drag path 6 r u mine?
AO3 Story Link drag path master chapter list
Please note: This chapter contains the first instance of explicit sexual content (masturbation). MDNI! Though not in all of them, there will be more such instances in future chapters, so consider yourself on notice and check the warnings/tags going forward.
Pairing: Benjamin Poindexter x fem!reader Word Count: 14k (begging your forgiveness) Summary: Soulmate marks were an alien invention, literally. But they stuck around and so you carried those words on your body, and you yearned, and you wished for that person to come along. Of course, he arrived after you'd given up, and only after there was blood on your hands.
The thought of being marked with words from Foggy Nelson's killer sent spirals of shame and guilt to your core, but a fragile, thin line stretched between the two of you, and it wouldn't be broken. Warnings/Tags: fem!reader, no use of y/n, canonical character death, canon-typical violence, explicit sexual content (masturbation), explicit language, hurt/comfort, catholic guilt, soulmate identifying marks, your honor they're in love, two touch starved idiots, SLOW BURN, MDNI
Taglist: @benspoindexter @kkkkisworld @starlitflora @mewmew222 @noble-17 @nbhrhn @bubbletae7 @sarahskywalker-amidala @mariayjws5 @kplatzman @trulovekay @douazz
Notes: Back from being a wedding guest, and I'm pretty fairly pleased with this one. This was one of those chapters that just came out of my hands without much prodding, which is primarily why it's so damn long. We just had to see what happened after that SUPER AWKWARD Lyft ride that Dex definitely horned in on. And John Pilgrim entered the scene, because things weren't complicated enough. And Dex also enjoyed some quality time at home, as one does.
Because I am a woman of culture, there is both a Jane Eyre reference and a RuPaul's Drag Race reference in this chapter, somehow. +5 points per reference to you when you can spot them. Next chapter, we should have some good old fashioned hurt/comfort wound care.
I'm positively dying to hear what you all think!
she’s a silver lining climbing on my desire, and i go crazy ‘cause here isn’t where i wanna be and satisfaction feels like a distant memory and i can’t help myself, all i wanna hear her say is, “are you mine?”- Arctic Monkeys. “R U Mine?” AM, 2013
The night of June 18 to 19, 2027
Dex was in your apartment.
Okay, Dex was in your apartment. Your soulmate was in your apartment. A wanted murderer was in your apartment. Dex.
It was nearing two am, and your eyes were going crosswise from fatigue, looking at him prowl through your space like it was the most natural place for him to be in the whole world. Full dark clothes, imposing stature, and intense curiosity. It made your head swim to think that an hour ago you were dancing in a club; that six months ago, you were sitting alone in your apartment vowing to take care of yourself before him; that ten years ago, almost to the day, words had trickled down your body to surface on your ribs as if floating in a lake. But there he was – a tick of the lip at the bookcase, a raised eyebrow at the laundry basket, a casual touch to the dishes drying in the rack on the counter. This was no dream, no figment of another world, another life – this was happening.
“I’m so not ready for this.” You muttered, watching him methodically close all the blinds in the apartment like this was the personal mission for which he’d been born.
Dex, it seemed, had better hearing than people like Kirsten – or rather, he cared to pay much more attention when you talked to yourself; his head cocked in your direction, eyes flitting over before his body turned a moment later. “Not ready for what?” He asked, standing there with his dumb handsome face and terrible strong hands and your ring like a favor, dragging a metric fuckton of past with him down the road. The last blind was closed, and he finished by placing one of your chairs across the room from the front door, sat down with his legs spread and back to the wall.
“This whole…” You hesitated to say the words when the moment came because surely it didn’t need to be said, right? But the longer the silence stretched out, the more you knew that he wanted you to say it, wanted you to admit the connection out loud. Was directing the conversation already. “Soulmate thing. Conversation, I guess.”
He nodded lightly, running his tongue along the ridge of his bottom teeth, face no longer curious but rather, reserved. “You sound unhappy.” His eyes ticked to one window and then the door before returning to you.
You sounded resentful, because when something was infected, the infection had to be drained first. “I mean, am I supposed to be happy?” Blurted out from your position by the couch. None of this had been normal so far.
Dex’s face closed even more, held with one cheek quirked, and he looked at the floor. Looked like he had anticipated an answer that would disappoint him, that was a self-fulfilling prophecy. The arrow lodged in your ribs rankled when it constantly pushed you to go to him, touch him, be there, and you moved further away purposefully to stand behind the tiny kitchen island. Ran your fingers along the grout lines as a distraction.
“I mean, there’s no way out, is there?” You posited like that was reason enough, like it wasn’t your fear holding you back and scars from another man and another time and place and the way he – Dex – seemed to manipulate gravity and so could probably manipulate you as easily.
At the same time, “How do you want me—” Dex stopped, looking over the room slowly before finding you with his eyes, and you saw then how tight all the muscles in his face were. Saw that beyond the bruise and the cut on his jaw, there was another slice, shallow, across the back of his bicep, a bruise at his elbow. What if you gave into him, surrendered yourself so you weren’t a free being with an independent will but rather part of the pair and then – after all that, he didn’t come back one day. What would you do then?
“How do I want you?” Maybe that wasn’t his full question but it was what stuck in your mind like a song on the radio from a far off memory. Insistent, partial, impactful. Your eyes dropped to his lips without permission, the way they parted just so, just for you, and then looked away with a sharp intake of breath.
Dex’s hands curled abruptly into fists in his lap and he leaned forward to brace his forearms on his knees because he wasn’t blind – he understood the secondary meaning to a phrase like that, of course, and he had already considered it too. His face held the stirrings of a desire that threatened to consume like wildfire and leave only ash behind, a desire that was echoed in you too. That made you remember how seeing his face so stern and unforgiving in the courthouse made you wish for it stern and unforgiving above you elsewhere; made you think about how you knew what his tongue and teeth and lips felt like. How you could imagine them on the back of your neck or your breasts or your thighs.
God, and your bed was right over there. Stop looking at it. Fuck.
You cleared your throat, the sound making him jerk his head up and look around the apartment for threats, look anywhere but at you. He was checking the windows again from his peripheral vision, the door. “I mean, uh, we didn’t choose this. And there hasn’t been any real progress getting rid of it. I can’t imagine you’re any happier about that part than I am.”
Turning to get a glass of water afforded you some shield from his eyes after saying that, but you still caught how the tips of his ears were red. Felt him marking each of your steps. “That part?” In that voice of his you heard in that same way others heard prophecies, promising so much.
You were hesitating over whether to pick up one glass or two, and finally just grabbed two like it meant nothing, and filled them both up with water from the jug in the fridge. “The, you know, the part where we don’t get to make our own decisions. I don’t like it. I’m sure you don’t either.”
Silence stretched out between you like ribbons of miles on a deserted highway.
“No.”
He said it so finally, and only looked up when you set the glass of water on the table next to him. Inhaled sharply like he was trying to draw as much of you into himself as he could. Something on his face, just a hint like the way his jaw ticked, hiding something. God, the way he stared, brow furrowed, almost a physical touch down the bridge of your nose and line of your throat to your sternum, down your side and ribs, searching. Searching for that one thing he wanted to know about and have for himself so badly, but couldn’t quite grasp.
Instead of moving closer or putting your hands on his shoulders or touching him, you sat down on your couch and crossed your legs sharply. Resettled and tented them by putting your bare feet on the little coffee table. “We’re really bad at this.” A glance at him and a dry laugh. “I barely know anything about you.”
You both knew that the trial had already revealed far too much about him, and yet so little, and he didn’t say anything, just watched and catalogued your restlessness. A tiny figure all the way down that highway full of silence and still he saw when you swallowed, or when you pulled your hair back nervously, or when you rubbed your lips together because words were trying to come out. “Me, I mean, it’s not like there’s anything to see here. No big deal. But you… “ A well so fucking deep you could drown. Put your fingers to your lips like that would hide you.
Dex frowned a little then, because the idea that you were lying to him stoked an anger he didn’t want to burn. “The more someone says that, the more they’re usually not telling the truth.” This time his eyes sought you out and caged you with the accusation until you were good and trapped by him, your words pulsed with what could only have been his scrutiny and disapproval.
