#and it is for smaller once in a while purchases

[howlingmod]

crawls up to you on 3 of my 4s (joldong a soda in one hand) ummmm uhh can I get a uhhh hcs for killers x a survivor reader who is a single parent of a kid. as you’d expect the spectre freakin sucks and dragged the kid there too

summary - 1x4, Jason x single parent reader

misc - ASKS THAT REMINDED ME I HAVE A SWEET DELICIOUS DRINK IN THE FRIDGE ..... thank you so much anon ..... this ones a little silly i can't lie I <3 PARENTAL 1x4 ....

1x4

-Your relationship started off as poorly as it could. You'd been with a smaller group of survivors, watching as they were picked off one by one. You didn't think it would go this bad. You all knew there were threats whenever you went out, you just didn't expect that they'd be so close to your campsite.

-You'd all gone on a small run to pick up supplies, running low on basic necessities. It was just meant to be a quick look around and then head back home, it was never supposed to devolve like this. You'd hid your kid as soon as you heard the screams, finding a place for them to hide from any potential danger while you figured out what was going on. You thanked your past self for finding somewhere they wouldn't be able to see any of this. Bodies were strewn about the ground, in all states of togetherness- disemboweled, beheaded, all clearly dead.

-You'd only managed to find one other survivor before you'd been caught, finding him hiding away in an odd corner of the area, clearly just as lost and confused as you.

"What happened? Did you see who did this?" You'd asked, struggling to keep your voice steady enough with how fast your heart was beating. His hands flew to your shoulders, clasping down tight in desperation for some support.

"I-I don't know, I was with Casper and then this thing just appeared out of nowhere and tackled him and-" He started to ramble, devolving into incoherence the more he spiraled.

"Hey, just calm down. We'll find a way out of here, I promise," you tried, mustering as much calm as you could in an effort to reassure him.

He opened his mouth like he was going to say something before suddenly stopping, growing pale as he looked a little past you. His hyperventilating only got worse, much to your displeasure, after a few seconds of trying to make him look back at you, you relented, looking over your shoulder and finding the source of his fear.

They were tall, unnaturally so. You didn't have to stare long to find the swords clasped in either hand, dripping with fresh blood. You both scrambled to stand up, you immediately trying to think of a way to lose them once you started running, but your thoughts were cut short. The hands on your shoulder squeezed and, through the blood rushing through your ears, you could just barely hear an 'I'm sorry,' before you were shoved forward.

You landed hard on your back, stunned by the sudden motion as you stared up at the sky. Shakily raising your head, you watched as they ran away, slowly growing smaller. The thing behind you laughed, low and sinister before drawing closer. You didn't have any time to get back up, them catching up to you and dragging you up by the collar of your shirt.

"Well well well, the unfortunate martyr," She crooned, leering down at you. Your feet dangled off the ground, unable to find any purchase other than their legs, unmoved by your struggle. His glowing eyes found your own, delighted by the fear he saw in them. He only grinned, slowly raising the edge of one of his blades to your throat, daring you to move and cut yourself on them. He opened his mouth, ready to mock you once more before something hit him.

"Hey! Leave 'm alone!" Your blood ran cold instantly, the rush instantly dizzying you to nausea. You couldn't breathe around the ball in your throat. Of course they would come looking for you, you'd been gone so long. God, you should've just ran when you had the chance. You thrashed harder now, kicking hard at his torso and scratching wherever you could find space. To your absolute dread, she cackled, full-bodied and unadulterated.

"Well, what do we have here? This is your rescue?" He just kept laughing, dropping the blade to his side to turn to your child.

"Leave them out of this!" You yelled, falling on deaf ears.

"Let my (parent) go!" They yelled, only furthering your struggle. You couldn't afford for them to get the ire of the killer holding you hostage. You wouldn't be able to protect them in time.

"This is too rich," he hummed, thoroughly pleased. Finally, she dropped you, letting you hit the ground once more. You'd scrambled up, instantly heading for your child as they ran to meet you in the middle. You stared back up at the killer, finding them grinning back down at both of you.

"I have to admit, you're a brave one," she started, directing her attention to your child, "I'm curious to see what you'll become."

Without another word, she turned on her heel and ran in the direction that the other survivor had gone, leaving you to sit there in confusion. You watched her slowly shrink into the distance, disappearing behind the tree-line. You made no move yet, too dumbfounded to think of what to do next. Finally, your child had looked up at you, still caged in your arms.

"Who was that?"

-The next few months were a blur. You found your way back home with everything you were able to pick off of the others. You felt awful for it but you had a mouth to feed, you couldn't afford to overextend your kindness if that whole interaction had taught you anything. You were able to find a relative normalcy, only haunted by the new silence with your lack of company. Your kid took to sword fighting with sticks in the yard, using the dead trees as dummies to duel with. It wasn't the best life, but it was enough of a routine that you were happy with it. That was until you noticed the same monster that nearly killed you was gifting your child a sword.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" You'd shouted to your visitor, watching as your child's extended hand shot back to their side in surprise.

"Aw, don't be like that, I'm merely checking up on my prodigy," he called back, calm as can be.

"Your- That's my kid, jackass!" You were seething now, temporarily dropping your filter in disbelief.

He only laughed at that, placing the gift in your kid's hands before stepping closer towards you, "I never said they were mine, just that I've taken an interest in their development. It takes guts to stand up to me, I was impressed."

He only stopped once he was a hair's breadth away, smiling down at you like she was a family friend. You glared right back up at him, crossing your arms over your chest with a grimace.

"I don't know what kind of game you're playing but you can leave them out of it. If you have some kind of problem you take it up with me, you understand?" You hissed, poking her in the sternum for emphasis. You were playing a dangerous game prodding her, but you'd much rather take the blunt of their malice over your kid.

She scoffed, turning to throw her arm over your shoulder and pull you into her side, "Are you deaf? Like I've been saying, I'm just invested in seeing their talent be used to the fullest. I'd hate to see such courage go to waste, is all."

"Here," she crooned, tugging you ever closer and leaning down to your level as best she could, "If you're really so concerned, I'll only ever come to visit while you're around. You can supervise me if you truly think it necessary."

You narrowed your eyes, glancing over to your child. They were busy looking at the sword they'd been gifted, brushing their fingers over the dull blade wrapped in burlap to protect their hands. You could practically hear her grin grow with your growing defeat.

"Fine. Only when I'm around," you relented.

"It's a deal," he chimed.

-It became routine from then on. 1x4 would come to visit, offering all kinds of gifts to your child: post-cards from far away lands and coins long out of production. In recent times, he'd begun to offer you gifts more often, bearing glimmering jewels and a surplus of food for the two of you. He'd present them to you as soon as he found your side, watching as 'his prodigy' trained. Rarely would he participate, only when you relented to your child's pleading for him to play with them under your careful eye. Usually, he'd just sit next to you in a comfortable silence, occasionally offering some kind of feedback to your child, both praise and critique. Truthfully, it seemed like they really were getting better with that sword...

-The visits would turn longer and longer, following you two into your home for dinner when your kid asked for him to stay one night. Tentatively, you'd busied yourself in the kitchen, preparing some of the supplies she'd dropped off the other day as you listened to their conversation. Your child was rambling all about the books they'd been reading, filling her in on all the stories they'd heard about drakobloxxers and princesses in castles saved by shining knights. Readily, she listened, offering her own inputs and spins on those tales with pride. Slowly, you grew calmer, finding peace in the moment.

-One day, she'd come all the same as normal. Greeting your child and offering them a piece of seaglass they'd soon put up on the shelf with all her other gifts before she found your side once more. You'd given her a nod of acknowledgement, too focused on your kid's training to pay mind to her finding her gift for you. Just a moment later, he'd presented it to you, more casual than he normally did. He said nothing, just held his palm out for you to look. It was a ring, lined with diamonds and held by a gorgeous, gold band. You'd laughed, more earnestly than he'd heard before.

"What's this supposed to be?" You hummed, warm with amusement.

He smiled back, softer than his usual mischievous grin, "A gift."

You'd snickered at the simplicity of it, readily taking it from his hand. It fit perfectly, unsurprisingly. You found he had a way of knowing things before he was told. Neither of you said anything more about it, turning your attention back to the excited child in the yard pointing out the deep cuts they'd made in the bark.

Jason

-Jason found you before you could even meet the others. You didn't know it then, you couldn't see him in the dark, sneaking through the cover of the woods. You were too scared then, too terrified to pay attention to the sounds around you over your own heart in your ears. You just needed to find safety, somewhere you could hide away with your child until you figured out where you were.

-You ran around in circles, passing the same clearings and scratching yourself on the same brambles of thorns- straining to lift your kid up above them and through the webs of branches reaching out for you both. Jason only watched as you got more and more lost, growing more frantic by the second. It'd taken watching you trip over an overgrown root and flip over to ensure you hit the ground instead of your child that finally made him draw closer.

-It was still too dark for you to really see him, only able to make out that there was a person there. You'd shot upright, scrambling backwards against a tree and pulling your kid tight to your chest, hidden behind your arms.

"Who are you?!"

He didn't answer at all, just stood staring at you from a few feet away. You were going to try asking again, only further irritated by his lack of response before he finally moved. It was purposeful but unhurried, leaving you just a sliver of time to contemplate running before he reached out and grabbed for one of your arms. You'd instantly tried to pull back, fearing he was trying to pry your arms away from your child but he was stronger, overpowering you-

He grabbed your hand, turned away, and started walking.

-He didn't talk on the way there at all either, didn't make any noise at all, really. So, you didn't ask any questions. You were terrified, you really shouldn't just be letting him drag you god knows where like this but ... if he really wanted to hurt either of you, you figured he would've done that already. You could just barely spot the glimmer of something sharp in his free hand.

-Eventually, he reached a cabin. It was a very worn, aged looking cabin but shelter nevertheless. It was only then he dropped the iron grip he had on your hand, barely turning to you and pointing in the direction of the door. You'd stood there for a second, dumbly staring at him. The thought of this all being one big trap, some game to him, popped back up in your mind. Nevertheless, you tentatively padded over to the door, tightening your grip on your child once more. You'd expected him to be on your heel, shoving you over the threshold and into his lair but, looking over your shoulder, you found he hadn't moved an inch. He stared right back at you, waiting for you to step into the house. He stayed there even when the door was shut, only turning to leave a few moments later, leaving you in the shabby house without a word.

-The house itself was in better condition than you'd expected. It hadn't been occupied too recently based on the layers of dust piling up but, compared to the woods you'd just run through, it may as well have been a fully-furnished mansion. It was just you and your child as far as you can tell. There seemed to be some kind of dirt road leading there but you'd made no move to explore, not wanting to risk it quite yet. There were enough supplies left behind there for you to provide for your kid as they slowly regained their energy and started running around the house to explore. By the time you even began to worry about running low, he came back.

-You'd been startled, nearly jumping out of your skin when you heard the knock on the door, but, even though you'd barely seen him in the dark that night, you could immediately identify who it was. He didn't strike any fear into you, even with the mask and ragged clothes. He'd saved you and your child's life, you couldn't muster any ill-will towards him if you tried. You'd welcomed him in with arms warmer than he'd expected, inviting him inside and talking to him. You'd been a little worried by his lack of response until he began signing, slow and shaky but still understandable. It wasn't the clearest to you at first, but, with his repeated visits, you slowly picked it up more and more. As did your child, who would happily run up and try signing back to him, much to his delight. Their energy was refreshing, the familial situation made him feel comfortable, at peace for a time.

-The cycle repeated for a few months, you slowly growing more and more acclimated to your surroundings. You found ways to live off the land, figuring out what was and wasn't safe to forage with the help of your company. Your kid found new trees to climb and learned to set up small traps that you'd learn how to spot and avoid. Life had found some kind of normalcy again.

-One day, you had a new visitor a strange looking man with an equally strange face(?) on his shirt and a hat your kid would later laugh about when describing him. Neither of you spoke to one another, he'd gone stock still and slack jawed staring at you and your kid from afar, obviously confused about why you were there. You didn't bother filling him in, only turning on your heel and heading back home. You're sure he would've tried to chase after you, ask who you were and why you were there if it weren't for the shadow that'd followed you here, standing just a few feet away from you in a clear threat. 'Stay away.'

[struungout]

My Haru Casting E-minor is officially ordered and I am hundreds of dollars poorer lmao. I played the “pay later” game a few too many times this year and I ain’t doing that again so Sachi got paid in full bahaha.

[prael]

Delicacy

ILLIT Moka x male reader smut

Happy (kinda late) Moka Day!

Masterlist word count: 5,401 Kofi(donations/commissions)

"Ladies and-a gen-entleman! Step right up! Ge-get yourself a-a mystical item today!" The old Murgo's voice is loud, his tone is jovial. His accent is hard to understand and his stuttering speech patterns would indicate a man who is not well-educated, though you've always expected he puts it all on for show.

His skin is scruffy, full of moles and unkempt facial hair that creeps down to his thin neck. The elderly man's uniform consists of a long, purple-sleeved coat—sleeves that fall every time he waves an arm at the next item he tries to flog.

"Y-you sir! Consider this, this is truly a-a magical mirror, for as long as you lo-look into it, it will make you b-beautiful." He smiles at the group before him, pearly white teeth contrasting with his murky skin colour. They are the only noteworthy things about him, other than his height, a whole foot smaller than the usual man.

The rough-looking labourer by your side mumbles, "What a crock of shit!"

While the bald man at the front calls "I'll take it!"

Murgo, as Murgo so often does, announces the catch, "Very wise pu-purchase. Now, just remember, the m-magic only works if you look a-at in complete darkness."

Murgo collects his due payment and the man at your side shakes his head as he turns away. "Idiots," he grumbles before he walks away.

"You there!" Murgo singles you out. "Do you fancy trying a-anything?" He asks you with a smile.

Murgo's entire stall is packed full of oddities, and none of them are ever what they seem. You may not believe in Murgo's little items, but it's always interesting to come and see what he has to sell today. It's nice to consider his fantastical excuses and embellishments.

"M-may I interest you in a fan-antasy?" He sing-songs. "You must ha-have a wish to make come true? Consider this ma-magical music box! One wish! M-Make it come true!" He boasts about another silly item, something that always leaves you rolling your eyes. Wishes cannot be bought.

"Tha-that's a look of uncertainty. Well, how about this." Murgo holds out a hand containing a single chocolate. A perfect, colourful item shaped like a square. "Gen-entleman, please m-may I present, a most magical item to y-your attention! A chocolate! Bu-but not any chocolate! They say this one tastes of m-mocha, and its ingestion a-allows you to live a fantasy."

You scrunch your brow.

"Ingested fantasies might seem an im-impossibility, but I have p-proven through a rigorous scientific process..."

You know he's lying, as always, but you're not about to interrupt though. You doubt the old man actually has much training in anything even related to science, and everything about him can only lead you to believe that he doesn't own many resources to test things on anyway.

"...so, sir, I urge you!" Murgo finishes his meaningless rambling by saying, "Try and taste your fondest dream. Try the ma-magical wonder and live a dream so real, so plausible that y-you'll forget who you are!"

Live a dream so real... He's definitely lying, but you are curious as to the taste of his chocolate.

Your eyes switch from Murgo's insistent, excited stare to his chocolate, and back to Murgo's knowing smile. "Just this once," you tell him.

-

You sit at your kitchen table, staring at the little rectangular block that rests on the wood.

"A fantasy, huh?" you contemplate. You lean in close and give it a sniff; it certainly smells like chocolate, with a hint of mocha.

Shrugging, you hold up the chocolate and drop it into your mouth. Immediately, it melts away and you're overpowered by the delicious flavour. It's milk chocolate, but you find hints of cocoa and coffee mixed between your lips.

You chew a few times and then swallow. At that moment, Murgo's words ring around your mind. 'Live a dream so real,' they repeat.

You sit and you wait. Staring expectantly at the table, you blink blankly at the slab where the chocolate once rested. You tap your fingers. You scratch the back of your neck. And still, nothing.

"Wow." You shake your head, chastising yourself for thinking so optimistically, and push out the chair.

As you stand, your head spins. The world about you warps into another form, a dark space resembling nothing you have ever seen.

The ground crunches beneath your feet. Gravel, perhaps? Black grazes at the surface, but you can't quite make out any details. As if a curtain has fallen to obscure your vision.

You spin around and wave your hands to find a purchase with something.

And then you feel it. Feel... her?

Small, smooth hands in your own. They let go before too long, and then those hands brush up your forearms.

A shadowed girl—clearly a girl by her soft curves—gently touches your cheek, and you grab her hand again. A soft gasp escapes her, and then she giggles. "Do you know how hard it's been, to be stuck inside a piece of chocolate? Of course, you don't. Why would you?"

This... isn't real. Could you be dreaming? Could you be high, or drunk, or passed out? Perhaps poisoned? You bring your fingers to your face to ensure you're not gushing blood or anything odd. Nope, normal. Completely and utterly normal, so... what the hell?

She whispers as her fingers move along the waistband of your pants, "Did you like the taste of the chocolate? Of... Moka?" She laughs. "My name is Moka, do you understand? Mocha and Moka!"

She has the cutest laugh. Soft, genuine, and one that leaves you smiling. Smiling? You ask yourself what you're doing and how you possibly ended up with some mysterious woman pawing your crotch. Regardless, you answer.

"Yeah," you say, her laugh encouraging you to express honesty. "Definitely not a bad product at all."

"Of course not!" Moka cheers. You catch a glimpse of a smile in the shadows that surround her. "After all, I was made with all the finest ingredients to give a taste that absolutely anyone can enjoy! And you're no exception, are you?" Moka's weight presses against you, and she leans close to your ear to murmur, "This little bump in your pants proves that."

You let out a sharp breath, but no denial. Moka may be shrouded in darkness, but you don't have trouble appreciating her presence. You can feel the warmth from her body, her rounded breasts that are all too tempting to touch.

"I'm so confused..." you whisper.

"Good." With the utterance of one word, you see the brightness of a smile. How wonderful and expressive her face is. The darkness clears and the mystery goes with it. The girl in front of you can only be described as utterly breathtaking. She's wearing this smile that turns up a little more on one side of her mouth than the other, and you're absolutely enchanted by its beauty. There's this beauty mark on her nose, such a cute mole. And then her eyes... you could very happily lose yourself within them.

"So incredibly confused," you repeat, and watch with fascination as a lock of her dark hair slips past a black strip and over her flushed cheek.

Moka kisses you. A gentle, testing peck, but there's no time for timid, because she pounces, and suddenly you're drowning under her affection. Kissing her like this is all you can think about, and the way she tangles her small tongue around your own is wildly erotic, both innocent and sinful at the same time.

You are too complacent, but then Moka brings her body flush against yours. You don't know where she came from, you have no idea why she's here and what's going on, but your body is certainly not questioning that right now. Her lithe form under your touch is as smooth as the chocolate she came from.

"Take me," she all but purrs, "It's what I'm here for."

"But you're..."

"Not real? A fantasy? Exactly. That's all the reason you need to let go," she whispers and there is a clarity that brings her words like truth.

Real or not, you can't deny it. You want her, this exotic enigma. You tug her close, fingers tracing a curve, your lips following a line. Her body, her skin, you adore her. Every facet, every inch, you crave her. You take hold of Moka and lift her, she lets out the gentlest of squeaks but instantly wraps her legs around you, and just the sound and feeling of her draws a shudder out of you.

"I spent months in Murgo's storage, just waiting for someone like you. Every single day growing more and more frustrated as I waited. You can't imagine being that pent up, can you?"

She's taking off your shirt. Impatiently running her hands down your torso, like she can't get enough. You stumble until you plant her against the wall, holding her firm and kissing her with all the frustration she feels, biting and sucking and leaving her breathless.

Moka wraps her arms around your neck, curling her heels, pulling you close.

"I can't imagine it, but you don't have to wait for another second though." You squeeze at her taut thighs, making her whimper with delight.

"Taste me," she whispers and you take your lips to her neck. It's not exactly what she has in mind, but she knows it's inevitable. All roads lead between her thighs.

So you fall to your knees before her. Hands up her thighs, driving up the frills of her skirt. She's a delicacy, soft and pink, beautiful, just waiting to be savoured. And the moment your lips touch the inside of her thigh, she gasps, one palm smacking the wall behind her. The tension, the excitement, the breathless little whimpers that escape her, every little thing, has you completely engrossed.

The whole time you press a barrage of kisses against her thighs, moving closer to her core with each passing second, but the light, teasing kisses draw a litany of frustration out of her.

"P-please..." Moka whimpers.

The breath from her plea leaves her in a shudder. She huffs, already trembling. You test how wet she is with your fingers, feeling her damp warmth, her sticky arousal coating your digits. You're unable to resist running your fingertips up the folds of her pussy, using the natural slickness to help move, dancing around her clit and drawing cries from the breathless girl. Her pleasure is plain to see, the rising blush reaching her chest and the deep breaths escaping her.

You slide a single finger inside her, then quickly two, slowly finger fucking her pretty pink, twisting around and feeling her wrap around you.

"You like it?" you murmur and it's not like you could call anything happening now an act of romance, but you turn your head and kiss her thigh. Such a tender moment is shared despite the sordid acts.

Moka huffs, her fingers clinging to your shoulder. "I need it." She sputters, moaning and thrusting down to meet your slow motions. "Oh... It's so good..."

"It's about to get even better," you say.

You lap your tongue along the seeping moisture of her beautiful cunt, and you lick over her slick folds and lap up everything she has to offer. With deep, intense licks, you give her pussy the attention she's been begging for.

"Ahh! Oh, yes!" she shrieks, falling back against the wall and panting with pleasure.

The sweetness of her nectar assaults you, and your tongue finds the little spot that has her moaning each time you lick near it. Faster and faster you circle her clit, watching as her knees quiver and twitch. Closer and closer, your tongue working her into a frenzy.

"More... I-I... yes, don't stop!" she cries, pulling your face against her. She wants more, she won't wait, and she twists and tangles her fingers into your hair, pushing and grinding her dripping sex against you. "Can you imagine it? I was made for pleasure. To give and receive, only to be forced to hide away, all alone? To suffer every day, tortured by my need?"

Moka whimpers and struggles to keep her breath even. You must want to do something about that, don't you?

You grab her thighs, lifting her off the ground and shifting your hands under her, grabbing her soft, plump ass cheeks. She cries at the movement, but then her legs are wrapped around your shoulders, clutching you to her desperately. You eat her little pussy out furiously, ravaging her drenched folds as she cries out, screams filling the room as you pick up the pace. Your tongue dances around her clit, your fingers sinking deeply into the soft flesh of her cute little ass.

"Oh god... I can't stop myself," her desperate cries fill the room.

You cannot deny this girl, even if you wanted to, so you devour her sweet cunt, and watch as her eyes close, the pleasure becoming too much as her body explodes with euphoric release. She screams, desperately riding your face, her entire body quivering and twitching as she cums. The juices drip down your chin as she rides the wave of intense bliss, rolling her hips, indulging in it, prolonging it for as long as she can.

Finally, the surge of her overwhelming orgasm ends, but she slumps, nearly lifeless in your grasp. You struggle to keep her up, and she keeps trying to grind her sensitive folds against you, but her exhaustion finally hits her. So you take her, back in your arms, and toward your kitchen table.

There she lays, shaking and sweating, struggling to catch her breath, and you want nothing more than to pry her delicate figure from that dress. You strip her, your mouth kissing every newly exposed surface of her perfect body.

"This is how things should have been, how life should have been," Moka mumbles, her dark hair swirling beneath her as she lays across your table. Her sweet skin comes into sight and you can't help running your hands along the feminine curve of her stomach. Her perfect breasts fit in the palms of your hands and you trace circles around her taut nipples as she sighs happily.

You undress, and she watches, pulling her lower lip between her teeth. Her expression is suddenly guilty, as though admiring a man naked isn't something a girl should do. But you caress her face, she's your beautiful enchantress, and that moment of hesitation seems to pass as she leans into the palm of your hand. Her eyes shimmer with acceptance, and she's accepting of all the dirty things she's thinking, all the things she's about to say. "I...I want you inside me," she whispers.

Your cock is erect and eager, so hard, aching, throbbing with the desire to know her warmth, and you line yourself with the wetness between her legs.

Gently, you lean forward, pressing the tip against her tightness. "Are you ready?"

"For however long I've waited," she breathes.

She's quivering under you, full of tension, gripping the edge of the table tightly. The expression on her face is so vulnerable, open and raw, so beautiful. Her chest rises and falls with her need, and there's a hunger burning in her, a fire begging to be ignited.

"Please," Moka begs.

"Gentle..." you tell her, though who it's meant for, you're not entirely sure. But you take a deep breath and ease into her slickness.

She gasps, her grip around the side of the table tightening. It takes a moment, but she grows accustomed, her tension dissipates and her trembling is overcome. She laughs, and the sound is nothing short of stunning. Chime-like, the light, airy melody fills the room as she touches herself. Cupping her supple breasts, and tugging her pink nipples, she indulges in her lust and rocks gently against your hard shaft.

"Fuck away my lusts. Fill the void, be the man I've needed so badly," her sweet voice begins to sing with pleasure, her pitch rising.

Her cunt is so warm and inviting, so wet, stretching tightly around you as you pump back and forth. Wet noises sound with every pass. Moka's eyes glaze over and her legs wrap around your waist, pulling you even deeper.

Your thrusting finds a comfortable, easy rhythm, and soon your hips are slapping eagerly against her every time you push in. Wet noises fill the air each time you drive into her deepest parts.

"God, yes..." her desperation only heightens, "Use me, please. Don't stop, fuck me."

"How could I ever?" you pant, both leaning in, sucking the taste of her chocolate mouth, twirling her tongue, drinking her intoxicating exhales.

She's a dream, this girl is made for indulgence. Her arms hook under yours, hands grasping your shoulders, digging into your back, desperate for some way to anchor herself. You want to touch every part of her, soak up her delicious little whimpers and commit them to memory. As your breath runs ragged and your heart pounds in your chest, nothing other than her is present in your mind. Nothing else matters. She is the pure embodiment of desire.

As the feverish motion speeds up, her soft breasts bounce and her entire body shimmers. Sweat glistens along her slender form and you push her to limits she's never known. Her cries run longer and louder until she's screaming, moaning your name, muttering incoherent praise.

"Moka..." you whisper her name, lacing her with what little you can say with a mind lost in the overwhelming bliss of her body.

It isn't long before your rhythm begins to break down. A rising and falling beat, speeding and slowing, stuttering with your every breath. She's drowning with you, and yet floating all at once. Latching onto you, refusing to let go. Desperate, clamping tightly onto you as you enter her deeper with each sharp thrust.

Panting, drenched, bodies so close. Your hard, feverish heat, her spiking lust, colliding with explosive fervour as you surge forward, burying yourself inside her and grunting as you shudder.

