𝜗𝜚 objection, your honor! he’s insufferable! 𝜗𝜚 (dda!markcallanxclumsy!reader)
summary|| some love stories begin with a spark. this one, however, began with a spill. coffee stains across case files, in the courthouse, where softness is hidden behind manuscripts and closing arguments. one clumsy courthouse scribe and a sharp-eyed prosecutor create one giant mess of documents, pastries, and personal desire, and the terrifying realization that they’ve become suddenly become each other’s favorite part of the day. wc: 27k
warnings|| MDNI; 18+ content, slow-burn romance, romantic comedy, mild sexual content/fade-into-explicit romance, angst with a happy ending, workplace romance, recordsroom/courthouse setting, mutual pining, emotional repression, “ldiots in love” energy, grumpy x sunshine, forced proximity, yearning, tension & restraint, jealousy, hurt/comfort, protective!mark callan, soft domestic moments, late-night office scenes, courtroom gossip, coffee as a love language, touch-starved characters, stolen kisses, emotional vulnerability, praise & tenderness, fluff & angst balance, love confessions, emotional slow build, lots of banter, men written pathetically in love, falling in love through routine, “she falls first but he falls harder”, trauma & self-worth Issues, fear of being loved.
chapter 1: the people v. your dignity publish date: 5/22
chapter 2: the rumor mill finds you guilty publish date: 5/25
chapter 3: motion to dismiss your feelings publish date: 5/28
chapter 4: counsel for the defense has completely lost his mind publish date: 5/31
chapter 5: a brief recess for emotional catastrophe publish date: 6/3
Clint “falling first” when he’s in love with someone, but this “someone” “falling harder” bc HE IS such ray of sunshine, compassionate, caring, loving… it’s very personal to me.
I’m starting to write all my stories from here, thank you very much.
PAIRING; TYLER OWENS X OC
RATING; EXPLICIT
SUMMARY;
Kylie Mathers has spent years hiding behind the name Kylie Rose, determined to build her own storm photography legacy instead of living in the shadow of her parents...two heavily admired chasers who were killed by a tornado five years ago.
She's used to working in the background, slipping from one chase team to the next with her camera in hand. But everything changes in the summer of 2024 when she runs into her old college roommate, Lily, and gets pulled into a new crew; one that includes Tyler Owens, a famous chaser whose livestreams she's only ever seen clips of.
What starts as another season behind the lens quickly turns into something deeper: a fight with grief, an intense attraction, and a confrontation with a storm similar to the one that shattered her life.
Because this season, Kylie isn't just chasing storms.
She's chasing closure.
And she just might find love with one reckless cowboy.
ONE
The clouds always looked heavier in Oklahoma compared to other states I’d chased in. They carried secrets, low enough that my stomach pinched with a familiar, anxious thrill just standing beneath their vast, tumultuous ceiling. It was the feeling of standing on the edge of a precipice, knowing something huge was about to happen. I shivered, but not from a chill in the air.
The wind was stiff, carrying the dry, dusty smell of the plains mixed with the distinct, metallic tang of an approaching storm. Perfect light, though. I lifted my Nikon D850, the familiar weight of the lens a comfort in my hand. I framed the shot: the endless stretch of empty blacktop bisecting the flat horizon, the sickly, expectant green hue that bled from the bottom of the clouds, and the dark silhouette of the gas station sign in the foreground.
I adjusted the aperture, focused on the swirling texture high above, and clicked. The shutter sounded crisp and professional, a tiny, satisfying punctuation mark in the vast silence. The image that popped up on the review screen was stunning. The green was sharp, the clouds' underbelly looking like bruised silk. That single shot, just one fraction of a second, was the distillation of hours of driving, waiting, and calculating.
It wasn’t always glamorous work. For every transcendent shot of a mesocyclone or a perfect shelf cloud, there were days spent photographing the mundane logistics; mud-splattered chase vehicles, exhausted teams huddled over laptops, or the frustrating sight of dented equipment being loaded back up. But those once-in-a-lifetime shots of the storms? The ones that captured nature’s terrible, beautiful majesty? They were totally worth it. They were why I kept coming back to the chase, year after year.
I’d been working as a freelance storm photographer for two years, ever since I graduated college and finally admitted I couldn’t stay away. My parents, Doug and Melinda Mathers, had been storm chasers; the kind of chasers that were practically legends in the community. They were innovators, known for their unwavering dedication to data collection and their incredible footage, before... well, before that storm took them. The memory was still visceral: standing behind them as a kid, my small body vibrating with the raw energy of the wind whipping around me while they shouted over the roar of the atmosphere. The excitement was overwhelming, intoxicating.
Losing them left a massive, howling hole in that adrenaline-fueled world. For a long beat, during the start of college, I wanted nothing to do with it. The sight of a dark cloud made my heart pound with dread, not anticipation. But the obsession, the inherited love for the atmosphere, was in my blood. I couldn't cut it out.
So, during my second semester of college, I built a life around the storms in my own way, carving out a safer, quieter space behind the lens rather than behind the data instruments. I was still chasing the rush, but I was doing it on my own terms.
Being freelance meant my name wasn’t plastered on flashy YouTube thumbnails like the big chasers or slapped across the bottom of a weather broadcast like the celebrity weathermen. Just a quiet byline credit whenever my work was shared: Kylie Rose. Exactly how I liked it.
I specifically left my true last name off everything it didn't strictly need to be on. The Mathers name was a heavy one to carry. It carried expectations, tragedy, and a legacy I wasn't sure I could ever measure up to. I didn’t want clients or fans to seek out my photos because of who my parents were; I wanted them to do well because of my talent, the sharpness of my eye, and the uniqueness of my angle. I needed to stand on my own merit, not on the shoulders of giants.
The wind shivered through the tall, dry grass of the field across from the battered gas station. I walked slowly back to my vehicle, a reliable but unremarkable black Equinox that had driven more miles than it had any right to. The trunk hatch was open, creating a perfect mobile desk. My laptop was balanced precariously on the edge, the radar display on the screen glowing with a vibrant, anxious map of greens, reds, and yellows; it looked like a radioactive Christmas tree.
The atmosphere was primed. A significant cap was holding strong, but the storm indices were screaming instability. If that cap broke, today would be huge. I was so engrossed in the data, analyzing the wind shear and the convergence zones, that the shout nearly made me jump out of my skin.
“Oh. My. GOD. KYLIE?”
I glanced over my shoulder, my hand instinctively gripping the camera strap. The voice was familiar, high-pitched, and charged with energy.
Lily. It was Lily Vance, my former college roommate and my very first unofficial chase partner. We hadn’t chased together in about two years, not since she decided to drop out right before graduation and pursue full-time streaming with a crew from Arkansas. But here she was, standing in front of me with the same blinding grin, looking like she’d just stepped out of our last Meteorology lecture.
She wore a bright blue branded hoodie that clashed magnificently with the moody sky, her auburn locs pulled back in a bun. Her eyes were wide, taking me in. “Wow,” she breathed, already moving. She pulled me into a fierce, breathless hug before I could even fully register her presence. Her scent was still the same, a mix of sunscreen and Diet Coke. “You look exactly the same. What are you doing out here? Freelance job?”
I leaned back from the hug, my heart rate finally slowing down. The warmth of the reunion was a pleasant distraction from the storm anxiety. “I’m getting some pre-storm landscape shots for my Instagram portfolio,” I smiled, gesturing to the laptop. “I assume you still chase?”
Lily nodded enthusiastically, her eyes sparkling, and she gestured behind her. A man was leaning against a massive, red pickup truck that looked like a tank; fully equipped with an arsenal of antennae, a roof-mounted barometer, and reinforced metal plating. He was tall, easily six-foot-five, and dressed in a dark, worn denim shirt and jeans. The brim of his weathered cowboy hat cast a shadow over sharp, sun-squinted eyes that were fixed on us like a spotlight. For a flash of a second, I thought he looked genuinely annoyed at the interruption. Then, his hand lifted in a slow, lazy wave, and his face softened into an easy, slightly challenging smirk.
Tyler Owens. The name popped into my head instantly. I might not watch chase streams, but you couldn't be in this world and not know who he was. Streamer. Daredevil. Chase celebrity. A little reckless, maybe even dangerously so, if the viral clips I’d seen online of him driving through baseball-sized hail were anything to go by. I hadn’t known Lily had partnered with HIS crew.
Lily followed my gaze. “We’re part of his main team now. We stream all our chases, can you believe we have almost a million followers now?” she said proudly, practically vibrating. “I fly the drones now! No more cheap college drones, either.”
“That’s awesome, Lily,” I grinned, genuinely happy for her. I reached out and squeezed her arm. “I’m glad you found your team.” I remembered fondly when it had just been us, crammed into my old Toyota, chasing miles of empty road for a single, barely formed funnel cloud. Our chases were quiet, focused on data and safety.
This setup was... different. My gaze slid back to Tyler. He was no longer looking at us. He stood with another teammate now, a younger guy whose face was buried in a tablet. Tyler’s head was bent in concentration, the intensity of his focus visible even from a distance. He looked like a general planning a military campaign. I couldn’t begin to explain what it was that instantly intrigued me about him. It wasn't just his reputation. It was the way he commanded the space around him, a calm center in the brewing chaos.
His type of chasing was everything I deliberately avoided; the celebrity, the hype, the danger taken to the edge. And yet, I couldn't look away.
“Hey, I have a crazy question,” Lily began, suddenly plopping down onto the edge of my tailgate, breaking my gaze away from Tyler. “Would you want to come photograph for us this season?”
I paused, the intensity of the opportunity hitting me like a physical punch. I snuck another glance at Tyler. He was looking at his truck's monitor now, a subtle frown creasing his brow. This could be a good opportunity… a really good opportunity, I thought, the internal debate instantly commencing.
Freelance assignments of this caliber didn't come often. A few high-profile, credited photos with a name like Tyler Owens could solidify my reputation for years and finally make the Mathers name irrelevant to my identity. And the chance to work close to such a... noted individual? Impossible to ignore. Dangerous, perhaps, but impossible to ignore.
It was the kind of professional leap I’d been waiting for. I pushed the fear of the spotlight down. “Sure. Let’s do it,” I said, the decision surprising even myself. I grabbed my laptop and secured my camera.
The smile that spread across Lily’s face was dazzling. She practically vaulted off the tailgate, grabbed my hand, and tugged me straight across the lot, right into Tyler Owens’ orbit. I shuffled behind her, trying to maintain a semblance of professional calm. The camera was secured around my neck, and the laptop was tucked firmly under my arm.
My inner monologue was frantic. Keep it cool, Kylie. This is a job. You’re better than he is, photographically. Focus on the light, not the man.
Despite the mental rehearsal, I couldn't help but study him as we approached. He was even broader up close, radiating a low-level heat that had nothing to do with the weather. His truck smelled faintly of gasoline, dust, and something woodsy. Tyler’s gaze lifted from the monitor and met mine. My face, to my utter horror, instantly burst into a rush of heat. It was childish, unprofessional, and completely unavoidable. His eyes were, admittedly, a beautiful, clear green/blue, fringed by impossibly long lashes; the kind of eyes that could spot a tornado from ten miles away.
“Kylie,” Lily began, breaking the tense silence, her excitement oblivious to the undercurrents. “This…” she gestured dramatically to the man who still hadn't moved, “is Tyler Owens.”
He straightened up from his truck, a casual, almost predatory movement. He gave me a quick, full once-over, his gaze lingering only a second too long on my camera before sweeping back to my face. I could feel the weight of his stare, an unnerving focus that seemed to dissect me and made all my well-organized thoughts scatter like loose papers in the wind.
“Tyler,” I managed, extending a hand firmly, determined not to seem intimidated. My fingers brushed the rough calluses of his palm. His grip was strong, surprisingly warm. I swallowed hard, feeling the brief, electric contact. “I’ve seen a few clips of your chases,” I said, forcing a calm smile, praying I didn’t look as flustered as I felt. I couldn’t believe how physically reactive I was being to a man I’d just met.