“Yeah, well… prove it.” The way you said this, through a stiffened mouth posture, did more than reveal that there was something there. An ‘x’ on the map if he wanted it.
“I will.” The words hung over your heads, and he said them from his seat, but you could hear him if his mouth was pressed to your ear. Dex stood up, moving restlessly to settle himself into the small corner made by the back wall of your space and the minimal partition wall meant to delineate the sleeping area. He braced his legs casually, and folded his arms tightly across his chest. From there he could better watch every entry point of the apartment and still see you no matter where you went. “Ask me then.”
You snorted, drawing concentric circles on the smooth skin of your thigh. Knew he was watching your fingers and tracing each shape, that he understood what it was. “You are not gonna want to talk about this.”
He laughed softly, warily, without any real amusement. “Might as well try.”
The smallest circle. “Karen told me about it.”
The medium circle, this time not with a fingertip but the sharp edge of a nail. “About what you did.”
The largest circle, meandering, on your knee cap, while you stared him down. Dex just waited, stoic. “To Julie. Your girlfriend.”
It wasn’t as if he started raging, screaming, or left in a rush, slamming the door behind him. But he stiffened, and his face shuttered over like a lighthouse window in a storm, and any life in his eyes died away to leave you cold and alone, out there in the rain. You were perilously close to a line being crossed but you couldn’t tell exactly where it was yet. “What about Julie.” It was not a question.
The clocked ticked over to 2:30 am, and you were a shitty person because Karen did acknowledge that Julie’s death was at the hands of Fisk. But she said it without really knowing firsthand, and he was a convicted killer, and there was all this infection still buried deep down inside that overrode soulmate word bond and said, ‘Push. Push. Push push him until he snaps and see if he hurts you. Try him.’
And because you knew that it was a nasty thing to do, that you were imperfect and wanted to test him the way you constantly felt like you were being tested, you couldn’t bring yourself to look at him then, when you said it. “That you killed her.”
“I did not kill Julie.” There was the line, your feet just shy of it. The words came out immediate and clipped, born to a tense silence. And when you finally did look up, his lip had that trademark uneven snarl to it, reproach and anger that made your heart sink. Made you worry he would fail the test.
“Well,” More circles again, all of them little and uneven. “That’s what she said.”
Just from the tone of his voice, it was apparent that he was nearing whatever snapping point you were trying to shove him across. “She’s wrong.”
“But she said—”
“You’ll listen to her but not to me?” And now he was angry, it was leaking out of him like oily sludge from a barrel sunk deep into the ocean, a pollutant that made the room feel small and inadequate, made you feel smaller, and even more useless. He met your gaze head on, dark, dark stone eyes, and shoulders bunched up with muscle, and jawline so fucking hard you couldn’t have chiseled it into something happier – something nicer – something less sad. “I did not kill her. I’ve killed a lot of other people, but not her. And we were not together.”
You nodded, and Dex chased your eyes like a hawk racing for a dove, unwilling to let you go until he had you in his claws. Had you vulnerable, made you look him in the eye again and see that he was telling the truth. You’d feel like hell if he pushed on all of your soft, rotten parts, wouldn’t you? What a piece of shit you were for pushing on his. Finally, you stood up and wrenched your face in the direction of the kitchen again – it was a physical, grisly effort to turn away from him first when, in his way, he was pleading with you to believe him. Pleading a generous term, of course.
Out in the hallway, someone was stumbling past your door with loud, uneven footsteps – probably Mack heading to his place at the far end of the hall. On the street below echoed the sounds of two women yelling at each other, even though Dex had closed the window. Outside New York spun and didn’t know that you were rending into each other to see what was beneath. It was early, it was also late, it was technically so many hours since you last had food, and also it was a pretty sure bet that there was cheap frozen cookie dough in your little freezer. Fuck it. “Are you hungry? I am.”
Doc Ock had once peeled open the side of a subway car you were in, exposing everyone to rushing wind and danger; you vividly remembered screaming and huddling together with all the other passengers at the threat of death from falling out of the car. The kitchen felt then the exact same way – like it had once been safe but was now raided and open to attack. Still, you turned your back on him and dug through frozen dinners and ice until you came up with a stick of dough. Banged it on your thigh absently like that might do something while he watched.
There was no agreement from Dex, no chiding laugh about eating in the middle of the night, no warmth returning to the room. He just observed. The burned, semi-dented baking tray that got used for anything and everything, including cookies, was in the top cabinet of the kitchen – plopped there by Marci atop a ladder when she helped you move. She’d wedged it real far back there too. It took tiptoes and a leveraged knee on the counter to reach up and try to grab it, knocking a few other plates and bowls out of the way with a clatter.
You had it – you had it between two fingers and were trying to pull that stupid tray out but it was caught on something and then – the bowl it was caught on, heavy and ceramic, rolled forward and off the shelf, falling directly for your head.
But it never hit because Dex’s hand was there, catching it in his big palm. His body was pressed against yours from the behind, all the heat of him was spearing through you like knives. You thought you could feel his breath in your hair, the press of his belt buckle against the small of your back, the cage of him because one hand was on the counter at your side and the other was bracketing your head to hold the bowl. If he could feel how startled you were, how you tried to neither lean into him nor lean away, he didn’t say anything. Only set the bowl down on the counter and then didn’t step away.
“Oh fuck, thanks.” You turned, saw his eyes streak down to your chest, because it was rising and falling a little more dramatically than normal, and remembered swiftly that you were still wearing that dumb, dark blue halter top. Silly rabbit, that top is for the club, not the kitchen.
Still Dex didn’t move away or give you space. Your eyes darted from his face, still shuttered but not quite as angry, down his body, the line of his arms to where it caught like a fish on a hook against his forearm. Wriggled against the words there. Couldn’t help it when that rope between you two thinned into the most delicate, tensile twine and drew you by each individual fingertip to rest them against his skin there.
Felt the imprint of your own voice on his flesh and felt Dex jerk at the touch. Where you always swore that your mark was raised and tactile, his seemed like an imprint in his skin, where something or someone needed to fill him in to make him whole. You could have resisted running your fingers along each letter about as much as a moth could resist the brightest of lights, and a reciprocal airy touch ghosted over your own ribs, his want manifested.
“Your words,” You said, clearing your throat again awkwardly, and looking up at him. Snatched your fingers and hid them behind you on the counter like he wouldn’t notice what you’d done. Deep and dusky they were, no uneven color or fading like others might have, as if formed of semi-precious black stones that glittered with the faintest light. “They’re so beautiful.”
You’d looked up at him as you said that, and Dex did draw away a little then, nerves flickering across his face like candlelight, so wavering and sputtering red hot behind his eyes. This was the hunter, the bow and arrow – the spear – the knife drawn – looking for the most precious prize from prey cornered. He glanced over the skin he could see while setting the bowl down, then asked, “Yours?”
“They’re in a private place. I don’t show them to strangers.” You didn’t mean to say that. God, you didn’t fucking mean to say that. Came out before you could think otherwise. Fuck. That was your auto response when someone asked because people did have a habit of asking strangers in a bid to find their match; was practically one of the first things you’d had to say to your friend Lois, from the running club. Not everyone was as touchy about their words as you were. But whether you meant to or not, that was what you said.
Immediately, your response was a stone dropped in a calm pool, the moment breaking, feeling evaporated. Dex fully stepped away, face distant again, the flames smothered under sand and dirt and hurt. The hawk had the chase turned back on him, dove with talons to the eye even if unintentionally. He swallowed, mouth tight and you knew he felt rejected. Could feel it beating down the bond like war drums. Could see him retreating back down that damned highway, dragging you along from a distance even if you dug your feet in.
“Understood.” Suddenly his hands were anywhere but close to you, suddenly he wasn’t even on that road with you anymore but a million miles away. Like Tantalus, he had reached for the fruit he was so hungry for, and it had withdrawn just out of reach.
“Dex…” But fruit was made to be eaten, and if you never stopped withdrawing, you’d rot on the vine.
