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shyvioletcat · 14 hours ago

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Part 2 of this fic like I promised! This was inspired by the PICTURE prompt provided by @throneofglassmicrofics may prompts but it doesn't fit the micro fic criteria. It's one thousand and something words. But, you'll soon find out, it was impossible to cut anything out. Thanks for reading!

CW: smut

~~~~~

Aelin picked up her robe and gracefully shrugged it onto her shoulders, pulling it across her body but not bothering to tie it. Rowan supposed all things considered, she wasn’t shy about her body. Her… antics during the shoot only proved that. With a knowing wink over her shoulder Aelin headed towards the refreshments table, cracking open a bottle of water. Instead of watching her like a transfixed idiot Rowan did what he was supposed to do and pulled out his laptop.

He inserted the SD card into the slot, clicking away when the photos appeared. A flurry of expletives overtook his brain because holy gods, these photos. Rowan ignored the heat in his cheeks, why was it suddenly so hot in here?

“How did we do?” Aelin called out.

Rowan turned, drawn to the sound of her voice. “Ah, good.” When Aelin raised a questioning brow he amended his answer. “Great, even.”

“Your confidence is astounding,” Aelin said sarcastically. “At least the merchandise is pretty and I get to keep it. It’s the one bonus of all these lingerie shoots that Arobynn likes to book. Fucking pervert.”

Rowan had to agree there. Aelin picked up a chocolate covered strawberry, her eyes lighting up in delight. Then she looked towards the door, and wariness set in and she put it down. It was like she was worried that pervert could see through the walls and judge her every move. In a blink of an eye that brief show of vulnerability was gone. She was smiling again, as sly as any assassin, and she was looking at him like he was her next target.

Aelin walked over, still wearing those heels and each step with a deliberate sway of her hips. Rowan went back to his screen, willing the torture to end soon. Little did he know but it was only about to intensify as Aelin lent in, close enough that the softness of her body pressed into him—and he tried very hard to ignore exactly where their bodies met. But no, he couldn’t, not when her hair tickled across his cheek, the scent of her perfume filling his nose. Rowan was all but gone when Aelin dragged her clothed breast over the bare skin of his bicep. His jaw was tight as he refused to let his gaze shift away from the screen in front of him.

“I like this one,” she tapped a manicured fingernail on his screen.

Rowan opened the thumbnail on instinct and almost failed to suppress his groan when he realised his mistake. The picture Aelin had chosen… it was one small step away from pornograhic. Lost in his creative flow he had just snapped away, capturing everything. Kneeling on the bed, Aelin's bottom lip was tucked between her teeth, her eyes half-lidded but focused enough to send her sultry gaze down the lens. One hand pulled the fabric of her flimsy bra down enough that the edge of her nipple was exposed and the other hand splayed across her hip. She looked like the most decadent of sins.

Swallowing once, Rowan replied, “They can’t use that one.”

”No, but you can.”

The words surprised him enough that Rowan turned— found himself nose to nose with Aelin. There was a sweet smile on her lips, as if she hadn’t been tormenting him for the last forty-five minutes. The need to kiss her was overwhelming. Rowan had his resolve by the reins, he was in control, but then her eyes dipped down to his…

Aelin stood straighter, moving the laptop away and putting a hand on his shoulder to guide her as she circled to stand in front of him. Rowan wasn’t breathing as she put her thighs over his own, straddling him in the chair. Heat flushed his cheeks when she felt the hard-on he hadn’t been able to will away. Aelin sighed, sinking further into his lap with just the smallest roll of her hips. He had to fight his baser instincts not to return the movement in kind.

Aelin’s eyes focused on Rowan’s face, and she lent in just a little. “Thank you for looking after me.”

Rowan didn’t exactly remember putting his hands on Aelin’s waist, but they were there, his thumbs brushing over the soft silk of gauzy robe. “I—” he realised he hadn’t the faintest idea where his sentence was going. “It’s what you deserve.”

“Do you want to kiss me, Rowan?” Aelin asked, her head tilting enough to send her hair swaying.

His hands tightened on his waist, he didn’t have it in him to lie. “I do.”

That was all the permission Aelin needed. She closed the distance, not playing around with anything soft. The kiss was just as fierce as she was, and Rowan gave back as good as he got. He dipped his tongue into Aelin’s mouth, making her chase him for more. She moaned when he caught her top lip with his teeth, stoking the fire between them.

Aelin pulled back far enough to let the robe fall away, exposing swathes of skin for him to touch—to taste. And Rowan did just that. He knew how easy it was to pull the lace of her bra down, so he did. For months he wondered what it would feel like to have her warm skin beneath his palm, so he found out. He wanted to know what noise Aelin might make as he kissed her while he toyed with the peak of her breast. His curiosity was more than answered.

The sweet noises Aelin made had his cock hardening further and all the threads of his control snapping. When the harshness of her next moan broke the kiss Rowan took the opportunity to urge her taller in his lap, his head bowing to take her nipple in his mouth. He worshipped her, all the while she rode him, writhing over him.

“Oh Gods, Rowan,” Aelin gasped.

Rowan pressed opened mouthed kisses over her cleavage and up her neck. “Tell me I can, Aelin,” he whispered in her ear, pushing her down against his cock. She was already so close, but he didn’t want her to come until he was inside her. “Tell me I can fuck you.”

”Yes,” Aelin replied, her hands cupping his face. “I might just murder you if you don’t.”

That made Rowan laugh. “If those are the stakes.”

He stood, carrying Aelin to the bed. When her body hit the mattress she sprawled out beneath him. Rowan wasted no time, pulling his t-shirt over head and unbuttoning his jeans and kicking them off. Aelin’s bright eyes ran over him, taking in every inch of him. He did the same, his hands leading a trail up to her thighs. Aelin hadn’t bothered to fix what he’d pulled out of place earlier and now her own hand toyed with her exposed breast, pebbling the skin beneath. The sight had him bowing down to the closest skin he could find—that was the skin of her left thigh.

“May I?” Rowan breathed onto her skin, his fingers playing with the waistband of her underwear.

“You fucking better,” Aelin demanded.

He couldn’t help it, the sass had a low chuckle rumbling through him but he reprimanded her by sinking his teeth into her upper thigh. If she thought he had any inclination of stopping she was the wrong kind of insane. Fucking on a photoshoot set when anyone could walk through the doors, that was the right kind of insanity for him. Aelin’s gasp was more of a moan and Rowan took some delight in the pink mark he’d left behind. Then he’d had enough of waiting.

Rowan had the patience not to rip the underwear off, but dragged them down her legs and then bracing himself over Aelin. His hand drifted between her legs, feeling her swollen clit and how ready she was for him just from grinding on his lap. The moan that came from her mouth sounded desperate, her hips bucking as Rowan lightly flicked a finger over the bud. Aelin pulled him down, kissing him and urging him closer with a knee hooked over his hip. The tip of his cock dragged over the slickness between her thighs, her hips rising up to encourage him closer. Rowan’s fraying patience didn’t allow room for playing games. A roll of his hips and he was pushing into her tight heat, groaning at the feeling of it. Aelin gave a shuddering sigh, throwing her head back. It allowed Rowan to kiss the length of her neck, careful not to leave any evidence of what they were doing behind.

“Give me everything, Rowan,” Aelin breathed on his lips, holding him tighter.

So he did, their bodies moving together. Aelin begged for harder and faster, and Rowan followed the demands as they were given. There was no knowing how long they had left, and even though he may not have been able to draw this out as long as he would have liked, he was savouring every second of it. Every sound, every feeling, this would haunt him. Aelin was perfection, he’d be wrecked and begging for her after this.

Aelin cried out as her pleasure crested, slapping a hand over her mouth before she gave them away. Her eyes danced with mirth, but then they rolled back as Rowan changed the angle of his hips. Pressure built as the base of—he was close too.

Then he realised they hadn’t bothered with protection, his sex hazed brain struggled to figure out what he needed to do next. His hips slowed and Aelin groaned in protest, her heel digging into his lower back.

“Don’t stop,” she begged through gritted teeth.

“But Aelin—”

The pressure on his back built and Aelin looked right into his eyes and said, “Don’t you fucking dare stop.”

The urgent and messy kiss she gave him was the acceptance Rowan needed, thrusting deep and hard like Aelin had begged of him. Her sharp but quiet moans showed how close she was, and only when she shuddered around him, shaking and moaning into the skin of his neck did Rowan let himself go, spilling into her. He fucked into her until oversensitivity made him stop. Aelin was panting beneath him, her hands running idle paths over his body.

It was hard to believe what they’d just done, but Rowan regretted none of it. Not when he drew back just enough to see Aelin smiling back at him.

“I’ve wanted to do that forever,” she said softly, nudging her nose against him.

Rowan pressed a soft to her lips. “Likewise.”

Aelin let out a bright burst of laughter, ruining the kiss and maybe his heart as well. She was brave and strong, and Rowan might turn to religion and start praying that this wasn’t the last time they got to do this. A horn blared from the street, breaking the quiet of the room and the spell they had both been under.

“I need to get dressed,” Aelin said.

Nodding, Rowan helped her up, trying his best to make sure that they wouldn’t leave behind any messy incriminating evidence. For a moment they stood there, Aelin looping her arms around his neck. They shared one more kiss, enough to ignite the heat back into Rowan’s blood. But they didn’t have time for anything else, and they both knew it.

“Thank you,” Aelin said and then turned away, walking off to the small bathroom.

Rowan gathered his clothes, slipping each piece on, those two words echoing in his mind. He couldn’t explain why, but they had sounded like a goodbye.