His smirk widened, a subtle tilt of his mouth that suggested he knew exactly the effect he was having. “I’ve seen your photos,” he countered, his voice a low, gravelly timbre that vibrated between us. He tilted his head, eyes narrowing in open, challenging appraisal. “You’re THE Kylie Rose, right? The ones who got the time-lapse of the multi-vortex EF-3 over Cheyenne?”
I froze for a beat. Sure, my work was known in the community, but hearing my carefully constructed pseudonym from his mouth, accompanied by such an accurate reference, was a jolt. He knew my work. He was aware of my talent. “Yeah,” I said finally, allowing a small, professional pride to override the sudden shock. “That’s me.”
He registered my slight, awkward pause but didn’t press. Instead, he flicked an amused glance at Lily, who was bouncing on the balls of her feet. “I take it you’re about to ask if she can be our official photographer?” He grinned knowingly, folding his arms across his broad chest.
Lily nodded eagerly. “Best shots you’ll ever get, Tyler. She sees things no one else does.”
“Freelance?” he asked, the curiosity flashing across his eyes now purely professional, dissecting the potential terms
“Yup,” I confirmed, keeping my voice steady. His next words were quiet, confident, and made me blush harder than I wanted to admit.
“I like a freelancer.”
I forced a genuine smile, fighting the urge to step back far enough to escape his immediate gravitational pull and calm the butterflies taking over my stomach. Why did this reckless streamer make me feel so fundamentally unsettled? This wasn't professional. This was ridiculous.
“Well,” Lily said brightly, clapping her hands together, oblivious to the silent, charged exchange. “I think you two are going to get along just fine. Kylie, show him your latest! You know, that landscape you just took.”
I nodded, fingers tightening on my laptop. Every instinct was buzzing with excitement, fear, and a sharp, unfamiliar attraction. Tyler’s gaze lingered for a moment, a silent acknowledgment of the tension, before he gestured toward my laptop, a simple nod of acceptance. I blinked a few times, taking a deep, fortifying breath of storm-tinged air before placing the laptop on the tailgate of his massive truck. Okay… first interaction survived. Now I just had to survive chasing the season with him.
𝜗𝜚 objection, your honor! he’s insufferable! 𝜗𝜚 (dda!markcallanxclumsy!reader)
summary|| Mark tries to avoid you, but the tension only grows stronger when he finally admits you distract him more than he wants to confess. between archive-room honesty, courthouse gossip, cafeteria tenderness, and one very public hand-touching moment, it becomes clear that neither of you can keep pretending this is harmless. wc: 3.3k
warnings|| SFW; workplace romance, emotional tension, mutual pining, anxiety, avoidance, accidental touching, romantic jealousy/gossip, mentions of violent crime cases, work burnout, family/financial stress hints, public embarrassment, unresolved feelings; no smut yet.
Chapter Three: Motion to Dismiss Your Feelings
After the hallway incident, Mark Callan began avoiding you.
Not in an obvious way. That would have been easier.
No, Mark avoided you subtly, almost carefully, with the precision of a man trying desperately to remain professional while failing at it internally.
He stopped lingering in records. Stopped finding excuses to “coincidentally” appear wherever you were working. Stopped looking at you for more than a second at a time.
Somehow, that hurt far more than it should have.
By Monday, your mood had become so visibly pathetic that even the courthouse security guard paused while checking IDs and gave you a sympathetic look, as if even he could sense your disappointment.
“You okay?” Rita asked, eyeing you slumped over your keyboard.
“No.”
“That bad?”
“I think he regrets me.”
Rita made a face immediately. “Absolutely not.”
“He’s avoiding me.”
“He’s trying not to fall in love with you in a government building.”
You dropped your forehead onto the desk, overwhelmed by helplessness.
“That is not helping.”
“Honey, that man looks at you like you personally invented hope.”
You groaned into the wooden surface, but unfortunately, Rita’s encouragement stopped working around lunchtime.
When Mark walked into records looking devastatingly handsome and emotionally unavailable, which, honestly, should have qualified as workplace harassment.
He was wearing a charcoal suit with his tie slightly loosened, the circles beneath his eyes looked deeper than usual.
The exhaustion was unmistakable, etched not just in his face but in the way his shoulders slumped, weighed down by case files and the impossible expectations of the DA's office.
The second you saw him, your heart ached with a terrible mix of worry and longing.
You wondered if it was only the mountain of trial prep draining him, or if something heavier was pulling at him from outside the courthouse walls.
Once, you'd caught a glimpse of a crumpled envelope peeking out from his briefcase, its corner marked with a bank logo and handwriting that did not look like his—hinting at a complicated family relationship.
Sometimes, late in the day, you heard him on tense phone calls, his voice tight, layered with the kind of worry you recognized from experience.
Occasionally, there would be a reluctant mention of his brother or flashes of half-finished sentences about someone 'back home' before his voice dropped to a low murmur the second anyone passed by.
“Callan,” Rita greeted casually.
“Rita.”
His eyes flicked toward you automatically, then away too fast, as if even making eye contact cost him something vulnerable, exposing feelings he was not ready to share, and the thought sent a sharp, anxious ache through your chest that made it hard to breathe for a moment.
“I just need the Davidson files,” he said.
“I’ll grab them,” you offered too quickly.
Mark hesitated.
“Okay.”
The word came softer than expected, so you disappeared into archive storage, desperate to escape before your humiliation became impossible to hide.
Naturally, the Davidson files were on the highest shelf imaginable, because even fate—or God—seemed personally committed to targeting you in your moment of vulnerability, and you climbed carefully this time, muttering under your breath as you reached for the box.
“Okay,” you whispered. “No falling. No humiliation. We’re evolving.”
The box caught awkwardly, so you tugged harder.
Three additional binders immediately slid off the shelf directly toward your face.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me—”
One hand caught a binder midair while the other grabbed the ladder before it could fall, and when you looked down, of course, it was Mark, because apparently the universe had officially typecast him as your personal emergency response team.
“You know,” he said dryly, “most people retrieve files without entering combat.”
“I was ambushed.”
“By office supplies.”
“They moved first.”
His mouth twitched faintly despite himself, and you climbed down carefully this time—which meant, naturally, your shoe caught on the final rung.
Mark steadied your waist automatically before you could stumble, his hands lingering for barely two seconds, but the brief touch still sent a jolt through your body, rattling your nerves and leaving you dizzy.
Then his hands dropped immediately, like he had remembered, he wasn’t supposed to touch you anymore.
The realization stung more than it should have, leaving you feeling foolishly exposed as you quietly handed him the Davidson files.
“Thanks.”
Mark nodded once, and then silence settled between you—awkward, heavy, and instantly unbearable. You hated it, hated how thick the air felt now, how it seemed to amplify every uncomfortable emotion twisting inside you.
“I haven’t seen you much,” you blurted before your brain could stop you.
Mark’s expression shifted subtely.
“I’ve been busy.”
The answer was technically true, which somehow made it worse, and you stared at him for a second too long, unsure what to do with the uncomfortable honesty sitting between you.
“You’re avoiding me.”
Straight to jail.
Your soul left your body the moment the words escaped, and Mark looked genuinely startled—not offended, but caught.
The room went painfully quiet before he finally exhaled once through his nose, like he was trying very hard not to react.
“Yes.”
Your heart sank, a cold heaviness settling in your chest as disappointment took over.
“Oh.”
Mark’s jaw tightened immediately. “That’s not—”
“You don’t have to explain.”
“I do, actually.”
The intensity in his voice pulled your gaze up, and your stomach somersaulted with nervous hope.
Mark ran one tired hand across the back of his neck before speaking carefully.
“You make this difficult.”
Your pulse stumbled painfully, the reality of his words stunning you into silence.
“…What?”
His gaze locked onto yours fully for the first time in days, and suddenly, all the oxygen disappeared.
“You walk into a room,” he said quietly, “and I stop thinking about everything else.”
Your heart skipped a full beat, and Mark looked almost frustrated by his own honesty now, as if the words had slipped out before he could pull them back.
“You smile at me, and I forget what I’m saying mid-sentence.” His laugh came rough and humorless.
“Do you have any idea how dangerous that is for a prosecutor?”
You stared at him in complete silence, because surely this was a stress hallucination.
“I spent three hours yesterday rereading the same witness statement,” he continued quietly.
“Because I saw you in the hallway and my brain stopped functioning afterward.”
Heat flushed through you so suddenly it was almost unbearable, a dizzying rush of shock and hesitant yearning, because Mark Callan looked wrecked, as if every honest word had cost him something he had not meant to give away.
“And that,” he said finally, “is why I’ve been avoiding you.”
The ache in your chest shifted, softening into a tenderness so sharp it made your eyes sting, because he sounded scared—not of you, but of wanting you too much.
In that moment, your own fears pressed in alongside his, twisting through every part of you. Some old memory flickered beneath the surface, the familiar echo of a love that unraveled when you let yourself hope a little too much, the disappointment of trusting someone who promised to stay but chose to leave instead.
You wanted so badly to believe in the hope shining in his eyes, but under it pulsed the old, familiar panic: What if you reached too far? What if you rushed everything by hoping for more than he could give?
The vulnerability felt impossible, like standing at the edge of something breathtaking and terrifying at the same time. But still, you couldn’t let go of the hope that maybe he was just as afraid of losing this as you were.
When you finally spoke, your voice came out softer than you intended, trembling at the edges with nervousness and an honesty you could no longer hide.
“You make me nervous, too.”
Mark went still.
“I know.”
That admission hit hard, sending a rush of relief and vulnerability through you, because of course, he knew. Mark noticed everything.
Silence stretched between you then, thick with all the words neither of you knew how to say properly, heavy with feelings too fragile to name, until finally, softly, you whispered.
“Mark…”
Your phone rang, and you nearly screamed as the noise shattered the tender moment, jolting you out of your feelings and back into reality.
You fumbled it from your cardigan pocket while mentally apologizing to every known deity, and Mark actually laughed under his breath—warm, helpless, and dangerously fond.
You answered the phone too quickly. “Hello?”
Rita’s voice blasted through immediately.
“WHY IS CALLAN STILL IN RECORDS?”
You closed your eyes in mortified horror, feeling embarrassment boil over. Across from you, Mark looked genuinely delighted for the first time all week.
“I hate everyone,” you whispered into the phone.
“Evelyn says you two have been missing for fifteen minutes, and she’s taking bets now.”
“Oh my God.”
“Also,” Rita added cheerfully, “if you kiss him in archive storage, I need at least twenty dollars from somebody.”
You hung up immediately, and silence fell for one suspended second before Mark laughed—really laughed, low, helpless, and completely devastating.
You stared at him, stunned, your heart skipping at the sound, because there it was again: that rare, unguarded version of him, beautiful enough to make your chest physically ache.
“You know,” he said once he recovered slightly, “your coworkers are terrifying.”
You smiled helplessly. “You should hear what they say when you walk by.”
His eyes softened instantly at your smile, and suddenly it felt as if your hearts recognized each other all over again, the room quieting as the laughter faded and the air thickened between you.
Mark looked at you for too long, and you looked back, neither of you moving until he finally spoke.
“We should probably get back.”
“Yes,” you whispered.
Neither of you moved, the tension pulsing quietly between you as you lingered on the edge of something more again.
Mark’s gaze flicked briefly toward your mouth before he caught himself, sending your heartbeat into catastrophe, and then he stepped back first—always first—but this time, before he fully turning away, you spoke softly.
“For the record…”
You swallowed hard.
“You make it difficult, too.”
He walked out of archive storage shaking his head, leaving you standing there alone with a heartbeat that felt like a full legal confession.