“No.” The word came out so sharply, reactionary, that you held still against the counter. Dex’s lip was curling up crookedly into this expression that was supposed to be disdain but was instead wounded underneath. “You said it. Off limits to someone like me.”
“Off limits— Dex –”
Rejected. Bereft. Disappointed. He just backed up more and went to the window by your table, where the fire escape attached, purposefully avoiding your eyes now. Yanked the blinds up with deft skill so as not to break them but to still let you know that he was not okay. Because of course he’d go that way. What other way would he possibly go but the window when the damn front door was right there.
The window was open before you could blink, and he disappeared from sight almost immediately in the deep morning darkness with his black clothes and grim emotions. The rattling metal walkways and ladders that could have raised any number of people from the dead, including Tony Stark himself they were so loud, were completely silent. Fuck, he was leaving and you had truly fucked this up. Actually cared that you had fucked it up no matter how scared you were. Cared.
“Dex!” And this time you said it while frantically flinging yourself out the window to hang halfway outside in the chill, gathering dew before dawn. Whisper shouting down at him because this felt do or die. Hips and legs still in the apartment, everything else hanging out in some kind of desperation.
He was stopped mid-motion on the floor below, shoulders tense and big hands gripping the railing like it would buck him off otherwise. Ear cocked and listening even though his face was impassive.
“I meant what I said when I told you I’m not good at this. It takes me awhile to get used to things. Just… you gotta just go real slow. I’ll get there.”
You didn’t say sorry, didn’t even really have to because it was implicit in your tone and words and the way you were half-way to falling out the window to talk to him. The infection wasn’t fully purged – it would rear its ugly head for as long as it took to cleanse, but at least it had lessened, just a little bit. He nodded, took another few steps down and then looked up for a brief moment. “Close and lock your window. Now.”
Left.
***
June 20, 2027
Dex normally felt some satisfaction in eliminating threats with perfect aim – he was that good at it. Even good guys might admire their own handiwork when said work was a clean headshot, after all. And taking on fascist AVTF officers? The gratification reached new heights. But a day and a half after his conversation with her in her apartment, late at night when he should have been able to reel her in a little faster, and here he was only looking for violence to assuage himself with.
A group of six officers in an alleyway, discussing how much satisfaction they took in inflicting Wilson Fisk’s policies on the general public. So heavily armored they appeared as stiff, rolling wine barrels rather than mobile men. Extra clips he’d liberate from them, radios, service weapons, batons – all possessed without the skill to really use them. They were minding their own business, if temporarily yes, but they were convenient. More importantly, they’d strike a blow to that inflated ass in the Mayor’s mansion, so Bullseye dropped in to disturb them.
One headshot from close range, the officer’s body reeling back into a half-moon before collapsing, blood and brain matter flying to cover everyone in the vicinity. She was stubborn, his girl.
Another lashed forward with a baton and Dex dodged to the right, drawing a knife as long as his forearm to plunge it deep within the idiot’s side from the back – at an angle so it slipped between ribs and punctured a lung. He used the leverage to drag the man around and shield himself from a few ill placed bullets, letting friendly fire take the officer instead of dry drowning in blood. She insisted on prying into his own shit and then hid hers like a mother dog guarding newborn pups. It was infuriating.
Dex snorted when a third officer and a fourth tried to tag team him, coming from opposite sides to flank him when he wasn’t a man you could fucking outflank. Throwing knife to the forehead for one, a second to the same dying man’s throat because he felt like it. If he could just find a pry point, maybe he could wear her down into letting him in.
The fourth tripped on a piece of garbage in the alley, and Dex stopped his forward momentum with a knee to the abdomen, hitting right under the vest where the top of the stomach and the ribs formed a hollow, felt bone break. Followed with a punishing punch to the man’s face that was sure to crack a cheekbone like a sledgehammer on granite. The fifth officer was standing braced several feet away and firing wildly with his gun, but the shots were all missing so there was time to indulge himself. Knelt down so his knee was in the fourth man’s back and pulled that ugly helmet off, felt drops of blood splatter the skin around his eyes and brows when he crunched the officer’s face into the cement repeatedly until there was no more moaning.
Narrowed his eyes as the fifth officer’s gun ran out of bullets. There was shit in her past that she didn’t trust him with yet, but didn’t she know that he’d been born to a life of shit and it hadn’t stopped him yet? He still had strap marks on his hip that his father had given him, for fuck’s sake.
The fifth was fumbling for a second firearm, so Dex pulled his own and ended the man’s life with the casual disregard you might give to a used tissue you threw in the garbage. One bullet to the thigh, precisely placed to the femoral artery. Another to the jugular when the man collapsed. More as he walked past the corpse because he could. “Just go slow.” He muttered because he was angry at the situation and he wanted that anger directed at others, not at her.
Just go slow. And do what? His lack of relationship experience was finally catching up to him, and Dex regretted never trying harder to perform that normal adulthood he used to think about. This was something casual sex had never prepared him for. He knew this wasn’t the right response, but he was truly upset that she’d withdrawn from him. Couldn’t figure out what the right response actually was. It stung, badly even as he acknowledged the need to adjust his plans and move slower.
The sixth was on a radio, calling for help, so the time to linger and enjoy himself was over. Because he could, Dex pulled another knife and lunged, sinking it into the man’s sternum just above the edge of his armored uniform. Getting close so he could hear the gasping and smell the blood.
Dig until he could find whatever dark shit she was ashamed of and scrape it out of her so there was more room for him.
Convince her that she could do the same for him.
Stop Wilson Fisk and inflict his revenge upon Vanessa Mariana.
Plan adjusted.
All dead bodies around him, competently and quickly dispatched and the city bustled without stopping, unaware he’d done it a service. Dex checked his watch as he began picking through their uniforms for clips and knives: a minute and change.
Daredevil could never.
***
June 21, 2027
Three days later, you sat in the dry cleaners at the sewing machine and tried to will yourself not to sweat.
Three miserable days wondering where Dex was and if you had well and truly screwed things forever. And if you had, did it matter because weren’t you still doing that thing where you pretended you had a choice in the matter and might want to go your own way? (Not really, no.) He’d actually looked hurt, leaving that night, upset. There’d been no sight of him since, just a return to the phantom glimpses of dark blonde hair that was never him, and anxious listening for noises at night that never materialized.
Meant you walked to work with increasing listlessness each morning, so much so that even the preacher who had taken to reading on a bench on your street seemed to notice. How pathetic.
It was getting into the meat of summer, and the air was muggy and wet, no matter that several dusty fans blew all day and all night in the lobby; that just meant it was recirculated, muggy, wet air. Lea had even retrieved her summer stool, so that she could sit and sweat instead of stand and sweat at the cash register. Customers filtered in and out just as listlessly as you all catered to them, and a fly buzzed around the back where Jim was working on a load of bedding from a small boutique hotel a couple of streets over.
“Can you bring me another container of bleach?” He called to you from the back, knowing that Lea was in the front and Brandon had escaped with several friends for the afternoon.
“Sure, one minute.” You set down the project you were working on, a chiffon skirt needing shortening, which meant a baby hem. A baby hem in the summer? With an iron? You’d take any excuse to put it down.
The errand was quick enough, traversing through different layers of the shop like they were Dante’s seven levels of hell in the heat; but by the time you’d returned to the front of the store, the axis upon which the entire city block rested had shifted because there Dex was… in Zhang’s Dry Cleaners.
Bullseye, Benjamin Poindexter, Dex. In public? In full view of others, smiling amiably and talking to Lea as if this was a completely normal thing to happen. Hearing your footsteps, he shifted his gaze to catch the stunned expression on your face, and the corner of his smile kicked up awkwardly into something that felt disgustingly honest instead of the put upon friendliness of before. Real. Seeing that little extra half-smile flipped the switch on your soulmate words, on your pulse, warming it up like a racehorse even as you slowed your approach.
This was apparently his idea of going slow: appearing without warning at your place of employment.
