is booked months in advance. I can't just—"
"Tell him it’s Y/N," she interrupted, leaning slightly onto the high desk. "Tell him I’m here about the commission."
The receptionist blinked. "The commission?"
"He’ll know what it means."
The receptionist hesitated. There was a spark in Y/N’s eyes that suggested she wasn't a random petitioner. She looked like trouble.
"One moment."
The receptionist picked up the phone. She dialed a number. She spoke in a hushed voice, turning her chair slightly away.
"Yes... a woman named Y/N... No, no appointment... She says it’s about a commission?"
Pause.
The receptionist went pale. Her eyes went wide.
"Yes. Yes, sir. Immediately."
She hung up the phone. She looked at Y/N with wide, terrified eyes. The pity was gone. Replaced by awe.
"Mr. Styles says you are to go up immediately," she said, her voice shaking slightly. "Top floor. The private elevator is to your right. Scan this pass."
She handed Y/N a plastic card.
"Thank you," Y/N said, tucking the pass into her pocket.
She walked to the private elevator. She scanned the pass.
The doors slid open.
There were no buttons inside. Just a single panel that lit up as soon as she entered.
Floor 45.
The elevator rose. Her ears popped.
She watched the numbers climb. 10... 20... 30...
Her stomach did flip-flops. She wasn't just going up a building. She was ascending back to Olympus. She was going back to the god who had thrown lightning bolts at her in a gallery and left her with a storm.
40... 45.
Ding.
The doors opened into a sleek, minimalist reception area. It was all glass and white marble. A severe-looking assistant sat behind a desk that cost more than Y/N’s university tuition.
"You are Y/N?" the assistant asked, looking her up and down with open disapproval. The baseball cap seemed to offend her personally.
"Yes."
"Mr. Styles is currently in a meeting," the assistant said coldly. "Take a seat. He will see you when he is finished."
Y/N didn't argue. She walked over to a black leather bench and sat down. She stretched her legs out, her trainers scuffing the pristine floor. She crossed her arms and waited.
Ten minutes passed.
Then, the large double doors to the inner office opened.
A woman walked out.
She was in her forties. She had perfectly coiffed blonde hair and was wearing a tailored navy suit that fit her like a second skin. She was carrying a leather portfolio and looked every inch the successful, "appropriate" executive.
She stopped when she saw Y/N.
Her eyes raked over the younger girl, the baggy jeans, the tank top, the baseball cap. Her lip curled slightly in a look of pure disdain. It was the look of someone who recognized an intruder. A tourist.
She shook her head slightly and walked to the elevator without a word.
Y/N watched her go. That was the competition. That was the life Harry was supposed to have.
The assistant’s phone buzzed.
"He will see you now," she said stiffly.
Y/N stood up. She adjusted her bag. She walked to the heavy double doors.
She pushed them open.
Harry’s office was massive. It occupied the corner of the building, with floor-to-ceiling glass walls on two sides. London lay spread out below like a toy set.
Harry was standing by the window.
He was wearing a suit identical to the one he wore to the gallary. It was perfectly fitted, emphasizing the breadth of his shoulders and the narrowness of his waist. He was holding a tumbler of amber liquid. He looked breathtaking. He looked rich. He looked untouchable.
He heard the door close. He turned around.
He saw her.
He froze. The glass lowered slowly in his hand. His eyes swept over her, the coat, the jeans, the cap casting a shadow over her eyes. The contrast between her youthful, cool aesthetic and his severe, corporate surroundings was jarring.
He didn't smile, but his eyes lit up. It was the first time she had seen life in them in weeks.
"You came," he said.
Y/N didn't walk further into the room. She stayed by the door, her hand gripping the strap of her bag.
"Who was she?" she asked.
Harry blinked, confused by the lack of greeting. "Who?"
"The woman," Y/N said, her voice tight. "The blonde. The suit. The one who looked at me like I was the cleaning crew. Is that her? Is that the appropriate choice?"