~~~~~

Again, thanks for reading this most definite two part fic that I have absolutely of course stopped thinking about entirely

#just thinking about this one a little more

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shyvioletcat · 4 days ago

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HOW IVE MISSED THEM

They’re just so cutthroat with each other and I can’t not love it

high tension wire

elide x lorcan, modern au/nsfw, exes, word count: 6926

She’s standing near the reception desk and realising that she doesn’t remember, really, why they broke up.

It could have been about what percentage milk fat he decided to buy, how much she tipped the bartender, whether they should just buy another duvet to avoid hogging issues, whose turn it was to clean the bathroom, which place they should get breakfast at—the café with the airy croissants up the block or the diner with the fluffy scrambled eggs twenty minutes away.

If she thinks about it (and she has), then it was probably the publishing job she applied for in Varese, the one she didn’t tell him about until she was hired, and even then he didn’t yell or shout. He just did that thing with his jaw and went quiet for a few days. And anyways, the break up didn’t happen until a month later when she left, in a haze of red and yelling, shoving unfolded clothes and too few shoes and her favourite mug into his biggest suitcase. She refused to look back at where he stood in the doorway, because she knew his eyes would be watery and that would break her heart even more.

She went from their one-bedroom apartment to the airport and spent the cross-ocean flight with an iced gin in hand and his ratty Dead Boys shirt on beneath her wool sweater.