Unbridled and relentless, the swelling heat pulses through you and down your length. Rippling through her, filling her cunt, pouring into her. Her cries peak alongside yours. She shudders and shakes as your pulsing cock pumps a shockwave of ecstasy through her.

Delirious laughter escapes her when her rolling euphoria subsides, and her satisfied smile when she strokes her hand down your hot chest... everything about her... the delight of satisfaction washes through her.

Just what was that? That woman made you feel desires you could never imagine possible. Never could you have imagined something would make you feel as if you were flying.

Never could you imagine her.

And yet here she is.

"Can we..." she seems uncertain now, nervous, unsure.

You take her hands and kiss them. A delicate display of adoration that causes her nervous smile to transform into something happier, more certain. "What is it, Moka?"

She presses her finger to her lower lip, searching for the right words. "We can do this again, can't we?"

You can't resist chuckling at the blush that reaches her chest and the shy way she turns her head.

"Of course," you say.

-

Now you understand, even if vaguely, what happened and how things came to be; your actions and hers.

But, as always, the question remains... can a fantasy ever stay?

Moka is sitting outside on the small porch of your humble home. Fond memories occupy your thoughts; nights filled with bliss; mornings spent listening to her joyous voice.

"Are you having doubts?" she asks, unable to meet your gaze.

You sigh and rest against the rail. Her feelings are difficult to understand sometimes, but you have this odd connection, as if an invisible bridge exists between you, allowing you to feel her as she can you. She wants your happiness, you know that, she craves it, and yet...

"Will you stay?" you ask her quietly, a little afraid of the answer.

The setting sun casts pink across the sky. From the lush valley, there's a stream that cuts across the landscape, shaded by the greenery, broken only by the towering tree that stands tall in the distance. Its wide leaves filter the sunlight, casting gentle patterns in the trickling water. It really is such a peaceful place to live.

You stand and enjoy the moment. Fresh air, the calming simplicity of nature.

"I'm sorry," Moka's voice is only a whisper, "I don't know the limits of the magic that brought me here. If I stay, would I be stuck as a human? If I leave your side, would I ever be able to return? It's as much of a mystery to me as it is to you."

"Should I ask Murgo?"

"That fool? He didn't even know the chocolate was really magic. No," her voice grows firmer, "Don't trust the words of that merchant." Her hands clutch tightly at her knees, "I do have this feeling. I can't quite explain it, but, I've been feeling it since you first tasted me."

"Feeling?"

"A pulling—a tug—toward you, away from you too," she says. "Magic, desires, loneliness... maybe they've been woven together. I can't be sure."

"Not sure I understand."

"I feel it now. There's this need to be satisfied. And when I'm not, it feels like the magic will just tear me away."

You push away from the railing and step towards her. She's sitting, knees pulled against her chest, wearing nothing more than a white linen gown. Seeing her so small...

"So, if I just satisfy you..." You reach out and gently brush your knuckles along her soft cheek. Moka leans into your touch, her deep brown eyes gazing up. Your fingertips push through her silky dark hair and cup her delicate chin. As she stares at you, you can feel the deep, yearning emotion within her. "Then you will stay with me."

"I think—"

You interrupt her with a kiss. Softly locking your lips, bringing her comfort. Just a moment, simple tenderness. Then passion, as you open your mouth and taste the pure sugar of her tongue. Slipping around yours, her hot exhale, her warmth, both erotic and meaningful.

You can only pull away by taking her with you, pulling her up from the chair. Eagerly, Moka smiles and steps into your arms. Squeezing her tight, holding her around the waist, breathing her scent, feeling the tension inside yourself. She kisses you back with the same intensity, lips tight on yours, warm and dripping as they open, teasing you with her sweet taste.

You stumble back towards the railing, bodies entwined. Tilting your head, her chocolate flavour can make anyone addicted. Kissing her, nipping, sucking, biting her lip. Sinking into her warmth, her body. Lifting the hem of her short gown, running your fingers along the silky skin of her thighs. She arches back into the wooden railing, and you break apart the kiss as she sinks into the support behind her.

You take hold of her shoulders and turn her. She braces against the railing and leans forward, showing off that inviting, delicate shape. Between the arch of her back and the curve of her cute ass, she begs to be taken. And that thin linen may as well not even be there; it's so taut, so transparent.

You move behind her. In the fading light of the evening, the shadows reveal more than they hide. Lifting the cloth and leaving her bare. Running your hands down the lines of her hips and sides, your fingers lightly trace back up her ribs and finally, you cup one of her light breasts. Her nipple presses into the palm of your hand, and she's so sensitive, arching at even the slightest touch.

She looks back at you, her eyes longing, knowing what comes next. Spreading your fingers down between her legs, you run them along the slick, wet flesh waiting for you. She's already ready, dripping, and your fingertips only tease her. Bending, lining up your rigid cock against her wetness. You place your other hand on her hip and ready yourself, preparing to push forward.

"I'll never grow tired of this," you say.

Moka looks back at you, blushing, hair over her face as she tries to look through the veil. Before she can respond, you push, and she lets out a sharp cry at being filled. With her firmly held, you slide in and out of her dripping cunt. It's not a frantic, hurried pace, but deep, intense thrusts that give Moka what she needs—give her relief.

"Ah! That's so deep... so deep."

Her moans spill out without restraint. Such a vibrant voice, full of the lusts she's harbouring. Holding her firmly, plunging deeper and faster, her tiny pussy wrapping tightly around you. Wet, slippery squishing echoes through the empty air. Slaps sounding with every time your crotch strikes hers. It's all so lewd and brings you ever closer, keeps driving you.

The deeper her chest falls, the more she arches, and a deep moan escapes as her body shakes. Her orgasm comes strong, fast, and powerful, making her legs quake and her voice stutter. But you hold her and keep fucking. Slipping against her back, clinging to her waist, burying your face in her hair. Her trembling sex tenses and flexes and still she moans, incoherently telling you just how good it feels.

You've lost track of the number of times you've filled her tight cunt in the past few days, so this is just another one of many. She loves it, though; loves feeling you pour so deeply inside her. She'll do anything to feel it. So you fill her. Firm thrusts as you pump her full of your cum, right there on the porch.

-

During the moments she spends staring out the window, you run your hand down Moka's back. She hums a little sound, appreciating the act, and snuggles into the blanket further.

"Cold? I could go get the fire going again if you like."

Moka stares blankly, fixated on a flower just outside the window. She blinks and laughs suddenly.

"Hm? Sorry, what did you say?"

You repeat what you said and she quickly responds.

"It's alright, but there's something I need you to do."

"What is it?"

"Lie on the bed, let me ride you. I want to feel you fill me. I need it." She reaches a hand up and cradles her own breast, grasping at it and squeezing the supple mound.

It's getting worse—her constant need. Like an itch, she says. Something has to constantly be done to keep it from being painful. It's barely been two hours since you were last inside her, and it seems to be the only thing she can think about.

"Please. I just need a little more..."

You can't bring yourself to deny her. Not when she looks at you like that. So you stumble backwards, pulling her naked form along with you, and ungracefully land on your back. Already you're growing hard, just from looking up at her dainty body and recalling all the wonderful acts you have performed and thinking of what is yet to come.

Moka runs her hand through her hair and gazes downward, a serene look washing over her delicate features.

"Smiling suits you," you tell her.

Again, you watch her eyes light up at that little kind of praise. "Thank you," she says, blushing as she clambers across the bed to kneel above you. She fixes her knees on either side of your hips and runs her palms over your chest, teasing your body as her breasts sway before you.

"Oh..." she purrs as she rocks back and forth, rubbing her bare sex up and down your length. "Oh, yes..."

You hum with delight, but remain still for a moment, listening to the happy sounds she's making, letting her indulge in the simple foreplay.

Eventually, she can take it no longer. "Here..." She lifts herself with her thighs and wraps a single hand around your hardened cock, steadying it and gripping tight. With a single gasp, she guides you inside her. Her moisture envelops you and she's so tight, the way her pussy seems to suck you in all the way to the base. But once you reach that far point, you both let out a loud moan of satisfaction. She's got all of you, every last inch of your shaft has found its home inside her.

Moka rests there for a moment, staring down with these innocent, almost vulnerable brown eyes. From the soft feeling of her velvety interior and the cute, lewd look of her blissful face, you can't help yourself, and buck up into her, plunging even further in. She lets out a gasp and stumbles forward, catching herself on your chest.

"I'm sorry! Are you alright?" you ask.

The dark-haired girl giggles—something that pleases you more than you can describe—and returns to that dainty smile. She pulls her hips and then drives them against you, before groaning, "More than alright."

Moka finds her rhythm. Rolling and grinding her hips, each motion punctuated by her spiking arousal. Her small cunt welcomes the friction, drips with desire. You grip her waist, helping her balance as she bounces in your lap, pushing herself harder and faster each time. She pushes harder, taking more of you, and soon she's crying out your name, begging you to fill her with everything you have.

Her gorgeous form rocks above you. Thrusting vigorously, her little breasts barely bouncing in a way that you can't take your eyes away from. Moka digs her nails into your chest. Her moans and cries grow increasingly desperate.

"You're amazing," Moka moans through her pleasure, voice quivering and trembling with it.

You can feel her clenching tighter and tighter, her insides quaking as she begs, and pleads for release. It brings your climax close, and despite the urgency of her pleasure, she maintains a controlled rhythm. Not so fast as to short-circuit things, keeping you on the very edge of euphoria.

"God, I love the way you..." she exclaims as a bright flush blossoms across her face. She sinks her teeth into her lower lip, muting her sound.

"What?" you struggle to speak as her slick folds wrap so tightly around you.

You don't know what it is, but something catches her attention. Her movements slow and she's searching, somehow peering through the dark outside. The noise has stopped too, usually at night there's a cacophony of singing insects and rustling, fluttering wings, but now nothing. No wind or creak or creasing leaf. Quiet. Dead quiet.

Moka slips off of your cock and crawls backwards to the end of the bed.

"What is it?" you ask.

Moka's lips twitch. Anxiety sets in over her features and she steps away from the bed, toward the window. Moonlight kisses her skin, the pale rays dancing on her shadowy form. Your heart falters and you realise... you really do want her here. Like this. Always.

"Moka?"

A strong gust blows and the window swings open. Her silky hair whips against her face, catching on her lips. She raises her hand, fingers hovering lightly in the moonlight. You remain motionless in fear of breaking whatever is occurring. Nothing feels right, not a single thing. As if the fabric of reality has been slashed in two.

The wind howls. The lights flicker and the fireplace across the room somehow brings itself to light. She turns to face it and the flames illuminate Moka's eyes. They glow a pale violet, the hue all wrong, ghostly. A tremble comes over her, and she says just five words. The last five words you'll ever hear from her.

"I'm sorry. I'll miss you."

Her hand turns to dust. The grains reflect the moon as they blow out of the window. You watch as the rest of her body follows, leaving only the imprint of where she once stood.

Time moves slowly—too slowly—like your heart, which can't beat. Something has broken, something in you, though not a sound passes through your lips. Tears stream from your eyes. The pain, the sorrow, the emptiness—it all feels irreparable. You can't bear it, and without a single word, without a single sound, the world goes black.

[dwaekkicidal]

𓆩Mochi Boyfriend Channie𓆪

gn!reader | he was top of the poll :3 Lix's will be posted tomorrow and then I will only make more if somebody requests other member versions <3

Mochi Channie who introduces you to the boys pretty early on, mainly because they begged to meet their new parent but also because they are his whole life, so it's important to him that you all get along. Their opinion is important to him so when they all approve of you instantly (and you handle them well), he’s through the roof

Mochi Channie who is shy about skinship, especially in front of the others, but will tank through it just to see the smile and blush covering your face (as if his ears aren't bright red)

Mochi Channie who encourages you to allow him to spoil you and eases you into it with smaller things like buying you small snacks, then ordering your favorite food after you’ve had a long day and showing up unannounced with it and your favorite treats, then finally will ease you into accepting brand name jewelry/clothes or any gifts that are generally expensive/valuable

Mochi Channie who puts everything (that he can) on pause to answer your texts and calls, even cutting himself off mid sentence when he sees your contact show up with a distressed message

Mochi Channie who calls you every morning and night when he's on tour, even when he's exhausted and doesn't want to do any talking. He'll sit there and listen to you talk about your day and falls asleep to the sound of your voice and the comfort of seeing you beside him once again

Mochi Channie who gives you secret sneak peeks into their latest endeavors, 1. so you know what he is doing at all times and 2. so he can see your eyes sparkle at events you find particularly interesting

Mochi Channie who gives you sneak peaks into songs like he did in Chan's room, only giving you a second or so of noise and then being a tease and leaving you hanging

Mochi Channie who, if you puppy dog eye him at a particular demo that sounds interesting, literally can not resist you and will show you as much of the song as you want/as he is comfortable with

Mochi Channie who, over time, opens up more and will eventually start taking your compliments to heart (Christopher you WILL love urself. 🔫<3)

Mochi Channie who is a fast learner: memorizes every little thing about you within a week of figuring out. New favorite food or drink? Knows the exact order and your preferred store of purchase. New favorite song or movie? Always plays it whenever he can.

Mochi Channie who indirectly asks stay for opinions on gifts for you. Goes on Bubble to send a picture of some items and a message along the lines of "Which do you want? haha." he reads through the replies and tallies them, using the final count to make a decision

Mochi Channie who may be inexperienced at first, but again is a very fast learner. So much so that by the 3rd or 4th time you guys are having sex, he knows your body to the same degree as, if not better, than you

Mochi Channie who has every spot that makes you squirm, every angle that makes you cry out, and every kink that makes your legs weak engrained in his head

Mochi Channie who won’t hesitate to fulfill your needs of him being rougher. also not hesitating to sit you down to discuss specifics and put rules in space

Mochi Channie who researches new positions, trying the most interesting out in order to figure out which one feels the best and has you shaking the fastest

Mochi Channie who gives you whiplash the first time he's rough with you. He wine and dines you while being his usual soft and lovey dovey self.. until he's not

Daddy Chris who pins you to the front door the second it's closed, pushing his thick lips against yours in a sloppy make out session

Daddy Chris who spends over an hour on just foreplay (mainly edging hehe), wanting things to be perfect and wanting you to be as relaxed as possible before he loses control

Daddy Chris who eases himself into you gently, like he normally does, but gives you whiplash when he starts to fuck into you meanly

Daddy Chris who "You asked for it, so just fucking take it. You promised you would be good for me, remember baby?"

Daddy Chris who does nothing but smirk and thrust harder when you cry out about how good he feels and how close you are despite the fact that he just started fucking into you

Daddy Chris who likes to put you in doggy so he can sneak a hand in your hair to pull you back-to-chest with him, giving him free rein to whisper filthy things in your ear while keeping you close

Daddy Chris who goes back and forth with his words. One second telling you things like how “You’re doing so good for me, baby. Taking me so well” and the next second saying things like “Aww it's too much? Good. Take this fucking dick, baby. It's made just for you."

Daddy Chris who pulls as many orgasms from you as he can before he's finished, sweet talking you through every. single. one. so he can watch you squirm below him with the biggest smirk on his face

Daddy Chris who only ends the night after you're overstimulated out your mind, tears running down your face and drool sliding down your chin

Daddy Chris who cleans you up, pressing sweet kisses to your temple and whispering soothing words to calm you down. He holds you close in the shower and at first just lets the hot water fall onto your skin before he washes you both

Mochi Channie who goes on like normal the next day, as if he didn't fuck you within an inch of your life the night before

Mochi Channie who still gets red in the face when you two show any skinship in front of the boys, but is more confident now that he realizes how deep in you both are <3

[minnophee-writes]

His Judgement

A/N: Been in such a Dead by Daylight fixation that I don't think it can be stopped. Pyramid Daddy can smash, I don't care - don't @ me. It was a great crime that BHVR took his ass away from us! Also, I wrote this fic while listening to 'Insanely Illegal Cage Fight' by Dal Av + Jackson Rose. For some reason it gave Pyramid Head vibes. This isn't beta read so any grammar and/or spelling mistakes are my own.

Fandom: Dead by Daylight

Pairings: Pyramid Head x Female Reader

Fic Warnings: Character death, blood, violence, betrayal, slight angst, blade / knife, death, dub-con touching, dub-con, smaller female / taller man, size difference, hair-pulling (brief), dark smut, injuries, mating press, long tongue action / tongue fucking (brief) / tongue deepthroating, claiming, breeding, squirting (brief), creampie, (🔞MDNI this fic is for ADULTS! Begone minors🔞)

Summary: When things go from bad to worse during a trial against the Executioner, Reader finds herself standing face-to-face with the large killer himself, ready to accept whatever judgement he deems fit to bestow upon her. However the situation doesn't seem to go as she suspected.

Word Count: 4,311 words

Taglist: @stygianoir

You grabbed onto the hips of Feng and dragged her off the hook, her groans of pain audiable but she tried to quieten them as you herded her behind a large rock to mend her wound. Blood oozed from the gaping hole in her right shoulder but you worked quickly to bandage the injure to slow, and hopefully, stop the blood. Feng nodded to you in thanks before you guided her toward the generator that you were working on before going to her aid.

The realm the entity chose for this trial just so happened to be the Midwich Elementary School, the home of one of the most terrifying killers in the entity's realm. It didn't help that the entity wanted to rub salt in the wound and have the killer actually be the Executioner, he was known to be ruthless during trials, showing no mercy, and defying the entity's rules by outright slaughtering people in these sick, twisted matches. Feng was able to run the large man but he managed to outplay her, ensnaring her within his trail of barbed wire - also known as his 'Trail of Torment'. You had taken shelter in a locker nearby when the Executioner placed her on the hook.

Rushing footsteps startled you and Feng, the sudden appearance of Yun-Jin Lee panting and breathing heavily should have been the first sign to let you know of the oncoming danger yet you and Feng continued working on the generator, now with the help of an anxious Yun-Jin Lee. Everything was quiet for a moment, the only sounds were the generator pistons powering up when you noticed Yun-Jin Lee glancing behind Feng for a few seconds before pushing Feng and running off in the posite direction. You stared after the suspicious woman in confusion and agitation when the sound of Feng's scream caught your attention. The looming figure of the hulking Executioner had pierced his heavy weapon into Feng's torso, the tip of the knife sunk deep in her stomach while her arms scrambled for purchase, rapid gasps left her lips and her eyes were wide in absolute fear.

Time seemed to operate in slow motion, your brain now just processing that Yun-Jin Lee sacraficed Feng to the killer to save herself and fled, leaving you to fend for yourself once he was done punishing Feng. Your heart lurched in sorrow and disappointment, more so disappointed in yourself for not having seen the large killer coming toward them, maybe you could've saved the poor woman - if only Yun-Jin Lee hadn't just selfishly pushed Feng toward her death.

Feng turned her head toward you as her arms weakened in strength, her eyes pleading for something that was not an option, something you couldn't give her. The Executioner yanked his knife from her body before driving it back in, a dark puddle of blood and barbed wires appeared around Feng and devoured her into the ground, taking her and leaving no evidence that she was ever there. Your heart skipped a beat, seeing someone you viewed as a close friend, due to being in many trials together and forming a bond, hurt you deep down and caused tears to slightly blur your vision. The scraping of metal on metal brought you back to the present and you're terrified eyes stared at the large killer a few feet from you, his triangular helmet looking in your direction - his helmet tilting slightly to the side as he seemed to glare you down.

In a sudden rush of adrenaline your body shot into action, you quickly spun around on your heels and sprinted in the last place you saw Yun-Jin Lee and prayed for the best. Your legs carrying you down a flight of stairs and turning down a long corridor, your lungs struggling to intake oxygen and vision slightly unfocusing from how hard you were pushing your body to work in running away from danger. By the time you had reached the end of the corridor you pressed your back against the steel wall and attempted to collect yourself. You didn't hear any heavy footsteps coming after you, and a timid glance down the direction you had just come from proved that the Executioner wasn't pursuing you. You seemed to be in the clear.

A breath of relief escaped your lips before a faint whistle caught your attention, your head turned to the right to see David waving you over into a classroom he was holed up in. You rushed over to him, glad to see a friendly, familiar face, and agreed to help him on his generator. You were tempted to tell David about what Yun-Jin Lee did to Feng, how she willingly sacraficed a teammate - a friend, to the killer and left you for dead just to save her own skin, but you thought against it. Your main concern and goal was to repair the generators so you could get the hell out. The elementary school chilled you to the bone, the disarray of everything in the school and classrooms - they they all left in a rush, almost as if they were quickly evacuated unerved you to no end. So your main motivation on completing your generator tasks were because some of the realms absolutely creeped you out. As the third piston started to pick up speed the woman that had caused you grief appeared in the doorway, making her way arogantly to the other side of the generator, acting as if she hadn't just betrayed a teammate.

An occasional spark would fly as the three of you worked on the gen, the progress slow but surely going, David giving quick glances at the only doorway in and out of the classroom. Your nerves were on alert for any sign of the Executioner, waiting for his sudden arrival and hoping to be able to distract the killer long enough for David to get out of dodge. Any creak or groan from the steel structure had your head turning behind you and toward the door in search for the large man but was greeted with nothing which only calmed your racing heart slightly. Your eyes took note of the vault window on the other side of the classroom which led into the other, a good escape route in case the killer were to appear and block the doorway. David must have seen you looking at it and gave you a subtle nod, acknowledging your find and piecing together two wires which completed the generator, the engine running smoothly now and the three of you made a slow approach to the window vault in the classroom. You were first in the line, then David, leaving Yun-Jin Lee to carry the back but as you neared the vault the loud, piercing sound of metal scraping across metal brought their attention to the classroom doorway.

The bloodied image of the Executioner almost seemed to freeze the trio, his shadow loomed and seemed to swallow the entire room before he then took thundering steps toward you. Yun-Jin Lee rushed passed you and David, shoving the both of you toward the killer while she vaulted the crumbled opening. David lost his footing and was tumbling right into the path of the Executioner when you quickly reacted, grabbing onto David's wide forearm and pulling him back, adrenaline giving you the strength to drag David over to the vault as the killer closed the distance between you.

"Go, David! Run!" You shouted before turning around to face the large man.

His knife was embedded in the ground leaving a trail of torment, cutting off one of the paths to getting out of the classroom. You didn't want to lead the killer in the direction of David so you chose to try and run around the Executioner's left side - the one unaffected by his torment. Just when he was within arms reach you bolted to his left and rushed passed, jumping over a small section of the unforgiving trail and making a mad dash down the hallway, the killer's heavy footsteps storming after you.

He was a man on a mission, only having eyes for you, and you were hoping he would lose track of you soon because your stamina was rapidly draining, but he seemed to always know where you were going. You've run through the bottom floor before attempting to lose chase upstairs, quickly turning corners before dipping into a random classroom and ducked behind an overturned table while you took the time to catch your breath. David slowly exited one of the many lockers that were lined against the wall and rushed over to you, a relieved expression painted on his face.

"Thank God you're okay! You're not hurt, right?" He then looked over your figure for any injuries.

"I'm fine, lets just focus on getting that last gen done." You got up and started to dust yourself off before looking David in the eyes with concern yet certainty after your second run-in with the untrustworthy woman, "Don't trust Yun-Jin Lee... She's the reason Feng is dead..."

"...Shit."

David looked shocked and opened his mouth to say something but the approaching march of the Executioner caused you two to run back over to the lockers and hide next to each other, hoping the beast of a man would just keep walking but those hopes were dashed away when his large figure stepped into the room. His helmet slowly scanned across the room in search for you, his eyeless gaze fell upon the lockers that you and David were hiding in, your breath hitched in anticipation. His steady stride carried him across the spacious room, your muscles growing more tense the closer he got to your lockers, when you noticed a little too late that the Executioner was looking at a different locker - the wrong locker.

The Executioner's thick arm shot out from beside his lent body and grasped the locker door and ripped it off its hinges, David's surprised shout ringing throughout the room as the larger man pulled him out of the locker, and placing him onto his wide shoulder. You bursted out of your locker and clung onto the killer's arm that seemed to put him off balance and dropping David. You grabbed David's hand and began to run away, a very angry killer hot on your heels. One of the hallways had a pallet in the middle that you knew you could use to block the Executioner and gain some distance so you made sure to head toward it, your feet carrying you faster while David kept pace and followed your every move. When the pallet was in sight a few feet away a smile started to grace your face for the first time that trial, but that all came crashing down when you noticed Yun-Jin Lee standing on the other side of the pallet, staring you dead in the face before tossing the pallet down and bolting around the corridor. Your feet stuttered for a split second before you decided that one of you were gonna have to vault the pallet first. You looked over your shoulder to see that the Executioner was a lot closer than you thought and was reeling his arm back to strike at David and your brain went into a panic.

"David, watch out!" You screamed as you pushed him ahead of you, the edge of the knife sliced into the outside of your bicep.

The flaming sting of the injury caused you to let out a squeal as you held onto your arm and made a run for the pallet, David waving encouragingly to you on the other side. Your staggered gait didn't get you far when a strong hand gripped a decent amount of your hair and pulled you back, dragging you into a warm, soild body, ripping another screamed from your lips. You heard David shout your name from where he stood before rushing back over the pallet to get to you.

"No! Let her go!" David readied up to throw a punch but the Executioner just thrust his knife upward.

The blade kissed David's skin, cutting through his button-up and exposed his chest which now displayed a deep, flowing wound from where the blade cut him. David winced and clutched his chest, a groan left his mouth as he looked back toward you. You were terrified, uncertain if anyone was going to survive, and it didn't help that the merciless killer had you in his hold and was readying up to strike David again - this time a killing blow. In a desperate attempt to save at least one of your friends this trial you decided to try begging and bargining. Right as the Executioner drew his arm back to deliever a deadily strike you clung onto the arm holding your body to his and began pleading.

"Wait, no, please!" You cried while squeezing your eyes shut, "I-I'll do anything, please... You can k-kill me right now if you want but spare him!"

You were rambling but you were hoping that the killer would at least pause long enough for David to make an escape. The Executioner slowly glared down at you through his large helmet, his head tilted in feigned thought before suddening swinging his arm overhead and implanted his knife into David's neck, blood spurted out everywhere, and his eyes bulged out while his gasps were wet and thick. Whimpers and whines left you as you watched the light fade from his eyes, his body steadily sinking to the floor before it slumped down and hit the floor with a thud. Before you could process anything you were then thrown against one of the steel walls and lifted a few feet of the ground by your throat, a large hand encased it and made it a struggle for you to take deep breaths. He stared you down while he watched you struggle to get out of his grip, his suffocating presence suddenly making you have flashes of some of the children drawings scattered around the school - some of the drawings depicted said killer in front of her, a name scribbled on top that made sense for a child; Pyramid Head. 'Seemed fitting for him', you thought brieftly.