Lea heard you as well, of course, and she turned around with a stack of fabric folded in her hands so neatly that it might as well have been an artist’s rendition of what folded clothes looked like. “There you are – a new repair job. The gentleman here would like to discuss it with you.” And then, then, then she smiled. Conspiratorially. As if to say, ‘Get a load of him.’
And you were pretty sure you were going insane now.
The gentleman in question shifted in place, not catching the girl code communication because he was too busy studying every detail of you like you were some variant version of yourself he’d never seen before. Oft washed denim jeans and worn tennis shoes, a loose band tee for some group he’d never heard of with sweat stains where it was trapped by your body when you hunched over sewing, soft plastic measuring tape draped around your neck, seam ripper behind your ear. Dex’s eyes blitzed over each thing and didn’t miss your hands that clasped behind your back anxiously or the way that you tilted your head down and looked up at him rather than straight on.
He was wearing the same combination of black cargo pants and black t-shirt as the other night, and it occurred to you belatedly that you didn’t know what his living situation was like. Did he even have a place? Or money to feed himself? Was he switching between homeless shelters and making frequent trips to laundromats? Did he have nowhere to sleep after he left the other night? Should you offer to do his laundry for him at work? Okay stop, too far. Maybe this wasn’t the time to let your bond strum with worry and pity and oh my god, pay attention.
Lea was shoving the pile of fabric into your hands, dark blue and heavier than it seemed; part of you cringed at how just holding it, you were destroying how nicely they had been folded. “I’ll leave you two to go over the… the pricing model.” Because in the tradition of all mothers, it was impossible for her to be any less obvious.
Alone in the front of the store with only fluorescent lights that buzzed nascently for company, Dex’s face dropped into its usual stern expression; only somehow it didn’t seem like a cover or an insult, more like he’d let go of a mask just for you. Let you know that you could peek through the cracks if you wanted to, while everyone else got the baldfaced lie. He tilted his head down too, looking at the laminate counter and then you in turn, clearly waiting for you to lead the conversation. At least he smelled clean, like generic drugstore soap, so there was somewhere he could go.
“So, sir, you need… um…” Cleared your throat awkwardly and withheld an embarrassed eye roll like an adult. Wrapped your arms around both your middle and his clothes, where they pressed against your chest and words – a poor man’s substitute for what your bond was telling you it really wanted. Dex’s eyes fixated on the press of something that belonged to him against your body, lips held loosely together, not making the conversation any easier and also, somehow, making your heart beat faster at the same time. Neat trick. “Yeah, so the other night, it was awkward.”
His attention snapped up to your face, shrugging a little. “Goes like that sometimes.”
You nodded, praying that the Zhangs weren’t hovering just on the other side of the motorized clothing rack. “Does it? Go like that?” Pushed a long, awkward breath out through your teeth because then impulsively, you added, “When you’re involved with someone?”
Dex froze, looking for all intents and purposes like a man who’d sighted a target and was about to hit it dead on – Robin of Locksley with his bow and arrow nocked. The muscles in his throat flexed and he glanced at you, then around the store front; you knew the moment his eyes found the Bulletin cover because of the whisper of a grimace across his face. “I don’t know. Never been… involved with anyone before.”
“Oh.” It came out before you could stop it, surprised because someone as handsome as Dex? Surely he’d been with people before like you had. Dated. Done the walk of shame. Tried to find someone before the words appeared in 2017. Julie – her ghost floated across your brain briefly, but he’d sworn that wasn’t the case. ‘Was Dex a virgin? Fuck, don’t go down that road.’ You held yourself to recognizing the admission for what it was: a gift. “I—"
He’d stopped avoiding looking at you, returned to suspending you in place with his polished bronze eyes, his brow slowly furrowing as said eyes narrowed in concentration. A little flare of anticipation igniting in his pupils. “Are we involved?”
An excited whisper that was hurriedly shushed from several feet to the back. You froze mid-inhale, humiliation climbing up your spine, because yes of course Jim and Lea were back there listening like you were a teenager standing on their front porch after a date, while they flicked the lights on and off. Your cheeks burned the more you heard them shuffling from their hiding spot, knowing that Dex was seeing you infantilized like this when he was most certainly a full-grown man. Turned to chastise them for listening in, though how exactly you weren’t quite sure yet, when something pinged past your face, too fast to trace.
There was a popping sound, and the clink of a heavy silver coin hitting the floor and bouncing, rolling on its edge in a lazy arc until it came to rest against the side of your tennis shoe. You turned back to Dex, startled, knowing your eyes were wide and eyebrows raised, to which he just grinned back smugly; lips almost closed but just a flash of teeth beyond, enjoying your attention. After a delayed beat as the system started up, the motorized clothing rack jumped with a crack and started to turn, eliciting startled whispers and hurried footsteps as the eavesdroppers were evicted from their spot.
One of his hands was poised by his hip, thumb up from where he’d flicked the coin to hit the system’s ‘on’ button across the room; the other he tucked into his pocket with satisfaction. He accepted the coin when you picked it up and handed it back over – it was some kind of prayer thing – let his fingers caress your palm as he took it, the stroke of his skin like a lightning strike.
“Thanks.” You muttered, cheeks still flaming, though now from more than just the interlopers.
“I’m still waiting for an answer to my question.” His voice had turned to gravel, deep and rough enough to make you lose all traction, go down hard with no plan.
Your voice, high and reedy with nerves. “No.” A quick shake of your head because embarrassment wasn’t a strong enough word to cover exactly what you were feeling. Put under a microscope, examined, akin to standing in front of the class to give a book report except nobody was laughing and the class was actually a very attractive man that an alien race had deemed your perfect match. “I mean, um…”
He raised a brow silently, the jerk.
“I’m um, you know, uh.” Maybe if you cleared your throat again the ground would open up and swallow you whole. “If you have to ask, sh—shouldn’t that be your answer? So, um, no. We’re not.” Oh God, this was going about as well as when you asked out Steve Carson in the sixth grade because you swore he looked like Steve Rogers and were turned down in front of half the class. This wasn’t going slow.
Yet. Not yet, say it you fool. Here he was, clearly trying for you, and you had to fuck it up.
The fumbling answer had cooled much of Dex’s self-satisfaction, dimming that light in his eyes and knocking away his smile. The scar on the side of his face crinkled as he looked around awkwardly, grimaced fully this time, the gap in his teeth stark. Even though he was hiding it well, you could feel just the bare stirrings of anger and rejection through the bond, starting to crash against the shore, waves signaling the sea wasn’t calm. He stepped back from the counter, the distance not a mere foot but a chasm without warning; held out a hand expectantly, the gravel in his voice turning coolly to razor blades. “The shirts?”
You sucked in a sharp breath, mouth open in an ‘oh’ of remembrance, looked to see them still clutched in your arms. He was asking for them back, you knew that – he would take what was his, and he intended to leave and it would be all on you to figure out how to fix this. You clearly struggled with it, but maybe he actually did have enough strength of will to sever all connection? Shit. “What seems to be the problem with them, sir?”
No warning, and the shirts were dumped on the counter and with deft fingers pretending professionalism, you held one up by the shoulder seams to inspect it. Ignoring Dex’s eyes – surprised, confused, wary. Dark blue in the body, black at the arms and sides, semi-stretch tactical material lined with something you’d bet was some sort of combat safeguard. Of course the problem was pretty obvious – someone had fucking tried to stab him or had stabbed him while he wore them, and there were several cuts along the arms, the side, the back. One by the neck that you did not want to think about.
“Simple repair work it looks like?” Your voice tilted up to emphasize the question. Dex nodded with narrowed eyes.
The other shirt received the same treatment, had the same issues. Some of the gray ribbing at the neck was permanently discolored to a rust despite the scent of detergent to tell you he’d washed it, and you had to ignore him with even more studiousness when you brought it up close to your eye for further inspection. “And the material is reinforced? Armored or something?”
After a moment’s hesitation, “Yes.” He bit out, the posture of his mouth and teeth making him look distinctly irritated. Sent a shiver down your spine that was not from embarrassment and had to be repressed.