Eight months have passed since they saw each other or spoke. Any amount of time could pass, and Elide could recognise the back of his head and broad cut of his shoulders.

There’s still some kind of programming entrenched in her that tells her to weave across the hotel lobby, duck under his arm and press into his side. She’s always led with her head, which is a good thing because if she went with her gut, he’d shrug her off and stalk away.

“Ma’am,” the receptionist calls her forward.

Elide forces herself to smile and steps up, tears her eyes away from Lorcan. “Hi. I’m checking in, last name Lochan?”

The employee nods while she taps the name onto the keyboard. “And that’s L-o-c-h-a-n, right?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Here for the Ashryver Galathynius-Whitethorn wedding?” And when Elide nods, “Three nights?”

“That’s right.” She can make it three nights in the same location as Lorcan, laying awake rooms away from empty arms she fits so well in.

“The bride and groom have requested that everyone in the wedding party stays in the same block of rooms, overlooking the ocean. Is that alright with you?”

“Yes, that’s fine.”

She thought it would be easier, really. All she’s done is see the back of his head, hasn’t seen his eyes yet or his smile, hasn’t heard his voice or the way it rasps after a drunk smoke and makes her stomach clench.

She’s only seen the back of his head, after eight months of hiding all the photos of him on her phone, and already the stapled pieces of her mangled heart want to crawl back to him.

The receptionist finishes the check-in and hands her a small envelope with key cards. With a wide smile, she says, “You’ll be in room 110. We hope you enjoy your stay.”

“Thank you.”

“Welcome to Banjali, Miss Lochan.”

She looks back at him as she crosses the lobby. He’s talking to a group of men she doesn’t recognise, who won’t recognise her.

She remembers leaving for a good reason. They were mismatched and no matter how many times they crashed into each other, they could never patch each other up well enough. Or something like that.

✵✵✵✵✵

Around eight in the evening, someone knocks at her door—loudly.

Elide puts her laptop aside and unfolds herself from her cross-legged position on the bed. The remains of her late-lunch room service sit on a tray at the end of her bed. She’s managed to avoid anybody else by staying in her room, not even tempted by the sparkling sapphire sea a few steps beyond the veranda.

The knocking returns at full force. She sighs and says, “I’m coming, I’m coming!” She yanks it open without looking through the peephole.

Manon’s standing in the hall in a sequined silver dress and a pair of stilettos Elide would break her good ankle in, her white hair pulled into a ponytail. Her eyebrows arch into an unimpressed look as she takes in Elide’s loose tank-top and linen shorts.

“Hey, stranger,” Manon says, voice sharp. “Get changed, we’re celebrating Aelin’s last night of freedom.”

Elide huffs. “I am dressed.” She’s unable to help her smile. “And it’s nice to see you too, Manon. I missed you.”

The other woman maintains her steely gaze for another second before a small grin curls her lips. She steps forward to give Elide her classic stiff hug. Elide feels her carefully boarded-up emotions start to rupture and hugs her back. “We missed you, too,” Manon tells her quietly. “All of us.”

Elide chooses to ignore that. “Does this last night of freedom involve alcohol?”

“What do you think?”

She smiles. “Alright, I’ll get changed and meet you at the bar?”

“No, Aelin wants us to hang in her suite—she has a pool attached and stuff.”

Manon warns her that if she isn’t there in twenty minutes, she’s coming back to drag her up no matter what state she’s in.

Fifteen minutes later, Elide walks out of her room in a black mesh low-back dress over her bikini. She steps out and Lorcan freezes in the doorway of room 112.

She feels heart drop into her stomach. She freezes too, shocked still with her fingers fumbling the door handle. It’s ridiculous because it’s Lorcan, the person who knows her best in the world, who hated her the last time he saw her, who looks at her with an open jaw and wide eyes. It’s only for a second before his expression hardens like granite.

He looks good in his baggy shorts and t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He’s sunkissed, the Eyllwe weather making his brown skin pinkish and freckled, and it’s obvious he’s been in the ocean, his usually straight hair sort of frizzed and wavy from saltwater.

He locks eyes with her, and his look is as intense as it’s always been, even in those last weeks when she never knew whether he would yell or kiss her. He’s shuttered off and doing that thing with his jaw.

Elide chews on her lip and closes the door, the latch loudly falling in the tense silence of the hallway. She swallows and has no idea what she means to say when she starts, “Lorcan—”

“Look,” he interrupts, and now he’s not looking at her at all and she beats back the feeling that hearing his voice is like coming home, “all we need to do is be civil for three days, for Rowan and Ace, and then you can run off back to Varese, or wherever the fuck you’re living now, and we can go back to our lives.”

It’s like a punch to her solar plexus reminding her that there’s nothing amicable between them, and the best they can hope for is to be civil.

“Lorcan,” she tries again, voice softer, “we should talk, at least.”

They were never that good at talking, so she knows it’s a weak plea, but she doesn’t expect it to go so badly that his response is a scoff and nothing until he pulls out his pack of cigarettes to stick one between his lips: “I have nothing to say to you.”

Elide recognises this feeling—the one she took with her to the airport, the stiff, pulled muscle of her heart twisting inside her chest cavity that made her slam their bedroom door in his face, made her take his favourite shirt and storm out to a taxi while he shouted that she was being ridiculous, come back, come back.