Harry’s expression hardened. He set his glass down on the window sill with a sharp clink.
"That was Victoria," he said. "She is a client. We are discussing a merger."
"She looked like more than a merger," Y/N accused. "She looked like a Sunday morning. She looked like someone your parents would love."
"She is a bore," Harry said flatly. "She talks about tennis and pension funds."
"So you haven't moved on?" she asked. Her voice wavered slightly, losing its edge. "You aren't... replacing me?"
Harry laughed. It was a dark, humorless sound.
"Replacing you?" he repeated. He walked toward her, stopping just out of reach. He looked at her with an intensity that burned. "Y/N, I have spent the last three weeks staring at a wall and checking your bank account every hour. I went to dinner with that woman once and I left before the main course because she wasn't you. I haven't moved on. I haven't moved an inch."
Y/N let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. The knot in her chest loosened.
"Good," she whispered.
"Good," Harry echoed. He looked her up and down again, this time taking in the outfit with appreciation rather than shock.
"Ideally, I would have sent a courier," Y/N said, recovering her composure and walking further into the room. Her trainers made no sound on the plush grey carpet. "But the item in question is a bit difficult to transport."
Harry’s lips twitched. "Is it?"
"It’s four feet wide, Harry," she said, stopping ten feet from him. "It blocks the bathroom. I have to shimmy past fifty thousand pounds of Danish angst just to brush my teeth."
Harry chuckled. It was a rusty sound, but it was real.
"I thought it matched your mood," he said smoothly.
"It matches the damp spot on the ceiling perfectly," she countered. "Josh wants to sell it on eBay."
"He wouldn't dare."
"He might. He wants to buy a used Ford Fiesta."
Harry grimaced. "Please tell him I will buy him a Fiesta if he promises never to touch the canvas again."
"I’m not here to talk about Josh’s car," Y/N said.
"Why are you here?"
"I’m here to negotiate."
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Negotiate? I didn't know we had an open deal."
"We do now."
She walked around the desk. She was now in his space. She was invading his territory just like he had invaded hers at the gallery.
"I have a counter-offer," she said.
Harry turned fully toward her. The playfulness dimmed slightly, replaced by an intense, hungry focus. "I’m listening."
"I am not signing a new contract," she stated.
"Okay."
"I am not taking an allowance for 'services rendered'."
"Okay."
"And I am not living in a schedule," she said. "If I want to see you on a Tuesday, I see you on a Tuesday. If I want to call you at 3 AM because I had a bad dream, I call you. No appointments. No shifts. No walls."
Harry looked at her. He looked at the fire in her eyes under the brim of the cap.
She took a step closer. She reached up and took off her cap, letting her hair fall around her shoulders. She looked up at him, baring her face.
"But it’s real, Harry. And I think you’re bored of perfect."
Harry stared down at her. He reached out and touched her hair, as if checking she was real.
"I am," he admitted softly. "I am bored to death of perfect. But I am also terrified of the mess.”
He looked up at her, and for the first time, the confident mask cracked completely. He looked vulnerable.
"You have to understand, Y/N... I don't know how to do that," he said, his voice rough. "I have lived my entire adult life in a contract. I understand terms. I understand boundaries. I understand ownership."
He stepped closer, his hands twitching at his sides as if he wanted to reach for her but wasn't sure if he was allowed to.
"I don't know how to do 'real'," he whispered. "I don't know how to handle the chaos without trying to fix it with money. So if we do this... if you want no walls..."
He took a shaky breath.
"You have to go slow with me. You have to be patient. Because this is new to me. And I am going to make mistakes."
Y/N softened. She saw the fear behind the power. He was a master of the universe, but he was a novice at love.
"I can be patient," she whispered. "As long as you are trying."
"I am willing to do anything to get you back," Harry swore. "I will burn the contracts. I will deal with the mess. Just... teach me how to do it."
"Deal," she whispered.
Harry looked at her mouth. He looked at her eyes. He looked like a man who had been holding his breath for a month and was finally exhaling.