The back of your neck prickled as you bent down, nearly nose to counter, to write out a sales slip, penning, B.P. in the name column and scribbling in your own address just in case the Zhangs decided to snoop later. Looked up at him from the height of the counter and saw the moment he looked at your tongue bitten between your teeth. “And your phone number, sir? For my records.”
If he caught the, ‘my’ that was a, ‘my’ and not an, ‘our,’ he didn’t show it. Only gave it up reluctantly, “212.”
“212.” You parroted back, writing it down without looking much as he had sent the coin sailing – as if you could compare the two actions, really.
“373.” He’d backed further away without you noticing somehow, and you’d have to stretch to hand him the slip when the time came.
“373.” Numbers scratched out that probably weren’t even in a straight line at that point.
“9284.”
Writing the final four numbers down on the sales slip, you ripped off both pieces and held the yellow half out to him, hoping your expression said anything close to, ‘I’m an idiot who can’t express this shit very well, please believe me.’ Dex looked at you for a long moment, evaluating, and maybe it really was true that he didn’t know shit about relationships; that he didn’t know about being dumb and having baggage because it still seemed like he believed you when you said no, you weren’t involved even though clearly –
--clearly your heart was pounding in your chest and this was that moment in your pattern where you almost lost something and fought to keep it; then withdrew in fear when it came back. That was what you needed to get over, part of the infection that was deep in any idea of a relationship – but that meant there was an idea of a relationship. With him. Someday.
His hand gripped the half of the yellow slip closest to him, careful now not to touch you skin to skin, but you didn’t relinquish it – held on hard enough that the paper threatened to rip between you. “Yet.” You told him, throat closed with nerves, but your eyes were direct enough – this time it was you holding him in place. “I forgot to say yet.”
Even though he didn’t actually breathe out heavily or sigh or really react, the signs were there, you were just learning to read them. Dex’s shoulders slowly dropped, the muscles in his jaw released just enough to keep him from looking truly murderous, his lips pursed into an almost smile before he caught it. “Copy.”
The door chimed as Dex left, dry cleaning receipt crumpled in his hand, not looking back but at least your words weren’t jumping at the idea of him leaving, at least he wasn’t departing with simmering anger. God, at least you’d managed to salvage the message, so to speak, after telling him to take it fucking slow the other night and then almost ruining it in the light of day.
“You almost screwed that the hell up, girlie.”
“Goddamnit!” You jumped, putting a hand down on the counter in surprise that slid abruptly because you’d managed to place it on one of Dex’s shirts, which had no traction on the counter. Banged your elbow against the corner edge. “Lea, you scared the shit out of me. What the hell.”
Your boss grinned with a saucy shrug – the summer heat always made her a little sassy, if you remembered correctly. You just wished she’d aim it at someone else, Jesus. She picked the shirts up off the counter – pulling one of them out from under your still braced palm – and folded them up again. “This is going to be a pain in the ass to fix, you know.” Not folded as neat as Dex would have done it but also damn, get a grip. Handed them to you with the white merchant’s copy of the slip on top. “Next time stop pussyfooting around and just ask the boy out.”
With raised eyebrow and a pointed finger in the air, prepared to serve sass back to her, “Next time—”
Chime – from the front door again, and then – bang – as the door was pushed so hard it hit the side window. So hard it was a near thing that there weren’t any cracks in the glass.
You and Lea both startled, backing up towards the rotating clothing rack like that would offer some shelter; out of the corner of your eye, you saw Lea’s hand itch for the panic button on the wall, hidden by a plant sitting atop one of the business’ filing cabinets. A man in one of those vile gray sweat suits stood in the door, not anyone you’d seen before but clearly he shopped in the same establishments as the man from the alleyway the previous month.
Jim was calling Lea’s name from the back, sounding worried, his footfalls heavy with fear and speed. He burst from around the rack and cabinets, upset, holding a baseball bat in one hand – but stopped dead to take in the scene.
As if the whole exchange was perfectly normal, the man in the track suit stretched out his shoulders and sauntered up the counter. Rang the little service bell twice for the hell of it. His gold chain necklace glinted in the light and so did his gold tooth when he smiled – it was not a pleasant smile, by any stretch of the imagination. After a great length of silence in which you, Jim, and Lea were too nervous to move and this new man was too delighted by the effect he was having on you all, he finally moved to pull something out of his pocket.
A white envelope, folded and slightly grubby, which he uncreased to the best of his ability and placed on the counter with great gentility. “From Jusufi. He says he hopes you get the message this time.”
***
June 25, 2027
New York state was in full summer swell, a paradox of happiness over the sun and despair over the muggy heat. Similarly, New York City was balanced on a pin head, always wavering between contentment and violence. Yes, children played in the parks; people sat on their stoops talking late into the evening; community entrepreneurs stopped boarding up their business windows and little old ladies chatted with anyone who would listen about how delighted they were that the streets were safe again.
But that smiling delight was a layer of cheap paint over the truth, lifting in places to reveal ugliness and anger. The street vendor carts that were left abandoned on corners when their owner was hijacked and kidnapped by the AVTF; the nightly local news reports about beatings when some kid mouthed off to those same officers; the constant prowling of a privatized militia in all back around city streets, eyeing down anyone who fit their profile. Their profile being primarily: not white or being masked, even when that mask was a paper COVID one. The missing and wanted posters dotting the streets popped up more and more like blemishes on the city’s skin.
Karen’s solemn face watched you walk down the street from a multitude of such posters, Matt’s too, ruining the sunshine of the day each time you saw them. Made you feel terrible for giving up trying to reach her when your texts went unanswered for weeks and weeks. She and Matt were still missing, you should still be looking for them. Walking past Josie’s Bar on the way to your lunch appointment made your stomach churn – for a number of reasons, only one of which was their mutual disappearance.
Your phone buzzed in your pocket as you strode through Hell’s Kitchen, in a hurry because you were almost late. Fumbled the book you were holding into your bag so you could grab it and flick the screen open. Sighed when it showed the 9284 number you were growing rapidly familiar with, still listed as a jumble of numbers with no contact name.
DX 6/25/2027 12:26 pm EST Stop walking so close to the edge of the sidewalk.
You rolled your eyes and lifted one hand with a casual bird flipped to the general area, and because it was New York City, no one paid any attention. Well, almost no one.
DX 6/25/207 12:27 pm EST Is that supposed to be funny?
And if you flicked your eyes back in the direction of Josie’s where people sometimes left flowers for Foggy on the sidewalk, and if a hot stone of guilt flared in your stomach until you looked ahead again because the man texting you had the one killed Foggy Nelson – no one could have guessed it.
Dex was, it turned out, extremely interested in personal safety – so much so that it both made you terribly uncomfortable with how often he seemed to be invisible and yet actually around, and also semi-charmed by how vested he apparently was in keeping you secure. The charm was…
…exceedingly grudging.
Grudging because he’d gone from closing your window himself to harassing you about it over text and that was the very definition of irritating. There was nagging about the blinds, about the windows, the sidewalk, the street, strangers on the sidewalk, assholes on bikes, and any number of things. Nagging was a strong word, but still – a lot of people wouldn’t have put up with it. Yet his behavior reminded you of absolutely no one in your past so you’d tolerate it – for awhile anyway, because that seemed to be his way of trying. And if someone called your vaguely antagonistic behavior and texting flirting well – as Lea had so plainly stated, maybe it was time you stopped pussyfooting around.
(Ironic, since Lea and Jim were both pussyfooting around themselves by refusing to share anything they knew about the Eastern European maniac with an envelope. But it had only been a few days of prying, you had time to get it out of them.)
Take things one step at a time and if you felt comfortable one moment – great; if you were scared the next, that was okay too. It was okay. Breathe.
How he had even gotten your number, you weren’t interested in contemplating. Probably something to do with back doors into governmental systems of overreach. Turned another corner and decided to think about it another time because if you squinted against the sun, you could see your lunch date approaching.
“Hey, I’m so glad that we could do this!” Kirsten was walking towards you on the sidewalk, looking effortlessly professional despite the Stanford t-shirt and jogging shorts she wore – everything was so pristine. Tennis shoes and hair in the ponytail contrasting with gold studs in her ears, tasteful make-up, and her heavy work bag slung over one shoulder. She pulled you into an impromptu hug and smelled nice as she clasped you close.