—𝜗𝜚—
After the archive storage incident, the tension between you and Mark became unbearable—not awkward, but worse, mutual. It lived in lingering eye contact, unfinished sentences, accidental brushes of hands that left both of you silent afterward, and the way Mark started appearing beside your desk with coffee you never technically saw him buy.
It was in the way you began memorizing the sound of his footsteps without meaning to, and it was becoming a problem, a huge one, because now the entire courthouse watched the two of you like a live television drama.
There were whispers in the break room, knowing glances exchanged in the halls, and suddenly every late afternoon coffee or shared smile felt like it might end up as the next headline of courthouse gossip.
At moments, you caught your supervisor watching a little too closely or heard your own name paired with Mark's in a low-voiced conversation that quieted the second you appeared.
There were protocols against workplace relationships here, or at least enough unspoken rules to make your cheeks flush every time an email popped up from HR. Just existing in the same space with him felt riskier now, as if the next slip could turn rumors into real consequences neither of you wanted to face.
“Morning, lovebirds,” Simon from intake greeted Tuesday morning.
You nearly dropped your bag.
Mark, standing beside your desk reviewing a file, didn’t even look up.
“Good morning, Simon.” He said.
Simon blinked. “Wow. Didn’t deny it.”
Mark calmly turned a page in the file, and your soul left your body.
“Oh my God,” You whispered.
Simon physically clutched his chest. “OH MY GOD.”
“Get out,” Mark said dryly.
Simon fled immediately to spread destruction elsewhere.
You turned slowly toward Mark in horror. “You cannot do things like that.”
Mark finally looked up.
“What things?”
“You just— you—”
“I answered a greeting.”
“You answered it like that.”
A tiny flicker of amusement appeared in his eyes.
“You’re blushing.”
“You’re impossible.”
“And yet,” he replied calmly, “you keep talking to me.”
Your mouth opened, closed, then opened again, but nothing came out.
Mark looked unbearably pleased with himself for approximately two seconds before professionalism settled back over him, which was deeply unfair.
“How’s the Wilson transcription going?” He asked.
You narrowed your eyes suspiciously. “Are you pretending to be normal right now?”
“I’m always normal.”
Yesterday, he’d stared at your mouth for six full seconds while you explained copier issues.
“Sure.”
Mark’s gaze softened for the briefest second before his expression shifted, and you noticed immediately.
“Wait,” You said slowly. “You look awful.”
He blinked once, as if the statement surprised him. “Thank you.”
“No, I mean—” You lowered your voice. “Have you slept?”
Mark looked away, and your chest tightened at once, because there it was—the answer was absolutely not.
“You’ve been here all night again, haven’t you?”
“It’s trial prep.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
Something frustrated and tender twisted painfully inside you, because he said things like that so casually, as if exhaustion was normal, as if running himself into the ground didn’t matter, and you stood before you could overthink it, making Mark look immediately wary.
“That expression concerns me.”
“You need food.”
“I eat.”
“You had pretzels for lunch yesterday.”
“You remember my lunch choices?”
“You remember my near-death experiences.”
“That’s because there are so many.”
You ignored that. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
“The cafeteria.”
Mark stared at you like you’d suggested armed robbery.
“I have work.”
“And you’ll still have work after consuming one vegetable.”
“I’m not sure the cafeteria legally counts as vegetables.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“You dragged me away from a homicide file.”
“You prosecute murders better when your organs function properly.”
Something warm flickered across his face—quickly gone, but there all the same—before he sighed and finally set the file down.
“Five minutes.”
“Ten.”
“Seven.”
“You negotiate literally for a living.”
“And I’m excellent at it.”
You smiled before you could stop yourself, and of course, Mark noticed. His expression softened instantly in that dangerous, quiet way that always made your heartbeat feel suddenly unstable.
“Seven,” you agreed softly.
The courthouse cafeteria was mostly empty at that hour as you carried your tray carefully toward a corner table, Mark walking beside you with black coffee and what looked suspiciously like an actual sandwich. It was progress.
Unfortunately, the second you sat down, your sleeve caught the edge of your plastic fork, sending it flying dramatically across the cafeteria.
A woman at another table ducked.
Mark closed his eyes briefly, as if asking the universe for patience and e none.
“I genuinely need scientists to study you.”
“I’m having a hard day.”
“You threw cutlery.”
“It was accidental.”
Mark laughed quietly into his coffee, and there it was again—that impossible warmth, the kind that still startled you every time.
You watched him take a bite of his sandwich, exhaustion lingering heavily beneath his eyes, and without the sharpness of the courtroom or the constant noise of the courthouse halls around him, he looked different sitting there.
Softer.
Lonelier somehow.
Enough to make your chest ache unexpectedly. You had the sudden urge to reach out, to find the right words that would lift the heaviness from his shoulders, but all you could do was sit with the ache in your chest and hope he felt less alone just from your quiet presence.
For a moment, you almost whispered something honest—a small confession about wanting to help, about how hard it is to see someone you care about struggle and not know how to fix it—but the words caught in your throat, fragile and unspoken. Still, you lingered there in the hope that he might feel it anyway.
“What?” Mark asked suddenly.
You blinked. “What?”
“You’re staring at me.”
Mortifying.
You looked down instantly. “Sorry.”
Mark was quiet for a second.
Then:
“Don’t apologize for that.”
Your heart absolutely folded in on itself, and suddenly the cafeteria felt too small, too warm, too full of things neither of you were saying.
Mark leaned back slightly in his chair, studying you with those unbearable dark eyes, as if he could hear every frantic thought your face was trying to hide.
“You know,” he said quietly, “most people are intimidated by me.”
“I am intimidated by you.”
“No,” he murmured. “You’re nervous around me. Different thing.”
Your pulse stumbled.
“You cross-examine murder suspects for fun.”
“I do not do it for fun.”
“Your face says otherwise.”
A reluctant smile tugged briefly at his mouth before it faded, the exhaustion returning so visibly you could almost watch him retreat back into it in real time.
“How long have you been doing this?” you asked softly.
“Too long.”
“That’s not a number.”
Mark looked down at his coffee for a moment before answering.
“Eight years in the DA’s office.”
“That’s a lot.”
“Yeah.”
“You ever think about stopping?”
His eyes lifted slowly back to yours, and suddenly something deeper moved beneath his expression—something tired, aching, and far too honest to hide.
“I don’t know how.”
The honesty of it hit hard because he didn’t sound dramatic; he sounded sincere, as if somewhere along the way work had consumed everything else.
Your chest ached painfully for him, and before you could think better of it, you reached across the table and touched his hand, just lightly, warm skin beneath your fingertips.
Mark froze instantly, his eyes dropping to your hand before lifting slowly to your face. You should have pulled away, absolutely should have, but instead your thumb brushed once against his knuckles, the smallest movement imaginable, and still enough to change the entire atmosphere.
Mark inhaled sharply, not loudly, but enough to make your heartbeat turn catastrophic as the cafeteria noise faded into something distant and meaningless.
His gaze locked onto yours with an intensity that made breathing difficult, and then he said quietly, rough around the edges, “You really need to stop doing that.”
You swallowed hard. “Doing what?” His voice dropped lower.
“Touching me like it doesn’t affect you.”
The words landed somewhere deep and dangerous because he sounded like he was barely holding himself together, and maybe, horrifyingly, so were you. Your voice came out barely above a whisper.
“It does affect me.”
Mark looked wrecked, absolutely wrecked, and his hand turned slightly beneath yours before he could stop himself, like instinct, like he wanted more contact. Your breath caught, and then suddenly, Rita’s voice rang across the cafeteria.
“Oh my God.”
You jerked apart instantly as Rita stood there holding a salad and the expression of a woman witnessing live theater. Behind her, Evelyn Price looked one second away from screaming.
“You two are insane,” Evelyn informed both of you, while Mark leaned back in his chair, visibly resigned, and you considered immediate death.
Rita pointed aggressively between you. “Hand touching in public? During business hours? In this economy?”
You opened your mouth weakly. “It wasn’t—,” but Evelyn cut in with,
“What are you, a Jane Austen protagonist?”
Mark pinched the bridge of his nose. “Can either of you behave professionally for one minute?”
“No,” both women answered immediately.
You buried your face in your hands, but across from you, Mark looked dangerously close to smiling again, and somehow, that made everything worse.
You peeked between your fingers, your embarrassment still prickling, and caught the hint of warmth softening his features.
For a split second, it felt like it was only the two of you at that table. Despite the chaos around you, something hopeful settled between you.
Mark glanced away with the trace of a secret smile still hiding in the corner of his mouth, and you couldn’t help wondering if this was the start of something neither of you had enough courage yet to name.
𝜗𝜚 objection, your honor! he’s insufferable! 𝜗𝜚 (dda!markcallanxclumsy!reader)
summary|| a coffee spill makes one ordinary intern impossible for Mark Callan to ignore. what starts as an embarrassing accident turns into ruined muffins, falling files, nervous laughter, and unexpected romance. wc: 3.5k
warnings|| SFW; teasing banter, embarrassment/social anxiety, workplace/courthouse setting, mention of a murder case file, mild injury risk/falling, food and drink spills, romantic/jealous tension; no smut yet, mention of a past fiancée/relationship ending badly.
Chapter One: The People v. Your Dignity
The first time you met Deputy District Attorney Mark Callan, you'd spilled your coffee across a murder file.
Not cutely, and not in the delicate, rom-com sort of way where a few drops landed near the corner, and everyone laughed because it’s meaningless.
No, you managed to knock over an entire cup of scalding hot, overpriced courthouse coffee right across Exhibit B, three witness statements, and the sleeve of Mark Callan’s perfectly pressed white shirt.
For one terrible second, the world stopped. Mark looked down in disbelief, and the paralegal beside him made a sound of pure despair.
You clutched your notebook to your chest like it might shield you from prosecution, and the devastating reality of his stare.
“Oh, my god. I am so, sorry.”
When Mark Callan looked back up at you, it was determined that he was the kind of handsome that seemed almost unfair.
Sharp cheekbones, tired eyes, and a mouth that looked like it never smiled without good reason. His hair was neat, his tie was straight, and his expression was the kind you’d expect in court right before something life-altering happened.
For a ridiculous moment, you forgot how to breathe. Up close, Mark was both intimidating and enticing.
You, on the other hand, wore a sweater with ink-stained cuffs and had, on more than one occasion, committed a caffeine-based felony.
“This is the People’s case file.” he said calmly
You winced. “I can see that.”
“It is no longer legible.”
“I can also see that.”
His gaze dropped to the spreading coffee stain. “…and now it smells like hazelnut.”
“That part might be my fault.”
“Really?” he asked. “I was about to blame the defendant.”
You blinked, then, because you were nervous and apparently possessed absolutely no survival instincts, you laughed—a small, terrified sound that slipped out before you could stop it.
Mark didn’t laugh, but something shifted in his eyes, something that wasn’t quite warmth but came dangerously close, like the smallest crack of light beneath a door he usually kept locked.
“I’ll fix it,” you blurted. “I’m a scribe—well, I’m interning with records, but I type fast. I can redo everything. I’ll stay late. I can—”
“You can start by not touching anything else.”
Your hand froze midair, and God help you, because Mark Callan had looked at you like you were going to be his newly appointed, biggest problem.
Mark sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “What’s your name?”
You told him it. He repeated it once, as if he were filing it away under future liability.
When he left, coffee dripping from the edge of his file folder onto the courthouse floor, leaving a path for you to follow as he walked down the hall.
You should have felt relieved. Instead, your stupid heart gave one hard, humiliating kick from inside your chest.
—𝜗𝜚—
The courthouse had its own soundtrack: ringing phones, shoes striking marble, muted arguments leaking beneath office doors, and the steady hum of overworked officials trying to hold the justice system together with nothing but caffeine and spite.
You’d only been there exactly twelve days, and somehow, in less than two weeks, you had already earned a reputation.