He’s walking away from her towards the elevator, presumably because he’s also meeting Rowan, and the bride- and groom-to-be's' rooms are on the same floor. Like hell if he thinks she’s going to wait, so she grabs the long skirt of her dress and hurries after him, slipping inside the car just as the doors slide shut.

Lorcan rolls his eyes slightly and stares at the brushed steel doors.

Elide blows out a puff of air. “You’re going to have to look at me at some point, you know.” He lifts his brows in silent disagreement. She huffs again and crosses her arms, resisting the urge to stamp her foot. “You know you can’t smoke that in here.”

“Fuckin’ hell,” he mutters. “‘m not that dumb.”

She never liked that he smoked, except when she fell in love with him, she started to love the smell of it on his clothes and the trace of tobacco on his tongue when he would kiss her, or how when she was drunk, she could find him and sink onto his lap so he would blow some into her mouth.

He’s doing that thing with his jaw, probably grinding the filter to mush, and it would be so inappropriate to do what she used to do, and yet—

“I want my Dead Boys shirt back.”

“What?”

“My shirt? I want it back.”

She clenches her teeth together. “What makes you think I have it? Maybe Vaughan took it, he likes them just as much—”

“No, you have it,” he cuts her off. “I haven’t seen it in eight months, and I might be dumb and without ambition by your standards, but I can track correlations, Lochan.”

“So, now you’re accusing me of stealing? That’s really fucking nice, Salvaterre. I’ll just add that to the charges against His majesty when I’m back in Varese—”

“You go ahead and do that, and then mail me back my shirt.” His voice is hard, but it lacks any loudness, telling her that he’ll fight this to the bitter end.

“I didn’t take your stupid shirt, Lorcan. Why would I take that ratty thing? And besides, it hasn’t fit you in years.”

“It’s still mine, isn’t it?” he snaps.

She presses her tongue against the back of her teeth, fuming. “Anneith below, just buy a new one, if you want it so bad.”

Lorcan turns, his eyes bright and cheeks short of flushed, and Elide knows that if she stepped up to him and pulled him down, his kiss would be all-consuming and he’d have her against the wall--

The elevator dings and the doors slide open. Down the hallway, Rowan and his groomsmen wait in a cluster. Their bright, friendly smiles drop when Lorcan strides towards them, revealing Elide.

“I gotta smoke, fuckin’ Elide…” is all she hears before she huffs and sashays past him, throwing a contemptuous look over her shoulder at him.

“Ever consider teaching classes on civility?” she snarks, her fingers curling around the handle of Aelin’s suite. “You’d be good at it.”

He lifts his head, eyes blazing as he opens his mouth, but before he says a word, Elide pushes the door open and leaves him out in the hall, again.

She exhales and drops her purse, plastering on a bright smile as she follows the sounds of her friends out to the terrace.

✵✵✵✵✵

Hours and an uncountable amount of drinks later, Elide trips over her hem while leaving the elevator. Her shoes, long since abandoned and now hanging from hands, go flying down the hall.

She sighs and collects them, muttering nonsense to herself.

At her door, she rummages through her small wristlet for her key card. She raises her head when the elevator dings softly, and the doors open before a drunken Lorcan.

His brows settle into that disappointed frown she’s always hated.

Elide pauses, staring at him as he walks towards her.

He has no intention in talking to her, she can tell, as he pulls his worn leather wallet from his pocket to find his own key. She turns to look at him, her project of entering her room completely abandoned.

“I miss you,” she says, and she thought she had more willpower than this. She thought she had saved herself—them both—from a bad relationship they should’ve ended years ago. And it turns out she’s still that twenty-two-year old girl waking up to her friend’s boyfriend’s friend burning toast and eggs to ask her to be his girlfriend. No matter how much she wants it, she won’t get over him.

Lorcan turns, and the look on his face is like he’s been punched. “Whose fucking fault is that, huh?”

She swallows and looks away at the wall sconce. “We- were a mess, Lor. We were a time-bomb, and it was only a matter of time—”

He laughs harshly, “You keep telling yourself that, Lee.”

Hot with anger, she steps into his space, “You think it was my fault, then, right? We- our relationship was unhealthy, we didn’t want the same things! I didn’t want either of us to be wrecked.”

“Oh, so what, you were saving us?” His voice is rough, and probably everyone in the hall can hear them. “Stop putting us in a gods-damned box, Elide. I never cared about getting wrecked by you—”

“But I couldn’t take it anymore,” she cries, dropping her shoes and her bag to grab her hair. She stands her ground with weak knees and a jelly spine under the concentration of his stare. “Everything was a fight with you—”

“Like you were any better. We fought, but we always worked it out—always. We worked, we were good together, we were the best thing that ever happened to me, and you’re the one who walked out. You left, and—” he sweeps his hands out like he’s clearing something away, “you makes sense of that however you have to, but it’s always going to be you who threw us away like nothing mattered—”

He stops, the muscles of his jaw jumping, breathing in through his nose and out through his mouth, eyes shut. They’re so close she imagines she can hear his heart pounding and his angry pulse racing.

Her response is quiet. “You were the only thing that ever mattered, Lorcan. I thought I was doing what was best for us.”

He opens his eyes and his forehead smooths out, and he looks at her earnest and yearning. She sucks in a breath when he steps forward into her.

Lorcan’s mouth crashes into hers, and her hands grab him, one twisting his shirt and the other on the back of his neck, freshly done nails digging into his skin. She stumbles back, and he goes with her, his big arms stopping her from outright slamming into the wall.