You smiled at her, shrugging off lingering penitence for another time. “Yeah, me too. I’m glad I could get a couple of hours off.” You gestured for her to go ahead of you on the concrete. “Thanks for suggesting this place, I’ve been wanting to try it.”
The place in question was a little Mexican brunch spot tucked in between an ancient Fedex location and a bar that wouldn’t open until 2 pm. Bright orange flowers in little vases on each table set for two and an open bar of salsas for people to overfill little plastic containers with. Mariachi music strained from old speakers, and papel picado fluttered in the hot breeze. As you both debated the merits of sitting inside versus outside, a pair of AVTF officers came to a stop at the far corner, casually surveying the two of you for far too long.
Inside. Inside was good.
Over a plate of chilaquiles and a smattering of jokes, conversation picked up around basketball, around dating, around the state of chopped cheeses in the city. A quad of salsas sat between the two of you for sharing, daring each other to try the ominous ultra diablo one with equally shared laughter. The tension in your shoulders slowly drained away because Kirsten was a great person to be friends with and you hadn’t seen her in too long. Funny, smart, aggressive when she needed to be because of her job, always supportive.
But there were bags under her eyes that shouldn’t have been there. Around a tortilla chip soggy with roja salsa, “Are you still taking on all the casework by yourself? You’re not going to get some help in?”
Kirsten sighed, pushing around the Spanish rice and beans on her place with her fork. “Yeah, it’s just me.” A haphazardly piled bite of chile relleno later. “I just have this gut feeling that Matt’s going to come back. It’s my responsibility to keep things afloat until then.”
You dipped the tip of your fork in the ultra diablo and then swirled it through one of your egg yolks. “He’s not here though, K. Surely Matt wouldn’t get mad because you hired another lawyer for the interim.”
“I don’t have time to deal with it right now. Maybe if there’s no word by the time the Swordsman case actually moves forward.” That old excuse that everyone made at one point or another – I don’t have time to deal. Mentioning the Swordsman case set a pall over the table too, because everyone knew a sham when they saw it. A lawyer being set up to fail. Trial wasn’t for months, visitation was a literal joke, and the idea of mutual discovery a complete farce.
What was happening to Jacques Duquesne was a shockingly close to home reminder of what could happen if Dex was captured, if you slipped and told the wrong person, if he was ambushed and taken in. At worst, he’d die, going down in a haze of bullets; at best, they’d just put him back in Rikers. But most likely, they’d put him on trial – Mayor Fisk would, another circus to appease the masses. And people would start digging into Dex, and somehow, someway, you’d get pulled into it. You just knew it, that your life would be so far ruined this time that you’d have to move clear across the country.
Said mark on your ribs jumped at the idea of a nightmare like that, inconvenient and persistent.
You also had to bite down on the additional impulse to say, ‘Well, you know where I am if you need good help.’Because Kirsten did, in fact, know where you were and that you had experience in law offices, and nothing had come of it. No need to be weird and pushy over a job that wasn’t yours, not to be ungrateful for a job that was currently saving your bacon.
“You do have time to think about it though, at least.” And then the conversation returned to softer subjects with more places to land, more places to laugh. Lunch was wrapping up anyway when Kirsten’s phone rang, that same Law & Order theme song playing her back to work. Something about a witness that needed immediate reassurance, and paperwork she had to sign before a deal collapsed. But before departing there were promises of coffee soon, a close hug, a whisper to call. She set off like a bat out of hell and left you to begin your trek back to the subway station and then work.
It was a vaguely innocuous walk but as you neared the intersection by Josie’s, something caught your eye despite how you tried to avoid looking at the exact spot Foggy died in; the exact spot where Dex fell to his near death. A woman – walking with her head down, hands tucked into jacket pockets even though it was too warm for something like that, dark hair in a long bob. But her face… you caught a quick flash of her face and it near struck you dumb, a splash of cold water. Karen?
Without realizing it, you turned and walked parallel to her, the opposite of where you needed to go. The hair was wrong yes, but the pale skin, the sharp nose, the posture. It had to be her. Had to be.
“Karen?” You called across the street, narrowing your eyes at the woman in question. Didn’t miss how her shoulders shot up to her ears with tension and lengthened her stride to walk quicker. “Karen?”
This time she looked over her shoulder at you and everything clicked into place because yeah, it was Karen. You knew, you just knew it was. She had slowed to a stop to stare at you from across the street, face twisted in a mix of recognition and fear. Pulling out a phone and texting someone with nervous haste that seemed so out of place in the warm summer sun, looking up at you at what must have been every few words.
“Karen!” You called, confidently this time, and dodged into the street without thinking because Jesus, there was a friend who had been missing for months. You weren’t going to let this chance go. “Stop!” You were waving, had made it to the median where you perched like an awkward sea bird for a moment.
But she was leaving, near jogging in her haste to disappear. You called her name again, confused, worried, trying to feel for your phone so you could text her but your fingers were too skittery with adrenaline to fully grasp it. Into the other side of the street again because it was clear, fully distracted and walking slower as you looked down for just a moment to find your pocket in this freaking dress skirt and grab your damn phone.
You finally found your phone a few steps into the street. Looked up to see where Karen had gone, and realized with sudden clarity that a car had turned the corner and was blazing towards you. So close you could see the driver as he leaned on his horn but still wasn’t slowing; jumped into the next lane and heard his horn fading as he passed at top speed. But that car had hidden a second one from view, in the lane you’d just entered thinking it was clear, and for a moment, you were sure you were done for.
Except this car was driven by a woman who did know what a brake was, and she skidded to a stop a few feet from you, frowning. As you hunched into an apologetic wave to say sorry and got the fuck out of her way, you could see her yelling in the enclosure of her car before taking off. As you hurried to finish crossing, a few people on the sidewalk were staring at you like you were crazy, which, fair. And Karen?
The whole mess was over in seconds and she’d vanished. Disappeared from sight like fish at the first sign of a shark – except why she’d think you were the shark, you had no idea. But you were right – that had to have been her. You stood there, palm pressed to your chest because adrenaline made you feel shaky, bisecting the sidewalk for several minutes, hoping she’d come back – no such luck.
So finally, it was time to turn in the right direction again and get to work. Leftover energy made your fingers tremble a little as you untwisted the straps on your sundress and shoved your phone away. The soulmate bond squeezed you tight from the wrong direction like a vice clamp, chastising you in place of the man with your words.
Only a few seconds later your phone buzzed insistently from its place back in your pocket, another block and it did it again, two blocks and a third relentless notification; crap, of course that would be Dex because he was somehow definitely saw you almost lose life and limb. Ignored all three messages out of a combination of exasperation and embarrassment. He could text you and try to dictate your safety with fascinating determination all he wanted – you could also silence notifications.
Kept walking down the street, skirting a group of kindergartners all in a line, with their little hands clenched on a buddy rope of some kind as they marched along. Pretended that you hadn’t almost died and smiled to see them toddling by. A few of them had visible marks, words that looked too big for their little bodies on their arms or legs, and your smile disappeared. Better just hurry up and get to work.
“Oncoming traffic is just a minor inconvenience for you now.”
A pair of footsteps fell into step with yours, loud from his big combat boots, and you didn’t need to look up to see who was there – the latch dug deep into your skin under your breast jerked with a sudden desire for touch. If your little incident unsettled him, Dex only showed it when he paused a moment so he could step behind you and walk between you and the street. Subtle. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see that he’d bravely introduced gray into his wardrobe, going by the color of his shirt. Pants and boots were still black though.
“Are you always following me around or what here?” He wasn’t looking at you, so you could get away with studying the line of his throat and the precise shade of his hair in the sunlight. The sharp point of his jaw by his neck. Dex? His eyes were bouncing from variable to variable, gauging possible danger.
But he did catch you looking eventually, glancing over and letting his eyes trail down the sundress you were wearing. Another variant edition of you he collected for himself. No smile but the disapproval in his voice hinted at reluctant amusement. “Not all the time. You just seem incredibly determined to get yourself hurt. It’s easy to predict.”