It wasn’t terrible, but it was enough that when you entered the records office Monday morning carrying three folders and a blueberry muffin, someone immediately looked up and said, “Careful, Callan’s in the building.”
You groaned. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Rita said from behind a stack of deposition transcripts. “You’re too sweet. Honestly, it’s irritating.”
You dropped your purse into the chair with a dramatic sigh. “He still hates me.”
Rita snorted. “Deputy District Attorney Mark Callan hates everyone.”
“That is not comforting.” You left your coffee and phone on your desk as you shrugged off your coat.
“That’s because you’re young enough to still want comforting.” She turned back to her laptop and placed her glasses back on her face, getting back to whatever Brenner had asked from her.
“You sound like a woman who’s seen things.” You said, and began unwrapping your muffin.
“I’ve worked in this building twenty-two years,” Rita replied. “I have seen things. Including Callan making a defense attorney cry in open court.”
You paused before getting up. “Seriously?”
“She deserved it.”
You appreciated her honesty.
“That’s… weirdly reassuring.” She shrugged, “He’s good at his job,” she said simply. “Too good, honestly. Men like him are pretty much robots, surviving on legal pads and self-loathing.”
You tried not to think about that for too long, but unfortunately, your brain betrayed you immediately, because now you were imagining Mark late at night in his office, sleeves rolled up, jaw shadowed with exhaustion, rubbing tired eyes over stacks of files beneath dim lamplight.
You didn’t even like him, not really. You liked the idea of him; there was a difference. A tragic one, admittedly, but still a difference.
“Earth to disaster girl.” You turned around and blinked. “What?”
Rita grinned knowingly. “You’re doing the thing again.”
“What thing?” You asked.
“The staring-into-space-like-you’re-in-a-period-drama thing.”
“I do not do that.”
“You absolutely do.”
You opened your mouth to defend yourself and, with devastating timing, walked your muffin directly into the edge of the filing cabinet.
It launched from your hand, and Rita screamed, but you screamed louder.
Blueberry filling exploded across the floor just as someone stepped around the corner. Polished black shoes, stopping mere inches from the scene of complete pastry destruction.
Silence fell.
Slowly, your eyes traveled upward—dark slacks, an expensive-looking belt, strong hands holding a trial binder—and finally landed on Mark Callan himself, staring down at the murdered muffin between you with disbelief. He had expected many different types of disasters that could happen this morning, but somehow, not this.
“…Again?” he asked.
You wanted the ground to open beneath you. “Okay,” you said weakly, “in my defense—”
“I’m fascinated to hear this.” He raised his eyebrows at you.
“I forgot the cabinet existed.”
“The cabinet has not moved.”
“That feels unnecessarily judgmental.”
Rita had physically turned away so he wouldn’t see her laughing—Traitor.
Mark crouched before you could stop him, picking up the surviving half of the muffin with a napkin from his pocket. His motions were surprisingly careful. Mark’s hands were large, veined, precise; everything about him seemed controlled. Even annoyed, he never wasted energy.
“Here,” he said, standing again and handing you the least destroyed half.
You blinked up at him. “You salvaged it?”
“It seemed important to you.”
“It was blueberry.”
“That explains the emotional attachment.”
Your lips twitched before you could stop them, and for the first time, Mark almost smiled.
It was tiny, gone in less than a second, but it changed his entire face. It made him look younger somehow, less severe, and less like a man permanently braced for impact.
You turned away first. Big mistake, because as soon as you moved, your elbow clipped the stack of folders on your desk, and paper exploded everywhere.
“Oh my God.”
Mark closed his eyes as Rita fully burst into laughter.
You dropped to the floor in horror, scrambling to gather loose witness statements before they slid under desks. “I’m quitting,” you muttered. “Actually, I’m fleeing the country.”
A page drifted past Mark’s shoe; he bent automatically to help.
“You don’t have to—”
“You’ll only make it worse.”
“That is so rude.”
“It’s also statistically likely.”
You glared up at him from the floor. He looked back down at you, and suddenly the space between you thickened.
Your knees pressed against cold tile as you fell to your knees to gather the half of them.
His hand brushed yours as he reached for the same page. It was warm, just barely, but still enough to send heat racing embarrassingly fast up your arm.
Heat crawled up your neck before you could stop it. It was ridiculous, humiliating even, how one accidental touch could undo you so quickly, but your body reacted before your pride could catch up.
Your pulse jumped hard beneath your skin, and suddenly the courthouse felt too quiet, too small, too aware of the two of you crouched there on the floor together.
Mark stilled, his eyes lifted to yours. They were dark brown, tired, and intense in a way that made you feel seen right through.
For one awful, suspended second, neither of you moved. Then someone shouted for “CALLAN!" from the hallway.
Mark stood first, expression locking back into place like a door slamming shut. He handed you the papers without another word and stood up. He walked away, leaving you with the lingering warmth of his fingers and the sudden ache of his absence.
You stayed kneeling on the floor long after he disappeared down the hall, and Rita slowly leaned over her desk. “…Well,” she said.
You stared blankly ahead. “I think I just died.”
A smile broke out across her face. “Yeah,” Rita replied. “That’s usually how it starts.”
—𝜗𝜚—
By Wednesday, you had developed a system.
Rule one: avoid carrying beverages near Mark Callan.
Rule two: avoid carrying food near Mark Callan.
Rule three: avoid carrying literally anything near Mark Callan; Sadly, this left very few options for functioning as a human being.
As it turned out, the courthouse required carrying things constantly; files, boxes, coffee, evidence binders, and your rapidly deteriorating sense of stability, and for some reason, Mark was always there to witness the worst moments.
You were beginning to suspect he appeared only when your dignity was in danger.
And, right on cue, the evidence presented itself.
“Why…” Mark Callan said slowly, “…are you on a ladder?”
You froze halfway up the records room ladder, balancing a storage box against your hip, and looked down to find him standing below you with the exact expression a man might wear upon discovering a raccoon in his office.
The ladder wobbled violently; you tightened your grip instantly, and Mark closed his eyes for one long suffering second.
“You've got to be kidding me.”
“I’m fine.” You said, though the breathless little laugh that followed didn’t make you sound very convincing.
“You are visibly not fine.” He added.
“I do this all the time,” you reasured, but the words came out too soft, like you were comforting yourself more than him.
“You shouldn’t admit that out loud.”
You scowled down at him. “You’re weirdly bossy for someone who isn’t my supervisor.”
“And you’re weirdly committed to workplace injuries.”
Your soul left your body as the box slipped, but Mark moved faster than your brain could process. One minute, the files were falling. The next, he caught the box against his chest with a sharp grunt while his hand shot out toward you, and before you could even process the danger of nearly falling, his palm closed around your ankle, firm and warm even through your tights, stealing the breath straight from your lungs.
The room went dead silent as you looked at each other, both of you frozen in sudden, dramatic stillness, neither one of you moving.
“Oh,” you said faintly. His hand loosened immediately, like he’d realized what he was doing.
“You were about to fall.” Something flickered across his face. It was not embarrassment, but something worse, awareness.
“I was.” Your thoughts jumbled wildly, heart thundering in your chest, skin prickling everywhere his hand had touched.
“You still might.” The air between you felt different now, stretched tight and trembling, as if every molecule in the room was waiting to see what would happen next.
“It’s possible.” You suddenly felt exposed, like he'd pulled back every layer of defense.
“You should come down.” A flush crept higher on your cheeks as you struggled to keep yourself steady, heat washing over you in a dizzying wave. In that moment, you could almost sense his pulse matching yours.
“You’re very close to my leg right now.” The silence felt thick, hushed, and you were certain Mark could see the commotion behind your eyes.
His gaze tethered you, sharp and questioning. You wondered if he felt it too—the silent, undeniable pull just beneath the surface.
Mark broke first. “Get off the ladder.”
You climbed down with all the grace of a newborn deer, which was to say, none at all, and the second your shoes touched the floor, one heel caught awkwardly against the tile.
Mark caught your elbow before gravity could finish humiliating you again, and for a breath, all you could do was stare at him while he stared back with the exhausted expression of a man slowly losing a battle inside himself.
“This cannot keep happening,” he muttered.
“Don’t think I’m doing it on purpose.”
“That’s what concerns me.”
You shouldn’t have noticed how close he was. You definitely shouldn’t have noticed how good he smelled: clean soap, coffee, and a hint of expensive cologne under all that courthouse fatigue. Most of all, you shouldn’t have noticed his hand still on your arm.
Unfortunately, your brain had become deeply unhelpful lately.
His fingers flexed once before he let go.
“Thank you,” you said quietly.
Mark nodded once. Then his gaze dropped to your face properly for the first time all morning. He was not distracted, not irritated, just... looking.
Your stomach fluttered with nervous anticipation.
There was something risky about being watched by someone who spent his life noticing people’s weaknesses. Mark Callan seemed to catch everything: your nervous habits, the way you tucked your hair behind your ear, how you pressed your lips together to hide a smile, and probably even your racing heart.
His gaze lingered briefly —his jaw flexed, and you caught the quick rise and fall of his chest before he refocused, looking almost as if he was fighting to contain his own expression.
It made you wonder, wildly and against your better judgment, if maybe you weren’t the only one struggling to keep your feelings at bay.
You suddenly became very aware of your heartbeat, your breathing, and his eyes that had not yet left yours.
“You missed a spot,” he said quietly.
Your brain short-circuited. “…What?”
He lifted one hand slowly toward your face, and you stopped breathing entirely. His thumb brushed softly beneath your lower lip, wiping away a tiny streak of blueberry jam from breakfast.
A rush of heat went through you so quickly it was embarrassing. Mark looked at the smear on his thumb, then at you, and suddenly the air between you felt too thick to breathe.
The records room door slammed open.
“You still alive in here—” Rita stopped dead.
You jerked backward so fast you nearly hit the filing cabinet.
Mark stepped away immediately, expression snapping back into professional neutrality with terrifying speed.
Rita’s eyes moved between both of you, then downward, then upward again.
“Oh,” she said.
“Oh my God,” you whispered.
Mark picked up the box of files as if absolutely nothing had happened.
“Your intern needs safer hobbies,” he told Rita.
Then he walked out, leaving you standing there red-faced and internally combusting.
Rita waited exactly three seconds before shrieking.
You buried your face in your hands. “Don’t.”
“He touched your face.”
“It was jam.”
“He touched your face because of jam.”
“I’m quitting.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I’m moving to another state.”
Rita leaned against the desk, grinning like a delighted menace. “Honey, that man hasn’t flirted with anyone in this building in three years.”
Your hands slowly lowered.
“…What?”
“Oh yeah,” Rita said casually. “Ice king routine. Doesn’t date. Barely sleeps. Eats vending machine pretzels like a divorced father of two.”
For some reason, that made your chest ache.
“Why?”
Rita’s smile faded slightly. “Work mostly. He had a fiancée once, years ago. Didn’t end well.”
Something uncomfortable twisted low in your stomach.
You hated how quickly curiosity bloomed, hated it even more because beneath it was something softer, something far more dangerous.
Before you could ask another question, Rita pointed toward the doorway dramatically.
“Also,” she added, “he absolutely likes you.”
You made a strangled sound.
“He does not.”
“He touched your mouth.”
“There was jam!”
“Men don’t touch women like that because of jam.”
Your face burned hotter, and though you wanted to argue, wanted desperately to deny it, your stupid heart had already started doing something far more terrifying: hoping.
—𝜗𝜚—
You spent the next two days avoiding Mark Callan with the tactical precision of a fugitive, which would have been easier if the courthouse itself had not apparently decided the two of you were part of some deeply unfunny cosmic experiment.
Every hallway led to him, every elevator opened to him, and every innocent coffee run somehow ended with Mark standing six feet away, looking tired and devastatingly handsome while your nervous system collapsed like wet cardboard.
It was ruining your life, and worse, Rita had noticed.