"You missed a term," he said.
"Did I?"
"The living arrangements," Harry said, his voice dropping to a low rumble. "The painting doesn't fit in your flat. It’s a health and safety hazard."
"It is," she conceded.
"I have a wall," Harry said, stepping closer until their bodies were almost touching. "In Mayfair. It’s a very large, very empty wall. It needs something pretentious to tie the room together."
Y/N smiled. A genuine, blinding smile.
"Is that a job offer, Mr. Styles?"
"No," Harry said. He wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her flush against the expensive fabric of his suit. "It’s a plea. Bring the painting back. Bring your toothbrush. Bring the chaos."
He lowered his head.
"Just bring yourself back," he whispered against her lips. "Because I can't survive another week of being appropriate."
"Deal," she whispered.
Harry didn't kiss her immediately.
He rested his forehead against hers, closing his eyes and letting out a shuddering breath that seemed to empty his lungs of all the stress and distance of the last month. His hands moved up her back, large, warm, and firm. One hand slid into her hair, cupping the back of her head, holding her like she was something precious he had almost lost in a fire.
Then, he tilted his head and captured her mouth.
It wasn't aggressive. It wasn't a demand. It was worship.
His lips moved against hers with a slow, devastating tenderness. He kissed her like he was memorizing the shape of her mouth all over again. He tasted like relief. He tasted like home.
Y/N melted into him, her hands clutching the lapels of his jacket, rising on her toes to get closer. The cold, sterile office faded away. The view of London disappeared. There was only the heat of his body and the beat of his heart against her chest.
Harry groaned low in his throat, the sound vibrating against her lips. He deepened the kiss, pouring every ounce of his fear, his need, and his unspoken love into it. It was a promise signed not in ink, but in breath and skin.
He pulled her tighter until there was no air left between them, kissing her until her knees went weak and she had to cling to him just to stay upright.
Then, the shift happened.
He didn't pull away gently. He tore his mouth from hers with a sharp exhale, his forehead knocking against hers. His hands gripped her waist hard enough to leave marks.
"Three weeks," Harry rasped. It wasn't romantic; it was an accusation. "You vanished for three weeks."
"I had to," Y/N breathed, trying to find her footing. "I had to see if I could do it."
"And?" Harry demanded. He pulled back just enough to look her in the eye. His gaze was dark, dilated, and terrifyingly focused. "Could you?"
"No," she admitted. "I hated it."
Harry let out a rough sound, half-laugh, half-groan.
"You have no idea," he muttered. "You have no idea what you did to me."
He grabbed her hips and lifted her effortlessly, backing her up until she hit the edge of the desk. He set her on top of it, stepping between her legs to get closer. The friction of his expensive suit against her denim jeans sent a jolt of heat straight to her core.
"I stopped going home," Harry confessed. He ran his thumbs over her jawline, holding her face still so she couldn't look away. "I stayed here. I slept on the sofa in the back office."
He leaned in, his nose brushing hers.
"I haven't slept more than three hours a night since you left," he said, his voice low and gritty. "I stare at the ceiling and I wonder where you are. I wonder if you're cold. I wonder if you're with someone else."
"There was no one else," Y/N promised.
"Good," Harry growled. "Because I don't share."
He didn't wait for more words. He crashed his mouth back onto hers.
This wasn't a soft reunion. It was a collision.
He kissed her like he was starving. His mouth was hot and demanding, his tongue sweeping into her mouth with a possessive rhythm that made her head spin. It was messy, desperate, and necessary.
Y/N met him with equal force, wrapping her legs around his waist, pulling him flush against her. She tangled her fingers in his hair, tugging hard, needing to feel the reality of him.
Harry groaned into her mouth. He tilted her head back, exposing her throat. He buried his face in her neck, but he didn't kiss the skin gently; he bit down lightly on the sensitive cord of muscle, scraping his teeth against her pulse.
"Harry," she gasped, her back arching off the desk.