The crosswalk light you were approaching was red, and Dex reached out to press the button before you could. Sunlight glinted off the warmth of his skin and in daylight you could see a pale scar near his elbow. Glanced at the one on his cheek because it was contrastingly dark in the sun and looked like a good place to put your lips. Another one just by his eyebrow too. Looked away with red cheeks when again, you were caught staring.
You pressed your tongue absently into your back molars, cleared your throat. “So, are you planning to follow me all the way to work or…?”
He was looking both ways as the light to cross turned green even as you stepped into the street. “That depends.”
“On what?”
“On if you’re going to keep doing stupid shit like that.” Dex responded quickly, roughly. The wind was ruffling his hair so that highlights of gold framed his face, which seemed more and more aggravated the longer you walked together. Absently you reached up to smooth your own hair from the breeze, and Dex’s eyes caught on the movement, watching your fingers with an intensity that would have ridiculously outweighed the moment if it wasn’t him.
With a shrug, hands fluttering to the waist of your dress as you avoided looking at him again. “Well, I do try, you know.” Nonchalant because you were still abashed, because you didn’t want to say anything about Karen.
“I do know.” He shot back, and the two of you walked in silence for another block. The sun was heating the backs of your shoulders too much to be comfortable but a part of you wished you could keep walking with him forever, just like that. After a moment, he added, “Do you want me to walk you to work?”
Dex sounded so hesitant there, again like he didn’t know what was expected of him and anticipated rejection. To return to the metaphor, Tantalus wondering if this fruit too would recoil. You glanced over and saw that he had closed off his expression because uncertainty was a hell of a thing. Another street to cross, another road he checked while you blustered forward carelessly. “Uh, I uh… well, I want you to… do whatever you want to do?”
“That’s—” The way you responded, the uncertain, high-pitched ending, what you said – that caught him off guard. Like most people didn’t care what he wanted, like most people just wanted from him and to hell with how he felt about it. It made your words shudder with a soft ping of sadness. He took his time putting words together, looked about ready to respond when he happened to glance down the side street you’d just crossed, and his face slowly hardened into something familiar. Whatever he saw reminding him of the real word. “I can’t…” There was great reluctance leaving his mouth with the words. “I have to go.”
You glimpsed a group in all black down that side street, officers patrolling and understood. He actually hadn’t been here for you, his business and your schedule had collided, and that definitely didn’t disappoint you just the smallest bit. Dex watched you back away and nod with understanding, disappointment etched in his posture. For all he knew, you could walk into another street at any moment; and for all you knew, he might be shot doing all the things you didn’t want to think about.
“I know, I know. Don’t screw around.” You stepped further away from him to balance on the edge of the curb and walked a few teetering steps backwards before making a face up at him, because listening to authority figures was not something you were particularly interested in anymore. “Stop walking so close to the edge of the sidewalk.”
Dex did not want to look amused, hesitating on the corner, stuck between leaving to do that which had his attention, and folding his arms across his chest in preparation for lecturing you. You cut him off at the pass though, and didn't realize that an arch smile lifted your face until you were done ticking things off on your fingers. "Don't walk into traffic." Tick. "Don't go anywhere without streetlights at night." Tick. "Close and lock your windows." Tick. "I think I got them all. You can go."
Tick, tick, tick went the bond like a bomb in your chest, counting down the seconds until you finally gave in.
***
June 26, 2027
DX 6/25/2027 9:02 pm EST Lock your windows and do not leave your blinds open again.
“Of course, Mrs. Smithers.” Dex was saying as he pressed send, trying to keep the pleasant expression on his face. Moved to unlock his apartment door and tried to escape his landlady. She wasn’t as bad as she could have been, and useful too – particularly because to her the internet was something her grandson used to look up porn and not a tool used to keep up with top local news like, ‘Wanted criminal Benjamin Poindexter still at large months later.’
With a photo of him from the FBI and everything.
She said something else about the shelves in her kitchen that were tilted, and he grimaced as the knob turned and his door swung open to the small studio that he’d reserved just for himself. Dex turned, smiled easily because that’s what she expected from Tony. Nodded his head when in his mind he imagined how easily he could shut her up forever with one small movement. One knife. “Sure, tomorrow evening then, I’ll come by.” And the smile meant to look unsure but earnest.
6/25/2027 9:05 pm EST your tone seems very pointed rn
Dex snorted softly despite himself, closed out the texts and stuffed the phone in his pocket. His girl seemed distinctly more comfortable when speaking over text than in person. And that was a bridge they’d have to cross at another time, wasn’t it? She still hadn’t messaged him first, always waiting for him to make the first volley. Silver lining: at least she was responding to him.
“Such a good boy.” His landlady muttered, oblivious to the fact that he was no longer paying attention to her, shaking her head fondly and closing her own door with a snap, leaving Dex to finally escape.
His apartment was threadbare, functional – violently impersonal. A television still in one of those faux wood cabinet frames that was older than he was by half. Small table with a chair tucked under it, a few books stacked neatly on the floor and pressed against the far wall, spines out if unread, spines in if he’d finished them already. His CD player and headphones with a few CDs on top of the TV. The kitchen was outdated, all chipped tiles and a faucet that sputtered angrily every day, but it was clean and he could lay out everything he needed precisely as he liked. A narrow twin bed with sheets and a blanket from the thrift store, washed so many times they carried someone else’s softness but never his. A single pillow with a divot right where his head should go.
No photos, no trinkets, no color.
In the closet, clothes were hung with military precision, even the cotton shirts and sweatpants dared not exist without sharp edges. Pride of place was taken by his work clothes – the armored shirts, utility pants, combat boots. An enormous cloth sheath that could roll up if necessary to house his knives. On the floor a gun cabinet that locked with a combination of 10302025.
Having made the concrete decision to pursue this bond with his girl and make it work rather than eliminate her as a simple distraction in his quest for balance felt so good to Dex. He was used to the idea finally, want no longer just a four letter word to him. Even if wanting her terrified him with the power it gave to people like the Fisks, like Daredevil, there was no denying it any further. A brighter purpose that would last longer than this Fisk thing, that would give him a reason to live beyond it – if she allowed him to stay around.
But seeing his girl set him on fire, taking it slow was killing him. When she was angry, when she was happy or sad, when she wore a damn sundress. That bittersweet combination of hurt and wanting that made his gut clench with desire to take; maybe it was the allure of what he hadn’t yet had, but he couldn’t stop thinking about all the things she might let him do to her; that she could do to him.
The only things out of place in his apartment? A small travel size vial of perfume, taken from her bathroom counter, and a spare balaclava on his bedside table.
Her perfume. His mask.
Dex hung his keys by the door, dropped his wallet on the tallest stack of books, put his shoes in the closet, washed his hands of any lingering blood – all methodically with the same competent precision he needed in his life. It did nothing to stem the flow of his thoughts.
He made himself dinner, plain chicken and rice, and he thought about the sundress.
He cleaned and sharpened his knives, the sound of the blades running against the whetstone deafening in the quiet apartment, and then kept looking at his mask.
He maintained his firearms, gun oil and powder clogging his nostrils, and still kept smelling her perfume.
Fuck.
A responsible Dex would shower and change into shorts and a t-shirt, try to sleep in order to maintain his body’s peak condition. A responsible Dex wouldn’t leave his dishes in the sink for even an hour longer. A responsible Dex would map out his plans for AVTF ambushes in the following days.
But an irresponsible Dex sat down on his bed. Pulled his thick black belt out of his jeans and listened to the leather hiss as it slid through the belt loops. Tossed it on the floor where the buckle hit with a hollow sound.
An irresponsible Dex pulled his shirt out from his pants and undid the top button there, slid the zipper all the way down slowly, making himself wait because even a second longer would prolong the pleasure beyond measure.
An irresponsible Dex picked up the perfume, and an absolutely psychotic Dex sprayed it carefully on the face of his balaclava. Not too much to overwhelm him when he wore it out next, but just enough so that it would linger in his nose for weeks.