He makes a soft sound against her, his teeth catching her lower lip, and Elide lets her mouth fall open under his, lets herself moan when he tongues the same place his teeth were. This is familiar, it’s safe and at the same time, she’s standing at the edge of a cliff about to fall or fly. It’s the feeling of the only man she ever loved, the only person, probably, the same guy she met the night she graduated university four years and eight months ago in Orynth—this is everything Elide gave up, and she’s never felt like a bigger fool.

His hands slide across the open back of her dress, his calloused fingers warm and steady, up to tangle in her hair, tugging at it to tilt her head back, his other hand grabbing her ass. She’s on her toes, and she knows that in any second, he’s going to hoist her up to his hips.

Their bodies are flush against one another, and she can feel him under her fingertips, feeling the muscles of his back beneath his t-shirt, the sharp cut of his jaw, the straight proud bridge of his nose against her cheek. She can feel how whole he is, how steady and solid and real and the same Lorcan she’s always loved, the same Lorcan she missed, and yet.

She left for a reason.

Elide draws back from his mouth, his arms keeping her pressed close. He follows her to rest his brow against her own, a gentle smile pulling on the corners of his mouth, his hard body pliant and gentle.

She shuts her eyes when she feels the burn of tears. That feeling is familiar, too. She unsticks her tongue from the roof of her mouth. “We shouldn’t,” she whispers.

“Lee, don’t,” he breathes, unable to stop it.

“This is a bad idea.”

He stiffens against her, and Elide forces herself to let him go.

When he steps back, the air between them goes cold. A hollow feeling settles into her gut as she opens her eyes.

His lips are sort of swollen and pinker, a battle wound.

"I'm sorry."

She can see the hurt on his face for just a second before he shuts himself back off, a blank glare stubbornly placed on the space above her head. “You’re right,” he tells her, carefully. “I—”

He cuts himself off again, doesn’t finish, and just turns towards his room to let himself in, leaving her in the hallway with her hair mussed and skin flushed like her whole fabricated world hasn’t been ripped apart at the seams.

✵✵✵✵✵

The day after, Elide has no time to wallow in her heartbreak. It’s the wedding, and she spends all morning in Aelin’s room, smiling and laughing with her friends while a hairstylist and make-up artist whirl around them.

It’s going to be an intimate affair, but Aelin is the bride after all, and ‘intimate’ never meant no glam to her.

Aelin and Rowan’s wedding ceremony makes everything in her life feel trivial.

At a secluded end of the resort beach, palm trees swaying gently in the ocean breeze, the altar is decorated with white flowers and greenery. The priest wears a white linen shirt and pants, standing by a waiting Rowan and his groomsmen.

Elide can’t bring herself to look at Lorcan. She knows he’s standing right behind Rowan, probably leaning over his shoulder to pass on advice.

She walks down the aisle behind Lysandra, Aelin’s maid of honour, her light purple dress flowing. The sand shifts beneath her feet, and Elide must be dreaming that when her bad ankle folds, Lorcan starts forward as if he’d catch her when she fell. She recovers with an embarrassed, slightly pained smile, and turns at the altar just in time to see Aelin appear.

Manon nudges her pointedly and nods towards Rowan.

He looks like he’s seen an angel, like he’s been in the desert for forty days and nights and someone has thrown a bucket of water over him, like he would be fine never breathing again if he could just touch her.

Soft music plays as Aedion steps out into the aisle to walk Aelin towards her future.

Her dress is beautiful, now that Elide is far enough removed from the pain of getting the thing on her.

Elide leans her weight on her left foot, teeth digging into her cheek as she tries not to think about how she’s known what dress she would wear to marry Lorcan, that she knew within the first month when she was leafing through a catalogue and he stopped her to point at a dress.

Aelin and Rowan face each other in front of the priest, exchanging smiling ‘hi’s.’ As the priest begins, Elide looks towards Lorcan to find him already watching her across the altar. Her throat tightens.

Lorcan is the only person she really felt tied to. Their relationship was a comforting anchor, solid like his waist between her thighs when he pinned her to their bed. And even though she broke every oath they made, she still felt in her bones that if she ever needed him, he’d haul ass to get to her.

When the couple reads their vows, her gaze becomes misty. Her tears come quickly and spill down her cheeks, and everyone else might think they’re for her friends, still she knows he knows they’re for him.

After they exchange rings and finish the handfasting, Aelin and Rowan are declared husband and wife. She tosses her bouquet aside to grab him by the lapels and kiss him something fierce, Rowan lifting her like she weighs nothing.

Elide feels a crushing whirlpool of joy and loss, gaze locked in Lorcan’s as everyone around them cheers for the couple.

Later, she claps as Lysandra finishes her speech and hands the microphone to Lorcan. He cracks a small smile, kissing her cheek in a friendly manner. Elide’s gut twists at the scene anyway.

He waits as the room quietens. The delicate glass of champagne looks ridiculous in his hand, and Elide knows he would prefer a beer or glass of liquor, something he could really sink his fingers into.

“Uh, hi, everyone. I’m Lorcan, Rowan’s best man. If you’ve ever met me, you’d probably agree that I’m no one’s first choice for a speech, but you can’t really say no to the guy getting married. Or to Aelin Ashryver Galathynius.”

The room laughs gently.

Lorcan clears his throat. “But, uh, seriously. I don’t know why they wanted me to give this toast. I don’t really have the greatest track record with love,” he continues. “I’ve only ever loved one girl and our relationship was the only serious one I’ve ever had, that I ever really had any interest in being in.”