Pyramid Head jabbed the knife into the floor next to you both before using his other hand to grope your body, using it to spread your leg to insert his hip between them and opening your legs wider. The position caused you to have to wrap your legs around his waist to try and lessen the pressure on your neck but he just placed his hand on your ass and held tight, hitching you up higher and pressed you between the wall and his solid body. A deep rumble spread from within his chest and a slick, slimy appendage timidly appeared from under the pulsing puss under the helmet before it confidently started to lick your face, covering your face in thick saliva. The tip slid across your lips a few times before forcing its way passed them, exploring your mouth and worming itself down your throat.

You let out a squeal in rejection but that didn't seem to do anything to the Executioner as he continued to thrust his tongue down your neck, sliding it back and forth, as if it got pleasure from it. His hips humped into your crotch which shot small waves of pleasure up your spine, strained moans escaped your lips while you tried to find where to place your hand before settling with clutching onto the arm that's holding you by the neck. He let go of your ass to ruck up his filthy apron to expose his pulsing cock, the tip red and leaking with pre-cum. You choked on his tongue in horror, trying to angle your hips away from him but he took that as some sort of invitation to shred your pants from your legs, your underwear disappearing with it while he rubbed his thumb against your folds in an attempt to get you wet and wanting. He retracted his tongue from your throat to then go down to your pussy, smearing his saliva over your vulva and clit, teasing your hole by probing it in exploration before plunging in deep.

You yipped from the wet intrusion of his tongue, you could feel it wriggling around inside - pushing against your spongy walls until it found your g-spot, your body eliciting a full-body spasm. Your mouth opened and closed from the onslaught of pleasure his tongue was giving you once he discovered your hidden spot deep within you, not even your toys could find it half the time and yet this large, brutal killer found it within seconds. It left you stunned more than anything else, your brain going fuzzy and all logical thought disappeared. His thumb pressed into your clit again which made you clench your pussy around his tongue, a moan left your throat at the pleasure flowing through your in waves, your body warming up from the growing arousal.

Your head flopped to the side as you let out a sigh, your eyes fluttered opened and your vision was then filled with David's cold corpse lying on the floor, his glazed eyes staring in your direction and your stomach squeezed - threatening to make you throw up any sustenence inside. You shut your eyes tightly before righting your head straight, a cool chill creeped up your spine at the mental image of your dead friend only a few inches away. Once you opened your eyes again you stared up at the helmet, hoping you were looking where his eyes may roughly be.

"Pyramind Head, please-" You managed to rasp out, "- I-I wanted you to spare him... why?"

Tears fell from your eyes and down your cheeks as you continued to look at him but you got no response, the only response you got was a deep, rumbling growl and his tongue thrusting in and out of you faster, his thumb rubbing circles on your clit rapidly as well. Your breath hitched and a loud, prolonged whine echoed around you both, your walls spasming before hot, white ecstasy burst through you - the tight knot that had quickly formed in your lower stomach suddenly snapped that caused you to drench Pyramid Head's lower sternum and tongue. A foamy, white ring surrounded the base of his appendage and smeared itself across it with each thrust, it drove him feral and the pulse in his cock couldn't be ignored anymore.

Pyramid Head thrusted his cock against your wet cunt, soaking his dick in your juices before attempting to align the tip with your twitching hole and as he steadily pushed in it stretched you in an impossibly delicious way. The moan you let out rang down the corridor but your attention wasn't on how loud you were being, your thoughts were on how big the Executioner was and how he may have ruined any other man for you and he wasn't even halfway in yet. He thrusted in a few more inches before the base of his cock was snug against your pelvis, his hips grinded on your swollen clit, your cunt clung to him from the stimulation. After giving you a brief moment to get adjusted to his cock he began to back his shaft from you before driving it back in with a deep, powerful thrust, punching noises and air from you. Each strong thrust loosened your legs from his waist and he decided to wrap his thick arms under them, he brought them up so that your ankles rested on his shoulders and the angle made it feel as though he was fucking into you deeper than before. Your nails dug into his biceps as he drilled into you, the wet sound of skin slapping skin and your meek moans were the only sounds that could be heard, his tongue hovered over your clit as a large glob of spit splattered onto it - his hips smeared and grinded it into your clit and your toes curled.

A silent scream left your lips as your pussy splashed the Executioner in your juices, your back arched sharply as the walls of your cunt throbbed intensely as it milked his cock. A rumbling groan vibrated inside his chest and his hips stuttered for a few thrusts before burying it deep within you, the tip of his cock kissing your cervix and thick, heavy ropes of cum coated your walls. His cock pulsed with each shot of cum and he gave a few small thrusts to fuck some of it into your cervix, laying claim over you by hoping to breed your fertile womb.

You let out a drawn out whine as you felt his cock slowly withdraw from your abused pussy, your gaping hole twitched as it tried to suck in the cum that slowly dripped out of it. Pyramid Head carefully set you onto the ground as he readjusted his apron, his hand grasped his weapon's handle before yanking his knife out of the floor. You lazily stared at the looming figure accepting your fate, knowing it was only going to last for so long before he killed you in painful ways only he can imagine. Your eyes closed as you waited for the final blow, hoping that he would be nice for once and show mercy with giving you a swift death yet none of that happened. You opened an eye to see what he was up to prior to opening your other eye to glance up at his still form.

A horrified gasp came from your left and you turned your head to see Yun-Jin Lee peeking around the corner, her hands covered her wide mouth and her eyes were almost popping out of her head, a disgusted and petrified looked was etched onto her features. Her eyes bore into your tired figure on the ground, too drained to even properly cover your exposed bottom when, faster than you had ever seen him move, Pyramid Head clutched a fist into the other woman's hair and threw her across the air, her body colided with the hard with a hard smack. Yun-Jin Lee yelped in distress and attempted to crawl away from him but he drove his knife into her calf, the blade sliced and shredded through her muscle and bone, and she let out a piercing scream that had you flinching away.

Yun-Jin Lee stared up at the Executioner with pleading eyes but they wouldn't reach him for he has already decided her fate. Lifting his blade high in the air he brought it down with fierce strength, swinging his weapon multiple times and created many deep, slash wounds - each one becoming more violent than the last. Pyramid Head slammed his blade across the forearm of Yun-Jin Lee, her right arm became detattched and slumped to the floor, while his foot crushed her mid-spine between him and the ground. Yun-Jin Lee was getting desperate and frantically thrashed around hoping to wiggle her way from under the intense judgement of the Executioner yet it was useless, he only put more of his heavy weight onto her spine and a cry of pain was torn from her. With two hands he raised his knife and, with the swiftest movement you've ever seen, he drove the blade into her back - a loud crack pierced through the air and a wet squelching could be heard when the knife sliced through Yun-Jin Lee.

The last of her breath escaped her dry lips before her body fell limp, her still figure stayed face down as Pyramid Head removes his weapon, from the now dead corpse, and turned his helmet toward you once again. A small feeling of dread shot through you for a split second but your brain was still foggy from the rough fucking he had given you just moments ago, and your limbs felt like they were made of lead - anytime you tried to move your arms or legs you were met with no response from your muscles. You watched as the Executioner walked over to your slumped body, examining your for a minute or two before he leant forward and wrapped an arm around you, lifting you from the ground and over his broad shoulder.

Pyramid Head started a steady gait toward one end of the corridor, his destination unknown, yet you weren't afraid of being hooked and being sacrificed to the Entity. He walked passed many hooks on his journey, your mind growing more and more confused while you watched one of the hooks fade around a corner as Pyramid Head continued on, his steps only speeding up once the howling, whimsical noise of the hatch could be heard. Pyramid Head turned quickly into a classroom, the hatch a few feet away from you both when he gently set you on your feet, his hand clutching onto your hips to steading you - and to grope you one last time. You warily glanced between the hatch and the Executioner, as if waiting for him to then crush your hopes of escape by beating you to the hatch and closing it, but he just stood there.