“You’re spiraling,” She informed you Thursday morning.
“I am not spiraling.”
“You alphabetized sticky notes yesterday.”
“That was organizational.”
“You labeled your lunch.”
“It got stolen last week.”
“You wrote ‘Property of a woman on the edge.’”
You looked down at your yogurt. “That was emotionally honest.”
Rita snorted into her coffee.
You tried focusing on your transcription work instead.
Unfortunately, your mind was no help.
Every sentence turned into thoughts about Mark: the way his voice dropped lower when irritated, the faint shadows beneath his eyes, the rare moments where amusement slipped through before he buried it again, and the way he’d touched your face, almost like it surprised him too.
Which was ridiculous; you were reading too much into it. Men like Mark Callan did not look twice at women like you. He was composed, intelligent, and brutally competent. You once tripped over absolutely nothing while carrying soup.
These were different species of people.
“Hey.”
You looked up too fast. Mark stood in the doorway of records holding a legal folder, and your stomach jumped.
“Hi.” Very smooth, very normal, definitely not the voice of someone seconds away from cardiac arrest.
“I need the McAllister deposition transcripts.”
“Oh. Right. Yes.”
You stood up too quickly, your chair rolled backward, directly over the hem of your cardigan.
The cardigan yanked tight against your throat as the chair wheels locked, and you made a horrible choking noise.
Mark stared.
Rita physically had to turn away.
You untangled yourself, trying to act like this sort of thing happened to everyone.
“Here,” you squeaked, grabbing the wrong folder entirely and shoving it toward him.
Mark glanced down. “…This is a cafeteria inventory report.”
You closed your eyes. “Perfect,” You muttered. “Great. Love that for me.”
For one terrible second, silence hung between you. Then a sound escaped him, it was small, rough, and almost disbelieving.
Your eyes snapped upward. Mark had turned slightly away, one hand covering his mouth. His shoulders moved once.
“…Are you laughing at me?”
“No.”
“You are.”
“I’m not.”
“You literally are.”
His composure cracked completely.
It wasn’t a big laugh, Mark didn’t seem like the type, but it was real, low, helpless, and startlingly warm.
And God, it changed him; the tension in his face eased, his eyes softened a little and for a second, he looked less like the intimidating deputy district attorney and more like someone who hadn’t let himself relax in a long time.
Your own breath caught, and suddenly, you understood something dangerous.
Mark Callan was beautiful when he smiled, absolutely breathtaking. The realization hit you so hard you forgot how to function.
Mark recovered first, clearing his throat and straightening again, but the damage was done. You had already seen it now and realized you never stood a chance.
“You’re enjoying this way too much,” You accused weakly.
“You handed me lunch inventory.”
“I’m under pressure.”
“We’re standing in records.”
“You’re very intimidating.”
That flicker of amusement returned briefly. “Am I?”
“Yes.”
“You spilled coffee on me the first day we met.”
“That was an accident.”
“You nearly concussed yourself with a filing cabinet yesterday.”
“That was also an accident.”
“And you climbed unstable scaffolding.”
“It was temporarily unstable.”
Mark looked at you for a long moment. Then he shook his head once, like you exhausted him in some fundamental way.
“I’ll come back later for the transcripts.”
“No, wait— I can get them.”
“You seem one minor inconvenience away from a full systems failure.”
“That feels dramatic.”
“You’re holding the yogurt upside down.”
You looked down as blueberry yogurt slowly dripped onto your shoe.
“Oh, come on.”
Mark laughed again—actually laughed this time, quiet but unmistakable—and before you could stop yourself, you laughed too.
The sound seemed to startle both of you.
Something shifted in the room after that, softening at the edges, as if the space between you had become a little less careful and a little more familiar.
Then Mark looked at you again with that dangerous, steady focus, and just like that, the air changed.
Your laughter faded first, but his eyes stayed on yours a second too long, long enough for your pulse to stumble and the courthouse noise outside to feel suddenly, impossibly far away.
“You know,” he said quietly, “most people are nervous around prosecutors because we can ruin their lives.”
You swallowed hard. “And me?”
His gaze dropped briefly to the yogurt dripping sadly onto your shoe, then returned to your face.
“You look at me like you’re trying to outlast it.”
The words landed directly in your chest. Hard, because the worst part was that he wasn’t wrong. Before you could answer, a sharp voice cut through the hallway outside.
“CALLAN!”
Mark looked away first, jaw tightening slightly like he’d been pulled back into himself.
Assistant District Attorney Evelyn Price appeared around the corner with a case binder tucked against her chest. She stopped the second she saw you, her gaze flicking from your face to Mark’s, then back again.
Something in her expression shifted almost too subtly to catch, but neither surprise or recognition.
“Oh,” she said slowly.
Mark’s entire demeanor cooled by several degrees.
“I’m coming,” He told her.
Evelyn’s eyes lingered on you a second longer than necessary before she turned away.
Something uncomfortable twisted in your stomach when Mark glanced back at you once before leaving. He was not cold, not distant, just unreadable.
You watched him disappear down the hall beside Evelyn Price, both of them talking quietly about trial prep and witness scheduling. Professional, Effortless, like they belonged in the same world.
Rita appeared beside you silently.
“…You okay?”
You stared down at the yogurt on your shoe, which somehow felt less embarrassing than the ache blooming unexpectedly behind your ribs.
“Who’s Evelyn Price?”
Rita grimaced instantly.
“Oh boy.”
Your stomach dropped.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you should maybe not overthink it.” Rita said carefully
𝜗𝜚 objection, your honor! he’s insufferable! 𝜗𝜚 (dda!markcallanxclumsy!reader)
summary|| you and Mark slip into something that feels almost like a relationship, built through quiet acts of care, shared lunches, stolen kisses, and growing tenderness. but when Tyler shows interest in you, Mark’s jealousy and fear of not being enough push him into self-sabotage, leading to a painful fight where you finally admit you want him—and he still lets you walk away. wc: 4k
warning|| SFW; workplace romance, jealousy, possessive tension, unwanted flirting, emotional self-sabotage, romantic angst, insecurity, argument, fear of abandonment, workplace gossip, kissing/making out; no smut yet, heartbreak.
Chapter Five: A Brief Recess for Emotional Catastrophe
Somewhere between the fire-alarm kiss and the third coffee Mark silently placed on your desk without ever asking how you liked it, the two of you slipped into something dangerously close to a relationship.
That territory stayed suspiciously uncharted. No official talks, no labels, no 'what are we?'. Yet, by week two, Mark had memorized your breakfast order by heart, and you started stashing protein bars in your bag so he wouldn’t starve until late afternoon.
“You’re enabling him.” Evelyn eyed you as she watched you slip a turkey sandwich into your purse. One she knew you were planning on dropping by Mark’s office between hearings.
“He had pretzels for breakfast.”
“He’s a grown man.”
“He’s a prosecutor,” you corrected. “That’s basically the same thing as a raccoon digging through survival supplies.”
Evelyn pointed at you accusingly. “See? This is exactly how it starts.”
“What starts?”
Unfortunately, she wasn’t entirely wrong.
The thing about Mark Callan was that he loved quietly, not with speeches or grand gestures, but with small, careful acts that slipped beneath your skin before you even realized they mattered.
What you never saw was how deeply these acts cost him, how each gesture was the product of a dozen silent decisions.
Mark’s mind spun constantly around you, cataloging your preferences and making quiet promises to himself that he would notice, remember, protect.
He never said it out loud, but every morning, every gently placed coffee, every watchful glance in a crowded hallway, was Mark’s way of telling you what he didn’t yet know how to say.
Like the way he automatically moved you away from crowded hallways with a hand on your lower back, or how he’d started leaving sticky notes on your desk attached to coffee cups.
Eat lunch with me today.
You forgot your scarf.
Don’t climb anything while I’m in court.
You kept every single one, which felt equal parts romantic, pathetic, and maybe a touch concerning for your mental health.
Until one Tuesday morning, when Rita walked into records and saw Mark setting a blueberry muffin beside your keyboard.
“Oh, so we’ve entered domesticity.”
Mark barely looked up. “Good morning, Rita.”
“You brought her breakfast.”
“She skipped it yesterday.”
Your mouth fell open. “How do you know that?”
Mark finally glanced at you.
“That’s not important.”
The terrifying thing was, he genuinely meant it.
Of course, he noticed things like that, as if it mattered by default. Your chest warmed painfully.
Rita looked between both of you, her expression that of a woman witnessing the slowest courtship in human history.
“You two are one shared grocery list away from retirement.”
“We are not together,” you protested weakly.
Mark handed you your coffee without even looking away from the file in his hands. You stared at him in betrayal while Rita physically wheezed.
She wasn’t entirely wrong. Over the next few weeks, your routines quietly tangled—dangerously so.
You started eating lunch in Mark’s office because pretending you didn’t want to see him was harder than you thought. At first, it was by coincidence, then it became normal.
You'd walk in, balancing takeout containers and iced coffees, while Mark sat buried beneath case files at his desk, tie loosened, sleeves rolled to his forearms.
Every single time, the second he saw you, something in his face unknotted, eyes softening with a glow that belonged only to you. Without fail, a small, unguarded smile would break through, and your heart would thud with giddy affection.
God, you loved being the reason he smiled.
You realized it one mortifying Thursday, when Mark smiled at something ridiculous you said over cafeteria soup, and your whole chest ached with something softer, deeper than affection.
You began noticing the little things, too.
The way he pushed his coffee toward you automatically when you reached for it absentmindedly.
How he remembered which pens you liked because you “complain dramatically” about the bad ones.
The way he silently moved dangerous obstacles out of your path after witnessing enough of your accidents to lose faith in your survival instincts entirely.
After days of slipping into routine, you stepped into his office one rainy afternoon, shivering from your dash through the parking garage, umbrella forgotten.
Mark looked up from his desk, noticed you shivering, and immediately stood, concern evident on his face.
“You’re soaked.”
“I noticed.”
“You didn’t bring a coat?”
“It looked sunny earlier.”
“That was six hours ago.”
“Time is fake in this building.”
Mark sighed softly like a man carrying an unbearable burden. Then he shrugged off his suit jacket and walked toward you. Your heartbeat instantly stumbled.
“You’ll freeze.”
“Mark—”
“Take the jacket.”
You stared at him helplessly as he settled the jacket around your shoulders himself, his hands carefully draping the fabric and smoothing it down.
The jacket was warm from his body and smelled like dark coffee, cologne, and him.
Your pulse hammered, wild and unfair, as his hands lingered by your collar, fingers warm and close, heat prickling along your skin. He was always too close now, close enough for your heart to trip and your breath to catch.
His eyes dropped to your mouth automatically, then back to your eyes.
Silence filled the office, heavy and familiar, the kind that always ended badly for both of you.
“Tell me,” you whispered softly, “that you’re thinking very respectful thoughts right now.”
Mark looked genuinely offended.
“I’m a prosecutor.”
“That is not an answer.”
His mouth twitched faintly. Then he stepped closer, and your breath caught immediately.
“You’re standing in my office wearing my jacket,” he murmured. “I’m doing my best here.”
Heat flooded your entire body.
“You’re impossible.”
“And yet,” he said quietly, “you keep coming back.”
Your heart folded painfully in on itself because he still sounded almost bewildered, as if he couldn’t quite grasp why you wanted him.
Warmth climbed up your throat as you reached up—almost without thinking—to straighten his crooked tie, your hand trembling with tenderness.
Mark went completely still, the intimacy of the gesture striking you both at once. When your fingers accidentally brushed the warm skin of his throat, his breathing shifted—subtle, but enough.
“Careful,” he said softly.
You looked up. “Why?”
His eyes darkened immediately.
“Because I haven’t kissed you all day.”
Your stomach dropped; your hands turned sweaty and hot.
The room seemed to shrink, every sense narrowing to him. Suddenly, you needed air and more of him all at once.