His eyes flit over the room, and she can pretend he’s looking for her even when he doesn’t find her. “I suppose that gives me a unique perspective on the whole love thing. Because I can tell you that once you’ve found that person, that relationship, all that’s left is to do everything to make it last. For the rest of your life, just—make it last.

“Rowan’s always been the smarter one, about everything and certainly about this. I’m glad he is, because I get to see him be happy. I think we can safely say that it’s a lock at this point.” He ducks his face and wipes his eyes. He looks up and raises his glass, prompting the guests to follow suit.

He’s slipped back into the crowd when she puts her glass down, and Rowan leads Aelin to the dance floor for the first dance. Elide watches with a saddened impression because all the drinks she’s had have made her sullen instead of raising her mood.

The music switches to something upbeat and dancey, and though Rowan is not one to dance, he stays there with Aelin as other couples join them. Even as Manon and Lysandra begin a slinky dance, Fenrys and Connall flailing about excitedly, Rowan holds his wife by her waist, swaying and speaking softly in her ear.

Well on her way to becoming a not-so-functioning alcoholic, Elide downs half her wine in one sip. As Vaughan slides onto the bar stool beside her, she can’t begin to care.

He clears his voice softly and orders a drink. When the bartender sets it down in front of him, he takes it but doesn’t drink. “Elide,” he begins, “you know I’m no good at this. But I’m also the only person here who will choose him over you, every time. And you have to know that for Lorcan, it’s not over. It’ll never be over, unless you tell him straight up. So, if you choose him again, you have to choose him.”

Elide turns to look at Vaughan. “Ok.” He nods, then leaves her. She finishes her drink, then sets it down on the bar. All she wants to do is hole up in her room, and bundled up in the Dead Boys rag until she falls asleep. But that would only be a substitution for the real thing.

✵✵✵✵✵

She finds him on his veranda, sitting on the chaise lounge with a lit cigarette. He’s abandoned his jacket and tie, his shirt unbuttoned.

Lorcan exhales and asks, “What do you want, Elide?”

He looks warm in the darkness, and Elide shivers, rubbing her arm. The sand is cold under her feet. Her short walk in the brisk ocean air has sobered her up and ruffles her dress around her legs.

“We were the best thing that ever happened to me, too.”

He looks up sharply, brows lowered. “That’s not fair. You said we were a mess, you were right. You wanted to leave, and you made sure that we were over—”

“It’s never over, Lor,” she says. “Not with us. I love you, and I’m always going to love you, no matter how mad I am with you, or how far I go, or whoever else I meet. It’s always going to be you.”

In the orange light from the torch, his expression is wide open and awed. He looks at her like he did during her first attempt at seduction, on his birthday—the first they spent together—wearing a dark red set.

Cautiously, she kneels on the lounge between his bent legs. He abandons his smoke, his hands settling on her hips. His face is level with her stomach. He swallows hard, shutting his eyes, and rests his forehead against her. “You met someone else?” he asks, and it is so like him to fixate on that.

“No,” she tells him. “It was a hypothetical. There’s never going to be anyone else. You’re it for me.”

He curls his hands into fists, bunching the delicate fabric of her dress. Next thing she knows, she’s being tugged onto his lap, knees on either side of his hips, his hand running up to her nape.

She runs her palm down the side of his face. His breath warms her lips, his arms steady around her when she sways into him, and he murmurs, “You’re it for me, too.”

Lorcan kisses her slow, but the embrace has an edge of desperation that has Elide rocking in his lap, one hand in his hair. A soft sound grows in the back of her throat as his calloused palm presses into her bare spine. When she licks into his mouth, his groan is like the roaring of a jet engine taking off, like a wave surging up to swallow the world whole.

She starts to unbutton his shirt, her movements sure and familiar even after their time apart. The urge to feel his skin overwhelms her, like the taste of cigarettes on his tongue.

Elide crushes her hand over his heart, smiling breathlessly when she feels the thunder of its beat. His face takes up her whole view, his smile curled and soft and encouraging; it feels so much like a breath of air after being underwater that she could sob.

Instead, she kisses him with less of an urgent undertone than before, her hand curling around his jaw. She can feel his smile, taste the subtle, acrid tang of champagne on his tongue, the immense familiarity of his mouth that she spent four years learning. She gets the rest of his buttons undone to touch his stomach, feels his abs contract from the contact.

He leaves her mouth to nip her jaw, following a path to the spot that only he’s ever found, the spot that liquifies her. Elide gasps, her chest heaving against her dress, and his hand on her waist pushes her down against the stiffness in his pants. It sends a rod of pleasure through her centre.

His nose skims hers as he lifts her hair off her neck, heavy gaze point-blank on hers. It feels like she’s in a trance. He whispers against her skin, “I woke up every morning missin’ you, baby.” She can’t not kiss him then.

Kissing him has always been easy, whether it’s in a dark bar or crammed in the back of his old Jeep Cherokee, or laying on the too-soft couch at his mother’s house. It’s just as easy now, a hundred or so metres away from their best friends’ wedding reception, music playing intermittently across the distance.

She kisses down his throat, the shaved skin under his jaw hot against her tongue and driving her crazy. Lorcan’s hands push up her thighs, his thumb hooking under the string of her panties to snap it, tossing the flimsy lacy thing aside to spread his big hands over her soft bare skin.

Elide puts just enough distance between them to fumble with the clasp of his pants, all fine motor functions having disappeared due to the pit of fire in her belly, and he moves his hands to bury in her hair, pressing kisses to her cheeks, the freckled bridge of her nose, dusted over her eyelids, and she can’t breathe.