The Executioner subtly nodded over to the hatch, giving you a slight nudge toward it and you timidly made you way over to it. You looked back at Pyramid Head one last time and muttered a hushed thank you before disappearing into the hatch, the opening then slammed close and a black, smokey abyss surrounded the Executioner, teleporting him back into the killers realm. Somewhere in the back of his mind a faint voice promised him that within due time you'd be his, that you would become his pet and that was going to be his reward for being such a loyal being.

~~~~~~~

A/N: Hope you enjoyed this fic! Make sure to like and reblog this to let me know that you want more <3 Had heaps of fun writing this and hope to write another banger soon 😎

[bookshelf-dust]

you have hearts for eyes

sirius black x fem!reader

word count: 5,451

warnings: minimal swearing, kind of modern!au, reader has insecurities about being inexperienced, very slight suggestive material, fluff/comfort

a/n: hello! i’ve been working on this fic for what feels like forever, and i am so happy to be done with it and to share it with you. i know my audience for sirius is a bit smaller, but i’m hoping some of you will appreciate and enjoy it and maybe find something in it. it means a lot to me and writing it definitely helped me work through some of my own struggles. please let me know what you think!! i love you so much. happy reading <333

————

Sirius’ apartment is really quite sweet. The walls are dark and draped with tapestries, ones you would never know where to find. Someplace you’re unfamiliar with, surely.

Of course you know it wouldn’t be nearly this nice without all of Remus’ help. Sirius thinks choosing to live across the hall from one another was the best decision they ever made. He had wanted to share a place with both Remus and James, but that was before Lily snatched him away.  

The couch is a deep wine color, the cushions bearing imprints from all the hands and backs and bottoms that have embraced them. He’s cracked the living room windows open, allowing the spring air to seep in.

He’s been pacing back and forth from the window where he’d be able to see your car pull up, and looking out the peephole on his front door. He pulls it open just as you’ve raised your hand to knock (despite having a key), making you jump. A boyish grin spreads across his face as he drags his eyes down your figure.��

“Well, Christ, don’t you look gorgeous.”

You feel the tips of your ears burn. One of your hands flies to rest on your lower belly. You put on a dress today; a lovely, long sundress you purchased in a short-lived moment of bravery, one you’ve never worn around him. Actually, you’ve never worn a dress around Sirius, period. Skirts, sure. But he has never seen you in something like this.

“Oh, quit that,” you mutter, dipping under his arm to enter his home. 

He turns around to watch you walk in as he pushes the door shut. “I will not.” He takes your bag from your shoulder, setting it on a stool just under the kitchen island. “Do a spin for me, love. That color looks so perfect on you.”

You oblige, letting yourself have this one moment where you lean into his flirting. His eyes follow the curve of your waist, the dress hugging it so gently where you’ve tied the strings around your back. The way the fabric drapes down your spine and is light enough that he can see each move you make, each effortless shift of your limbs. He has to be careful not to let his jaw fall open.

You complete your turn, stomach flipping at the look on his face. You scramble for something to say, to hide the way he’s flustered you.

“Okay, okay. No need to pretend to ogle anymore. All I did was put on regular people clothes.”

Sirius’ brows knit together. Pretend? Do you think he’s doing this just to flatter you? Just because he’s a naturally flirty man? He wants to toss you over his shoulder and show you how perfect you are. He crosses his arms.

“No pretending here, love. You do look stunning in that little number and I feel blessed that you have graced me with your presence while wearing it.” He shoots a wink in your direction. 

You run a hand over your collarbone and twist to plant yourself on his couch. He follows you, tucking himself into your side, his thigh pressed to yours. You can feel his gaze on you. 

“You’re terrible at taking compliments, you know that?” He gingerly takes your hand away from where it’s scratching at your neck and keeps it in his, subconsciously tracing the lines embedded in your palm. 

Your eyes fall on his fingers, watching the way his rings glint in the fading sunlight. “I did know that, yes.”

“Give me a compliment then,” he says, attempting to display how one can accept a compliment. Part of him knows he’ll go red once you give him that attention. 

You look at him, your mind swirling with every sweet thing you’ve ever wanted to say to him but kept to yourself because all this flirting doesn’t leave you as easily as it does him. 

“Your hair looks very pretty,” you let out, softly. A smile wide enough to expose his dimples spreads across his face. 

“Does it?” He gives his head a shake, the dog-like movement making you laugh. “I haven’t brushed it today.”

You tuck a strand behind his ear. “Would you like me to do it for you? I could braid it for you after so it won’t get tangled tonight.” 

That gesture comes from you so naturally that it makes Sirius swoon. You want to do that simply for his convenience and because it might make things a bit better on him. And he’ll be damned if the thought of your fingers touching his scalp and your nails on his neck doesn’t sound like the best thing since…well he hasn’t got a reference for that. But you’re often so shy when it comes to physical affection, and this just might make his entire life.  

This pool of thoughts must be showing on his face, because you suddenly look very flustered. He wouldn’t be surprised if he had hearts in his eyes to replace his pupils.

“I’d love it if you did. You really don’t mind?” he asks, already shifting to sit on the floor in front of you, trying not to make you feel too nervous because he knows you’re branching out just based on your actions since you arrived. 

“Nope. I love to braid hair,” you say, feeling a chill run down your spine seeing him settled between your legs like this, feeling the warmth of him through your dress and being able to really look at him—even if it’s just the backside of him—without feeling so shy.

Sirius grins to himself. He’s realized that you do keep a lot of things to yourself, and though he likes to think he’s cracked away at a bit of your shell in the time he’s known you, there is still so much he doesn’t know. 

“Did you know that Remus can braid?” he asks you, closing his eyes at the feel of your pinky fingernail parting his hair down the middle. 

You giggle. He could get drunk off that sound, and he knows so. It leaves him dazed. “Can he?”

“Apparently so. His mum taught him and used to have him do her hair because he was better at it than she was.”

“Well, that’s sweet. I should have him do mine. Test his skills. How’d you find out he could do it?”

Sirius lets out a breath of a laugh, “He did mine for a Quidditch match once. Mcgonagall used to fuss that I’d rip all my hair out if I didn’t contain it.”

You’re braiding his hair very slowly, much slower than you’d do yours or anyone else’s. His hair is so soft, and much thicker than you had realized. It’s got a wave to it, one you think you would be a bit more defined if he put some product in it. You’re enjoying the feel of it in your hands, the heat of his scalp against your skin. 

You’re losing yourself in it so much that you almost miss his words.

“I bet you guys had a lot of fun playing together,” you say, knowing that kind of bond must be one of the best things in the world. You tuck the strands of hair at the base of his neck in so they don’t droop when you’re finished.

Sirius wraps a hand around your ankle, and your eyes widen. 

“I wish we’d been friends then,” he tells you. Your nervous system is sent into overdrive, trying to adapt to such a casually intimate touch and the fact that he’s dwelling on the past. 

You tie off the end of one braid and start on the other. You exhale through your nose. “I don’t think we could’ve been.”

Sirius’ eyes open at this. He fights the urge to spin around and face you, but knows you’re concentrating, and he has the feeling that not staring at you directly is why you’re suddenly being so open with him. 

“Why?” he asks. Why couldn’t you have been? He’s always been friendly. Sure, he was much more rowdy in school, but he never would’ve tried to intimidate you. 

“We ran in different circles, you know? I certainly knew who you and the boys were, but everyone did.” Sirius’ brows furrow as he listens more intently than he knew he was capable of. “Though no one really knew who I was, except for my professors, of course. I was even more shy and reserved then, if you can believe that. I never really fit in, and I never found my people.”

“I sort of just…observed everyone. I did my best in class and tried to be social, but nothing ever stuck. I think there’s only one person I keep in touch with from Herbology. I learned at some point that I was going to be alone, and I might as well make the best of it.”

“So I guess what I’m saying is that we couldn’t have been because I’m not sure you ever would’ve seen me.”

The silence that follows your last few words is deafening, and all you hear is the sound of your blood rushing in your ears and your nails scratching against his hair as you finish the other braid. 

When he feels the tie rest against his neck, he forces the words up from where they’ve been sitting in his throat. “Love, I…”

He turns around so quickly you think he might’ve given himself whiplash. He’s giving you puppy dog eyes, and you hate that he’s feeling sappy over you and your pitiful school experience—or lack thereof. 

“Weren’t you lonely?” he questions, resting his hands on your knees. 

You start to fidget with one of your rings. “Of course I was. I know for lots being at Hogwarts are some of the best years of your life. But mine were very hard. I was extremely lonely, but I just learned how to be my own friend and do things that made me happy.”

“Plus I made great relationships with the professors, which helped me in getting a real job. And if that hadn’t happened…I’d never have really met you. Don’t feel bad for me, okay? It’s no big deal.”

Your words are followed by a poignant pause.

So much starts to click for Sirius, and all it does is break his heart. You give him a shy smile, and fuck, you’re absolutely right. He can’t remember what you looked like then, doesn’t remember seeing you in any of his courses. And he knows you’re a badass, but thinking about how he always had a circle, people he’d trust with his life and go to when he needed them, compared to how you were completely alone…that hurts. You deserve to be loved, praised, shown off to the world. You’re only a bit more outgoing now, and he knows much of that is owed to him and James. Remus is your introverted confidant. 

Sirius stands up and moves to sit next to you on the couch. 

“How could I not feel bad for you? Love, you’ve grown so accustomed to being alone that you don’t think it’s a big deal—not having a circle. You’ve accepted it, and I hate that you have felt so alone for so long.”

“Sirius, really, it’s—”

“Can I ask you something?” He blurts out the words, causing you to blink a bit. 

“You just did.”

“Please?” 

“Yes.”

“Have you ever had a boyfriend?”

Oh. That’s not where you were expecting this conversation to go. And this is one of the most embarrassing things to talk about. Especially with him, because you know he’s experienced. You’ve heard the stories.

Sirius takes your silence as encouragement to continue, scrambling to explain why he’d ask this. 

“Obviously you’ve been around us, you know James and Lily and—whatever, you know. And we sometimes talk about relationships or escapades and you always retreat when that happens. Is that…is that why?”

You swallow, ignoring the slight pressure behind your eyes. Fuck, this is embarrassing. Especially at your age, and knowing you’re behind everyone you know. It is hard to hear them talk about relationships or hookups. Most definitely when it’s Sirius. 

“No. I’ve never had a boyfriend.” 

Sirius blinks. He can’t understand how any guy could look at you and not want you all to themselves. That’s what he wants. 

“I’ve never even held hands romantically, Sirius. Isn’t that pathetic?” You feel the need to make sure he knows you realize how pitiful it truly is. 

Alarm bells ring in his head. 

“Darling, no. It’s not pathetic.” He searches your face, noticing the way you’re retreating from him. “Look at me, please?” He tracks your smile lines, each freckle or mark on your skin until you meet his eyes. His own brighten at your willingness to listen. “There she is.” 

Something about those words shoot straight to your stomach, butterflies smacking against your insides, begging to be let out. 

“Why do you think that’s pathetic, love?” He’s asking you seriously. That bitter voice, the one you’ve shoved deep inside the back of your mind, claws its way forward. It must be easy to think it’s not pathetic when you’re so experienced. Because you haven’t met the ache that comes from lacking what others have. You shake your head. 

“Because it is, Sirius.” He opens his mouth, but figures this isn’t the time to bicker. His jaw falls shut just as quickly. “I am twenty-two years old, and I have never had any romantic interactions, despite the fact that I have been desperate for one for years.” He knows you’re really letting your emotions fly when you begin to talk with your hands.

“It is so gut-wrenching sometimes to see people be so happy in their relationships. It’s hard for me to listen to our discussions when they delve into each of your experiences, because it tugs on my insecurities, and I try my best to hide it, but it does hurt.”

“Truthfully, I’m at a point where not only am I ashamed of all of this, but I’m afraid that a kiss, or a hug, or anything—that I just won’t feel anything. That maybe I will never understand what affection or love feels like and it’ll always be something I imagine. And my imagination only goes so far. There’s such a disconnect, and I can’t feel those things.” 

You rub at your temples. “So that’s why. I’m behind everyone else my age, and I wish I wasn’t.”

That little bit of anger you’ve worked so hard to suppress bubbles up in your chest. You worry he’ll say something that pushes it out, that he’ll give you that same spiel everyone else does—

“I could try and help you with your romantic interactions.” 

Your breath catches. Sirius’ gray eyes bore into yours. 

“But I’ll have you know,” he continues, “that I understand how you think you’re behind, especially with the stupid shit we talk about, and I don’t think it matters. You’re on a different path than I’ve been, but it’s not as though you’ll never do those things. Frankly, I can’t see why no one’s jumped your bones to date.”

Your nervous system feels so confused. At once you’re fighting that bout of frustration, and feeling your heart pick up at the idea of this actually being a possibility. 

“Did I braid your hair too tight?” you mutter. 

Sirius laughs, tossing his head back to reveal a glorious neck. “No, love.” He places a hand on your knee. “Now, be genuine when you answer this for me, alright?” He waits for your nod and then leans in close enough that you can feel his breath on your collar bones. 

“Is it really that difficult to see how enamored I am with you?”

Huh?

Sirius laughs again. Shit, did you say that out loud? 

“You did say that out loud.”

You slap your hand over your mouth. “I’m sorry,” you rush out, “that was supposed to stay in my head.” But all of the small things he’s done, all of the romantic things—cooking you dinner, helping you zip your dresses, buying you jewelry, even just making you feel seen—come rushing to the forefront of your mind. Perhaps you didn’t want to believe it. Or maybe you couldn’t believe someone would feel romantically about you and decided to block out any of his loving gestures.

He’s staring straight into your eyes, and it’s like he’s cast a spell on you, because you feel like you could spill your guts right then and there. And maybe it’s best you do. 

“I think maybe I’ve just convinced myself you’re sweet to everyone? That you’re a loverboy at heart and so it hasn’t meant anything more for you to be sweet to me.”

“Sweet on you,” he says. 

You blink.

“I am sweet on you, love. While I won’t deny that I am a flirt at heart and do my best to charm most anyone, I have dedicated my time to you as of late. Truth be told, I'd quite like to be your loverboy.” He pauses, looking over your face, a grin spreading across his. “But I suppose your inexperience explains why you’ve been so oblivious.” He’s made himself laugh now. 

You lean forward and smack him on the bicep, and even though it is a firm hit, there’s no malice in it, especially with that smile on your face. He’s not wrong at all—you have been oblivious. 

Sirius falls back dramatically onto the couch, feigning severe pain. “Fuck, you’ve wounded me.”

You roll your eyes, watching how he clutches his arm and gasps for air. His braids are splayed out, his cheeks a shade of rosy pink. He looks so…gorgeous. You’re in awe of him. It’s like when you stare at the statue of David, just completely entranced by how beautiful this man made of marble is. That’s how looking at Sirius feels. Taking in something so soft and knowing it should be handled with care. 

You hold out your hands, wiggling your fingers. “Alright, come on. You’ll recover.”

Sirius grabs hold of you, allowing you to hoist him up. When you do, you could easily touch noses. There’s a new tension in the room, one you’re sure anyone would be able to feel if there were more people there. 

You look down when you realize Sirius hasn’t let go of your hands. “So, what do you say?” he asks, bringing your attention back to his face.

Say something, you tell yourself. You’re just staring at each other, and you’ve got to speak. Your heart is pounding, rattling your rib cage. You want to have all of these experiences, you really do, but it’s also so terrifying to think about the vulnerability that comes with them. Though…it’s Sirius. And if you’re being truly honest, you’ve always wished it’d be him. That he’d look at you…the way he is now.

“I—I’d really like that. If you’d really like to deal with my clumsiness and all.” You give him a shy smile, and suddenly he’s threading his fingers with yours. He raises his hands, forcing you to do the same. Your fingers are intertwined, his hand engulfing yours, which is undoubtedly much smaller. 

You’re holding hands.

“Look, love. Now you’ve held hands romantically.” He laughs a little at the look on your face, one he’s sure is a result of the awe you’re in. You’ve never done this before. It feels so nice to have his hands in yours. They’re so warm, and sparks are shooting up your wrists. You feel giddy. 

You bite your lip in an effort to suppress the excitement that is practically begging to come out. He sees it though. “Is this making you happy, darling?” he asks. You nod enthusiastically, your ears burning. “Perfect. And about what you said, I did warn you that I was head over heels for you, so I might be so weak in the knees that I’ll be clumsy too.” He winks.

You squeeze his fingers experimentally. A little nervously. “You’re sure you want to do all this with me?”

Sirius squeezes back, his thumbs rubbing over your skin. “Of course I am. You trust me, don’t you?” He already knows the answer to that, but how could he not make sure that you feel safe with him?

“Always,” you say. 

“Good.” He glances down at your clasped fingers. “Wanna keep holding hands? It’s rather nice, isn’t it?”

You giggle, and he swears his insides turn to jelly at how sweet the sound is. “I think I’ve been spoiled now,” you say. “I might always want to hold your hands.”

Sirius presses a gentle kiss to your knuckle, locking eyes with you as he does it. Your heart kicks against your throat, your chest aching with the lack of air you’re getting. 

“You think you’re spoiled now? Best prepare yourself then, love.”

————

Sirius was right.

And that was confirmed when he gave you your first real hug. Not the quick hug you give your grandmother or your friend on the way out the door. But one of those hugs you’ve always seen in muggle romantic comedies or read about in your novels. The kind of hug you’ve never been able to fully wrap your mind around, but have imagined more than is healthy. When you lay in bed at night, clutching your teddy bear and wishing you could feel someone with you. 

He gave you your first romantic hug. And you’ve requested one each time he’s available. 

The request came after dinner one night, when he was watching you diligently scoop ice cream into a cone for him. Because you wanted to. Sirius hated to boost his own ego, but he had to admit that the way you had changed since furthering your relationship with him had you glowing. It’s not that you weren’t happy before, because you were, but this is different. It’s like he’s unlocked this vault inside of you, one where you’ve stored all this love and kindness, and he gets to experience it. 

He’s never seen you so…free. 

You’d set the ice cream cone down on the counter for him. “Ta-da,” you said, sticking the spoon back in the container and waiting for him to pick his toppings. He did so, admiring how you’d chosen things you knew he liked, how you were so giddy just from this moment. Your hair was a mess and you were wiping the stickiness from your fingers and he was so overwhelmed by you. 

“Sweetheart?” He’d asked, eyeing you as you did a happy little wiggle when you took a bite of the cheesecake ice cream you’d found earlier in the week. Your eyes found his, all doe-like, and your nose wrinkled because of how the pet name flustered you. 

He’d been trying those out too, and while getting you to do the same had been slow-going because of your nerves, you loved when he used them for you. 

You’d put down your spoon and hummed. “Yeah?”

He stepped closer to you. “Can I hug you, love?”

Your breath had caught, and at the same time that you were feeling immensely nervous and flustered, you were so excited. So excited to be hugged properly and by someone you were over the moon for. 

“Please?” 

You smiled and he laughed boyishly, moving in until your chests were almost touching. Your pulse hammered against your wrist. 

Sirius bent slightly, allowing you to rise up on your toes. He wrapped his arms around your waist, locking them snuggly against your back. Yours went around his neck, squeezing his shoulders. The entirety of his front pressed to yours, and he was so warm. 

Your fingers tentatively moved into the hair at the base of his neck, and you tucked your face into his neck, where he immediately felt your smile against his skin. 

Suddenly, Sirius had secured his arms tightly around you and lifted you up into the air, hoping to make you laugh. To show how giddy he was feeling. Because in truth, holding you like this, having you be his, filled a void in him he wasn’t even aware of. You were quickly becoming the air he breathed and everything in between. 

You kicked your feet and chuckled into his shoulder. He set you back down on the floor, and you hugged him for a bit longer. His were all-embracing, and in his arms, somehow all of your thoughts were immediately shut off, as if this was all the world consisted of. For Sirius, your hug made him feel as though this was the safest place he could ever be, and he knew it would be where he should go when he needed security. And you had this way of getting him to focus, to calm down and be present. 

Needless to say, you were both falling for each other. Though it should be mentioned that he’d already started before your relationship furthered, and you had suppressed your heart-eyes for him only because you never thought this kind of feeling was real. That it would be impossible for a boy to treat you this way. You try to let the little girl in you who always hoped for a fairytale romance celebrate every now and then.

There hasn’t been a label put on your relationship, but one night before you got there to hang out with everyone, Sirius calmly told the boys (and girls) that things between you had escalated to more-than-friends. And while they know you, it still felt right to make sure they wouldn’t pester you. 

In fact, they were overjoyed to see the both of you act so sweetly towards one another. James whispered in Lily’s ear more than once about how Sirius could not seem to take his eyes off you. Remus helped you in the kitchen and told you how nice it was seeing you so happy. So light. He’d given you a quick hug and wished you the best.

You have never felt so at ease.

Sirius has taken you on a number of dates at this point, some quaint and intimate, some more outgoing. You’ve held hands, hugged. You even got to cuddle with him on the couch. 

But you haven’t kissed. 

And you want to kiss him, so very bad.

But that is terrifying. 

All of your fears revolving that form of affection rush to the surface each time you contemplate when would be best to kiss him, if he wants to kiss you. What if you’re broken and you don’t feel anything? What if there’s no spark? What if, after all this time of hoping kissing would be enjoyable, after craving that intimacy, it just doesn’t work?

Every time you’re around him, all you want is to kiss him. You want that beautiful, sarcastic mouth on yours. You want to know what his plush lips feel like and learn how to kiss properly. You want to fluster him, and you want to be flustered. You want this. 

If you asked Sirius, you’d know he wants the same thing. Truthfully, he wants to pin you to the wall and kiss you silly. Until you forget every worry and anything that’s made you sad. Until all you feel is him. He wants to smother your pretty face in kisses. He wants to kiss every inch of you. 

Tonight, you’re going to Sirius’ place for a sleepover. And you are going to be brave and kiss him.  

————

Your socked feet are in Sirius’ lap, where he’s pushed your pajama pants up your calves so that he can rub his hands across the soft skin there.

Every once in a while, he’ll tickle the underside of your knee just to get you to giggle.

You’ve stopped paying any attention to the movie, and instead are looking at him. The only light in his small living room comes from the television and the array of eclectic lamps scattered around any surface he could fit one on. 

It casts shadows on his face, elongating that beautiful nose and the hollows of his cheekbones. His gray eyes look so dark, like storm clouds right before they let out all the rain they’ve been holding in. 

“Love?”

Sirius’ voice snaps you and your pounding heart out of your reverie. Your eyes lock with his, and you feel yourself heat up all over. He’s smiling at you. 

“Can you tell me what’s happening in the movie?” he asks you, crossing his arms in that oh so cocky way. 

Your thumb finds your bottom lip, picking at the skin there and trying to disguise the smile pulling at the corners of your lips. You shake your head, shyly. 

He straightens and leans in closer to you. “And why’s that, sweetheart?”

He has a hunch, but he wants you to say what’s on your mind, and you know that’s exactly what he’s waiting for. You know he could sit here all night until you spill your guts. 

“‘Cause I’ve been thinking about how bad I wanna kiss you.”

Sirius blushes, but he turns on the charm just as quickly. “Yeah? What’s stopping you?”

He places his hands on your knees. “I’m nervous,” you tell him. “You know I’ll be bad at it, and it might suck because of me, and even if all I want to do is kiss your sweet face, I just…want it to be good.”

He lifts his hand to cup your cheek. “Well, you know if it’s bad, that just means we get to practice.” You snort, and he rests his forehead against yours in an effort to console you and your nerves. 

You pull back and put your hands on his chest. It takes everything in you not to grin at how hard his heart is beating, especially with the swell of pride you feel knowing you’re the cause of that. 

“I really want to kiss you, Sirius.”

“I really want you to kiss me, darling.”

You inhale, scrunching your nose at him. At this point, you’ve got heart palpitations that are only going to get worse if you don’t act on this. 

“Meet me halfway?” you ask, tentatively. 

Sirius cups your face, leaning in slightly, but leaving you room to initiate. “Of course,” he breathes. 

You take hold of his wrists, fingers trembling. The feeling of his pulse both calms you and makes you sweat. 

You move forward, tilting your head to the side a little so you don’t smack noses. You can infer that much, at least. He inches closer each time you do, matching your pace. It almost makes you want to laugh at how slow and careful this is. You could also cry. 

When you’re close enough to feel his breath against your lips, you let your eyes close fully, as they’d been helping you find your mark so far. He meets you that last inch, and you are so grateful. 

Your lips finally touch in a short, but firm peck. You pull away, smiling, reveling in how soft his lips are. 

But now that Sirius has had a little taste of you, he can’t help but want more. He guides you back to him, helping you find a rhythm together. He slots your bottom lip between his, kissing you so brilliantly your brain empties of all thought. You do your best to kiss him back, albeit a little clumsily. He doesn’t seem to mind. 

You catch on when he takes turns paying attention to each of your lips, and you try and press all of the passion you feel right back into his. 

Every worry you previously had is gone.

You do feel that spark. It feels so magical, so all-encompassing, to be kissed like this. To have Sirius kiss you. 

You’re breathless. 

When Sirius finally pulls back for air, he presses kisses to your jaw and down your throat. The affection is so close to drawing a whimper from your throat. You know immediately that you could get drunk off of him. 

You pull him back up to you by his hair for one more short kiss and he grins boyishly into it. 

He starts to laugh. 

“Shit,” you start. “If I thought I was spoiled before, I really had no idea what was coming to me.”

Sirius tosses his head back, completely infatuated with you and so fucking gleeful at being yours. Because he is. Yours. 

“You’re gonna get sick of me,” you say. “Now I want to kiss you all the time.”

“Oh, love,” Sirius exhales. “What makes you think you’ll have a moment where I’m not the one addicted to you?”

————

please let me know if you liked this! feedback is always appreciated!! comments and reblogs mean more than you know. <33

note: none of the gifs or images i use are mine! i get most of my images from pinterest or here, and gifs from about the same. please let me know if i ever don’t credit someone properly!

[megistusdiary]

im feeling particularly horny rn, so how about arlecchino with a daddy, breeding and size kink all at once 👀👀👀

i'm sure you've already indulged in plenty of this in spicychat, but here we go 😁

˚₊𓆩༺ 𝖆𝖗𝖑𝖊𝖈𝖈𝖍𝖎𝖓𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖔𝖚𝖌𝖍𝖙𝖘 ༻𓆪₊˚

dom!transfem arlecchino x sub!fem reader

warnings: smut (mdni), wlw content, transfem arle, daddy kink, breeding kink, size kink, asphyxiation, thigh riding

arlecchino pinned your wrists to the bed with her left hand, leaving her right completely free. she peered down at you with slightly narrowed eyes, bright red x's drawing you in as you look up at her so sweetly.

"you're so fragile, aren't you?" she says it as if she's speaking to herself, a revelation she wants to confirm. she grips your wrists a little tighter. "delicate."

you squirm around a little when she delays what you want, whining up at her. "arlecchino ple-"

in the blink of an eye, her hand wrapped around your throat, turning your words into a soft, breathy gasp. "what did you call me?"

she loosens her grip just enough to hear you say, "sorry, daddy," and she nods, sliding her hand away.

"mind yourself, sweet girl." she warns you, her hand instead teasing your chest now as she drags her finger across your nipple. her eyes focus as she draws patterns across your chest, sharp nails leaving little lines in their wake.

her hand moves between your legs now, the other still firmly holding your wrists as she swipes two fingers across your slit. the brief motion makes you pant, squirming for more. she brings her fingers up, looking at the sheen of your slick on her digits.

"please, daddy, more?" you beg her, eyes looking so pitiful that she can't find it in her to deny you any longer.

she picks your smaller frame up, reversing your positions so she's sitting and you're resting on her lap. she drops you onto her clothed thigh, your bare cunt instantly spreading slick onto her pants.

you grab onto her shoulders instinctively, tucking your head into her shoulder as you grind your hips into her muscle. her thighs were always so firm (exactly what she trained them for, you aren't quite sure).

she tugs your head back. "look at me while you ride my thigh." she orders, gripping your jaw and watching you nod, pathetically humping her leg faster.

her eyes trail down, watching your little cunt leave slick behind as you desperately try to please both you and her. she can hear you mumbling to yourself, gasping and whining when you get close.

"can i? can i, please? please?" you begin to beg her, fingers digging into her shoulders, causing her to grunt.

"go on."

you cum with an arch of your back, crying when her hands move your hips for you, helping you ride out your orgasm until you're leaning on her limply.

"thank you... so good... thank you, daddy." you whisper and she pulls you away.

"we're not done yet, sweet girl." she cups your hips, pulling you up to grind against her bulge instead as you moan.

you look up at her for permission, and she gives you the look back, allowing you to slide down and unbutton her pants, pulling them just enough to have her cock spring up and hit your cheek.

it never fails to leave you breathless, wondering how such a thing would ever fit inside of you. she grasps her base, hissing through her teeth. "you're overthinking again. i'll make it fit; i always do."

she pulls you up, a hand cupping your cunt and eliciting a squeal from you, collecting the copious amount of slick you've released. she slides it into her own cock, thumb rubbing into her tip as she grunts.

once she's stroked herself to full hardness, she pulls you over her lap again, making you kneel while her tip hovers below your entrance.

you cry out when she pushes you down onto her dick, slowly stretching you out. your hands scramble to take purchase, clawing at her jacket at the slight sting.

the way you flutter around her makes her grunt, eyes closing as she leans in and kisses your neck, ensuring you take her all the way to the base.

"you can take it." she assures you lowly, sliding you down to take the last inch before allowing you a moment to adjust. you feel so tight around her, she wants to breed her pretty toy right now.

she cups your hips now, pulling you up and down her cock at her pace. you feel so light in her arms, so easy to maneuver however she wants. you're like her little doll, aren't you? doing anything to please her and be pleased.