Pulled it on, over his hair, his ears, his forehead, his eyes, nose, and mouth. Let himself fall back across the width of his bed, though he was so tall his neck tilted back over the far edge awkwardly. Pushed his jeans further out the way, then the boxer briefs, going so slowly to savor just the thought of her there with him. Breathed deeply so the perfume would hit the back of his mouth like sticky molasses.
Slid his palm down his abdomen so he could grasp his member and free it completely, wrenching a groan from his own chest, sounding wounded. The pressure from his clothing had been building as his own arousal had grown – cock against clothing, friction and frustration – and now just that easy release nearly undid him. Forced Dex to move at a glacial pace if he didn’t want to come fast and hard like a sex-obsessed teen desperate for privacy at Lyndhurst or a green army trainee in the barracks.
His hand was too warm and big for his own imagination, but it would have to do, curling into a fist around his shift and pumping up and down, just a few lazy strokes. The weight of him felt too hot, heavy, desperate against his palm, needy. Breathing deeply and heavily so his chest moved in time with his hand. Pictured her lips opening, the shape of her breasts as they bounced in the club.
There was just a little bit of leftover gun oil on his palm as Dex stroked himself, easing the roughness of his callouses, and his skin sensitized. Grasping roughly around the base and twisting at the reddened head, feeling his own mouth fall open against his mask and the inner jersey fabric wet with his own saliva. He was shuddering at the sensation, the reward of pleasure in his body, trying not to jerk against himself. Her legs twisted in her own bed sheets that night. The fall of her hair down the side of her neck at a coffee shop. Precum gathered at the head of his cock that he swiped at with this thumb, used to help wet himself in place of her. Her wetness.
“Ah, fuck.” It came out mumbled, dragged, hoarse. Dex’s muscles were tensing throughout his chest, his arms, his thighs as a warmth built in his body, at the base of his cock. Endorphins shooting through him like lightning, radiating up to his brain as his heart beat faster and the word bond between them slunk with smug pleasure up and down the arm he used to touch himself – the one with her words. He bet she could feel it too, couldn’t she, in those words of hers she kept hiding from him. Those big eyes. Her hands and delicate wrists.
He was close now, trying to hold himself back from the edge, the head of his member hypersensitive and beating in time to his own heart. Stroked himself faster even as he wanted to keep going and keep thinking about his soulmate for as long as possible, fingers gripping harder, the sound nasty and slick from his own precum and sweat and gun oil. Feeling so desperate for release as his hips tried to chase more friction, more feeling so that it would soak into his body and brain and soul and fix him completely.
“Fuck. Fuck fuck.” More warmth, pulsing in his balls, in his cock, barely able to think clearly. No, not able to think but definitely able to see those tears on her fucking face, that final girl shit he’d hated so much that made his mouth water, that tore groans from him until he wished his perfumed mask would smother him. The goddamn red ruby tears on her cheeks as she sat on her knees and opened her mouth when he told her too, streaming down her face and breasts as she stuck her tongue out on his order. Those damned deep indigo tears from the other night in the club, shining UV under the lights, trailing down her neck while she looked down at him, half propped up on his bed with her taste in his mouth; they’d slide to a point and join between her breasts, slide together further down her body, and if he stayed between her legs long enough maybe he’d get to taste those too.
The vivid play acting of both scenarios flushed through his brain, his body, his cock.
Whiteout. Contraction and release, gripping the bed with his free hand, no groan but a silent, choked sob as her perfume was sucked so deep it permeated his lungs. Bliss. Absolution as orgasm washed over him. The liberation of no thoughts, just ecstasy. His cum dripped down his own knuckles as pleasure faded gradually, feeling warm against the night air. Dex lay there, sucking in breath like his life depended on it, the mouth of his mask wet against his own lips, the rucked waist band of his pants digging into his hips.
The sensation of touching himself was becoming too much, too overwhelming – less gratification and more overstimulation. Still he kept going, to the pain, because he wanted to think of his girl for a moment longer. When he watched her orgasm would she bite down on him or throw her head back? Was she silent or would she scream?
He lay on his bed in that awkward position for a long time, wondering.
And then… time to be responsible Dex again. To sit up and pull the mask from his face, wipe his cum sticky hand on his shirt because laundry needed to be done anyway. Pick up his belt and hang it up in its proper place. Shower and dress for bed, do the dishes, make his plans.
Think about next time, when it might not be his hand, it might be her.
***
June 26, 2027
John Pilgrim hadn’t always been a man of conviction, but he had become one some years ago.
It was often though, that men of conviction found said convictions tested when the pillars they stood upon were threatened. And John knew himself to be in one such situation, for the second time, to his great regret.
He was a tall man, solemn, dour even with downturned eyes and a heavy brow nearly always overshadowed by his dark hat. The impression of a solemn person was reinforced by his long black overcoat, black pants, and black shoes, with just the littlest square of crisp, white collar peeking through at his neck. He was also a man of commitment and determination, skill – useful in a way that he regretted at times.
Wilson Fisk presented himself as an opposing force, wearing all white in one of his brilliant wool suits, with a black silk shirt underneath to rim his wrists and neck. The Kingpin set one heavy hand down on the table, tapping his fingers forcefully, the impression of a galloping horse a perfect match for his temper and ambition. Headstrong. Impulsive. Quick to ignite. For this meeting though, he kept those impulses to himself. “You’re doing as I asked?”
Pilgrim was, in turn, a slow talker with that accent he’d put on from years of living in the South. His hat was sitting on the table, the brim of it just pinched between two of his fingers. The business with the Punisher had brought him to Kingpin’s attention, and he almost wished Castle had just taken pity on him and eliminated him. “Yeah. I am.”
“You’re watching the girl?”
“I am watching the girl.”
“For a sign of the reporter.”
“For a sign of the reporter.” The words were parroted back with no amount of amusement, and some amount of disrespect. Pilgrim’s tone of voice conveyed exactly what he thought of the situation. Of the demands placed upon him. Of the person placing those demands. “And my sons?”
Fisk smiled with his own personal version of wistfulness, half-teeth and half-grimace as he looked down at that hat pinched between two fingers on the table, at the hand doing the pinching, and the brass knuckles it wore. “They are in school, unaware, as I promised they’ll stay, provided we continue working together as a team.”
John was quiet for a moment, pausing to look among the other men spread out around the room. They were in Gracie Mansion, yes, in the Mayor’s office of white plaster, pomp, and circumstance but these were definitely not all mayoral employees. Men in heavy tactical gear and helmets, all black but for the letters AVTF stamped on the front of their bullet proof vests. Generally staying as far away from New York City as he could, he knew very little about the private police force – but he did know, they were men of the wrong convictions.
‘But evil people and imposters will go from bad to worse as they deceive others and are themselves deceived.’Was that not how it went?
“And how long will that be?” The thought of Michael and Lemuel wondering where he was again made it hard to stay seated with these people. “I’d like to go back home.”
“As long as it takes.” Another man said in place of Fisk, stepping around the mayoral desk and straightening his smart blue suit at the same time. Unbuttoning the suit jacket revealed a firearm hidden underneath in a concealed carry, the implied threat feeling perfectly at home with the man’s English accent. “If you continue to follow our instructions and partner with us on this matter, of course, they’ll never know.”
“When I was a boy,” Mayor Fisk started abruptly, like a car engine that had been kickstarted to life. The agents around him shifted warily, as this was some sort of implicitly bad sign. “I beat my father’s skull in with a hammer. I was twelve years old. I understand that your boys are a bit older now?”
A pause, a demand for an answer. An appraising stare that was rewarded only with Pilgrim’s nod. “I would hate for your boys to have to witness a similar experience. Do you understand?”
Briefly, John Pilgrim mourned his own convictions; how he’d love to stick with them and not work with men of sin like Wilson Fisk or Buck Cashman. How he didn’t want to be in such a noisy, overwhelming sinful city like New York. Inside his black preacher’s hat was a photo of his two boys, smiling at him from the backyard, tucked up where it wouldn’t come loose. He thought of the photo, and the risk to his boys again, and decided convictions could be set aside when needs must. “I understand.”