You barely had time to inhale before Mark’s hand slid along your jaw and he kissed you.
It started restrained. Careful. A soft press of his mouth against yours like he was still pretending he had self-control left.
Then you kissed him back harder.
Mark made a low, rough sound in his throat that sent heat spiraling straight through you, and suddenly the carefulness cracked.
He guided you backward until the edge of his desk pressed against your hips, his hand firm at your waist now, fingers tightening just enough to make your breath catch.
The kiss deepened fast after that.
Hotter. Messier.
Like weeks of tension had finally found somewhere to go.
Your fingers slipped into his hair instinctively, and Mark swore softly against your mouth before kissing you deeper immediately, like that tiny pull unraveled the last thread keeping him composed.
His mouth moved against yours with growing urgency, slow enough to savor but rough enough to leave you dizzy, and every shallow breath you managed to take tasted like coffee and him.
A quiet sound escaped you before you could stop it.
Mark’s reaction was immediate.
His hand slid higher along your waist, thumb brushing beneath your shirt as his forehead knocked briefly against yours, both of you breathing unevenly now. His eyes stayed half-lidded on your mouth like he was trying very hard not to lose the remainder of his restraint.
“You are so much trouble,” he murmured against your mouth.
“You kissed me first.”
“You fixed my tie.”
“That’s not a crime.”
“It should be.”
You let out a breathless laugh. Mark smiled against your lips and kissed you again—slower this time, gentler, drawing out the moment.
The office door suddenly rattled.
“CALLAN!” Evelyn shouted from outside. “If you’re emotionally compromising each other again, your witness is waiting.”
You covered your face at once. Mark braced a hand on the desk and laughed, helpless and warm enough to make your chest ache.
After a moment, he looked at you again, and the smile faded into something quieter, fonder, dangerously real.
“You should probably go before I forget I have a job to do.”
Your heart did a painful little flip, and the worst part was that you didn’t really want to leave either.
—𝜗𝜚—
Mark Callan did not get jealous easily. Mostly because Mark Callan did not allow himself many things easily. Anger, sometimes. Exhaustion, constantly.
But jealousy was new to him, dangerous and tucked away, like something sharp hidden quietly behind his ribs.
You noticed it for the first time on a Wednesday afternoon. A subtle shift: a new investigator from downtown lingered too long near records, smiling at you. His name was Tyler Greene.
Pretty in an aggressively polished—expensive watch, perfect suit, the kind of man who leaned in too close when he talked, assuming women enjoyed that kind of thing.
You were only being polite.
Mark knew that.
Unfortunately, Tyler apparently mistook basic human kindness for encouragement.
Mark saw the whole thing from halfway down the hallway.
The investigator leaned casually against the records counter. You laughed nervously at something he said—not real laughter, just your polite one.
Mark could tell the difference now; God help him, he knew all your different laughs.
Tyler smiled wider anyway, then he touched your arm—briefly, casually, but enough to make something sharp move beneath Mark’s skin.
Rita noticed immediately from her desk. “Oh boy,” she muttered.
Mark didn’t answer, but his jaw clenched once—nothing more.
He kept walking, maintaining his professional, controlled, untouchable facade, but ten minutes later, while reviewing witness statements, he realized he’d missed an entire page—Tyler Greene’s laughter from records still ringing in his ears.
Absolutely pathetic.
He hated how his attention kept drifting,hated the irrational irritation crawling under his skin.
Most of all, he hated the ugly little thought that kept whispering beneath it all.
He can give her things you can’t; time, ease, normalcy, a life that didn’t revolve around homicide trials and emotional exhaustion.
Mark forced himself back to work, but his focus only lasted approximately twenty minutes.
Then, when he walked into the break room for coffee, he heard Tyler’s voice around the corner.
“…I’m telling you, she’s adorable.”
Mark slowed automatically. Another investigator laughed quietly. “The records girl?”
“Yeah. Sweetest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Something possessive and immediate twisted low in Mark’s chest at the phrase ‘records girl’. As if you weren’t a person, just something soft to point at.
“Bet you she blushes if you say literally remotely sexy to her.”
The other man snorted.
“What, you trying to ask her out?”
“I mean…” Tyler laughed. “Maybe. If Callan doesn’t murder me first.”
Mark went still, and the second investigator laughed harder.
“Oh come on. They’re not actually together.”
“Still,” Tyler replied. “Guy looks at her like he’s one inconvenience away from putting somebody through drywall.”
They laughed again.
Mark should’ve walked away; he knew that.
He was a prosecutor, an adult man; this was ridiculous, but then Tyler spoke again.
“She’s probably worth the trouble, though.”
Instantly, something in the wording hit wrong—not admiration, but assessment, like Tyler was talking about winning a prize rather than a person.
Mark felt his irritation sharpen, turning cold and precise—the same controlled anger he channeled in court.
Without giving himself time to reconsider, Mark stepped around the corner.
Both investigators straightened at his approach, Tyler’s smile fading first.
“Callan.”
Mark looked at him evenly.
“You have work to do?”
The other investigator vanished instantly. Coward. Tyler recovered slower. “Just grabbing coffee.”
Mark nodded once. Then quietly:
“Then grab coffee.”
The silence afterward felt suffocating. Tyler shifted first. “Look, man, I wasn’t—”
“She works here,” Mark interrupted calmly. “She’s not entertainment for bored investigators.”
Tyler’s expression tightened slightly. “I was just talking.”
“You were talking about her like she wasn’t standing ten feet away.”
The younger man looked uncomfortable now—which was good. Mark stepped closer; not threatening, but somehow worse.
“You want to ask her to dinner?” Mark said evenly. “Do it respectfully. You make comments about her with your friends again, we’ll have a different conversation.”
Tyler stared at him.
“…Are you her boyfriend?”
The question landed squarely in the center of everything Mark had been trying not to think about. Technically, no—you weren’t his, even if his entire body reacted to you as though you already belonged there.
Mark’s jaw flexed once before he answered, careful and measured.
“No.”
Tyler relaxed slightly. Big mistake.
“But,” Mark continued quietly, “you should still be careful.”
The younger man swallowed.
“Right.”
Mark held his gaze for another second before stepping away—conversation over, control restored. Or so he told himself. Yet his chest felt tight for entirely different reasons, because the question lingered:
Are you her boyfriend?
No, not officially.
Suddenly, that realization bothered him far more than it should have.
By the time Mark made it back to his office, he was thoroughly exhausted with himself. Of course, that was precisely when you appeared in his doorway with two coffees and a paper bag.
At the sight of you, his entire nervous system relaxed—an infuriating response he couldn’t control.
“There you are,” you said. “You forgot lunch again.”
Mark stared at you for a second too long. You noticed instantly.
“…What?”
In that moment, he looked tired—not with the usual courtroom fatigue, but with something deeper. You slipped into the office quietly and set the coffee on his desk, your movements gentle in response to his mood.
“Hey.”
Mark leaned back in his chair slowly, watching you.
“You flirt with everyone like that?”
Your eyebrows lifted. “What?”
“The investigator.”
Realization flickered across your face, and to his horror, a gentle smile appeared—not mocking, but softly amused.
“Oh,” you said quietly. “You’re jealous.”
“I’m not.”
“You absolutely are.”
Mark exhaled through his nose. “I dislike him.”
“You don’t even know him.”
“I know enough.”
You moved closer slowly, warmth flickering in your eyes now, and somehow that made it worse.
“You know,” you murmured, “you get very broody when you’re jealous.”
“I’m not jealous.”
“You look one minor inconvenience away from prosecuting somebody emotionally.”
“That’s my normal face.”
You laughed softly, and the sound made Mark’s chest ache; in that moment, all his irritation melted away, replaced by something far more dangerous: affection—deep enough now to terrify him. You stopped beside his desk, standing close.
“Mark.”
His eyes met yours immediately, and that unbearable pull between you surfaced once more.
When your fingers brushed lightly against his tie—a tiny touch, yet still enough to unravel him instantly.
“You know I only bring lunch to one grumpy prosecutor, right?”
The jealousy vanished so quickly it almost embarrassed him, replaced in an instant by something warmer. He let his hand settle gently around your wrist, the gesture instinctive and tender.
“You shouldn’t say things like that during work hours.”
Your heartbeat stumbled at the low roughness in his voice.
“Why?”
Mark looked at your mouth. Gone. Absolutely gone.
“Because I’m trying very hard to behave.”
—𝜗𝜚—
The fight began because Mark Callan loved you enough to suddenly believe someone else could make you happier.
Which, unfortunately, was the worst thing to say to a woman already halfway in love with him.
It happened on a Friday—of course it did. Fridays at the courthouse were always strange: everyone was exhausted, emotionally frayed, and surviving on caffeine and bad decisions.
You were already struggling when Tyler Greene intercepted you near the elevators.
He didn’t physically corner you, but strategically positioned himself between you and the exit, that too-smooth smile in place again.
“Hey,” he said easily.
You adjusted the files in your arms. “Hi.”
Tyler shoved one hand into his pocket. “Listen, I was wondering if maybe you wanted to grab dinner sometime.”
Your stomach sank—not because he’d asked, but because you already knew this would get complicated.
Reaching for gentle honesty, you replied carefully.
“That’s nice of you, but—”
“C’mon,” he interrupted with a grin. “One date.”
You shifted slightly. “I’m actually not really looking—”
“Is this about Callan?”
Your expression gave you away at once, and Tyler caught it, his knowing smile appearing immediately.
“There’s nothing happening there, right?”
The question hit harder than expected, because technically, what was happening between you and Mark? Stolen kisses, shared lunches, hands lingering a moment too long; he looked at you like you mattered. Still, there were no labels, no promises, nothing solid enough to explain.
Sometimes you wondered if you were making it all up in your head, if all those unspoken moments could really add up to something real.
You wanted to ask, to pull the words into the open, but fear kept you silent: fear that putting a name to whatever this was would break the fragile, lovely tension or turn it all into something casual.
Longing twisted quietly in your chest for something you could point to, something you could call yours—something more certain than coffee and glances you almost understood.
Your hesitation lasted just a beat too long, and Tyler’s expression softened slightly.
“Then let me take you out.”
Before you could respond, the elevator doors slid open behind Tyler, and Mark stepped out. The timing might have been funny if your life weren’t in the process of unraveling.
Mark’s eyes found you first, then Tyler, then the unmistakable tension between you both.
Instantly, something shuttered behind his expression.
“Callan,” Tyler greeted casually.
Mark’s gaze stayed on you. “Everything okay?”
You nodded too quickly. “Fine.”
Tyler leaned back slightly. “I was just asking her to dinner.”
A heavy silence fell, and your pulse spiked instantly. Mark glanced at Tyler, then at you—and for one horrible second, you caught it: that flicker of hurt, almost immediately buried beneath professionalism.
His jaw tightened once before he nodded.
“That seems reasonable.”
Your stomach dropped.
Tyler looked surprised; you, devastated. Mark didn’t seem to notice either reaction—or maybe he saw both and chose to keep going anyway.
“She should probably say yes.”
The words hit like a physical impact and you stared at him.
“What?”
Mark finally looked directly at you. He was calm, too calm.
“Tyler seems nice.”
Betrayal bloomed slowly, hot and sharp beneath your ribs.
Tyler glanced awkwardly between the two of you, suddenly realizing he’d stumbled into something dangerous.
Then it was just you and Mark, stranded near the elevators in terrible silence.
Your chest hurts, actually hurts, because suddenly, every soft thing between you felt humiliating.
Every lunch, every kiss, every moment, you’d started believing maybe this was becoming real.
Mark lowered his voice carefully. “You deserve someone who can give you more than this.”
“There it is.”
His brow furrowed. “What?”
“The self-sabotage thing you do whenever something starts to matter.”
“That’s not what this is.”