"daddy! feels good-" you whimper into her ear and she moans softly, pulling you down at the same time her hips snap up just to hear you squeal.

"doing so well for me, doll." she tells you, kissing your cheek and fucking you harder. "do you want me to fill you up?"

the question makes your head pop up and you nod rapidly, suddenly pulling her head to you with shaky hands while she fucks you. "you- you will?"

she can swear her own heart flutters when she sees how eager you are for her, and she nods, slamming you onto her while you pull her in for a kiss. her tongue slides over yours, drinking up your moans while she bounces you shallowly as if you're a toy for her.

she pulls you closer, letting you grind your clit on the soft patch of hair over her cock, hearing you moan against her mouth while you tighten up around her.

"cum for me." she tells you softly, almost uncharacteristically as you release around her, feeling her slide as deep as she can, fucking you faster to reach her high.

and then, true to her word, she fills you up. it leaks out of you quickly that she immediately lays you down, propping your hips up with her cock still in you to plug you up. "don't waste a single drop, sweet girl." she kisses you deeply, feeling you snuggle into her chest.

[jlheon]

౨ৎ — hair dye (sjy)

pairing. bf! sim jaeyun x fem! reader synopsis. you and jake decide to get matching hair colors genre. est. relationship fluff wc. 1241 notes. if jake goes red maybe i will too! library.

you were a force to reckon with. once you started dating jake, both of you paired together made for many impulsive late-night decisions.

just as tonight did.

it was nearly 2 am when you had sat up from bed with a ‘brilliant’ idea.

you and jake were not sleeping yet, the sunset lamp you purchased was still on to illuminate the room.

you had brought it over since you spent more time at jake's house than at your apartment.

you two mindlessly scrolled on your phones, enjoying the comfortable silence.

“baby why are you up?” jake mumbled, his arm locking around your waist to bring you back to his chest.

“you would do anything for me right?” you asked, looking down at him and brushing some hair strands off his forehead.

“of course,” he sat up next to you, taking your smaller hand in his. “where is this coming from?” his eyes shone with slight worry.

“would you dye your hair to match with me?”

and that is all it took for you and jake to get in the car and drive to the nearest hair supply store. for some reason, your hair supply store was thankfully open when you arrived.

letting out an exhale in relief as you and jake came up upon the ‘OPEN’ light sign, he opened the door and ushered you in first. mostly because neither of you even considered checking if the place was open.

“hi ____! nice to see you and..?” liz, the cashier, greeted.

she had known you as a frequent customer due to your tendency to get bored of your hair quickly.

“hi liz! this my boyfriend jake! we’re looking for some red hair dye enough for the both of us.” you explained, tugging him along when liz led you down an aisle.

“this should be enough!” she handed you a large bottle of developer, which jake quickly took off your hands.

the three of you walked towards the checkout to get ringed up. before liz even finished scanning all your items jake had already taken his silly minion card out to pay.

“ikeu it was my idea, you should have let me pay.” you huffed, settling into the passenger’s seat while he made sure you were buckled properly.

you had no idea when he started checking your seatbelt but he had been insistent ever since he started.

you told him multiple times you could buckle yourself but he said it made him feel more at ease. so who were you to oppose?

“you know that as long as i have money i’ll never let you pay baby,” he said, turning on the car engine, and driving back towards his apartment.

when you reached his building the sky decided to downpour.

making jake run to the passenger’s side to get you so he could wrap the both of you in his jacket and make a run for it.

once you had made it inside you both were completely drenched. sharing many giggles in the elevator, due to you calling him a puppy after a bath. he was just so cute.

unlocking his door he got himself changed into a new set of clothes and got you one of his old t-shirts to change into. picking shirts he wouldn’t mind getting dirty. grabbing some towels from the bathroom so you could start your hair dye escapade.

you sat on the bathroom counter, jake standing between your legs, putting the red dye all over his hair.

you made sure to wear gloves as you had an afternoon lecture the next day and didn’t want it to look like you killed elmo.

jake basked in the fact you were continuously carding your fingers through his hair.

sliding off the countertop when you finished his hair, you kept your gloves on. letting him help you do the back of your head while you handled the front.

he purposely got some on your neck, the coolness of the dye making you shake. in spite, you reached up to put some on his ears.

the acoustics of the bathroom amplifying your shared giggles, which you tried to lessen due to sunghoon being asleep in the room next door.

the soft sounds of your playlist filled the room while you both sat on the bathroom floor with a 30-minute timer for the dye to set in.

the alarm on your phone started to vibrate, signaling it was time to wash your hair.

since you had did your boyfriend's hair first he had to wash his out first. you put on another pair of gloves and had jake lean over the bathtub so you could rinse out the product.

the water from the faucet turned a bright red once hitting jake's hair. you used shampoo and conditioner to make sure jake wouldn’t sleep without the soft hair you loved to play with.

after you checked his hair was fully washed, you had him dry it with a towel as a hairdryer would most definitely disturb sunghoon’s slumber.

you had laughed once you switched places, jake now washing your hair, since he forgot to wear gloves his hands quickly turned a bright shade of red.

he didn’t even bother correcting his mistake, not minding the staining that would last for a couple of days at least.

as both of you dried your hair in front of the mirror you admired your matching hair.

smiling at how quickly he agreed to do his hair just for you.

he saw you grinning at him in the mirror and leaned down to kiss all over your face, rambling on about how the red suits you perfectly.

brushing your teeth and cleaning up the mess of hair products around his bathroom, you both finally headed to bed.

jake slipping into the spot next to you, engulfing you into a hug and intertwining his legs with yours.

by now it was nearly 6 am the sun was starting to peek out.

despite the sunlight creeping into the room through the cracks in the curtains, you both were knocked out like lights.

at around 9 am sunghoon waltzed into jake’s bedroom ready to ask him if he and you wanted anything for breakfast.

only to be met with a lump of blankets and red-stained hands peeking out from under the covers.

“OH MY GOD JAKE WHY ARE YOU COVERED IN BLOOD!” sunghoon shrieked, ripping the blankets off of you both.

triggering you both to tiredly groan. trying to return to sleep, you buried your head in the crook of jake’s neck, letting him deal with sunghoon alone.

“take a look at our hair hoon,” he rasped out.

“oh i see…” sunghoon lied. “it’s..?” waiting for someone to finish his sentence.

“it’s red hoon.” you deadpanned, shooing him to get out.

“OH! looks awesome guys! when did you do it?”

“at 2 am, now get out.”

“you are so cranky jake,” sunghoon pouted. “i guess i’ll only get ____ breakfast on my way back from class.”

“no please hoon i am so hungry..” jake pleaded.

“all you get is a slice of untoasted toast.”

“isn’t that just bread?”

“he will take whatever you give him just let me go back to sleep oh my god.” you groaned, flipping over.

“goodnight baby,” jake said, wrapping his arms around your waist to spoon you.

“it’s morning,” sunghoon commented.

“get out hoon.”

“finee,” he sulked, closing the door behind him.

[awionetka]

𝐞𝐧𝐣𝐨𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐰! ✩

what if Love and Deepspace was a college rock band?

𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐫: fluff in headcannon format. the band features all five of the boys. brief Xavier x reader.

𝐗𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐫 / 𝐙𝐚𝐲𝐧𝐞 / 𝐑𝐚𝐟𝐚𝐲𝐞𝐥 / 𝐒𝐲𝐥𝐮𝐬 / 𝐂𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐛

Xavier is…

the lead guitarist!

Effortlessly impressive and genuinely skilled, Xavier doesn't really brag about playing an instrument. Perhaps that's the most endearing thing about it, well, aside from how much smaller he looks while carrying a guitar case on his back (especially since he has so many keychains attached to it he is constantly jingling when he walks).

He doesn't have any sort of grandiose backstory when it comes to this aspect of him, one day he just simply decided he'd like to start playing, so that is exactly what he did. Back when he was merely a beginner, there weren't many ways for Xavier to spend his free time, so he used it all up for practice. Ended up becoming exceptional (on accident...?).

The only member of the band that got scouted, chosen personally by Rafayel himself. Wanted to be the rhythm guitarist at first but the members convinced him otherwise. Not a show off but maybe that's exactly what sells him, and by extension – the entire band. Great at improv. Could be because he keeps forgetting what he's supposed to play during his solos, so he just makes it up on the spot. Zayne is the only one who notices but is kind enough not to mention it.

The two of you met while you were working on an extended piece about the band for the college newspaper. The interview ended with Xavier teaching you the basics, carefully placing your fingers in the right places and adjusting your posture. You didn't tell him that you actually sort of knew how to play already; he seemed cute, smelled like freshly done laundry and had the prettiest, most elegant set of hands you had ever seen in your entire life, so you decided to take your chances.

Ever since then, you kept stumbling upon Xavier in bars scattered around the town, where he unhurriedly strummed on his guitar or played pool with the rest of the band. He always noticed you first, smiling politely and waving, yet rarely ever approached you, especially if you were with your friends.

It took Sylus expertly setting the two of you up (right after you complained to him about the utter lack of romantic action during a casual house party) as well as a bunch of vague song dedications and mismatched drinks for Xavier to properly ask you out. He fell asleep on your shoulder right afterwards, leaving you with the problem of dragging his unconscious ass back to his dorm. 

𝐗𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐫'𝐬 𝐠𝐮𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐮𝐝𝐞𝐬…

✩ Fender Made in Japan Hybrid II Strat - Limited Run - Satin Sand Beige RW

His go to. Nothing compares to the comfort of his beloved Fender Strat sitting in his lap (well, maybe except when it’s you situated in the very same spot). Uses it for casual day-to-day practice, also some gigs. If you ask him to play a song for you, he’ll sit down with his Fender (and then play some Judas Priest just to mess with you before switching to your favourite ballad).

✩ Gibson MOD Series 1961 ES-335 2019 Bigsby Blue Sparkle

His second favourite. Treats it with utmost care and consideration. It’s always perfectly clean and shiny, regularly restrung and tuned every single day, even when he doesn’t use it. Plays it once or twice a month, claiming that frequent usage damages the body. It has a dedicated place on the wall above his bed, right next to the newspaper article you wrote about him the band. Caleb adores to tease him mercilessly about it.

✩ Epiphone Kirk Hammett 1979 Flying V PM

Got influenced to purchase this one. Thought it looked kind of cool, ended up with a guitar that’s not entirely practical. Whenever they play in some fancier venue, he’s bringing out his Epiphone. Rafayel claims it makes him seem more skilled. In reality, he actually makes a handful of mistakes during each show because he’s not used to its feel. Lets you put whichever stickers your heart desires on it. It has a small dent on the bottom from when he accidentally made a hole in the wall while getting ready for a gig.

𝐗𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐫’𝐬 𝐟𝐚𝐯 𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐤 𝐭𝐮𝐧𝐞𝐬

✩ she’s not gone yet but she’s leaving; the fratellis

✩ this is nowhere; the black keys

✩ treat ya better; the criticals

✩ only angel; harry styles

✩ the urge; blossoms

[credus99-blog]

Aggression/ Danger to humans: Low – Low

Element/ Ailment: None

The Moss Crab or Josljësj Rhäm (Yoslyoesh Rawm), meaning “water-spider of moss” in Dhënuvgöm, is a species of Anthropod (Arthropods that have evolved internal skeletons closed, a circular system¸ andare Mesotherms). Moss Crabs are native to the first layer of the Hollows (also known as the First Hell) of the eastern continents of Atterra. They are one of several anthropod species that have successfully colonized the surface of Atterra. Moss Crabs are commonly found in moist environments where moss naturally grows throughout the east of Atterra.  These opportunistic omnivores are one of if not the most common smaller anthropods to be encountered on the surface (likely due to them preferring to spawn on the surface). While primarily eating moss, rotting wood, mushrooms, fallen fruits, and nuts, Moss Crabs are essential scavengers in the Northern forests and wetlands. Often seen gathering around carcasses with other scavengers, Moss Crabs help to pick apart and recycle calcium by crushing bone and consuming the marrow inside with their complex mouthparts. Anthropods make up many of the species native to the hollows and, like other organisms in the hollows, can see into the UV spectrum. Additionally, all anthropods possess skeletons and shells comprised of pyrite instead of hydroxyapatite and long-chain myosin fibers. These adaptations allow anthropods to identify each other with biofluorescents in the hollows and possess strength and size no arthropod will ever be able to achieve.

Unlike the pinchers of crustaceans and other arthropods, which have two digits on their claws, the Moss Crab has three pinchers on its two front claws. This extra digit allows the Moss Crab to have added dexterity when foraging and bringing food to the feeding pinchers at the Moss Crab’s mouth. The extra mobility the ‘arms’ of the Moss Crab possesses is due to the wrist joints the Moss Crab has in its claws and its ability to twist its forearm like a human’s.  These large claws are the Moss Crab’s only form of offense. Should something harass the Moss Crab (and pulling itself into an armored ball isn’t working), it will reach out with one of its three-pronged claws and clamp down with a bone-crushing grip that can easily snap a human’s forearm. Once clamped on, the Moss crab won’t let go of whatever it is gripping for several seconds while applying increasing pressure before letting go.

Besides its claws, the primary defense that a Moss Crab possesses is its pyrite carapace which is bullet-resistant (the carapace being not entirely bulletproof due to the porous nature of its shell). The Moss Crab’s bullet-resistant shell is highly porous and allows the growth of nonvascular flora such as moss and fungi (Red-Caps and Orange-Stems being the most common) to grow upon its shell.  This layer of moss growing on the Moss Crabs shell helps with camouflage, disguising the Moss Crab as a mossy rock, and aids in insulation. The moss that grows on the shell of the Moss Crab helps it regulate its temperature during the cold months by helping retain heat that might otherwise be lost through its porous shell. This adaptation allows the Moss Crab to survive on the surface during the winter when many other anthropod species would rather weather the icy winter months inside the warmer hollows.

The leathery skin and scales that the Moss Crab possesses are surprisingly tough and give the anthropod a surprising amount of protection as it traverses its environment. Thanks to its heritage in the hollows, the Moss Crab is a decent climber, using its pinchers, strong limbs, and robust toes to climb rocks and hoist itself up ledges. The feet of the Moss Crab further aid in its climbing by having microscopic folds in its footpads like that of a gecko to help it gain purchase on smoother surfaces. When it comes to finding food, the Moss Crab uses its two long fleshy antennae to smell and taste what’s around it. The Moss Crab can do this due to the many fine hairs that run across the surface of its fleshy antennae. These fine hair follicles contain olfactory receptors that allow the Moss Crab to sniff out potential food from 7km away.  While there are taste receptors scattered throughout the fleshy antennae of the Moss Crab, the majority of the taste receptors it possesses are concentrated on its oral claws.

Once a food item has been tasted by both the antennae and manipulating claws (the taste receptors being located on the ‘teeth’ of these claws) will then be given a final test by the oral pinchers. Should a food item pass the test, the oral claws will shovel the food into the complicated mouthparts of the Moss Crab to break up and swallow. Oddly enough, Moss Crabs have excellent eyesight due to the positioning of their eyes on their bodies. The compound eyes of Moss Crabs are made up of tens of thousands of individual ommatidia (elements containing a cluster of photoreceptor cells, support cells, and pigment cells) in each eye. Additionally, each eye possesses a fovea (a concentrated area of photoreceptor cells) that acts as a pseudo pupil in the compound eyes of the anthropod. These give the Moss Crab an extensive view of the world around it with stereoscopic vision where the vision of each eye overlap.  To blink, the Moss Crab, like other stalk-eyed anthropods, will pull its compound eye into its body cavity to clean it of particles and impurities before extending the eye again. Large tactile hairs exist on each of the six legs that the Moss Crab uses to walk (though it also uses its claws like legs when walking on occasion). Much like vertebrate whiskers, these whiskers the Moss Crab possesses help sense its environment. These tactile hairs enable the Moss Crab to not only sense changes in the air currents around it but also help it navigate cramp environments.

To communicate, the Moss Crab will either flex its armored abdomen to create chirps from its nineteen nostrils running down its abdomen or by making loud clacking sounds with its claws. The nostrils of the Moss Crab and other athropods evolved from the spiracles their ancestors possessed, and their book lungs evolved into a series of vertebrate-like lungs to diffuse oxygen into their bloodstream. The ears of the Moss Crab (located between its face and back plates) are sensitive to the chirps, and clacks Moss Crabs make and allow the anthropods to communicate with each other up to five kilometers away. When threatened, the Moss Crab will pull its faceplate back towards its backplate and fold its legs against its body for defense. Once in that position, the Moss Crab will release a stress call that resembles a low-frequency moan until the threat has passed or been grabbed by its claws. The Moss Crab will clack its claws loudly and release loud chirps from its abdomen when excited. These excited calls are commonly utilized by Moss Crabs when a carcass has been found, which draws in other Moss Crabs in the area to help break down the corpse. During the spring (or winter inside the hollows), female Moss Crabs will release low-frequency calls letting male Moss Crabs know that they are ready to reproduce.

Once gathered, male Moss Crabs will court females by making loud, frequent calls and chirps before fighting with other males. Male Moss Crabs fight by clasping their claws together and attempting to push the other competing male over onto their back or sides. The males who win these mating competitions earn breeding rights to the females gathered around them. To mate, the male and female Moss Crabs will face away from each other and unfurl their abdomens from underneath their bodies and connect their abdomens together. The two claws on the end of the male’s abdomen help by clasping onto the carapace on the end of the female’s abdomen so reproduction can occur. Once mating is done, the female will hold the fertilized eggs inside her abdomen for ten days before laying her clutch of ten to twelve eggs (Moss Crab eggs being the same size as chicken eggs) in a nest of vegetation the female has prepared. These eggs will incubate for between twenty-one to thirty-one days before hatching. Once these nymphs have hatched, they will call out to their mother, who will return and remove them from the nest. Nymphs will stay with their mother for the first sixth months of their lives, wherein their shells will have hardened enough to protect them and begin growing moss. Once separated from their mother, Moss Crab nymphs will grow over the course of three years before reaching their full size and reaching sexual maturity.

The naturally curious nature of the Moss Crab (their brains being slightly larger than a lemon and being located under the eyes behind the faceplate) has led to Moss Crabs being considered almost a nuisance inside the Walls of Malgori. This is due to their habit of rummaging through human trash to find something to eat, and occasionally breaking the hand and/ or arms of children harassing them. The long limbs of the Moss Crab allow them to pull themselves into large dumpsters or crush the flimsy metal locks of others with their claws. Moss Crabs are also a hazard for cars and trains due to the pyrite shell they possess making them a forty-pound rock with legs and eyes. Thankfully in the cities, Moss Crabs are rare enough that this is no longer a significant concern (though this is likely due to the high mortality rate of Moss Crab nymphs within the walls). The Moss Crab nymphs that manage to survive to adulthood within the walls have learned to use crosswalks like people. It’s becoming an increasingly common to see lone Moss Crabs hiding in moss-covered back walkways and Mother Moss Crabs crossing the street alongside a crowd of humans with their nymphs in toe. On occasion, Moss Crabs have also been called ‘Companion Crabs’by Guild Huntsman and people living in the country due to their habit of crowding around the fire alongside the humans.

Moss Crabs are intelligent enough not to throw themselves into the fire like crustaceans and instead will sit around the fire at night and stare into the flames. Over time Moss Crabs have learned that hanging around a fire with humans or Hakdor might earn them food has led to the risk of campers being harassed by Moss Crabs for food; or having their food outright stolen by a Moss Crab gently snatching their food away from them. Like other anthropods, the white meat of the Moss Crab is in high demand due to the taste of the meat being like crab and lobster flesh. Like crab meat, the meat of Moss Crabs (and other anthropods for that matter) absorbs flavor easily while cooking and, while soft, has a texture between red meat and poultry due to the muscle fibers the Moss Crab possesses. While this demand for anthroprod meat would usually lead to the widespread farming of the Moss Crab for its flesh, due to its tough pyrite shell and leathery skin it possesses, this is not the case. Instead, most anthropod meat within the walls is from farmed Jidderways (similarly sized soft-bodied anthropods), which are much easier to butcher than Moss Crabs. Leading the Moss Crab to be seen as the occasional curiosity encountered within the city and a general nuisance for restaurants and those living in the country where local Moss Crabs break into their trashcans for a snack.

[goblin-jr]

PHASE III: REINTRODUCTION PROTOCOL

=============================================== CONFIDENTIAL – GOTHAM PSYCHOSOCIAL RESEARCH UNIT   CASE FILE #: JX-1989   DOCUMENT TYPE: Postmortem Longitudinal Trial Summary   TRIAL NAME: A Character Study in Grief   TRIAL MASTERLIST: A Character Study in Grief   TRIAL DESIGN: Three-Phase Emotional Disruption Model   STATUS: Closed   SECURITY CLEARANCE: ALPHA+   ===============================================

Study Brief

 Subject B re-entered Subject A’s life under concealed identity. Initial interactions were indirect, progressing to sustained proximity and emotional reinforcement.

Subject A developed attachment under misidentified parameters. Full identity disclosure occurred under emotionally heightened conditions. Results indicate unresolved grief, enduring attachment, and high volatility.

Read full report below.

---

(click on links to access log)

🎙️ [ACCESS: STUDENT BROADCAST ARCHIVE — HARVARDRADIO.COM] Podcast Transcript | The Crimson Hour Ep. 68 | “She Said No (And That’s the Problem)” | Host Commentary

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📎 [ACCESS: UNIVERSITY CORRESPONDENCE — HARVARD.EDU] Termination Notice | Financial Aid Rescission & Enrollment Discontinuation | Issued October 14 | Confidential Addressee

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🚌 [ACCESS: TRANSPORTATION RECORD — GOTHAM COACHLINES] One Way Bus Ticket | Boston to Gotham | Purchased October 16

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🏚️ [ACCESS: HOUSING CONTRACT — GOTHAM CITY RENTAL BOARD] Lease Agreement | 1448 W. Park Row, Apt #4B | Signed October 19 | Tenant: Y/N

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📘 [ACCESS: EDUCATION RECORD — GOTHAM CITY ADULT LEARNING CENTER] Enrollment Confirmation | Bridge Track Program | Issued October 24 | Student: Y/N

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💼 [ACCESS: EMPLOYMENT LOG — GOTHAM CITY UNIFIED LABOR DATABASE] Multiple Positions | Service & Gig Work Ledger | Active Record | Employee: Y/N

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Subject A: Age 21 Subject B: 3 years, 4.5 months post-resurrection April 27

Jason arrives early.

For once, he’s calm.

No adrenaline. No ghost-rage in his blood. Just nerves.

The rain started earlier this year.

Jason was already at the grave when it did—hood up, hands in pockets, the crowbar long gone. He’d showered. Put on clean gear. The plan was simple:

Show up. Say hi. Let her see him. Let her believe it.

He practiced it all in his head—what he’d say, how he’d say it, how he’d wait until she smiled before falling apart.

10:45 p.m.

She shows up early.

Jason sees her silhouette first, cutting through the fog. Slower than usual. Shoulders hunched. Hoodie sagging under the weight of rain and long shifts.

Her shoes are soaked through. No blanket. No bag. No book.

Just her. Exhausted. Smaller somehow.

She stumbles once stepping over a root. Doesn’t even curse. Just keeps going.

Jason’s breath catches as she hits the clearing.

Something’s wrong.

She doesn’t talk to the grave right away. She just touches it—soft. Like she’s asking permission. Then lowers herself to her knees like her bones weigh more this year.

“Hey,” she says quietly, forehead brushing the stone. “Sorry I’m early. I couldn’t go home first.”

Jason doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Just listens.

“I had a shift. Then another one. Didn’t think I’d make it if I sat down.”

A long breath.

“I got kicked out,” she says flatly. “Harvard. Rich boy temper tantrum. He made some calls. They pulled my scholarship.”

Jason’s hands spasm. His body cannot decide whether to clench or let go.

“I didn’t tell anyone. I couldn’t.” A pause. Her voice drops. “Didn’t want him- Bruce- to be right about me.”

She talks for a while.

Tells him about the bus ride back. The coffee shop job. The night classes. The leak in her ceiling. The time she had to eat a granola bar for dinner and pretend it was fine.

She doesn’t cry. Not once.

She just talks.

Soft. Matter-of-fact. Like reading off damage reports.

Jason’s whole body buzzes with the wrongness of it. This isn’t how this was supposed to go. She was supposed to joke. Tease the stone. Curse Darcy and flirt with ghosts.

But tonight?

She just… fades.

After about an hour, she stops talking.

No goodbye. No inside joke. No “see you next year, dumbass.”

Just silence.

She curls up beside the grave. Hood pulled over her head. Shoes still wet. Breath fogging in the cold.

And sleeps.

Jason had been waiting for this all year.

She showed up soaked, empty, too tired to fake it. No jokes. No book. Just her knees in the mud and her pride holding what was left of her together.

And he knew— She would hate this.

She would never want him to see her like this. Not exhausted. Not unraveling. Not defeated.

She would rather die than be pitied.

So Jason stayed in the dark.

Because tonight wasn’t about him.

And love meant not crossing the line.

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🕵️ [ACCESS: PUBLIC THREAD ARCHIVE — REDDIT.COM/r/GothamSightings] Community Report | “Red Hood in Southside Again???” | User Submissions Logged 

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📣 [ACCESS: CUSTOMER FEEDBACK LOG — YELP.COM] Review | Bean & Gone Café | Reviewer: Chad R. | Entry Updated May 8

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💳 [ACCESS: TRANSACTION RECORD — LOCAL MERCHANT TERMINALS] Receipts Logged | Excessive Tips Flagged | Bean & Gone / Munchie Mart 

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🧾 [ACCESS: LANDLORD CORRESPONDENCE — DELVECCHIO PROPERTY MGMT] Maintenance Confirmation | Pest Control Approved | Unit: Apt #4B, Tenant: Y/N

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Y/N snapped the tip drawer shut harder than she meant to.

Again.

The register beeped like it was offended. JoJo didn’t even flinch—just looked up from her phone with that deadpan stare that meant she was either judging her or waiting to help bury a body.

“Another hundred?” JoJo asked, not even blinking.

“One-fifty,” Y/N muttered. “On a twelve-dollar order.”

JoJo whistled low. “Okay, but at what point do you find your mystery billionaire and marry him for healthcare?”

Y/N didn’t answer. She grabbed the bills, shoved them into her apron, and stalked toward the back.

That night, she emptied every envelope under her mattress. Every absurd tip. Every impossible number scrawled on receipts. Every crisp, creased bill she couldn’t bring herself to spend.

$4,329.72.

In cash.

No name. No signature. Just guilt.

She sat on the floor and stared at it for a long time.

And then—like a switch flipping—her hands started to shake.

Of course. Of course.

Bruce Wayne.

That smug, shadow-lurking bastard must’ve found out she was back. Working double shifts. Eating gas station ramen. Sleeping under a flickering ceiling light with duct tape around the base.

And instead of calling— Instead of knocking— Instead of saying one fucking word—

He sent money.

She found an old envelope in the junk drawer. Dumped the cash in, fast and angry. Grabbed a pen. No flourish. No flourish was needed.

keep your guilt money.

She folded the note once, sharp. Taped it to the envelope. Stared at it like it had cursed her bloodline.

It was after midnight when she left.

She didn’t take the bus. Bus costs cash.

She walked.

Across half the city. Past busted streetlamps and cracked sidewalks and three of the corners she used to sleep near in high school. Past the bakery that always smelled like disappointment. Past the train station she’d once left for Harvard from.

She didn’t stop.

By the time she reached Wayne Manor, her feet hurt and her coat was damp and her fingers were numb—but her spine was made of fury.

The gates loomed in front of her, tall and polished and exactly as she remembered.

She stood there for a minute. Just breathing.

Then she crouched. Picked up a rock from the edge of the path. Slipped it into the envelope.

Weighted.

Final.

And then—without a word— She threw it over the gate.

It landed with a thunk on the gravel drive.

Y/N turned and walked away without looking back.

Let him read the note. Let him choke on it.

She didn’t want his money.

She wanted to be left the hell alone.

--

BATCAVE — May 22, 2:13 AM

Status: Debrief in progress Subjects Present: D. Grayson, T. Drake, D. Wayne, J. Todd, B. Wayne

“So, are we just not gonna talk about the fact that Killer Croc was wearing Crocs?” Dick asked, toeing off his boots near the console. “I mean, that’s commitment to the bit.”

Tim didn’t look up. “I already filed it under ‘mental warfare.’”

Damian scoffed from the corner. “You’re all idiots.”

Jason ignored them. Sort of. He was leaned back against the armory wall, picking at the edge of his gloves like they’d personally wronged him.

Until—

ALERT: PROJECTILE DETECTED. PERIMETER BREACH. LOCKDOWN SEQUENCE INITIATED.

Every screen in the cave lit red.

“Who the hell throws something at the manor?” Tim muttered, already flipping through the camera feeds.

“Someone with a death wish,” Damian deadpanned.

“Someone stupid,” Bruce corrected, stepping forward.

Jason just moved toward the screen. “Pull Sector 12. Zoom in.”

The exterior cam locked on. Gravel path. Gate lights. A single envelope lay on the drive, still spinning slightly from impact.

Not a package. Not a threat. Not a warning.

Just a rage-fueled piece of paper addressed in sharp black ink:

TO: BITCH WAYNE FROM: GO TO HELL

Underneath that, written in all-caps and vengeance:

KEEP YOUR GUILT MONEY.

The envelope had torn slightly on impact. Caught on the gravel. A few crisp bills peeked from the split. One hundred dollar note folded clean. A rock the size of a fist visible inside, for weight.

Jason’s stomach dropped.

It was his money. Every tip. Every envelope. Every silent drop at her register or mailbox or door.

He thought she hadn’t noticed.

Turns out, she had. And she walked it all the way here just to give it back.

A beat of total silence.

Then—

“…Wait,” Tim said slowly. “That’s your money?”

Jason didn’t answer.

Dick turned. “Dude. You’ve been funding her anonymously? For months?”

Jason crossed his arms. “I wasn’t trying to be anonymous.”

Damian snorted. “You failed spectacularly.”

Bruce stared at the monitor, unreadable. Still. Barely blinking. “She thinks it was from me,” he said finally.

“She would,” Tim said. “You’re the obvious choice for unsolicited financial intervention.”

“And she still threw it back,” Damian murmured, almost impressed.

Jason crossed his arms.

“I mean… you guys saw that, right?” he said. “She didn’t keep it.”

Dick smirked. “She chucked it with incredible form. Like varsity softball form.”

“Yeah,” Jason muttered. “She’s pissed.”

“You sound proud,” Tim said slowly.

Jason turned away from the screen, tugging his gloves tighter.

“Oh, I’m so proud,” he said. “Bitch Wayne got a rock in the mail. From my girl.”

“She doesn’t know it’s you,” Bruce said, not impressed.

Jason ignored that.

He looked at the envelope one last time, then at the gate, then—somewhere no camera could track—toward her.

“…New plan,” he muttered.

Tim looked up. “New what?”

Jason cracked his knuckles.

“I make contact.”

--

The plan wasn’t complicated. Jason liked it that way.