“It’s always been you,” she feels the rumble of his voice. “I could never stop loving you.”

They decided after two years that the benefits of getting rid of condoms far outweighed the risks, that feeling him deep inside her skin-to-skin every night made the occasional pregnancy scare worth it. But it wasn’t like Elide failed to notice how adorably absorbed Lorcan got when his old coworker at the bar came to visit with her daughter.

So when she finally wrests his belt from its loops and his fly open, there’s but a second’s delay as he hitches her hips up before she takes him deep, until she feels the burn in her thighs as his size forces them to part.

Elide pauses, Lorcan breathing heavy against her shoulder, surrounded by him, his warmth, his scent, stretched full as he struggles not to buck up into her and slam her down into the cradle of his hips. She decides, mumbling into his hair, “I don’t want this anymore.” She runs her fingers through his hair, pushing the silky lengths away from his face so she can see him. She never wants to go back to a place where she doesn’t have this, where she doesn’t have him. “I don’t want to fight it anymore.”

He pulls her down into an open-mouthed kiss, rasps against her lips, “You were the only thing worth fighting for.”

And then he’s moving, she’s moving with him, and she can’t speak anymore. The only sounds between them are quick breaths, shared gasps while waves crash behind them.

Later, she’s curled against his chest, tracing absent swirls into his ribcage. For eight months, she carried around a tightness in her chest, but with him, she can’t feel it anymore and she’s never felt so free as she feels now.

“I love you,” she whispers as she starts to drift off. “I’m sorry.” For everything - for leaving him, for hurting them both, for not coming back when he asked her to, for taking his Dead Boys shirt.

His fingers still where they’ve been skimming over her side, and then he presses a dry, chaste kiss to her hairline.

She falls asleep easily. She doesn’t even have to stare at her laptop until her eyes dry out. Lorcan lays back against the chaise lounge.

When she wakes up, it’s a cloudy morning, the absent sun leaving her raw and hollow. She’s shivering in her dress. A kind hotel housekeeper is reminding her that check-out for this room is in half an hour, and Lorcan is gone.

✵✵✵✵✵

Elide maintains her deadened, straight-ahead stare as Vaughan sits next to her with a sigh.

“What’re you doing here, Elide?”

“Going back to Varese,” she answers mechanically. She takes a sip of her coffee, which has a generous splash of whiskey in it.

“What about last night? What happened?”

She finally looks at him, lets him see her pale face, mascara smudged beneath her tired and raw eyes. “You really wanna know?” Vaughan nods, and it’s almost hard not to look away because he reminds her too much of Lorcan. “I fucked Lorcan.”

He makes a face, “I don’t need to hear that. I mean—you’re running away again?”

Elide almost wants to say yeah, because if Vaughan hates her for breaking Lorcan’s heart again, then it might make it easier. But there are shards of anger sticking into her ribs when she breathes, and she flushes red, declaring, “Actually, he left me sleeping alone in his room. So, maybe I am running away, but it’s on him this time.” She sits back with a huff only to sit back up again, her pointed finger stabbing Vaughan’s shoulder. “And you know what, you just go on thinking I’m a heartless bitch for what I did, that’s fine by me—but Lorcan isn’t some precious little boy you need to coddle.”

Her exhale is shaky with tears, and Elide wipes her lips, feeling Vaughan watch her. And she feels so stupid for getting herself back in this mess.

“You’re both dumbasses. Did you talk at all?”

“We– talked some,” Elide says. “It felt like everything was ok.”

Vaughan clears his throat. “Um, I don’t mean to overstep, but talking while you’re having sex doesn’t count. His brain turns off when you’re naked. If you want to talk to him, you have to do it sober, with clothes on, and make up.”

She shrinks a bit, crossing her arms. “I was wearing clothes…”

He presses his lips together like he used to when he lived with Lorcan and would come home to them having sex in their apartment’s common spaces. “You have a connection in Orynth. Get a cab from the airport to your apartment, and you’re going to talk to my dumbass of a cousin.”

Elide picks at a loose thread on her sweatpants. In another life, she could be turning over Lorcan’s hand, tracing the life lines on his palms and bullshitting what they all meant to his amused ‘oh, yeah?’ They would have travelled together, stayed in the same room and danced close at the wedding and had breakfast the next day on the beach.

“Yeah,” she says. “I am. I’m going to do that.”

Vaughan smiles and squeezes her knee. “Good. I’ll be expecting a text from Lorcan saying everything’s worked out.” He stands up, hitching his bag over his shoulder. “And by the way, you should stop telling him that I have his Dead Boys shirt because he already ripped apart my dresser and closet looking for it.”

She laughs, smiling shamelessly. “Fine. I’ll come clean.”

✵✵✵✵✵

Elide lets herself into their apartment with the key she’s kept on her keyring.

Lorcan isn’t home yet, and he probably won’t be for a couple hours. Most guests weren’t scheduled to leave until the evening or even the next day, but she couldn’t stomach the idea of facing anyone. So, she got on the earliest flight out instead.

The apartment is silent, except for the sounds of Orynth city life far below and outside. He left the cream coloured curtains drawn, the ones he thought she was ridiculous for spending as much as she did on them. She still can’t make out much with the overcast, dim light from outside.

She gives herself a moment to stand in the dark entryway, breathing in the slightly stuffy but familiar air. Elide slips off her shoes and pushes her bag towards the coat rack.

When she starts to feel pathetic and slightly creepy, she flicks the lightswitch.