"I hated it," he murmured against her skin, pressing a hot, open-mouthed kiss over the spot he had just marked. "I hated every second of the quiet. Don't ever do that to me again."
"I won't," she breathed.
"I mean it," he said, pulling back. His lips were red, his hair was a mess, and his tie was askew. He looked thoroughly unraveled. "We figure it out. We fight. We negotiate. But you don't leave."
"I'm not going anywhere," she swore.
Harry stared at her for a second longer, cataloging the truth in her eyes. Then he nodded—once, sharp and decisive. The mask of control slid back into place, though his eyes remained wild.
He smoothed his tie with a hand that was still shaking slightly.
"Get off the desk," he said, his voice rough. "I'm taking you home."
Harry walked over to the intercom on his desk. He pressed the button with a heavy finger.
"Sophie?"
The assistant’s voice crackled through the speaker, crisp and professional. "Yes, Mr. Styles?"
"Cancel the board meeting," Harry said calmly. "Cancel the dinner with the investors. Cancel tomorrow morning while you are at it."
There was a stunned silence on the other end.
"Sir? The board meeting is regarding the Q3 projections. They are already seated in the conference room."
"Tell them something came up," Harry said. He looked at Y/N. He looked at her messy hair, her oversized coat, and the defiance still lingering in her eyes. "Tell them I am handling a volatile asset."
He released the button.
He grabbed his long wool coat from the rack and shrugged it on over his suit. He buttoned it once, his movements sharp and efficient.
He didn't ask if she was ready. He didn't offer his hand like a gentleman asking for a dance. He reached out and captured her hand. His grip was firm, warm, and absolute. It wasn't an invitation; it was a claim.
He pulled her toward the door.
They walked out of the inner office. Sophie was standing behind her desk, looking pale. She stared at Harry, then at Y/N in her baseball cap and trainers, and finally at Harry’s hand clamped possessively around the girl’s fingers.
"Sir," she stammered. "Should I reschedule for Monday?"
"Yes," Harry said. He didn't stop walking. "And Sophie?"
"Yes, sir?"
"Send someone to the address I am about to text you. There is a large black painting in the hallway. Have it transported to the townhouse. Carefully."
"The... painting, sir?"
"Yes."
Harry guided Y/N into the elevator, his hand moving to the small of her back to usher her in. The doors slid shut on Sophie's bewildered face.
They rode down in silence. It wasn't awkward. It was the charged, heavy silence of two people who had just narrowly avoided a collision.
When the doors opened in the lobby, the security guards straightened up. Usually, Harry walked through the lobby like a ghost—fast, focused on his phone, acknowledging no one.
Today he slowed down.
He kept Y/N firmly at his side. He walked her past the reception desk, past the marble columns, and through the revolving doors out onto the street. He didn't look at anyone else. He made it very clear that the only thing in the building that mattered was the woman wearing the baseball cap.
His driver was waiting at the curb. Harry opened the door for her, waited for her to slide in, and then got in beside her.
"Home," Harry said to the driver.
The car pulled away into the grey London traffic. The interior was quiet, sealed off from the noise of the city.
Y/N leaned back against the leather headrest, the adrenaline finally fading into exhaustion. She turned her head.
Harry was sitting in the corner of the seat, watching her. His arm was resting on the window ledge, his hand covering his mouth as if he was thinking. His eyes were heavy, dark, and unblinking.
"What?" she asked softly.
Harry dropped his hand. He didn't smile.
"I missed you," he said. It was a statement of fact, devoid of poetry.
Y/N let out a small breath, a corner of her mouth ticking up. She reached over and tugged lightly on the end of his tie, which was still crooked from their collision in the office.
"A volatile asset?" she teased softly. "Is that what I am now?"
Harry caught her hand before she could pull away, his thumb brushing over her knuckles. A ghost of a smirk finally touched his lips, bringing the light back into his eyes.
"High risk," he murmured, interlacing their fingers on the leather seat. "But very high reward."