He knew the alley behind her building was dirty, damp, and full of rats—human and otherwise. He also knew a low-level dealer had been working the block for weeks now, pushing light stuff to drunk college kids and the occasional night school burnout.

It wasn’t urgent. Wasn’t worth the suit. Wasn’t worth the attention.

But it was behind her apartment.

So Jason made it urgent.

He didn’t dig too deep. Didn’t check security. Didn’t run a full recon of the building. He didn’t want to know how bad it was. Not yet.

He showed up just before sundown.

Climbed up to her window. Plopped right down. Moved like smoke. Didn’t let himself look through her window—just paused long enough to slide a folded note through the small crack in the pane.

“Temporary stakeout. No danger to you. Lock your windows. —RH”

He noticed the broken latch right after. Rusted. Hanging by one screw. He made a mental note to have a second chat with her landlord. Maybe something about a crowbar this time. Or a window.

Jason repositioned on her fire escape. Cross-legged. Still. Watching the alley below like he’d done it a thousand times. He felt calm. Capable. Like this was right.

She’d come outside.She’d see the note. She’d see him.

And then, she would feel their undeniable connection, open the window, and profess her love. It was foolproof. 

Y/N got home around midnight.

Her backpack was heavy. Her jacket soaked. She had a paper bag under one arm and her keys already in hand before she even reached the stairwell.

She didn’t look up. She didn’t hesitate. She grabbed the note. Read it. Sighed. Crumpled it in one hand.

Then, with the kind of exhausted precision Jason had only ever seen on grieving people and nurses, she reached for the curtain—

And closed it.

Not angrily. Not dramatically.

Just… done.

Lights off. Lock turned. Curtain drawn.

Jason stayed on the roof.

And for the first time in years, he wasn’t sure what to do next.

--

STAKEOUT — DAY FOUR

This was officially the worst stakeout of his life.

Jason had done rooftop surveillance during hailstorms. He’d staked out mob hideouts in January without gloves. Once, he ate an entire protein bar that turned out to be six months expired just to avoid blowing his cover.

None of that compared to this.

Because at least in those cases, he had a target. A mission. A job to do.

Here? He was just... loitering.

Loitering outside the window of a girl who hadn’t looked at him in two days. Not since Day Two, when she peeked through the curtain for exactly 1.5 seconds and then closed it like she was doing pest control.

He hadn’t moved since sunset.

He’d counted exactly four rats, two alley cats, one dealer (still mid-tier, still boring), and zero signs that Y/N had any interest in acknowledging the helmeted vigilante nesting on her fire escape.

He was starting to take it personally.

His back hurt. His patience was thin. And his coffee had gone cold sometime around 9:00 p.m.

He was just about to call it—just about to tell himself he’d leave in five minutes, tops—when the window creaked open.

Not a curtain. Not a crack.

The full window.

Jason sat up straight, instantly alert.

Y/N leaned out.

Arms crossed on the windowsill. Hair pulled into a messy knot. Hoodie two sizes too big and sleeves pushed to her elbows.

She looked directly at him. “Listen,” she said, voice still dangerously even. “If this is about Gerald, I’m gonna stop you right there. Because Gerald literally ties his drug pouches with ribbons. He once left a baggie in someone’s mailbox with a thank-you note.”

Jason stared.

“I know this,” she continued, getting started now, “because I taught that man how to do cursive T’s a few months ago for a hundred bucks and a stale Pop-Tart. He paid in exact change and said, ‘Thank you, miss.’”

Jason opened his mouth.

She did not let him speak.

“Gerald,” she said, gesturing like she was introducing a sitcom character, “is not a threat. Gerald is a part-time dealer with a Yelp rating and mild anxiety. I could break his kneecaps in under two minutes and still make it to night class.”

Jason made a noise—could’ve been agreement, could’ve been fear.

She narrowed her eyes. “So unless there’s an actual cartel hiding in the bodega freezer, you can stop loitering on my window like a sad gargoyle and go bother someone else.”

Jason scrambled. “He’s… connected.”

Y/N tilted her head. “To who?”

Jason waved vaguely. “Bigger cartel. Out-of-town operation. Could be gun-running. Definitely not cursive.”

Y/N looked unimpressed.

“Right,” she said slowly. “Well, if you’re gonna keep lurking out here, just don’t scare the cats.”

Then she closed the window.

Didn’t slam it. Didn’t storm off. Just… shut it. Quiet. Final.

Jason stared at the glass, stunned.

So much for the moment. So much for the bonding. So much for the water.

Still—he smiled under the mask. She offered to commit acts of violence for him. 

The plan was working. 

--

💚 [ACCESS: VENDOR NOTICE — GERALD’S GOODS / PUBLIC MARKET BULLETIN] Store Update | Continued Operation Approved | Restrictions Applied

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STAKEOUT — DAY ELEVEN

It was getting bleak.

Jason had been camped out on her fire escape for eleven days. Eleven. He’d missed two minor muggings, skipped one whole safehouse rotation, and was now on a first-name basis with three alley cats and one concerned mailman.

Y/N had spoken to him exactly three more times since the Gerald Incident.

None of them were what he wanted.

Day Six: “You left food on my window ledge. That’s how raccoons get in.”

Day Eight: “Could you stop tapping on the railing?, I have work in 4 hours”

Day Nine: “Stop feeding Gerald. He keeps offering me coupons.

He’d pivoted his strategy. Brought better food. Left sticky notes with dumb jokes. Tried being helpful. Nothing worked.

She hadn’t smiled. She hadn’t invited him in. She hadn't even asked his name.

So on Day Eleven, just after midnight, Jason gave up all pretense of having a plan.

He knocked on the window once, then leaned in slightly and said the dumbest possible sentence:

“…Can I use your bathroom?”

Y/N blinked at him. She was sitting on the floor with a mug in one hand and a book in the other, hoodie slipping off one shoulder, expression unreadable.

A long pause.

Then she said:

“Are you serious?”

Jason shrugged. “I’ve been out here for, like, two weeks.”

She stared. Jason stared back. Internally panicking.

Finally, she sighed. “Fine. But if you bleed on my bath mat, I will kill you.”

She opened the window.

Jason crawled inside like a very polite burglar and immediately forgot how to function.

The place was small. Lived-in. Clean in the chaotic way that meant she was too tired to fake being put together. Books stacked everywhere. Couch slightly lopsided

She pointed to the bathroom and didn’t look at him. “There. In and out. Don’t touch my stuff.”

He nodded, heartbeat in his throat.

Once inside, he immediately did not pee.

He closed the door. Locked it. Turned to the sink.

The bathroom was small. Clean. Faintly pink. The kind of space someone maintained out of habit, not vanity. The light above the mirror flickered when he flipped the switch, then steadied. There was a hair tie looped around the faucet. A half-dead succulent in a chipped mug by the window. Toothpaste cap missing. A towel slung over the back of the door with an embroidered flower on it that looked like it came from a clearance bin at Target.

Jason stood in the middle of it, helmet still on, and breathed.

Then—slowly—he reached up and took it off.

The air was cooler on his face than he expected. The mirror caught him in full: tousled hair, dark circles, and that look he always got when the silence stretched too long—like he might flinch from his own reflection.

He looked awful. Not in the way he usually did. Worse.

Like a guy who hadn’t been sleeping. Like someone who’d been sitting on a fire escape for eleven nights hoping a girl who read Pride and Prejudice to gravestones might eventually say hi.

He stared at himself for a beat longer than was comfortable. Then splashed water on his face. Twice. Rubbed his palms over his jaw like it would help somehow.

It didn’t.

There was soap in a tiny ceramic dish shaped like a shell. Glittery, pastel pink. He stared at it for a full three seconds before muttering “what the fuck” and using it anyway.

The water smelled like coconut and something warm. Maybe vanilla. Maybe whatever scent meant “someone lives here and it isn’t you.”

He dried his hands on the towel. Realized too late it was her towel. Hung it back up very gently like it might press charges.

And then—because he was already spiraling—he started looking.

Not like a creep. Not really. Just... glancing.

There was a cup full of bobby pins. A near-empty mascara tube. A jar of Vicks vapor rub. Painkillers. A pack of gum. One very battered razor and—

Her shampoo. 

He picked it up like it was evidence. Opened the cap. Took a quick sniff.

Then froze.

Yep.

That was her.

Citrus and something warm. Something he couldn’t name. Something that smelled like sleep and soft laughter and the back of her hoodie after she’d been walking all day.

He blinked.

Stared at the mirror again.

“This is insane,” he said, out loud, to the drain.

The mirror agreed. Silently. Cruelly.

He didn’t stop snooping. 

His hand reached for the chapstick next. Pink. Untwisted halfway. Sitting like a loaded weapon on the shelf. He hovered. Pulled back. Reached again.

Nope. Nope.

He could not mentally survive indirect lip contact tonight.

Instead, he turned on the sink again, splashed his face a second time, and looked around.

Panic.

He hadn’t flushed.

If he walked out without flushing, she’d know. She’d definitely know. And then what? She’d think he didn’t pee? That he had a shy bladder? That he was snooping?

Which he was.

But not in a weird way.

Just a tragic, emotionally stunted way.

He flushed.

Waited.

Washed his hands again. Overcorrecting. Citrus soap. Same towel. Same careful dry.

He stared at the door. Helmet back on.

Then—deep breath—he stepped out, greeted by the sound of rain pattering against the living room windows. 

The rain was biblical.

One of those Gotham storms that sounded like it was trying to peel the skyline off the bones of the city. Thunder in full surround sound. Water hammering the roof like it was holding a grudge. The alley behind her apartment was already pooling into something that looked vaguely like a swamp.

Y/N stood at her window, hoodie sleeves pushed up, coffee mug empty, expression flat.

She stared down at the alley like she was waiting for it to apologize.

Then, without turning her head:

“…Yo. Gerald dipped.”

Jason, stepping into the living room, gave a dignified response . “What?”

She nodded at the alley. “Lace parasol finally gave out. Rain probably took it clean off his stupid little head.”

Jason craned his neck. She was right. Gerald’s usual folding chair was empty. The cooler full of whatever he sold was gone. A crushed Monster Energy can rolled through the runoff like it was fleeing the scene.

She turned after a moment. Raised an eyebrow. “You planning to just crawl back out there and rot?”

Jason blinked. “...Kinda?”

She sighed. Loudly. Like she was annoyed at the concept of him existing in space.

“I can’t afford the liability of you slipping off my fire escape,” she muttered, walking toward the kitchen. “You fall, you sue, I end up selling a kidney. That’s not happening.”

Jason just watched her.

She didn’t look at him when she said it—just opened a cabinet, pulled out a can of generic brand cola, and set it on the counter without ceremony.

“You want to sit for a while?” she asked, like it physically pained her.

Jason nodded. Too fast. Too eager.

“Yeah,” he said. “Sure. I can—uh. Thanks.”

She walked back toward the window and flopped down onto the couch like gravity won a bet. Jason followed, cautiously, perching on the very edge of the opposite cushion like a man trying not to disturb a wild animal.

Then he realized the problem.

The soda was still on the counter.

And he had his helmet back on.

Y/N glanced over at him, then back at the can. Then—without a word—she stood, grabbed it, opened the drawer, pulled out a bright pink curly straw, jammed it into the can, and handed it over like this was normal behavior.

Jason hesitated.

She stared. “You gonna take it or what?”

He did. Very carefully.

And then, with all the dignity of a man in full tactical armor drinking diet cola through a Lisa Frank accessory, he took a sip.

They’d been sitting in silence for maybe five minutes when she asked, “You affiliated with the bats?”

It wasn’t aggressive. Just flat. Tired. The kind of question that didn’t come from curiosity, but muscle memory—like checking the lock twice before bed.

Jason didn’t move right away.

He could feel her watching. Not suspicious. Not fearful. Just... waiting. Like someone who’d been burned before and had learned to ask the hard questions first.

He set the soda down slowly. Let the pink straw curl on itself like a secret.

“No,” he said.

It was the truth. And a lie. Both, kind of.

But it was what she needed to hear.

He could see it happen—the slow loosening in her jaw, the unspooling tension in her spine, the way her fingers relaxed against the fabric of the couch like she’d been bracing without noticing.

“Good,” she muttered. “Those freaks never told me he died.”

The room was quiet after that.

Jason didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

He just let the rain fill the silence. Let it hum against the windows like white noise. She didn’t look at him again for a long time.

When she finally spoke, it was softer.

“Sorry. That was... blunt.”

“You’re good.”

She exhaled slowly, eyes flicking back to him.

“You don’t seem like one of them anyway.”

Jason shrugged, watching her carefully. “Yeah?”

“You loiter. You drink soda through a straw. You’d trip in a cave and die instantly.”

“I’m an apex predator.”

She rolled her eyes. “You brought me dumplings in a shoebox.”

He raised the can again like it was a toast. “And yet, here we are.”

She didn’t smile. Not fully.

But the corner of her mouth twitched. And for now, that was enough.

She didn’t ask for his name. He didn’t offer it. They just sat there, listening to the storm try to peel Gotham open.

Eventually, she stood. Picked up his empty can. Tossed it in the recycling like it didn’t mean anything.

--

By the third week of the stakeout-that-wasn’t, Jason had a rhythm.

He came by every few nights. Always late. Never announced. He didn’t knock. Didn’t text. He just appeared on the fire escape like a guilty habit, boots scuffed, helmet fogged, and body language trying not to look like it needed a place to rest.

And somehow—without ever being formally invited—he started staying.

Y/N never asked why he came. He never said.

She just opened the window.

Their nights followed a strange kind of pattern. Jason would crawl in like a very large, heavily armed housecat. She’d be in her usual hoodie, curled on the couch with her laptop balanced on one knee and a heating pad strapped to her lower back like a battle injury.

The apartment wasn’t really built for guests. The living room was also the kitchen, which was also the dining room, which was also just the room. But she made it work. Kicked a blanket off the couch. Cleared a corner of the table. Pretended this wasn’t weird.

At first, they just sat.

Sometimes she put on old episodes of Chopped and yelled at the screen. Sometimes he read the crime blotter and gave her commentary like a feral news anchor. Sometimes they didn’t say anything at all. Just sat. Breathing in the same room.

She never asked who he was. He never offered. And that silence between them felt sacred. Like a ceasefire they didn’t dare break.

Then—one night—he brought food.

Takeout. Thai. Still warm. He said it was extra from a thing. Didn't elaborate.

Y/N narrowed her eyes, but said nothing. Just pulled two chipped plates from the cabinet, set them on the counter like she did this every night.

Jason hesitated. Hands still full of the plastic bag.

“I already ate,” he said.

She didn’t look at him. “That’s fine. I haven’t.”

Next time, it was shawarma. The time after that, dumplings. Then pizza. Then stir fry. Always with the same line:

“I ate already.” Or: “Can’t really eat in the helmet.” Or: “Not hungry.”

And every time, Y/N would split the food between two plates. Hand him one. Sit on the floor. Eat in silence.

And every time, he wouldn’t touch his.

On the fourth night, she snapped.

“If you’re gonna sit there like a haunted statue and watch me eat, you can leave.”

Jason blinked. “What?”

She set her fork down. Hard. “I’m not doing pity dinner.”

“It’s not—”

“Then eat.”

“I can’t—”

She stood up. “You can’t or you won’t?”

Jason opened his mouth. Closed it.

“I’m not your project,” she said, voice low now. “You don’t get to show up here, drop off food like some sad vigilante DoorDash, and act like that counts as caring.”

His stomach twisted. “I do care.”

“Then sit your ass down and eat something.”

Jason stared at her.

She stared back.

He sighed—quietly—but took it.

Then came the blanket.

He kept it by the window now. A faded throw with frayed corners that smelled faintly like her shampoo and dust. Jason threw it over his head with practiced ease, tucking the ends under his chin so his face stayed hidden and his hands stayed free.

Y/N called it “his little cryptid cloak.”

He couldn’t talk with the blanket on—no voice mod, no helmet, no disguise—so he didn’t. He just sat there. Eating silently. A ghost in tactical gear, chewing sesame chicken like it was sacred.

Y/N, however, did talk.

She talked the whole time.

Mostly to fill the space. Sometimes to punish him.

“…so then my boss says we can’t wear sneakers anymore, like it’s a ‘professionalism issue,’ but I know for a fact Jo-Jo showed up last week in flip-flops and nobody said a damn word.”

Jason hummed under the blanket. She took it as agreement.

“And this girl in my psych class keeps saying ‘let’s circle back’ like we’re on Zoom in 2020. I swear to God, if she says ‘let’s unpack that’ one more time I’m going to commit tax fraud on her behalf.”

Jason nodded. Fork to his mouth. Still silent. Blanket bobbing.

Y/N sighed dramatically. “This would be less one-sided if you weren’t eating like the Phantom of the Opera.”

Jason flipped her off.

From under the blanket.

She snorted. “Okay, rude.”

He kept eating.

She kept talking.

It was the most peace either of them had felt in weeks.

--

📄 [ACCESS: INTERNAL OPERATIONS LOG — WAYNE FAMILY DIVISION] Mission Report | Subject Missing Post-Injury | Filed November 25 | J. Todd (Red Hood)

--

Y/N’s fork scrapes the bottom of the takeout container.

It’s the last of the noodles. Cold, borderline questionable. Hood dropped them off two nights ago and she meant to finish them sooner, but time’s slippery lately and grocery money’s been tight. She’s sitting on the couch, hoodie sleeves pulled over her knuckles, heating pad dead beneath her, the hum of the fridge the only sound in the room.

She doesn’t bother with music anymore. She misses Spotify Premium.

She’s halfway through another bite when it happens.

THUMP.

A sharp knock—no, a thud—against the windowpane.

She freezes.

Head snaps toward the sound. Fork clatters to the plate.

For one wild second she thinks it’s a bird. A raccoon. Gerald, reincarnated.

But then she sees it. The shape.

Helmet. Leather. Bulk.

She exhales sharply. Stands. Walks to the window and pulls it open with more annoyance than alarm.

“What—”

Then she sees the blood.

His whole right side is soaked. The dark of his jacket is darker still, and there’s a sharpness to the way he’s standing—angled, braced, like the wall is the only thing keeping him upright.

“Hood,” she breathes. “What the fuck—”

He doesn’t answer.

He stumbles forward—tries to step in—and her hands shoot out automatically, catching his arm. He’s warm. Too warm. His breath fogs the glass behind him.

“Oh my god,” she mutters, voice rising. “Sit. Sit down—now.”

He doesn’t resist. Just slumps, knees buckling like he meant to collapse. She guides him down to the couch—his usual spot—and watches, horrified, as he leaves a full handprint of blood on the cushion.

She kneels beside him.

“Where are you hurt? Hey—hey, look at me.”

He doesn’t lift the helmet. Doesn’t move. Just leans back against the armrest, breathing shallow.

“Okay,” she says, standing. “Fine. Stay there. Bleed or don’t, I’m getting the med kit.”

She’s already halfway to the bathroom.

She returns with the med kit and a clean towel she’s been saving for emergencies. Turns out this qualifies.

He hasn’t moved.

Still slouched against the couch, right leg extended, gloved hand pressed loosely to his side like that’ll keep the blood in. She kneels beside him again, tosses the kit open, and gently lifts his shirt to reveal his ribs.

His breathing hitches. She ignores it. She can’t stop shaking.

“I—I don’t know how to stitch,” she says, voice raw. “I’ve never done this. I can’t—”

“You can,” he rasps, barely audible through the modulator. “It’s just thread. You’ve sewn buttons, right?”

“This is not a button.”

“Still got holes.”

She wants to punch him. She wants to scream. She wants to cry.

Instead, she grabs the suture kit with fingers that won’t stop trembling and tries to remember anything she’s ever seen in a movie.

“Talk me through it,” she says.

Jason shifts, barely. “You cleaned it?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Pinch the skin together.”

She does.

“Anchor the first one deep. Just push. Don’t think.”

She pushes.

He flinches. Hisses. But doesn’t stop her.

She stabs the needle through again, then again, lips parted, breath shallow.

“There. There. Keep going,” he mutters, slurring a little now. “You’re doing fine.”

“This is fucked,” she says.

“Totally,” he mumbles.

She gets through five stitches before she realizes he’s stopped answering.

Her head snaps up.

“Hood?”

No response.

“Hood. Hey—hey, come on—”

She reaches out, touches his faceplate. Cold. Still.

He’s breathing, but only just. Out cold. Head turned toward the back cushion, body slack, arm limp at his side. The moment she’d been dreading—being alone with this—has arrived, and it’s not cinematic. It’s not brave.

It’s awful.

“Shit. Shit, shit—”

She finishes the stitches with her whole body shaking. Wraps gauze with teeth clenched. Mutters every curse she knows under her breath. When she finally leans back, her palms are slick with blood and sweat and something else she refuses to name.

She wipes the blood off his helmet with the hem of her shirt.

Pulls a blanket over him.

And sits on the floor beside the couch like a kid trying not to look at the monster in the room.

She can’t sleep.

Not with him breathing like that.

Not with the way it hitches every few minutes, shallow and wet and wrong, like his lungs are trying to argue with his ribs. Like his body hasn’t decided whether it wants to keep going or not.

The helmet is still on.

She thought it was fine. He always wore it. Said he needed it. But now, in the silence of the apartment, with the storm finally passed and the fridge humming like it knows something she doesn’t—she’s terrified.

What if he can’t breathe in there? What if he suffocates and she sleeps through it? What if she wakes up and he’s just—

She bolts upright.

Back in her room, she throws open the dresser drawer and rummages blindly until her hand hits something soft and familiar—an old sleep mask. Faded pink. Fraying elastic. One of the eye patches has a cartoon sheep on it.

Stands there for a second, breathing hard.

Then she walks back out.

He hasn’t moved. Still sprawled across the couch, chest rising in slow, irregular beats. One arm fallen off the cushion. A streak of blood drying across the side of his neck.

She kneels again. Pulls the mask on.  

Her hands find the edges of the helmet. “Don’t die,” she whispers. “Okay? You’re not allowed.”

Then—carefully, slowly, blind—she lifts it off.

It’s heavier than she thought. The inside slick with sweat. It makes a soft, awful click as it comes free. She sets it down on the floor beside her and reaches up—still blindfolded—and cups his face with both hands.

He’s still breathing. Better now. Less noise. More air.

“Okay,” she says, to no one. “Okay.”

She sits there like that for a while, hands still on his cheeks, thumb brushing a raised scar near his jaw.

Eventually, she lets go of his face . She doesn’t take off the mask. She just curls up on the floor, forehead resting against the edge of the couch.

And listens. To his breathing. To the radiator. To the silence.

And when she finally lets herself sleep, it’s with one hand still reaching up—just in case he stops again.

--

Morning comes slow.

It creeps in through the smudged windows, casting pale gold across the floor, the peeling radiator, the crumpled takeout bag on the counter. Everything smells faintly like ginger and sweat and blood.

Jason wakes with a start.

His ribs scream. His side aches. His mouth tastes like metal and dust.

And his helmet is gone.

His eyes fly open.

He’s still on the couch—blanket twisted around his legs, shirt halfway undone, gauze taped awkwardly across his stomach. The light’s too bright. His heart’s too loud. And his face is exposed.

Panic claws up his throat.

Where is it? Where’s the helmet? How long has it been off? Did she see? Did she see?

He tries to sit up too fast and immediately regrets it, pain flaring sharp under the bandages. He swears under his breath, scanning the room, chest heaving—

And then he sees her.

Y/N is curled up on the floor, still in blood stained pajamas, limbs tangled awkwardly against the side of the couch. Her head is tilted back slightly. She’s breathing soft and slow.

And over her eyes—

A sleep mask.

Cartoon sheep. Frayed elastic. Still on.

Jason freezes.

She shifts slightly in her sleep, fingers twitching near her face. Then, as if pulled by some unseen thread, her hand drifts across the floor, brushes against his boot, and pauses.

She jerks awake.

Slow. Groggy. Like the world is coming back in pieces.

Then she sits up, stretches, and reaches beside her without looking.

The helmet’s right there.

She picks it up. Holds it out.

“Put it on” she mumbles, voice hoarse. “You scared the hell out of me, by the way.”

Jason doesn’t move.

She keeps holding it.

“I didn’t look,” she adds, quieter now. “Just… heard you struggling. Figured you’d breathe better without it. Blindfolded myself. That’s all.”

Jason still says nothing.

Just takes the helmet from her hands like it’s made of glass.

Their fingers brush. He grips it tighter. Puts it on, turns the voice modulator on.

“…Thank you,” he says.

She shrugs. Leans back against the couch again.

“Don’t die on my watch, Hood. It’d really mess up my Tuesday.”

Y/N finally pulls the sleep mask off.

Blinding light. Crick in her neck. Her whole body feels like it got into a fight with a vending machine and lost. But Hood’s still alive. Still sitting upright. Still breathing.

She exhales.

“Let me see,” she says, already kneeling beside him again.

Jason stays quiet. Tilts to the side slightly so she can peel the blanket back. The gauze is still holding. The stitches are—surprisingly—not awful. A little uneven. A little swollen. But clean.

She stares at them for a second. Nods to herself.

“Not bad,” she mutters. “For someone whose only medical training came the guy getting stitched.”

He doesn’t respond.

She pretends she doesn’t care.

“Don’t pull them. No jumping off buildings for a while. No cartwheels. No gunfights unless it’s urgent.”

She stands again and heads for the kitchenette.

The fridge greets her with its usual charm: One half-empty bottle of ketchup. A jar of olives. A single carton of milk.

She opens the cabinet. Cereal. One box. Crushed.

She does the math in her head. Stares into the abyss. Then grabs a bowl.

It’s just enough for one.

She pours it. Adds the milk. Doesn’t hesitate.

Walks back over and hands it to him.

Jason stares at the bowl like it might explode.

She shrugs.

“You almost died. You get the Cheerios.”

He eats slow.

Careful.

The sound of the spoon scraping the bowl is soft, muffled beneath the low hum of morning and the fabric of the blanket he’s thrown over his head. She doesn’t watch.

She ducks into the bathroom instead.

Ties her hair up with one hand while brushing her teeth with the other. Swaps out the hoodie for her “functional” shirt—stained, slightly oversized, halfway tucked into her jeans. Her socks don’t match. One of her boots is damp from last night’s rain.

It’s fine.

She’s used to leaving chaos behind.

She grabs her bag from the chair, keys already in hand, and opens the front door halfway before she turns back.

He’s still there. Sitting in her living room. Still under the blanket. Still clutching the empty bowl like he doesn’t know what to do with it.

“I’ll be back by six,” she says, voice casual, like this is normal. Like this happens every day.

He doesn’t answer.

She clears her throat. “You can stay. If you want.”

Another beat of silence.

Then, a nod.

Small. Barely there.

She closes the door behind her. Locks it with a click. And lets the day begin.

--

🧾 [ACCESS: PURCHASE RECORD — ROTHMAN'S / SUNDOWN GROCERS] Home Furnishing & Grocery Delivery | Buyer: J.T. | Delivery: Unattended Drop

--

Y/N unlocks the apartment with the usual two jabs and a kick.

Her shoulder aches. Her feet are soaked. Her last customer of the day tried to return a sandwich after eating it, and Gerald had the audacity to wink at her in the alley like they were co-workers.

She just wants five minutes to breathe.

She pushes the door open—

And stops.

Her bag slips off her shoulder.

She sees the couch.

Brown leather. Low-backed. Wide-seated. Big enough to drown in. Soft enough to hold you when you can’t hold yourself.

She stares at it like it might vanish. Then she drops her bag, walks straight up to it, and presses both hands flat against the armrest.

It’s real. Soft. Cool to the touch. The kind of expensive that doesn’t come from pity.

And that’s when she laughs.

A full-body sound, unexpected and too loud for the apartment. She laughs like someone who hasn’t had a real reason in months. Laughs like she’s going to scare the silverfish out of the drywall.

Then she spins. Right there, in her socks, on the peeling tile. A full circle. Like a rom-com idiot. Like she’s seven.

Because she knows what this is. She remembers.

“Hear me out,” Jason had said once, the morning Bruce took him away. “The penthouse. “Oh god,” she’d groaned. “The couch is leather. Brown. Like rich people brown. But not ugly. Real classy.” “No. Velvet,” she’d fired back. “Deep green. With gold buttons.” “Velvet stains.” “I won’t spill.” “You’ll definitely spill.”

It had been a joke. A fantasy. A nothing-future built on soda and sarcasm.

But now—years later— Here it is.

She’s dizzy when she sits down. Breathless. Tears on her face before she even registers them.

And the feeling hits her like thunder: This is permission. This is Jason—her Jason—telling her it’s okay to be happy again from beyond the grave.

The couch is the sign. The Hood is the messenger.

He sent her someone.

She presses her forehead to the armrest.

“You son of a bitch,” she whispers, smiling through it. “You sent me a friend.”

The couch smells like new beginnings. The lamp glows like a pulse. Her apartment—normally cold, narrow, gray—is warm now. Lived in. Soft.

Safe.

She curls up under the new blanket, legs tucked beneath her, heart still spinning in her chest.

And for the first time since he died, She doesn’t feel alone.

--

The next evening, Jason stood on the fire escape with a bag of food in one hand and a heart full of static.

He didn’t know what he expected. An eye-roll, maybe. A sarcastic comment about boundary-crossing vigilantes and unsolicited furniture. A quiet “you didn’t have to” said in that voice that meant don’t do it again.

He definitely didn’t expect the window to open before he even knocked.

Y/N stood there, framed in the fading orange light, hair pulled back, hoodie sleeves rolled to her elbows. She looked at him for a long second. No smile. No sarcasm.

Then she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around him.

It was careful—not rushed or needy—but firm. Real. Like something being set down that had been carried too long.

Jason blinked. His arms didn’t move at first. He just stood there, stunned, feeling her heartbeat against his chest through layers of armor and hesitation.

Then he let out a breath and hugged her back.

Slow. Gentle.

Not because she was fragile. Because she wasn’t.

“…Hey,” he said, voice low in his helmet.

She gave a soft little huff of air. Not quite a laugh. Not quite a sigh.

Then she stepped back just enough to look at him.

Her eyes were steady. Clear. Tired in a way that went deeper than sleep, but still soft.

“Thank you,” she said simply.

Two words. No qualifiers. No jokes. Just… gratitude.

Jason didn’t know what to say to that. Didn’t think he’d need to. But she just stood there, letting the silence speak for both of them.

Then she glanced at the bag in his hand.

“Are those dumplings?”

He nodded.

She opened the window wider.

“Well. Don’t just stand there. Come in.”

He climbed in, boots hitting the floor with a thud. She locked the window behind him and flicked on the lamp.

Warm light. Soft couch. Two plates already out on the counter like maybe, just maybe, she’d been hoping he’d come.

They sat. Ate (Him under the blanket). Talked about nothing. Argued about whether Gerald was a criminal genius or just terminally polite. Laughed until their stomachs hurt.

And somewhere between the last dumpling and the first yawn, they stopped being ghosts.

They were friends.

Real ones.

At last.

--

🟥 [ACCESS: SUIT DIAGNOSTICS LOG — WAYNE TECH MONITORING] Biofeedback Report | Non-Combat Physiological Spikes | Subject: Red Hood (J. Todd)

--

🟩 [ACCESS: TERMINAL HISTORY — GOTHAM PUBLIC LIBRARY, #17] Search Record | Subject A - Flagged Queries Logged Feb 12 | Accessed via Public Network | Surveillance Filter: Active

--

APRIL 25

She didn’t look at him when she asked.

She never did when it was something that mattered.

Jason was sitting on the floor beside the couch, helmet still on, fingers fidgeting with the strap of his gauntlet like it might reveal the answers to every stupid thing he’d ever done. Y/N was above him, curled sideways, eating cereal from a mug because she refused to do dishes before midnight. The lamp flickered.

“You doing anything the 27th?” she asked, casually.

Jason’s heart dropped.

He didn’t answer right away. She didn’t press. Just took another slow bite, metal spoon clinking once against ceramic.

“It’s kind of a thing,” she said after a moment. “Not, like, a party. It’s personal.”

Jason made a noise in his throat. Neutral. Encouraging. Safe.

Y/N stared down into the last third of her cereal.

“I go somewhere. Once a year. Same place, same time. Every year since I was sixteen.”

He already knew where. Of course he did. But hearing it in her voice still made something crack.

“I bring a blanket,” she went on. “And coffee. And Pride and Prejudice, because I’m a walking cliché. I stay until morning.”

Jason felt like the helmet was too tight. His breath fogged up the inner HUD. He didn’t dare move.

“I don’t usually bring people,” she added. “Not ever. But I was thinking… if you wanted to come. You could.”

Jason���s head snapped up before he meant it to.