“Then what is it?” Your voice cracked slightly despite your best effort. “Because you kiss me in your office, you look at me like— like I matter to you, and then the second someone asks me out, you tell me to go?”
Mark looked stricken instantly.
“You matter too much.”
“Do you hear how insane that sounds?”
The hallway fell unnaturally quiet around you, people nearby pretending not to listen—cowards. Mark stepped closer, lowering his voice even more.
“I’m trying to be realistic.”
“No,” you said softly, hurt blooming wider now. “You’re trying to decide for me.”
His jaw tightened.
“That’s not fair.”
“Neither is pushing me away every time you get scared.”
The words landed hard, and you saw the impact immediately—because beneath Mark’s composure was a man held together almost entirely by guilt and exhaustion.
A heavy, terrible silence settled between you—because you were right.
Mark looked away first, and that hurt worst of all.
When he finally spoke, his voice was tired.
“People like Tyler don’t come home at midnight carrying every verdict they couldn’t save, and closing arguments still bleeding through their teeth.”
Your chest tightened painfully.
“They don’t cancel plans because a witness disappears. They don’t cancel dates or spend night sleeping in their office.”
“Mark—”
“You want honesty?” His laugh came rough and joyless, the sound scraped raw from somewhere inside him.
There was a long, fragile beat before he continued, and when he finally spoke, his words faltered, thin as glass.
“Fine. I like you enough that I notice every time you enter or exit a room. Enough that hearing another man talk about you makes me irrationally angry.”
Mark swallowed, struggling for the right words, his gaze dropping to the floor as if ashamed.
"Sometimes it feels like everything in me is wired wrong—like loving you is a test I'm always failing even when I try."
He forced himself to look back at you, every defense peeled away, voice trembling now. "And I still think you’d be happier with someone easier to love."
The ache in your chest turned unbearable because he believed it completely. You stepped closer before you could stop yourself.
“You don’t get to decide what makes me happy.”
Mark looked wrecked now. Utterly wrecked.
“You say that now.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means eventually this stops being charming.”
Your eyes burned unexpectedly.
“Wow.”
“I’m serious.”
“And I’m serious too,” you shot back. “Why would you do this to me? You say that you care and then act as if it wouldn’t matter. That you’d rather go out with Tyler Greene?”
Something in Mark’s expression cracked at that, as if hearing it out loud wounded him.
Good—you were hurting too.
“You think I want easy?” you whispered. “I want you.”
An enormous silence followed. Mark stared at you, as if he couldn’t breathe, as if your words had physically wounded him. For one horrible moment, you thought he might finally say it too—but instead.
“You shouldn’t,” he said it quietly.
That was the breaking point—pain flashed hot across your face before you could hide it, and you stepped backward at once.
“Wow, got it.”
Mark’s expression changed instantly. “That’s not what I—”
“No,” you interrupted softly. “I think maybe it is.”
The hurt in your voice embarrassed you instantly.
You hated that he had this power over you—and hated, too, how miserable he looked.
Neither of you moved.
Finally, you shook your head once.
“I can’t do this today.”
You turned before he could stop you.
“Wait—”
But you kept walking—quickly enough that he couldn’t see your eyes burning or hear the tremor in your breath.
You stepped into the elevator alone, jaw clenched tight, throat burning. For the first time since falling for Mark Callan, he didn’t follow.
Each second he stood there settled like a cold weight in your chest.
By the time the doors slid shut, you pressed your back to the mirrored wall and let a silent tear slip down, furious at yourself for wishing he stoped you from going, even now.
The ache was sharp and absurdly hopeful—that maybe, just maybe, he’d still come after you.
𝜗𝜚 objection, your honor! he’s insufferable! 𝜗𝜚 (dda!markcallanxclumsy!reader)
summary|| jealousy and courthouse gossip begin to close in as Mark’s protective side becomes harder to hide. between whispered rumors, near-falls, accidental touches, and overheard confessions, both of you are forced to face the truth: whatever is happening between you is no longer harmless. wc: 3.6k
warnings|| SFW; workplace gossip, jealousy, mild possessive/protective behavior; no smut yet, unwanted flirting, mentions of violent crime cases, emotional tension, anxiety, near-fall/stair accident, accidental eavesdropping, romantic angst; no smut yet.
Chapter Two: The Rumor Mill Finds You Guilty
You told yourself you were not jealous.
That would be insane.
You barely knew Mark Callan. Technically, your entire relationship consisted of workplace disasters, emotional whiplash, and one deeply upsetting blueberry-jam incident.
You had no claim to jealousy.
And yet, Friday morning, you found yourself standing behind the records counter, pretending not to notice Assistant District Attorney Evelyn Price talking with him, while leaning against the office doorway, with the kind of ease that only came from familiarity.
She was beautiful.
Of course, she was.
She was tall, elegant, composed—the sort who never tripped over cords or stapled her sleeves to a documents.
Meanwhile, you were still haunted by the memory of walking into a glass door last month—an embarrassment that made your cheeks burn every time it resurfaced.
“You’re staring,” Rita warned under her breath.
“I’m observing.”
“You look like a Victorian woman dying of tuberculosis.”
You tore your gaze away. “I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.”
Unfortunately, Rita was right.
You were staring because Evelyn was laughing softly at something Mark had said, and he was smiling—a real smile, not the tiny, almost-smiles you usually got, but something relaxed and comfortable, as if it happened often.
Something sharp twisted unexpectedly beneath your ribs, jealousy and disappointment flaring up, and you hated how quickly it hurt.
‘Maybe they’re dating,’ your brain whispered unhelpfully.
You tried focusing on work instead.
Keyword: tried.
Unfortunately, your emotional stability was already hanging by a thread, which meant the universe naturally chose that exact moment to make it worse.
“Hey, sweetheart.”
You looked up automatically and immediately regretted it.
Brandon Pike from clerical support stood at the counter, grinning at you.
Brandon was handsome in a loud way. Too much cologne, too-wide of a smile, the confidence of someone never humbled.
He flirted with literally everyone, usually harmlessly.
Today, however, after everything, you suddenly found him exhausting, your patience worn thin by your own swirling feelings.
“What do you need, Brandon?”
“Ouch,” he said dramatically. “No good morning?”
“It’s nine-thirteen.”
“Still counts.”
He leaned casually against the counter. “You doing anything tonight?”
Rita made a noise suspiciously close to a snicker.
You narrowed your eyes at her before looking back at Brandon. “Probably reorganizing my life after repeated public humiliation.”
“So dinner’s a maybe?”
“Dinner’s a no.”
“You wound me.”
“You’ll recover.”
Brandon grinned wider. “C’mon. One date.”
Before you could answer, a voice cut cleanly through the room.
“Pretty sure she already said no.”
Every nerve ending in your body recognized Mark instantly.
Mark approached slowly, case file tucked beneath one arm. His expression was calm, too calm, which somehow felt worse.
“She answered you,” Mark said evenly. “That should’ve ended the conversation.”
Heat flooded your face, as a mixture of embarrassment and gratitude battled inside you as everyone watched.
Brandon laughed awkwardly. “Jesus. Didn’t realize she had a bodyguard.”
Mark’s eyes didn’t leave him.
“She doesn’t.”
The silence afterward felt dangerous, not dramatic, just sharp enough to cut.
Brandon cleared his throat first. “Right. Okay.”
Then, apparently deciding self-preservation mattered, he backed away down the hall.
As soon as he disappeared, everyone in records became very invested in their paperwork.
Cowards.
You looked up at Mark, who was already looking down at you. Suddenly, your heartbeat became a real problem—nervousness and anticipation rippling through you.
“You didn’t have to do that,” you said softly.
“Yes,” he replied, without hesitation. “I did.”
The certainty in his voice startled you, a flutter of relief and hope catching you off guard.
Something vulnerable flickered across your face before you could hide it, and you were sure Mark had noticed it.
“You looked uncomfortable,” he added, quieter now.
“I could’ve handled it.”
“I know.”
The words should not have affected you as much as they did. He wasn’t dismissing or belittling you, he was simply saying he hadn’t liked seeing you cornered—and somehow, that was worse, much worse.
Your chest felt painfully tight all of a sudden, anxiety and longing mixing until you could barely breathe.
“Thank you,” you said after a moment.
Mark nodded once, but he still hadn’t moved away, and neither had you.
The room suddenly felt too small, too warm.
His tie was loosened, and his sleeves were rolled to his forearms. He looked tired in that beautiful, devastating way—as if exhaustion was part of him.
“You shouldn’t let people talk over you,” he said quietly.
You blinked. “What?”
“Men like him.”
His jaw tightened faintly.
“You already said no,” he continued. “You don’t owe anyone softness after that.”
Your heart ached unexpectedly because there was anger beneath his calm—anger that surprised you, because it wasn’t possessiveness or ego, but something protective that touched you and left you shaken.
You studied him carefully. “You sound experienced.”
For the first time since walking in, Mark looked away. A tiny movement that was barely noticeable, but there.
“I prosecute enough cases,” he said flatly, and suddenly you felt heavy with understanding, a sadness settling across your shoulders.
The ache in your chest deepened.
Sometimes you forgot what his job was beneath the suits and sarcasm.
He spent every day seeing the worst in people, no wonder he looked tired all the time, no wonder he carried himself like someone permanently braced for impact.
“Mark—”
“CALLAN!”
Evelyn’s voice echoed from the hallway.
You physically watched the walls go back up around him again, so fast it left you dizzy.
Mark stepped back, professional distance restored.
“I’ve got court.” he said.
The softness vanished so fast you almost wondered if you imagined it.
Then his gaze dropped, and you glanced down—your shoelace was untied, again.
Before you could react, Mark crouched.
Your entire brain stopped functioning.
“What are you doing?”
“You’ll trip.”
“That is statistically fair, but—”
His fingers moved quickly, looping the lace neatly.
The records room had gone silent again.
You could feel Rita vibrating somewhere behind you.
Mark tied the knot, then looked up, and somehow that was worse.
Something about a man on one knee looking up at you with tired dark eyes felt catastrophically intimate—especially when his expression softened, and he quietly said, “There.”
Your heart genuinely stuttered.
Mark stood immediately afterward like nothing unusual had happened, as if he hadn’t just altered your brain chemistry.
Then he picked up his case file and walked toward the door.
Halfway out, he paused. Didn’t turn around, but you heard it anyway.
“Try to survive the rest of the day.”
Then he disappeared into the hallway.
There was silence, long, heavy silence.
Then Rita slowly emerged from behind a shelf.
“Oh,” she whispered.
You stared blankly ahead. “I think that was the most romantic thing anyone’s ever done to me.”
Rita placed a hand dramatically over her heart.
“Honey,” she said, “that man is in trouble.”
—𝜗𝜚—
The problem with Mark Callan was that he kept doing things that were romantic without realizing they were romantic.
Which somehow made it worse.
If he had flirted openly, you might have been able to handle it. Possibly. Maybe. Fine—not really, but at least then there would have been rules.
Instead, Mark lived in a gray area, tying your shoelaces with courtroom focus, then leaving like he hadn’t just undone you completely.
You spent the whole weekend thinking about it, which was humiliating.
By Monday morning, your brain had become completely unusable.
“Okay,” Rita said, sliding into the chair beside your desk with a coffee. “You look haunted.”
“I’m fine.”
“You just typed his name into a witness transcript.”
You froze. Slowly, horrifically slowly, you looked down at your computer screen.
Halfway through a burglary deposition, the sentence read:
The defendant entered the residence at approximately Mark Callan—
“Oh my God.”
Rita burst into laughter so violently that she nearly spilled her coffee.
You dropped your forehead onto the desk. “I’m quitting.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I’ll become a shepherd. Move to the mountains. Never know love again.”
“You’d trip over a sheep.”
“That feels unnecessarily personal.”
Unfortunately, Rita was still laughing when Simon from intake appeared in the doorway.
“Hey, records need the Ellis trial exhibits delivered upstairs.”