And—everything is the same. It’s not exactly alike, because things tend to move around over seven months, but her books are still crammed next to his on the bookshelf, her favourite mug sits next to his fancy espresso machine, and a drawing from his old coworker’s kid is stuck to the fridge next to Aelin and Rowan’s wedding invitation and her acceptance letter from grad school.

Elide moves around the apartment without touching anything, like if she does, it’ll disappear like a mirage. Her old notebook lays on the coffee table, the CD player he insisted on buying open to show the Bad Brains’ self-titled album waiting to be played, and Lorcan’s battered workwear jacket is hung over the back of a kitchen chair.

Their bed is unmade, as it always was. He’s moved their pillows into a pile smack-dab in the middle, but her dinky reading glasses—the ones she had to replace-rest in an empty glass on her nightstand. Lorcan’s brass cigarette case and the customised Zippo lighter she got him years ago are on his side, next to—

A small red box.

Entranced, she sits on the edge of the mattress and picks it up, pushing back the part of her that feels like an intruder, because this is their apartment, and she hasn’t done anything about her half of the rent that leaves her account monthly. She carefully lifts the lid, and she doesn’t know what she was expecting, but it’s a ring. A silver band, not too delicate or thick, holds an emerald cut ruby, flanked by a trio of sparkly diamonds on each side. And he’s been sleeping with it next to his bed.

For a long time, the image of his devastation when she shut the cab door plays over and over in her mind.

Three hours later, she hears keys in the door.

By that time, she’s had a shower and changed into clean-ish clothes—a pair of baggy jeans she’s missed and his stolen shirt. She’s been sitting on their couch, having put back the ring box like she never saw it.

Lorcan has hardly ever looked worse. His eyes are red-rimmed, long hair twisted into a deflated bun, expression reproachful, and he sets his jaw stubbornly as he sets his bag next to hers and steps out of his shoes. He stays silent, staring at her like he’s the one owed an apology.

Elide rubs the hem of his shirt between her thumb and forefinger. “Hey,” she starts. “You left me sleeping outside.” She licks her lip. “Low blow, Salvaterre.”

He scowls at her, looking like the curmudgeon everyone says he is. “You told me you didn’t want this anymore,” he snaps. “Basically came back just to tell me we were done while I was balls-deep inside you, Lee.” She always loved his vulgarity. “That’s a low fuckin’ blow.”

Her jaw unhinges. “You idiot, you thought—”

“You know, you coulda mailed me your key. Just take your stuff, go back to Wendlyn. Or maybe you wanna wait till I’m asleep, leave in the middle of the night this time—”

She storms towards him, one hand cutting sharply in front of her. “You’re a hypocrite. I came back, I told you I couldn’t do this anymore, that I need you back and,” she’s probably crying, and it certainly feels that way, “you tell me it’s always been me only to leave before I wake up.”

Elide stops, air sawing through her raw lungs. Lorcan’s staring at her like she’s both a terrifying enigma and the only thing in the world he knows for certain. “I thought,” he starts, then stops. “You said you didn’t want this. I thought you were saying good-bye, for good.”

Relief and understanding and hysteria surge through her, and she laughs breathlessly. “No, I meant- I don’t want us apart, us fighting. I want us back. I need you back.”

Lorcan shuts his mouth. After a long moment, he tells her, “I woulda gone with you. If you told me about Varese. I woulda gotten some job, or I could’ve visited you. I woulda made it work.”

Suddenly she doesn’t know why she isn’t kissing him.

He smiles against her mouth, and she smiles back, arms hooking around his neck, and after a second her feet leave the floor, he’s got her legs around his hips. She feels laughter rolling in his chest and pulls back just to kiss him again, and again, and again. He tips them over, and she bounces on top of him on top of their couch, the air leaving his lungs in a puff.

After she’s regained her balance, she sits up on his stomach, running her hands over his torso and chest. He looks up at her with soft eyes and a slight smile, his own hands loose around her wrists.

He takes her in slowly, his gaze roving over her until it drops to her top. Lorcan arches his brows and huffs out a laugh. His fingertips skim the outside of her thighs before fisting the worn cotton by her hips. “You lyin’ little thief.” He sharply pulls on the shirt, pulls her down into him as she laughs, cheeks red. “I knew you had it.”

Elide twists an errant strang of his hair around her finger, happy to lie on top of him. “It was the biggest piece of you I could take with me.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“...and maybe also I knew it would really piss you off.”

“There it is.” He kisses her head, his hand cradling the other side of it—it’s a familiar move of his that Elide once dubbed his ‘you’re-ridiculous-and-I-love-you-anyways-head-kiss.’ She presses her lips to his before she can tell him she missed that too. “Looks better on you anyway,” he mumbles. “I wasn’t that mad about it.”

“You didn’t want it back?”

“Nah, I wanted it back.” He draws away to push hair back. “Just wanted the girl wearing it back too.”

She whispers that she and the t-shirt are back for good and seals that oath with a kiss.

✵✵✵✵✵

an: soo i might be back. or i might slink back to my little cave of uni and work and student clubs and exam season. but anyway this is the first and only thing ive finished writing in months and months, so pls pls enjoy! the title is from Dead Boys' "High Tension Wire" bc im in a personal punk resurgence....

tag list: @sassyhobbits @empress-ofbloodshed @screamingwines @the-regal-warrior @shyvioletcat @icecream52 @elentiyawhitethorn @goddess-aelin @julemmaes @sunshinebingo (lmk if u want to b added/removed)

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