“You don’t have to,” she said quickly. “It’s dumb. Just me talking to a piece of rock for a few hours. But—” She hesitated. “You’re the first real friend I’ve had since he died. I figured… maybe you should meet him.”

Jason forgot how to breathe.

For a second, all he could hear was blood. Not in a poetic way. Literally—his pulse roaring in his ears, chest aching like something was trying to claw its way out.

Friend. She said friend. But the way she said it—quiet, steady, true—it was like being handed something breakable and sacred and entirely undeserved.

He couldn’t speak. Not yet. Just nodded once, sharp.

Y/N smiled, small and crooked. “Cool.”

She set the mug down on the floor beside him. Not on the table. Right next to his boot.

Then she flopped back down onto the couch and pulled the blanket over her face.

Conversation over.

Jason sat there, unmoving, watching the faint rise and fall of her breathing.

His helmet’s readout buzzed softly—elevated vitals. No shit.

She wanted him there. At the grave. Not as a soldier. Not as a name in her search history. As him.

And he said yes. And he meant it.

God help him.

--

Subject A: Age 22 Subject B: 4 years, 4.5 months post-resurrection April 27

She walked ahead of him, as always.

Jason let her.

The graveyard was quieter than usual—just the hush of wet grass under boots and the low, steady patter of rain trying to decide if it wanted to commit. Y/N didn’t bring a blanket this year. Or coffee. Just her hoodie, her voice, and him.

Jason followed in full gear. Hood up. Helmet on. Silent as the grave.

Literally.

When they reached the headstone, Y/N stopped. Took a breath. Then another. The kind you take before walking into a room where a version of yourself still lives.

She crouched beside the stone and brushed her sleeve across the marble like she always did. Her fingers lingered at the carved name.

Jason Peter Todd. Beloved Son.

Then she leaned forward and kissed it.

Jason looked away so fast his neck cracked.

“Hi, dumbass” she whispered. “The train was late. But I’m here. I brought someone, too. Hope you don’t mind.”

She turned slightly—looked over her shoulder, toward the shadow behind her.

“Come on,” she said. “It’s okay.”

Jason moved slowly, each step feeling too loud. The rain got bolder. He knelt beside her but didn’t touch the grave.

Didn’t breathe.

“This is Red Hood,” she said, gesturing between them like they weren’t already shoulder-to-shoulder. “He’s… my friend.”

She smiled at the stone. Then at him. Y/N kneeled, and pulled him down as well. They sat cross-legged facing the stone. 

“The first one I’ve had since you.”

Jason thought he might die again.

“He’s kind of awful,” she added. “But he keeps showing up. And bringing food. And I haven’t wanted to punch him in two whole weeks, which is saying something.”

The rain thickened without warning—sheets of cold cascading from the sky like someone up top had finally lost patience.

Y/N looked around, squinting at the sky. “Shit. I forgot the umbrella.”

Jason, who hadn’t moved in at least ten minutes, reached into his jacket and—wordlessly—pulled out an umbrella-adjacent object.

Y/N blinked at it.

“Is that… Gerald’s lace parasol?”

Jason shrugged. “He left it in the alley. I picked it up on the way here. Thought we might need it.”

Y/N snorted. “God, you’re ridiculous.”

Then she opened it halfway and dragged him under it without asking.

It was immediately clear that it was not built for two people—especially not two people in armor and emotional ruin. Her damp sleeve pressed against his jacket. Their knees knocked. Her hair was sticking to his cheek plate, and she didn’t even bother fixing it. The lace was already soaked through; water dripped through every delicate stitch, pooling at the rim and falling in uneven plops around their shoes.

They looked at eachother.

And then—cracked. The kind of laughter that came fast and real, unfiltered and soaked through. Y/N doubled over, face buried in the crook of her elbow. Jason shook silently beside her, shoulders trembling, the sound muffled behind the helmet.

Gerald’s parasol sagged.

They kept laughing anyway.

She looked at the grave. Then at him. Then back again. 

“I brought him,” she said slowly, easing out of laughter, “because I think you’d want to meet the guy who’s making me happy.”

Jason’s throat closed.

Y/N glanced up at him, voice dropping to a laugh-soft murmur. “You’d probably curse him out for cuddling with your girl over your grave. But you’d like him. Maybe.”

Jason couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak.

Then—

“I love him,” she said.

The words hung in the rain like smoke.

She turned to him, expression open. Real.

“I don’t know when it happened. I just know I look for him now. In the quiet. In the space between days. I like the way he shows up. I like the way he listens.”

Jason didn’t speak. Couldn’t.

The rain hit harder.

She blinked at him under the parasol. “If that scares you, it’s fine. You don’t have to say anything.”

Jason didn’t move for a second. Then—

“Don’t be mad,” he said. Quiet. Rough.

She tilted her head. “What?”

He swallowed. Inside the helmet, his hands had started to sweat. “Promise me. Don’t be mad.”

“Red—”

“Just—just promise.”

Y/N hesitated. Her brows furrowed. “Okay,” she said slowly. “I promise.”

Jason closed his eyes for a half-second. Exhaled through his nose.

Then reached up and took the helmet off.

It was quick. Clean. No ceremony. Just a click, a lift, and suddenly—

There he was.

Her Jason.

Older. Sharper. Jaw clenched like it might break. Hair longer (is that a white streak?), damp with rain, curls flattened to his forehead. The same look in his eyes. Tired. Terrified. Hopeful.

Y/N stared.

Her brain went blank. Then full. Then blank again.

She opened her mouth and made no sound.

Jason flinched. “Y/N—”

“WHAT THE FUCK,” she blurted.

She lurched to her feet. The umbrella wobbled violently. Jason scrambled up with her, hands out like he was trying to keep her from bolting.

“No—no, it’s me, I swear—”

“You’re dead,” she said, pointing at the grave. “You DIED. This is YOUR GRAVE.”

“I got better?” he tried.

She made a noise like a boiling tea kettle.

Her hands clenched and unclenched three times. She spun in a circle. Muttered something. Took a breath. Shook her head. Stared at him again.

“You—you were dead,” she whispered.

“I know.”

“You’re real.”

“I am.”

She reached forward—touched his chest, right over the armor. “You’re breathing.”

Jason nodded, too scared to blink.

Then she did something he wasn’t ready for.

She laughed.

Wet, broken, stunned. One huff, then another. And then, she flung her arms around him and buried her face in his shoulder.

He froze.

Then melted.

Jason wrapped both arms around her and held on like the world was still ending.

She was shaking. Laughing and crying at the same time. His hoodie was soaked through now. So was hers. Neither of them cared.

“You’re such an asshole,” she whispered. “But you’re here.”

“I’m here.”

“I’m gonna kill you.”

“I’ll die happy” he said, smiling into her hair.

She pulled back just enough to look at him. Her hands framed his face like he might disappear again if she let go.

“You’re real.”

“Yeah,” he said, voice wrecked.

“That’s all that matters.”

--

 PHASE III — REINTRODUCTION PROTOCOL: COMPLETE. CASE FILE #JX-1989 SUBJECT A: [Y/N] SUBJECT B: [J. TODD] STATUS: RESTORED

Final Investigator’s Note:

Subject A, long believed to be mourning an unresolved loss, made direct contact with Subject B seven years post-mortem under highly unorthodox conditions involving emotional confession, weather anomalies, and a formerly owned drug-dealer parasol.

Subject B removed helmet under extreme emotional duress. Subject A speedran the five stages of grief in under 60 seconds. No fatalities. Minimal property damage. Full romantic implosion.

Both parties appear to be fully alive. Fully in love. And fully ridiculous.

----

taglist : @4rachn3 , @mercuryathens , @the-halloween-jack , @milk-unleashed , @inkedinheels , @wonderbat385 , @feralwolfkat, @kasarian

[hisnumber1]

Devil's Embrace

Paring: Lucifer Morningstar x reader

Summery: (Y/n) had found herself at the hazbin hotel. She never thought of redemption but she got a free room while she does her work. (Y/n) made outfits and tailored for people if they pay enough. She loves trying to make unique dresses for balls or for higher class. Keeping her name in the high class of hell, she tailored for the king of hell himself. Finding herself tailoring for him in the hotel of his daughter is an interesting situation.

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Genre: fluff, slowburn, close proximity.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

I find myself leaning back in my seat, sighing. Watching AngleDust flirt with Husker and he growls in response. Charlie is putting more stuff on her board as she tries to figure out how to make the hotel work. I jump back on feet, strolling down the hallway ways to get to my room. I walk into my room filled with drawing and projects I've worked on. I fall flat on my face into my bed, I turn my head, looking at my recent project of a dress.

The dress was a long ballroom dress, with a long v going down the chest. The sleeves were mesh, and at the top it came off the shoulder. The skirt came out and poofed out, with the back covered in a long black mesh. The dress was white, with highlights of red, all of the mesh was black, giving it a dark energy.

Something just seems off, I don't know what it is but it just does. I hear a ping come from across the room. Lifting up my head and seeing my phone light up, I groan as I pull myself up. Walking to my table, I grab my phone and sit on the table. I read the notification, it was an email. I tapped on it, scanning over the text.

"Dear Ms. (L/n),

I hope this email finds you well. I recently purchased a suit, while I am pleased with the quality and style, I find that it is slightly larger than my measurements. Therefore, I am writing to inquire about the possibility of having it tailored to a smaller size.

The suit in question is a white Shawl Lapel with red highlights, the fabrics are jacquard and velvet, and I purchased it about a week ago. I have attached a copy of the receipt for your reference.

I would greatly appreciate it if you could provide me with information on the process and cost involved in resizing the suit. Additionally, if you require any further measurements or details, please do not hesitate to let me know.

I am eager to have the suit adjusted so that it fits perfectly, and I trust your expertise in handling this matter. I am available to schedule an appointment at your earliest convenience.

Thank you for your attention to this request. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Warm regards,

Lucifer Morningstar"

I sigh as I look at the photos he sent. It is a beautiful suit, but if I did it, the style would be better, but it is not mine. Thinking of what the price is, I need to get his exact measurements to tailor it correctly. Pressing the reply button, I started typing out my reply.

'Dear Mr. Morningstar,

Thank you for reaching out and for providing the details regarding your suit purchase. I appreciate your trust in our tailoring services.

I will be more than happy to assist you with resizing your suit to ensure a perfect fit. Before proceeding, could you please bring the suit to my studio for a fitting session? This will allow me to accurately assess the alterations needed and provide you with a precise cost estimate.

Once I have examined the suit, we will discuss the adjustments required and provide you with a timeline for completion.

Please let us know a convenient time for you to visit our store, and we will schedule an appointment accordingly. Feel free to contact us if you have any further questions or concerns.

Looking forward to seeing you soon and assisting you with your tailoring needs.

Best regards,

(Y/n) (L/n)'

I read over the email before hitting send. 'Wait, isn't Charlie his daughter?' I thought as I look back over his name. I press another reply button and put the the address, letting him know where he could meet me. Tossing my phone onto my bed, I walk out into the lobby again, sitting on the bar stool. "A shot of anything strong." I grumbled at Husk, he was cleaning a glass when he heard me. "What's the occasion?" He asked grabbing a shot glass before pouring some. "Work." I groan with my head on the bar, keeping my eyes shut, my headache gets worse with light.

"Ever thought of getting anything for those migraines?" Husk asked when he placed down the shot, I look up, grabbing the shot and downing it. "Another please. I've looked into it, but I don't need to, I'll just deal with it." Sighing as I push the shot towards Husk. He shakes his head as he pours another one, pushing it towards me. Taking the glass and downing it again.

I hear Charlie in the lobby talking to Vaggie about something, I turn to her. "Hey Charlie. Your dad is gonna come in a few days." I slur out, catching her attention she turned me wide eyed. "What?" She asked as she walked closer. "I'm tailoring a suit of his, I told him I need to take measurements cause he could have grown in the last year." I replied to her. "So he's coming to the hotel?" "Yeah, I think so." Replying to her she chuckled a but before pacing back and forth. "He's only gonna be in my room, just to get measured. He's one my highest paying customers." I chuckle, feeling the alcohol get to my system.

"He emailed me a few minutes ago about getting a suit tailored. I told him that I needed for take his measurements and then I would come up with the price." I explain to her. Charlie's pacing got faster, but she's stops when Vaggie puts her hand on her shoulder. "When would he be here?" Vaggie asked me and I shrugged.

"I can go see if he answered if you would like?" I got up from my seat, walking to my room. Opening my door, I walk to my bed, grabbing my phone. I look at the notifications, seeing a email. I walk out to the lobby, opening the email.

"Dear Ms. (L/n),

Thank you for your prompt response and for offering to assist with resizing my suit. I appreciate your attention to detail and professionalism in addressing my tailoring needs.

I will certainly bring the suit to your studio for a fitting session. I propose scheduling the appointment for this Friday afternoon around 2:00 PM. Please let me know if this time works for you, or if an alternative time would be more convenient.

I look forward to meeting with you and discussing the necessary alterations. Thank you once again for your assistance, and I am confident in your expertise to ensure a perfect fit for my suit.

Best regards,

Mr. Morningstar"

I read out loud. Charlie pauses and starts pacing again. "He can't come. We don't even know if this works. If he comes he'll know I failed." Charlie said lowly, Vaggie hugs her and kisses her cheek. "It'll be fine love." She said as she pulled away from the hug. Vaggie looked over at me and sighed. "He'll be here in two days, just make sure he is only here for that a not going anywhere else. Charlie isn't ready to face him at the moment." She said as she looked up at the clock to check the time.

I nod, I grab the shot glass and down the last one before walking to my room. Falling onto my bed, a breath left my lungs as I hit the bed. I turn over and pick up my phone, unlocking it and looking at the photo of the suit. Thinking for a second, it looks a lot like the dress. Looking between my phone and the dress on the lay figure, they would look together.

Standing up from my bed, I tiptoe to the sewing mannequin. I run my finger across it, looking back at the photo and then back at the dress. A light bulb lit up and I ran to my desk, grabbing safety pins. Taking out my sewing needles, turning on my machine, grabbing buttons. I pull the mannequin next to the desk, sketching out the idea in my head.

A bang woke me from my slumber, I jerk up and look around. Standing in my door way is AngleDust, he looks out of breath. "(Y/n)! My shirt is ruined!" He said as he walked closer with his torn shirt. I groan and put my head back on the desk. "You alright toots?" He asks as he puts his arm on my shoulder. "I'm fine, I finally figured out what was wrong with the dress, and I fixed it. There is a problem though, Lucifer is gonna be here tomorrow and he's kinda matching with his suit." A groan left my mouth, Angle walks over to dress. "It's gorgeous. I mean it's always been." He said as he looked over it.

Sighing as I felt my eyes closing. I stayed up all night working on it, adding new fabrics, adding the details. I felt myself falling asleep again as Angle looked over the dress.

My eyes slowly open, I groan as I sit up. "My back hurts like hell." Groaning as I stood up. It looked dark out, I must have slept all day. Walking out of my room into the lobby, the lights were still on so someone was awake. Yawning as I walk to the bar, my eyes saw Alastor, he was sitting on the couch as he read a newspaper. "Morning Al." I yawn as I pour myself something to drink.

His head perked up at my voice. "Morning, you know it's in the late afternoon right?" He asked as he placed his newspaper down.

"Yeah, I didn't sleep last night. So I slept all day." Yawning as I walk over to the couch, sitting next to Alastor. "Why didn't you sleep?" He asked as he sipped his drink. "Working on that dress." I groan. He hummed in response. I downed the rest of my drink before standing up. "Well Lucifer is coming over tomorrow, so I need to sleep. Night Al." "Oh goodnight (Y/n)." He grinned.

I step into my room, closing the door behind me. Sighing as I walk over to my bed, sitting on the edge before falling backwards. Grunting at the sudden stop, I throw my arm over my eyes, slowly drifting off to sleep.

Waking up to my alarm, I groan. I slowly sit up and turn off my phone. I whimper as the sun hits my eyes, I have to get ready and clean up for the appointment. I pick up my phone reading the time, but I saw that I had a email.

'Dear Ms. (Y/n),

Hello, I hope this email finds you in good health. I wanted to make an appointment to have a meeting. I want some new clothes by your hand. If you have the time for a meeting please contact me.

Love,

Valentino <3'

I read over the email before putting my phone down. I really don't want to deal with him right now, I sighed as I went to my drawers. Pulling out some presentable clothes, then walking to my restroom to take a shower. I turn the knob letting the water start, after I pull my clothes off of me, letting it hit the floor. Pulling my undergarments off before sliding into the shower. The hot water hitting my skin and wetting every inch of my body.

I put shampoo in my hair and scrub it in, soap going down my body as I rinse my hair out. Grabbing the bottle for conditioner, letting my hair run under water. Pouring some into my hand before scrubbing it into my scalp. I let the conditioner soak, I wash my body before rinsing off everything. Turning off the water, I grab a towel and put it around my body.

Walking into my room, striding to my bed, where I put my clothes. Taking the towel and drying off my hair before dressing myself. After wards I look at the time, it read 12:47 pm. I sigh, I still have almost two hours before he gets here. I look around the room, seeing my room is a mess, knowing us have to clean it sooner or later.

Cleaning up my room, putting everything in place before he gets here and picking up trash and dirty laundry. I organized everything and I looked at the time, it was 1:36 pm. My eyes widen as I look at the time. "Shit he'll be here soon!" I yelled at myself and I got a new mannequin out for the suit, making sure I knew where everything I needs was. Keeping track of time, I brushed my hair and put on light makeup, so I didn't look like I was dying.

Getting myself mentally prepared to see the sin of pride. He was cocky everytime you saw him, not a bad cocky but like 'he knows he's hot and he's not afraid to show it off' cocky. The man was hot, I can't denie that.

I walk to the lobby waiting for the knock, not a second later I hear it. Walking to the door, slowly opening it to reveal Lucifer. "(Y/n), it's been to long." He grinned as walked in to the hotel, his eyes shifted all over the lobby. "We will be working in a room back here, just follow me." I say as I lead the way to my room. He gladly follows along behind me, still looking everywhere. We make it to my room and I close the door after he walks in.

"Now if you would please stand here." I ask him to stand on a X mark on the floor. He looked down and nods with a smile. "So how have you been (Y/n)? I haven't seen you in about a year." He asked as he gave me the suit. "Eh, tired. I have been working on a new dress over that year, I finally finished it the day before yesterday." I reply, setting the suit on the mannequin.

"Yeah? May I see it?" He asked as he looked around my room. I nodded and I walked into my other room, I have to rooms attached to each other for my bed room and my studio. Rolling the mannequin out, the jewels sparkled in the sun light.

"That is gorgeous." Lucifer said as he walked over, feeling the fabric. "It looks a little familiar." He said as he put his hand on his chin. His eyes caught on the suit and he gasped. "It's like a set! The dress and my suit." Lucifer stated as his eyes light up. I chuckled and nodded. "I noticed that when you sent me the photos."

"I would love to buy it." He said as he looked at it. I stopped in my tracks. "What?" I asked with a chuckle. "How much, I could gift it to my daughter." He stated as he started pulling out his wallet. "I'm not selling it right now. I actually made it for myself, kinda a dream dress." I chuckled nervously.

You could practly hear his face light up. "I've never seen you wear a dress." He said surprised. "Well yeah, I don't like wearing them." "You should put it on." He said. "No." I said flatly.

"Oh come on (Y/n). You even match with the king if hell, why not put it on?" He asked. "Lucifer, I need to start measurements, please stand where you were." I said with no tone. He was a persistent man. "Come on, I would love to see you in it." He purred out. "Lucifer arms up." I said with a measuring tape in my hands. "Come on." He whined out.

As he is begging me to put on the dress, I just ignore him and measure his body. As I measuring his bust to his groan there was blast and the hotel shaked. Causing Lucifer to tumble over and fall on me.

I closed my eyes at feeling of the rumbling, so I didn't know how close he was to me. "Well hello gorgeous." I hear Lucifer say, I open my eyes to see his face a few inches away from mine. "Oh you're wearing makeup, it looks good on you." He complemented me. "Lucifer get up." I say as I start pushing him. "I am darling." He chuckled. Standing up, he offered me a hand, which I gladly took.

"Well that didn't sound good." He stated as he dusted himself off, I nodded in agreement. "I actually finished measuring you, I would probably charge you about $230." I said as I looked over my notebook, adding the measurements. "Always straight to business. That's what I liked about you." He chuckled. Taking money from his wallet, handing it over to me, before I pull away he takes my hand, bringing it to his lips. Kissing my knuckles for a moment before pulling away. "Well I'll see myself out, and you should probably check what that sound was." Lucifer said as he started walking out of my room.

Watching him walk off, I felt the heat leave my face. When did that happen? When did my face get so hot? I asked myself, but just blew it off as me just getting hot. Placing down my money on the table, and I hear another bang. Groaning as more rubble falls down in my room. "Ughhh! What is that!?" I yelled out.

A/n: My first story on here and I plan to write more. Sorry if I update slow but I'll get around to doing it!

[qichun]

❅ 17:15

❅ minors do not interact | 830 words | taglist

❅ contents: Wriothelsey had missed your birthday due to his duties in the fortress of Meropede. he pulls out all the works to make it up to you.

❅ warnings: fem!reader (no pronouns used.), author has never used a slow cooker before so i was free balling it, pet names used (my love), reader is smaller than wriothesley

❅ event: the sapling café's secret santa for @mlkbwunnies sorry i'm late. <3

❅ authors note: two fics in two days, who is he?

❅ no ai scraping allowed | reblogs and feedback are appreciated!! Graphics by @/saradika-graphics

The Duke of Fontaine doesn’t often have the opportunity to take time away from his duties at the Fortress of Meropede. When he leaves the confines of the prison, he is usually on emergency business or has been called to the surface by the Sovereign Neuvillette. Though the Duke considers this matter the biggest emergency he has encountered to date, he is late. Not only is he late, but he is days late, and he hasn’t been able to find the time to write a letter to explain his absence on his beloved’s birthday. Instead of wasting time with a letter, he decided he would make haste and prepare to make up for his tardiness.

His first order of business was heading to the docks. Since Fontaine’s catastrophe was diverted, the docks had been open to more nations, namely Liyue Harbor. Since the reconnection with Liyue Harbor, new ingredients that couldn’t be grown in Fontaine had become increasingly in demand. He made his way to the large ship named The Crux, with its large red sails folded. He was glad they had yet to close up for the evening. He made quick work of purchasing the necessary amount of bamboo shoots and wine for the dinner he wanted to make.

Once he had bid farewell to the crew, he made his way to Fontaine’s own market streets, where he could find the rest of the ingredients fresher and cheaper than at the imports dock. He had to haggle with a few of the vendors, but he managed to stay within his budget. He had two more stops before he headed to see his beloved. His first stop was Café Lutece to purchase your favourite dessert, Fontinalia mousse, before visiting Boucicaut at his store to buy you a bouquet of your favourite flowers, pluie lotus.

He looked at his pocket watch to check the time; he wanted to make sure you were still at work before he entered your residence. He hung his coat on the coat rack before swapping his large boots for house slippers. He padded toward your kitchen to place the ingredients in the fridge, especially the mousse, before searching for an empty vase. He filled the vase with water before cutting the ends off the stems of the flowers, methodically placing them in the vase. Once upon a time, he didn’t know how to prepare flowers; too rough around the edges to handle such delicate things, it was only after meeting you that he learned how to be gentle.

He placed the full vase on the kitchen table, with two fresh candles on either side, before he washed his hands so he could prepare dinner while waiting for you to return. He slowly worked through scoring and preparing the meat, along with the spices, bamboo shoots, and soup broth. An hour later, the house was filled with mouthwatering scents. This was the scene that welcomed you when you entered your home, you were tired and not expecting company, but a small smile pulled onto your lips.

“Welcome home, my love.” Wriothesley’s smooth voice called from the kitchen, where he was preparing the table for you to eat. You had been planning to order in since you were too tired to cook for yourself, before you released a sigh of relief knowing you didn’t have to.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” You wanted to be mad; you wanted to be upset, but you could see the flowers on the table, the bamboo shoot soup in the slow cooker, and the sheepish, apologetic look on his usually calm and collected exterior.

“I suppose this is a start to making it up to me,” you spoke sternly, wanting to make him squirm while waiting for your forgiveness, even though you forgave him the moment you stepped through the door.

Wriothesley led you to the table, where he placed the casserole dish of bamboo shoot soup before lighting the candles on either side, bathing the dimly lit kitchen in a warm glow. Dinner was a quiet affair, your small hand held gently in his much larger hand as if it were fragile. There were soft whispered declarations of love, apologies, and hugs; all of the stress that lined both of your shoulders melted away in the warmth of each other. After you had both finished your dinner, he led you to the living room to sit in the pile of blankets he had prepared for your return.

You waited in front of the fire; he returned from the kitchen with a plate of Fontinalia mousse in one hand and two mugs of hot chocolate in the other. He placed the treats on the low coffee table before pulling you into his lap in the pile of blankets. “Happy birthday, my love.” You spent the rest of the evening enjoying his warmth and comfort, the crackling of the fire filling the air as you watched the light snow fall onto the Fontanian streets.

[safarigirlsp]

From the Pages of the Penny Dreadfuls

Victorian Vampire Jacques Le Gris x OC Georgette

Word Count: 31.8k

Warnings: NSFW. Action. Graphic Violence. Gruesome Horror. Romance. Old Timey Sexism. Hot Toxic Masculinity. Conniving Bitches. Victorian Setting. Vampires. I play a little loose with time and events, but they are all within a couple years if not a couple weeks. But I also play a little loose with vampires and cowboys, so whatever.

AO3 Link

I'm finally catching up on some old requests. This is one from @napiersmirk that I probably bastardized totally, but hopefully there's some fun stuff in here. This is basically a 30k shitshow with Victorian Vampire Jacques and a Cowgirl.

Once upon an autumn dreary. Sir Jacques Le Gris modified the words to one of his favorite poems to suit his surroundings and mood, hearing it as an internal monologue as he strolled down Martin’s Lane toward Trafalgar Square. The nighttime air was cool and humid, the stars hidden behind a stormy veil. Mist crept low, slithering through the streets. It was the kind of weather Jacques loved most, when his breath fogged from his lips like ghosts wrought upon the darkness. In high spirits, he gave his ebony cane a twirl, letting the silver grip in the shape of a wolf’s head turn in palm. The streets were unusually vacant. Those damned Ripper murders were keeping people inside at night. Not only did the Ripper have the nerve to frighten the ladies of London, but he also had the gall and plain bad form to stain Jacques’s name. He went by Jack occasionally, usually when dealing with English and Americans, it seemed simpler for them. Jacques pondered solutions to this nuisance, as he had many evenings before. The best solution to the problem, both society’s and Jacques’s, was likely the simplest – for Jacques to hunt the hunter, victimize the villain. Bleed the butcher dry. He grinned at the thought, his tongue subconsciously tracing the peak of his canine.

But that was a game for another night.

Tonight, Jacques was on a simpler mission. Priding himself a champion of the arts, Jacques took pleasure in seeing the arts and the shows London had to offer. He was a man who enjoyed a spectacle, even if he was not partaking. Although he greatly preferred the latter. It was a wonderful time to be alive, Jacques knew better than most. From P.T. Barnum’s great circuses to group seances and magicians performing grand stage acts, spectacles were all the rage. Queen Victoria was celebrating her fiftieth year on the throne, drawing in crowds from across the empire and motivating every performer to put on his best.

Lithograph posters advertising performances of all varieties were plasters to the sides of buildings, ranging in size from a common portrait to as large as a bedsheet. Smaller letter-size fliers clung to every pole within reach of the urchins who earned a pittance by scattering them about the city. The posters called to Jacques as he strolled past. Thoroughbreds raced across a field of green on a poster for the Epsom Derby. A darkly handsome man stood in front of a gilded portrait advertising for the play The Picture of Dorian Gray. A snarling tiger faced a roaring lion on a poster for P.T. Barnum’s Circus. The infamous magician, Kylo the Malevolent, wore his signature black tailcoat and held a ball of flame in one hand while he conjured dark forces with the other in the poster for his show at the Royal Albert Hall. Even the wanted posters for Jack the Ripper were lost in the collage of lithographs. A Bohemian freakshow was passing through London this week on its way to Paris, the posters advertising its oddities littered across buildings and walls. Jacques saw a poster for the World’s Strongest Man displaying a burly man in a singlet with simian body hair flexing a monstrous arm. Next to him was a poster for a man labeled Ink Well who was tattooed over every inch of his skin.

Jacques stopped in front of a haberdashery he frequented. He had even purchased the tophat he wore at present there. Instead of the usual tophats, canes, and derbys that regularly filled the display window, there were now American style cowboy hats with different shaped crowns, and even two pairs of western chaps, one crafted from thick woolly sheepskin and another from splotchy grey sealskin. On either side of the display windows, the building was plastered with posters, unique from the others, that caught Jacques’s eye. Galloping horses, stampeding buffalo, cowboys with six-shooters, cowgirls with lever-actions, and a lively white-haired man with an impressive Van Dyke made the wall come alive with the spectacle of the American West.

In celebration of the Queen’s Golden Jubilee, Buffalo Bill was bringing his Wild West Show across the ocean to perform for her. Buffalo Bill was rumored to travel with well over one-hundred people, including gunslingers, Native Americans, sharpshooters, vaqueros, trick riders, and musicians. A menagerie of animals was also part of his troop: horses, mules, and longhorns, naturally, but also domesticated wildlife including buffalo and elk. Jacques wondered how much of that travelling zoo would accompany Buffalo Bill on his visit to England. Jacques hoped the store owner was getting a commission from Bill for all this free advertising. He decided he would purchase a new hat for the occasion and encourage his friend, Pierre to do the same. The comically large ten-gallon cowboy hat center stage in the display window would call to Pierre as seductively as a Parisian courtesan. Pierre would be an easy sell, always eager to parade new trappings that might impress the ladies. When Jacques had informed Pierre that he had secured the company of a pair of prima ballerinas from the Russian ballet to accompany him to the Wild West Show, Pierre had boasted that he would be attending with a trio of blondes from a theater troupe.