Rita pointed at you. “Perfect. She can take them.”
You lifted your head slowly, fixing Rita with an accusing look. “Why do you hate me?”
“Character building.”
“It’s emotional warfare.”
“Tomato, tomahto.”
Ten minutes later, you found yourself carrying two heavy exhibit boxes through the courthouse halls, muttering threats under your breath.
Naturally, the elevators were full, which meant you had to take the stairs.
“This is how I die,” you whispered dramatically while climbing.
Halfway up the second flight, one of the boxes slipped against your hip.
You adjusted awkwardly. Then your shoe caught the edge of the stairs and time slowed.
“Oh no.”
The box tipped, papers burst into the air, and your body pitched forward with the terrible certainty that you were about to die in the most humiliating way possible—until one hand caught your arm before impact and another caught the box.
You gasped sharply as your momentum slammed you directly into a solid chest instead of concrete stairs.
For one dizzy second, all you knew was warmth. Strong hands and the sharp scent of dark coffee and cologne.
Then Mark’s voice above you:
“…Every time I see you, gravity appears suspiciously aggressive.”
You squeezed your eyes shut.
“Please let me die here.”
“That wouldn’t be fair.”
You realized very suddenly that one of his arms was still around your waist. Not casually, firmly, he had grabbed you hard, as if the thought of you falling had scared him.
Your pulse stumbled violently. Slowly, you looked up to find Mark already watching you—much too close, his gaze intense.
The courthouse stairwell suddenly felt unbearably quiet.
His chest rose sharply beneath your hands because, apparently, in your panic, you had grabbed his suit jacket.
Your fingers loosened. “Sorry.”
He didn’t answer right away. His gaze dropped briefly to your hands, then back to your face.
“You okay?”
The softness in his voice nearly undid you on the spot.
You nodded too fast. “Yes. Totally. Thriving.”
Mark’s mouth twitched faintly. Still, he didn’t let go immediately, and you couldn’t stop noticing things.
The warmth of his hand at your waist, the faint shadow of exhaustion beneath his eyes, the slight looseness of his tie as if he had been working too hard again—every small detail made him feel dangerously real, and far too close.
“You really need safer hobbies,” he said, his tone somewhere between amused and exasperated.
You swallowed hard, nervous. “I didn’t realize carrying boxes counted as an extreme sport.”
“With you involved? Apparently it is.”
You laughed weakly despite yourself, and there it was again—that dangerous look he got whenever you laughed, as if, for half a second, he forgot he was supposed to keep himself guarded.
Then voices echoed from above, and the moment broke instantly.
Mark stepped back first. The loss of his warmth was intant and painfully unfair, but before you could embarrass yourself further, he bent to gather the scattered exhibits.
You crouched automatically to help, heart still stumbling over the space where his hand had been.
“Careful,” he said.
You blinked. “What?”
“You almost just fell down a staircase.”
“That was five seconds ago.”
“Yes,” he replied flatly. “A traumatic five seconds.”
Something unexpectedly tender bloomed in your chest, soft and unwanted, and you tried to ignore it only to fail spectacularly.
As you gathered the papers beside him, your fingers brushed once.
Then again, tiny, accidental touches that somehow felt louder than conversation.
You reached for the same photograph at the same time, and Mark’s hand settled briefly over yours and both of you froze.
The air shifted, thinning into something fragile and dangerous as his eyes lifted slowly to meet yours.
You stopped breathing.
There it was again—that impossible tension, building quietly between you without permission, without warning, as if neither of you knew how to stop it and neither of you were brave enough to name it.
When you finally spoke, your voice came out softer than you meant it to.
“Mark…”
He looked wrecked suddenly, not visibly, not dramatically, but something in his expression tightened like he was fighting himself.
Then—
“Callan?”
A man in a gray suit appeared at the top of the stairs, and Mark pulled his hand away immediately.
The warmth vanished with him.
In an instant, Deputy District Attorney Mark Callan returned—controlled, professional, untouchable, as if whatever had passed between you had never happened at all.
“We’re waiting on you for pretrial,” the man said.
“I’m coming.”
The man nodded once before disappearing again.
Silence settled between you afterward—awkward now, fragile in a way it had not been moments before.
Mark stacked the final exhibits carefully into the box, his movements precise and controlled, as if order could undo whatever had just passed between you.
Then he stood.
You rose too and lost your balance again because, apparently, God had taken a personal interest in humiliating you.
Mark caught your elbow with frightening speed.
For one suspended second, you just stared at each other.
Then, to your absolute horror, he laughed.
Not politely, not under his breath, not with that careful restraint he wore like armor.
An actual, helpless laugh.
“You cannot be real,” he said under his breath.
You covered your face. “I hate this building.”
His hand lingered on your arm one second too long before he let go. When you looked up again, something in his expression had softened completely—not amusement, not irritation, but something worse: affection, real and unmistakable.
Your heart did something violent and painful inside your chest. Suddenly, the possibility became terrifyingly real: Mark Callan liked you—actually liked you. Not in passing, not by accident. Judging from the look on his face right now, that realization scared him almost as much as it scared you.
He stepped backward first, always first, like he didn’t trust himself standing too close.
“I should go.”
You nodded even though disappointment struck.
“Right. Court.”
“Yeah.”
Neither of you moved, the silence stretched, then Mark glanced at the stairs beneath your feet.
“…Do you want me to carry the boxes upstairs?”
Your heart melted so fast it was humiliating.
“You already saved my life.”
“You tripped carrying paper.”
“It was a near-death experience emotionally.”
For the first time today, Mark smiled openly, small, tired, and beautiful enough to ruin you entirely.
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
And before you could recover, he lifted both exhibit boxes effortlessly and started up the stairs beside you.
Like it was the most natural thing in the world.
—𝜗𝜚—
By Tuesday morning, the entire courthouse had apparently decided you and Mark Callan were having an affair.
You discovered this when a bailiff winked at you in the hallway and said:
“Morning, Mrs. Prosecutor.”
You nearly walked directly into a water fountain.
“WHAT?”
The bailiff laughed himself into another dimension while you stood there in horrified silence, clutching a stack of transcripts.
This was somehow Rita’s fault; you could feel it.
You stormed into records to find her humming cheerfully as she organized files.
“What did you do?”
She didn’t even look up. “You’ll need to narrow that down.”
“People think I’m dating Mark!”
Now she looked up, and the woman had the audacity to grin.
“Oh,” she said. “So it’s spreading.”
You stared at her in betrayal. “Spreading?”
“Honey, the two of you have the subtlety of a hospital fire.”
“We are not—”
"You look at him like he hung the moon."
“I do not.”
“And he watches you, like you might accidentally kill yourself if left unattended.”
“That feels unfairly specific.”
Rita pointed a pen at you. “He carried your boxes upstairs yesterday.’’
“He was helping.”
“He glared at Greg from evidence for asking if you were single.”
This could not be happening. You were not workplace-romance material. You were workplace-workers-compensation material.
Unfortunately, your humiliation only worsened around noon, because you were delivering signed affidavits to the litigation floor when you heard voices drifting from one of the partially open conference rooms.
“…seriously, Callan?”
You slowed instinctively, not intentionally. Okay, maybe a little intentionally.
Inside the room, Assistant District Attorney Evelyn Price leaned against the conference table with crossed arms while Mark stood near the window reviewing a file.
“You’re imagining things,” Mark said flatly.
Evelyn laughed softly. “Am I?”
“You are.”
“Then why did you nearly bite Brandon Pike’s head off last week?”
Your entire body froze. Mark didn’t answer immediately, which somehow felt louder.
Evelyn tilted her head knowingly. “That’s what I thought.”
“This conversation is inappropriate.”
“So is staring at the records department every twenty minutes.”
You physically stopped breathing.
Inside the room, Mark looked profoundly exhausted.
“Evelyn.”
“Oh relax,” she said. “I’m not judging you. Frankly, it’s nice seeing you care about something besides work for once.”
Something complicated flickered across his face then, left too quickly to fully understand.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Evelyn’s expression softened slightly.
“I know you haven’t looked at someone like that in years.”
Silence. Heavy silence.
Then Mark said quietly:
“She deserves someone less complicated.”
The words hit you directly in the chest—not because they were cruel, but because they weren’t. They sounded honest, painfully honest.
You stepped back on instinct before they could realize you were standing there. Your heartbeat thudded too fast, too heavy, as if it had forgotten how to breathe.
You should have left, you absolutely should have left, but instead, like the emotionally intelligent woman you very much were not, you shifted your weight at the worst possible moment, and the affidavits slipped from your arms.
Paper exploded across the hallway floor.
Inside the conference room, silence fell.
“…Oh my God,” you whispered.
The door opened, and Mark stepped out first. His eyes found you kneeling among scattered paperwork, then flicked to your face, your guilty expression, and something in his own changed instantly.
“Were you standing here long?”
“No,” you lied terribly.
Evelyn appeared behind him, looking openly delighted.
“Well,” she said. “This is awkward.”
You wanted to die, preferably swift.
Mark crouched automatically to help gather papers. “You should’ve said something.”
“I was leaving.”
“You were eavesdropping,” Evelyn corrected.
You made a wounded noise.
Mark picked up several affidavits before speaking quietly without looking at you.
“You heard that.”
Not a question.
You swallowed hard. “Some of it.”
The hallway suddenly felt much too small.
Evelyn looked between both of you before sighing dramatically. “I’m going to go before this turns into a slow-burning legal drama.”
Neither of you acknowledged her.
She left anyway, muttering something about emotional constipation.
You stayed kneeling on the floor beside Mark in painful silence.
“You think you’re complicated?’’ You ask softly.
Mark exhaled slowly.
“You shouldn’t have heard that.”
“That’s not really an answer.”
His hands paused briefly on the paperwork. Then he looked at you—really looked at you—and something in his expression shifted.
He seemed worn in a way you hadn’t seen before: not just physically, but emotionally.
“I work seventy hour weeks,” he said quietly. “I miss holidays, birthdays, most nights I sleep in my office.”
You tried speaking, but he kept going.
“I prosecute violent crimes. Half the things I see follow me home.” His jaw tightened slightly. “And people around me…” He paused once. “Eventually, they get tired of coming second to the job.”
Your chest hurt because none of that sounded arrogant. It sounded lonely, painfully lonely.
Mark looked down at the papers again. “You deserve easy.”
The words came out rougher than intended, and somehow that hurt even worse, because it sounded like he had already decided he couldn’t be what you needed.
“Who said I wanted easy?” You said before you could stop yourself.
Mark went very still, and the air shifted dangerously. His eyes lifted slowly to yours, and there it was again, that unbearable tension, like both of you were standing too close to something neither of you knew how to describe.
Your pulse hammered painfully as Mark’s gaze dropped briefly to your mouth.
You noticed
God, you noticed
Then footsteps echoed at the end of the hall, and the moment was shattered.
Mark stood first, retreating behind professionalism with visible effort as he carefully handed you the last affidavit. His expression controlled again, but not quickly enough to hide what had almost happened between you.
“Our hearing starts in ten minutes.”
You stared up at him from the floor.
“Right.”
But neither of you moved, not yet, not while the air between you still felt too fragile to disturb.
Then Mark did something that completely destroyed what little remained of your emotional stability.
Very gently, almost absently, he reached down and fixed the crooked collar of your blouse, his fingers brushing your shoulder with a tenderness that felt far too natural, far too instinctive, as if some part of him had moved before the rest of him could remember he was supposed to be careful around you.
Your breath caught hard.
Mark seemed to realize what he had done at the exact same moment you did, and his hand withdrew.
The look on his face afterward was almost alarmed, as if touching you had become dangerous, as if the softness he kept letting slip was beginning to frighten him more than anything else.
Then, without another word, he turned and walked away down the hall, leaving you kneeling there with a stack of papers in your arms and a heartbeat that no longer felt survivable.