Smiling at his schemes, Jacques tapped his cane on the cobblestone and continued on into the square in the brisk, long strides he favored when he wasn’t ambling slowly in consideration of a female companion. Only a handful of people walked through the square, mostly couples and one raucous group of obviously drunk young men. There wasn’t enough traffic to keep the light fog from settling over the cobblestones, and it draped them in a spectral haze. With the Ripper at large, it was rare to see lone women and even lone men out at night unless it was unavoidable, or in the areas of town where the three-penny-uprights conducted their business. Jacques was surprised to see one lone woman in the square, standing at the base of Nelson’s Column. So surprised that he stopped short and simply stared at her for a long moment. She faced away with her neck craned to look up at the column, and a lovely neck it was. The grey coat she wore hung down past her knees and its black astrakhan collar rose nearly to her ears. The only bit of skin to be seen was a narrow satiny strip above the fur collar and below her hairline; her hair was piled on top of her head in an intricate bun, courteously enough to allow that tantalizing peekaboo of skin. She wore no hat nor fascinator, and was likewise free of a bustle in a rather risqué defiance of custom. Jacques’s eyes were well-seasoned at discerning ladies’ figures, and he could tell this one was shapely and alluring.

Jacques was striding toward her before he knew he had commanded his feet to do so. In the midst of the Ripper murders, he felt compelled to offer his company. That’s what he told himself. He might be every bit as violent and villainous as good ol’ Jack, but he was also a gentleman. Hearing his bootsteps on the cobblestone, the woman turned to face him, fixing him with a level gaze that speared straight into his eyes. There was nothing soft or demure about the way she looked at him, it was almost enough to freeze him in place like Medusa’s stare. Her eyes were luminous, seeming to catch all the scant light and reflect it back like starlight in the foggy night. She cocked an eyebrow at him when he came to stand beside her, silently but icily inquiring as to his purpose.

Most ladies would have looked away from him after so long a glance, or have broken the silence with a giggle or a pleasantry. This woman allowed the silence to spark in the air around them while her eyes appraised him mercilessly. She was terrifyingly beautiful, and her bold countenance beguiled him into smiling.

“I, too, find the sights more pleasing when admired in darkness,” Jacques said, feeling foolish for allowing himself to lose this small battle of brinksmanship.

“The solitude of darkness is what I find most pleasing. The solitude you’re intruding upon, I might add,” she answered. “I cannot abide crowds and mulling herds of humanity.”

“London seems a poor fit for you,” Jaques returned.

“I’m only visiting.” She smirked. “Admiring the sights, as you said.”

“As a visitor, you might not be aware of the dangers,” Jacques said more seriously than he preferred when speaking to an alluring woman. “Have you not heard of Jack the Ripper?”

She made to roll her eyes, but stopped herself and sighed instead, “I hope you’re not going to tell me that a lady shouldn’t be out alone at night. It’s very tiresome advice.”

“Of course not,” he lied. He was absolutely going to offer that exact advice. Instead, he added, “I am never tiresome.”

“Oh dear, you’re not waiting for me to agree?” She smirked again. Jacques liked that smirk, even if it was at his expense.

“No concern for the Ripper, and no concern for your reputation, being out at night without a chaperone. A lady should be more cautious.” Jacques grinned back at her. “Your wit may be rapier, but it won’t save you against such dangers.”

“Between my rapier wit and my derringer, I feel quite safe.” She patted her coat pocket. “My reputation in London doesn’t concern me.”

“Ah, yes, you’re only visiting.” Jacques took a step closer to her. Her scent curled into his nose, something sultry and sweet like roses and cinnamon. “How long is your visit?”

“Perhaps I should be flattered by your attention.” She sounded entirely un-flattered. “But I am intentionally alone. I am not desirous of company. Hence the hour and my relaxed state of dress.”

“If not this evening, perhaps you would grace me with the pleasure of your company another time.” Jacques flashed his handsomest smile. “Only this evening, I was thinking how grand a night at the Wild West Show will be.” He would cancel his rendezvous with the ballerinas in a heartbeat in favor of her. He inclined his head and said simply, “Join me.”

A smile bloomed on her lips, then she laughed lightly. “I already have an invitation, I’m afraid.”

“Decline whatever other invitation you have and accept mine,” he pressed. “You will not be disappointed. You have my word.”

“Mine is an invitation I cannot decline.” She smiled wider. “Besides, no seat is closer to the action than mine.”

“If the Wild West Show doesn’t strike your fancy, I can show you the sights,” Jacques offered. “Dr. Ren’s Cabinet of Curiosities is all the rage. Have you ever seen a satyr skeleton or a book bound in human skin?”

“A book bound in human skin? You know the way to a girl’s heart,” she laughed. “But my Saturday engagement must stand, I’m afraid.”

“Then permit me to walk you to your lodgings,” he countered. “Where are you staying during your visit?”

“I’ll permit you to say good evening right here.” Her demeanor was pleasant now, but she pointedly ignored his question on where he might find her again.

“May I at least know the name of the lady who is so immune to my charms?” Jacques asked as he took off his tophat and shook a persistence cowlick back from his face.

“Georgette,” she answered, offering her hand.

“Jacques Le Gris.” He introduced himself with a flourished bow, then kissed the back of her hand.

“Good evening, Jacques Le Gris.” She gave him one last smile, turned, and walked away.

Jacques followed her with his eyes as she departed. The sway of her hips was almost hypnotizing. He waited for her to look back, but she didn’t. Their small exchange replayed in his mind, her bold and beautiful face already imprinted on his memory. A rare and radiant maiden, indeed. He waited until she turned down a street and then he followed her anyway, gliding almost soundlessly over the cobblestones. He was as at ease in the darkness as any creature of the night, and he knew how to use the foggy gloom to cloak his movements. He would make sure she was safe during her foolishly imperious stroll. And he would know where to find her again.

*******************************************************************************************

Trailing the woman at a discreet distance, Jacques could savor her scent as strong and lovely on the air as the smell of a flower shop with fresh blooms. It required a heroic effort of will to restrain himself from chasing her down and snatching her up in his arms. He attempted to keep the thoughts and images of what he wanted to do next out of his mind, but that was a hopeless endeavor. He watched her until she safely entered the Grand Royale Hotel, and contemplated his next move. It was within his ability to compel her to come to her window and see him again in whatever light he wished, even to do after she undressed for the night.

But such parlor tricks would cheapen the hunt.

Big Ben had not yet tolled midnight. The night was young and Jacques was on fire, his senses alighted by the woman and desire burning through him in a rage. Frustrated and ravenous was no way to spend a perfectly dreary evening. He gave the cobblestones a decisive tap with his cane and walked toward a less upscale part of the city. His destination was far enough to warrant a carriage, but Jacques enjoyed a brisk stroll and it would be unwise to create any witnesses who knew of his haunt. A man as illustrious as Jacques had airs to maintain. Not that Pierre ever bothered with discretion. Jacques grinned and shook his head at the thought. How that philandering bastard hadn’t outed them both yet was a miracle.

Heading West, Jacques met few people and no other women. A few men returning late from their jobs passed him, their faces streaked with coal and grime. One rough-looking man in a bowler hat loitered in a doorway, holding the leash of a Bull Terrier. The man watched Jacques, appraising him, no doubt calculating his odds of successfully mugging the much larger man. Jacques hoped the man would try, it would be a fine bit of sport for the evening. The terrier knew better, whimpering and hiding its white face against the man’s leg. Animals always sensed Jacques’s nature more quickly than men. He again cursed the Ripper for bringing increased scrutiny to the streets and the bobbies out in force. This was the sort of hooligan who wouldn’t be missed, easy prey for Jacques to remove from the streets and perform a public service at the same time.

His destination was near Holborn Hill. Jacques paused to admire the shop’s sign, a fine piece of reverse glass depicting a green serpentine dragon with long whiskers and a fanned tail coiled intricately through gold letters that spelled Snap Dragon. The dragon’s clawed hands clutched the D and its head reared above the letter, snarling at incoming patrons. The Snap Dragon was an apothecary that stocked the rarest compounds and elixirs to be found in England. Rumor had it that Prince Albert purchased tonics there known to cure the pox and other maladies.

Now nearing midnight, the apothecary was closed when Jacques strode past its door. He turned down the narrow alley that separated the apothecary from the butcher next door, as black as a crevasse in the foggy darkness. He descended a set of stairs and stopped in front of a recessed iron door that appeared neglected and disused. Jacques rapped his knuckles on the iron in a peculiar rhythm and waited. The door swung in on well-oiled hinges without a squeak, admitting Jacques into the real business of the Snap Dragon. The apothecary, lucrative though it was, was a front for an opium den – a far better business than herbal remedies. Prince Albert also frequented this side of the business, and heartily enjoyed the expensive courtesans who could be enticed to entertain the delirious patrons for a fee.

Gossamer green haze wafted through the darkened parlor. It was a trick of the lighting, achieved with candles hidden inside green silk lanterns, sneakily engineered to give the ever-present smoke an ethereal quality. The effect was eerie, especially when paired with the dozens of barely conscious men reclining on futons and pillows, crooning, laughing, coughing, draped in smoky green gloaming. Most of the movements inside the den were languid and hazy, save for the sober attendants and one topless courtesan who bounced eagerly on the lap of a nearly unconscious man, determined to earn her fee whether or not the man was aware when he crossed the finish line. The first few breaths inside the den were always terrible for Jacques, as his heightened senses acclimated to the pungent scents of opium, unwashed men, and overused women.

A tall, sinewy woman wearing a brocade dress embroidered with dragons and flowers materialized out of the haze and fixed her black eyes on Jaques. Her smile was razor sharp when she greeted him. Jacques had known her a very long time, since she had been a dancer in Bohemia, long before her latest trade helping men chase the dragon. She had been beautiful then, long ago, in her former life. Pierre had been fond of her all those years ago, and she was eternally indebted to him for the gift he had bestowed upon her. Now, she was seen by most as exotic, with her abyssal black eyes, gaunt features, and straight jet hair that contrasted starkly with a completion that was almost translucent in its paleness. She looked to Jacques a bit like a dehydrated corpse. It was enough to unnerve a brave man when she smiled her shark’s smile at Jacques and told him to make himself at home.

Jacques threaded his way through the parlor to a private room hidden away in the back. Before entering, he could hear the familiar laughter of his oldest friend and the giggles of several women. The door was closed, but Jacques didn’t bother knocking. It had been many years since Pierre had managed to shock him.

Tonight was no different. Pierre D’Alencon bolted up from the large futon in the center of the room, ready to chastise the intruder. His blonde hair was disheveled, his pale chest flushed, but he smiled when he recognized Jacques. Wearing only an open kimono-style robe that did nothing to conceal his naked body, nor the tumescent evidence of his antics with the eight naked women flitting around him. He didn’t bother to cover himself when he gestured magnanimously and said, “Come in! Take your pants off!”

“Are any of them still fresh?” Jacques asked as he shrugged out of his overcoat and tossed it over the back of an obliging chair. His cane and tophat followed.

“Yes, you’re in luck. I’ve only just begun to defile them,” Pierre answered and the women laughed. “Where in the blazes have you been? I expected you hours ago. Now, we’ve only a few hours left before dawn approaches in all its intrusive goddamn glory.”

“I met a rather striking woman enroute.” Jacques smiled, picturing her.

“Oh, good. Is she here?” Pierre made to look around Jacques’s body toward the door.

“Certainly not!” Jacques laughed. “I barely got her name. She was most –"

“Did you hear what I said?” Pierre cut him off. “You’re burning darkness yammering on about some strange woman who wouldn’t give you the time of night. I won’t allow it! Get in the proper spirit of the evening or take your doldrums elsewhere.”

Two of the four women approached Jacques, sashaying their hips. They stroked his chest and began untying his ascot then unbuttoning his vest and shirt. Jacques continued talking to Pierre, unbothered by the women caressing his bare chest or Pierre maneuvering his selection of women back toward the futon. “You haven’t seen this one, my friend. Beautiful and strong. The kind of woman who could use some evil inside her.”

“Talking of only one woman while you’re in the company of several fine others is blasphemy,” Pierre said as he fell upon a pair of women on the futon, his kimono fluttering above his comically pasty ass.

Jacques persisted in telling Pierre about the mystery woman, paying the women in his present company little mind until the most ambitious of the two began shoving his trousers down his muscled thighs. When she traced her nails along his rapidly swelling cock, he decided he could continue this conversation later. He led the women toward a larger couch set against the far wall and fell back into the center of the push cushions. Another woman sat at the end of the couch, draped over the armrest, pale and delirious. Blood was smeared across her neck from her jaw to her collarbone, still oozing slowly from a pair of twin puncture wounds.

“You’ve been careless with that one,” Jacques said to Pierre as he gripped the hips of the nearest woman and assisted her in settling over his lap. He thrust up into the woman and added, “Best show some restraint with the others.”

“She’ll be as good as new after a good night’s rest and a good meal,” Peirre replied nonchalantly as several women crawled over him. “I’ll pay her extra. There are no surprises when they service us here.” He looked at one of the women and asked, “Are there, dearie?”

In response, she held her wrist up to Pierre’s lips, inviting him to drink from her.

Jacques found himself distracted from the task at hand. Despite being buried to the hilt in the woman writing in his lap and with another pawing at him from beside, his mind was still filled with thoughts of the woman he had met earlier, his nose still filled with her extraordinarily alluring bouquet. A most unnatural feeling came over him, one he hadn’t felt in ages. He felt a pang of guilt now, which was wholly unwarranted since he was beholden to no one. Certainly not to a woman who didn’t even want him to walk her home like a gentleman and who had given him a rather decisive brush off. In defiance, he thrust up harder into the woman straddling his lap. But if there was any doubt in his mind before that he wouldn’t seek out the beautiful stranger, he was now filled with resolve to find her again.

Trailing his hand up the woman’s back, he gripped the nape of her neck and drew her closer. His canines had descended in razor points, as eager to sink into warm flesh as the rest of his body. He didn’t bother to kiss the woman’s skin or entice her before he bit into her neck. He didn’t have to give, Pierre had paid her well for them to dispassionately take. It was always difficult to restrain himself when the first rush of blood coated his tongue. The primal part of him wanted to rip into her soft flesh like a wild beast; to feel muscle and sinew tear in his mouth; to feel hot blood coat his lips and drench him down to his chest. But he restrained himself, sipping the woman with gentlemanly care and only taking enough to sate himself for a while.

Restraint was the most important skill any vampire who wanted longevity must learn. Many vampires would say that either anonymity or community were of paramount importance. Vampires who prospered outside of cloistered covens or seclusion were the rarest of all their species. None had prospered better nor more infamously than Jacques and Pierre for nearly five-hundred-fifty years. Jacques attributed this to restraint more than anything else, not being glutinous or wanton when it came to prey and hunting. It was one of the few areas in life he exercised restraint at all, and it had taken him more than a century to master.

If one asked Pierre the key to survival, his answer was simple. Joie de vivre! If a man isn’t enjoying life, every moment can be agony. Immortality would be a terrible curse for the poor bastard who doesn’t live life to the fullest. Pierre had lived by this creed for centuries, flaunting his lifestyle to the more conversative of their species. He even made it a personal game of sorts to seduce the hunters who would find them on occasion. Most could be seduced by money or pleasure, and Pierre was generous with both. Jacques had a hotter temper and less patience. He enjoyed tearing apart anyone who threatened him or the small handful of people for whom he had genuine affection.

The grunts and whimpers coming from the futon creaking beneath Pierre and three women indicated that he was indeed living life to fullest at present. Jacques allowed himself to finish quickly, not bothering to hold himself back, and sipped from the woman as much as he dared. The woman’s body was limp and her head lolled sideways when Jacques lifted her off his lap and maneuvered her onto the couch beside him. She slumped against the semi-conscious woman Pierre had used earlier. Jacques watched her for a moment, satisfying himself that she would recover after a few hours. Turning to look at the unused woman on his other side, Jacques grinned and patted his thigh as an invitation. He was more eager to drink from her than fuck her, but those pleasures were best when paired together. Sinking back deeper into the couch, he gripped the base of his cock, positioning it for the woman as she smiled in delight at his impressive size then kicked her leg over his lap.

Vampires needed only seconds to recover between bouts. Jacques could do this all night, until all the women were spent or he became bored with them. The latter had been an increasing problem over the last century. His body was willing, but his interest was waning. Whereas Pierre never grew bored so long as he kept a variety of women parading through his sheets, Jacques had long ago grown weary of much of humanity. The fleeting, meaningless interactions he had with them bored him and left him deeply unsatisfied. Sometimes, he still found humor, even joy, in humanity. Other times, he felt as though they were a plague crawling over the earth like maggots on a carcass. Vampires were even worse, a macabre and morose lot whose tastes tended toward one perversion or another. That was a point on which Jacques and Pierre had always agreed, hedonism is far superior to perversion, and also just simpler.

After finishing with the second woman and using a third, Jacques reclined in a chair as he ruminated on these matters that were never far from his thoughts. He hadn’t troubled himself to redress fully and sat in his trousers and unbuttoned shirt. He swirled a glass of smoky green absinthe, his gaze fixed pensively at an unremarkable patch of floral wallpaper, unbothered by the raucous sounds of Pierre and the last pair of conscious women.

It wasn’t the Green Fairy that danced in his mind, but visions of the mysterious woman and her addictive scent. That she was beautiful didn’t hurt matters at all, but that fact alone would have held little appeal to him beyond wanting to possess her for a few evenings. When a man had centuries to hunt, even beauty grew common. Rarer than beauty was wit, and rarer still was nerve. Jacques had assessed her as having all three attributes. It may have been a hopeful guess, but he was rarely wrong in assessing women. He considered himself something between a connoisseur and a sommelier of fine ladies, and hers was a vintage like nothing he had tasted in ages.

First he had to find her again, and he would. He thought through what he would do to ensnare her, captivate her the way she had so easily captivated him. Jacques didn’t want to get her by crook or by hook. He had no qualms about employing less than savory techniques to lure a woman into his bed for an evening, but he had always maintained a personal ethic when it came to the few substantial women who had piqued his interest more deeply over the many long years of his life. He wanted her, craved her even, but he wanted to win her fairly and by his own merit.

Shortly before dawn, Pierre finally finished his escapades. He let his last woman flop onto the futon and donned his kimono, then joined Jacques in an adjoining chair. Jacques offered to pour him a drink from the decanter filled with green.

“Vile drink, absinthe,” Pierre declined and waved his hand toward one of the naked women strewn across the room like casualties on a battlefield. “How you can chase a perfectly fine vintage with that noxious green ooze is beyond me.” Instead, he lifted an opium pipe to his lips and inhaled deeply. He looked at Jacques fixedly and said, “Oh God, you’ve got that look. Don’t tell me you’re pining after that woman you saw tonight. It’s very tedious of you.”

“Pining?” Jacques frowned. Whatever he was doing, he certainly was not pining.

“Yes, yes. Pining.” Pierre glared and took another puff. “I’ve had to endure your pining over the occasional woman during the last few hundred years. It never ends well. Either the pining leads to sulking when you frighten them away or, far worse, it leads to that terrible sentiment I wish you’d purge from your emotional arsenal.”

“Which terrible sentiment is that?” Jacques smirked over the rim of his glass as he took a drink.

“I try not to sully my tongue with four-letter words,” Pierre said, acting offended.

“I’ve barely spoken to the lady,” Jacques replied dismissively. “I’m merely intrigued by her.”

“Ah, yes, I remember the last time you were intrigued by some strumpet.” Pierre grimaced at the horrible memory. “Dark times. You were the worst possible company during your infatuation. Then when she rejected you – as they all will when you want a taste of them – you had the morbes for years! You were utterly intolerable. If I were a lesser friend, I would have left you to wallow in your misery alone.”

“You hold a grudge as tenaciously as a scorned woman! That was over a century ago,” Jacques scoffed. “I should have known better with her anyway. All the ladies in Versailles laced their corsets so tight for King Louie, it deprived their brains of oxygen. Hardly her fault she was so fickle.”

“And the one before that?” Pierre raised his eyebrows. “She was wickeder than you and, tragically, far crazier to boot.”

“Ah, the Countess,” Jacques said fondly. “She was a marvel.”

“Marvelously batshit crazy. Batshit Bathory.” Pierre shook his head. “Imagine how deranged a mind must be to have a genuine vampire in the palm of her hand, yet believe the true path to immortality was bathing in the blood of servant girls. You’re better off without that raving harlot.”

“It’s been far too long since I’ve indulged in a nice blood bath.” Jacques smiled at the memory.

“Now that can be arranged!” Pierre said excitedly. “We’ll take in that Wild West Show, which cannot be anything but a wondrous spectacle. Then we’ll fuck some women, and soak in blood until your heart’s content. That should take your mind off this absurd infatuation with whatever wayward tart happened to wander in front of you.”

“You assume I want to take my mind off of her?” Jacques cocked an eyebrow and took another drink.

“Can you not think of me for once instead of pursuing this selfish course that invariably leads to misery?” Pierre sighed theatrically. “However it ends for you, it will be dark times for me, my friend.”

“You’re worse than a jealous damned wife,” Jacques laughed.

“Yes, insufferable, aren’t I?” Pierre agreed. “Best steer clear of the real thing.”

“The real thing would have assets that compensate for the times she’s insufferable.” Jacques smirked lewdly.

Pierre sighed exasperatedly. He looked at the window and visibly started when he saw the red drapes glowing pink around their edges with the coming dawn. “We’d best continue this debate in my carriage. Unless you’d prefer to stay here throughout the day. Actually, let’s do! I’ll buy us more women.”

“Put your goddamn pants on and get a move on,” Jacques laughed. “I’d brave a stroll at high noon before I find myself locked in an opium den with you all day.”

*******************************************************************************************

It had been Jacques’s nature as a man before he became a vampire that he slept little and found the darkness rousing instead of calming, so his vampiric nature paired well with that natural proclivity. Sleep wasn’t needed for its restorative benefits and Jacques couldn’t remember what actual sleep felt like. He spent the brightest hours of the day languishing like a cat, indulgently laying around as he pleased and lightly napping occasionally. Since his encounter with the captivating woman in the Square, he hadn’t been able to settle his mind or have a reprieve from his thoughts of her.

It was not unusual for Jacques to spend the nighttime hours restless and alert. It was, however, highly unusual for him to spend his nights alone. He was never in want of women to fill his bed, but now a woman of no consequence sounded as appealing as a mouthful of ash when he was salivating over filet mignon.

The halls of his manor were dark and cold, feeling almost unwelcoming as he roamed them restlessly in his dressing gown. He paused by a tall arched window in his library that overlooked a manicured garden. The moon was a perfect cat’s eye crescent, bright as firelight, beckoning him out under its glow. Without a plan or any intention beyond following his feet, Jacques dressed quickly in trousers, a loose white shirt with no vest or cravat, and an overcoat.

Minutes later, Jacques sat in the back of his carriage as the cadence of the trotting hooves of his team of black horses carried him away from his home. Jacques’s driver was always at his beck and call, no matter the hour – a creature who was once a man horribly disfigured by leprosy before Pierre benevolently turned him into a familiar for them both to share. Carroughes never had much of a brain in life and was much happier now in his eternal existence as chattel.

Something between nostalgia and hope directed Jacques back to Trafalgar Square. He didn’t realize he had leaned forward in his seat, nearly pressing his large nose to the window as he looked out to the place he had met her. The carriage hit a thick cobblestone, making Jacques bump his nose on the glass. Falling back in his seat, he rubbed the bridge of his nose, finding nothing there but the usual crooked bump, and cursed himself for being so foolish. Of course she wasn’t there again. It had to be nearly two in the morning. No one with any sense was out prowling the streets at this hour. She was almost certainly in bed asleep. He immediately shut his thoughts down when they began to careen into the terrible territory of imagining that she wasn’t alone in her bed.

Looking at the façade of her hotel would do nothing to satisfy his curiosity nor sate his desire, but he grumbled to his driver to take him there anyway.

Every window above the first floor in the stone face of the Grand Royale Hotel was black, looking down on Jacques like merciless eyes. On one of the higher floors, one lone window flickered dimly, no doubt some restless guest reading by the light of a single candle. Jacques eyed it curiously out of the window of his carriage but paid it no mind. His thoughts were occupied with an image of a beautiful woman with luminous eyes and a teasing smile. Picturing her in his mind, he barely noticed the light moving and growing slightly brighter as the person inside picked up the candlestick and moved toward the window.

Jacques felt a rush of hope that made him feel foolish. Like a fool, he stepped out of his carriage to get a better view of the high window. A cold breeze fluttered his hair around his shoulders and his coat around his knees as he stood alone on the street, craning his neck upward. He felt even more foolish holding his breath as he watched the light move closer to the window. But all his foolishness was burned away when the window opened and the beautiful woman from his thoughts leaned out over the railing. It had been a long time since Jacques had willingly watched a sunrise, but he couldn’t remember one ever warming him the way her smile did now when she looked down at him. Gilded by moonlight, her hair free and dancing on the breeze, she was the picture of an ethereal specter haunting him.

Although he didn’t know what had summoned her to the window at such an hour, her smile told Jacques she recognized him. Forgetting any sly reserve, he waved brashly at her and took several steps away from his carriage until he stood in the center of the empty street.

“’Tis the West, and Georgette is the moon!” Jacques called to her teasingly, uncaring if he woke the entire hotel. “Descend, fair moon, and let the stars envy you while you dance in my arms.”

“I never thought I’d see a wolf howling up at the moon in London,” she teased back. She didn’t need to raise her voice for Jacques to hear her clear as a bell, just as he could clearly see that she wore only a diaphanous gown under a velvet robe. His senses were as keen as the other creatures of the night.

Jacques could get to her easily and within minutes. Hell, he could scale the outer hotel wall if he wanted. But he wouldn’t risk frightening her. It was too soon to reveal the monster to the maiden. He could summon her down to him using his vampiric powers of persuasion, but he wanted her to come to him willingly.

“What will entice you down from your tower?” Jacques placed his hand over his heart in a gesture of sincerity. “I can tell you many wondrous reasons, but they are better shown.”

“Perhaps you’re more devil than wolf, trying to tempt me into risqué scenarios with your silver tongue.” She leaned her forearms on the rail, gazing down at him with moonlight glinting in her eyes.

“Rest assured, howling wolf and silver-tongued devil are both equally within my repertoire.” Jacques grinned devilishly. “Is it teeth or horns that you prefer, ma belle?”

She laughed heartily, a melodious sound to Jacques’s ears. She retrieved a handkerchief from the pocket of her robe. Holding it out over the railing, she let it catch in the breeze before releasing it. As the handkerchief danced lazily through the air on its slow ballet to the ground, she said, “Find me again on Sunday and perhaps I will listen to more of your howling. If you’re lucky, maybe I’ll even have a dance with the devil underneath the crescent moonlight.”

Before Jacques could respond, she flipped her hair and ducked back inside her room, closing her window and leaving her balcony as empty and bleak as all the others. Still, Jacques grinned like a dumbstruck fool as he watched the handkerchief float slowly down to him like an autumn leaf. Either her aim or fate directed the little cotton square true, because it drifted right down to Jacques where he stood in the street. He plucked it from the air above him before it settled neatly on his chest.

Bringing the delicate handkerchief to his nose, Jacques inhaled deeply. The woman’s alluring scent flooded his bloodstream faster than any dragon he had ever chased. From her scent alone, he could picture every nuance of her as clearly as if she stood in front of him, feel every luscious inch of her body as though she were pressed against him. He closed his eyes to better savor her perfume and groaned lewdly on the exhale. He grinned as he tucked the handkerchief away safely inside his pocket.

She was an affliction and Jacques was infected with her. Tonight, he knew he was powerless against succumbing.

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Saturday afternoon was blissfully overcast and foggy, shielding Jacques and Pierre from the sun as they strolled toward the exhibition hall at Earl’s Court to watch The Wild West Show. Each man had a pair of women draped on their arms. A pair of redheaded ballerinas laughed at nothing and smiled up at Jacques. He had always been fond of redheads. Pierre, who liked variety, was accompanied by a very pale brunette and a tan blonde. The women chattered as they walked past a colorful carousel playing cheerful music while its painted horses circled round and round. An army of other spectators crowded the streets as they too made their way toward the show. Tickets were sold out and Earl’s Court seated twenty thousand.

“Peasants. Commoners.” Pierre grimaced as he used his walking stick to shove a small man in pinstriped pants aside. “Commoners everywhere. I miss the good ole days when we didn’t have to mingle with the commoners just to go about our day.”

“Ah, but today we don’t have to worry that every third one of them might have the plague,” Jacques said with a laugh. “I don’t ever remember you complaining about common women.”

“The men are certainly more objectionable.” Pierre brandished his walking stick at a teenage boy who waved a newspaper for purchase too close. “Mustaches and damned bowler hats everywhere you look.” He made a sweeping gesture with his cane. “Look around. It’s a veritable, black, blunt sea of bowler hats.” He purposely knocked off the hat of the nearest man with his walking stick, then smiled falsely at the bald, offended man who had been wearing it. “Terribly sorry. My stick has a mind of its own.”

“Frequent problem for you,” Jacques muttered out of a sideways grin. He paused at a food cart and traded a few coins for a bag of roasted chestnuts.

Several women in nice but plain dresses approached them, waving pamphlets. Suffragettes. Three of them smiled invitingly at Jacques and the remaining two thrust their papers at Pierre’s chest.

“Women voting? What a bizarre idea!” Pierre laughed. Then, just to irk the women and help shoo them away, he added, “This is no way at all to go about getting a husband, dears.”

One of the feistier suffragettes handed Pierre’s brunette a pamphlet and told her scathingly, “Don’t let him seduce you. Marriage will make you nothing but his property.”

Pierre looked at Jacques and scoffed, “They think we want to marry them.”

“If you really want to keep the suffragettes away, just tell them about your brilliant investment ideas,” Jacques suggested wryly. “In only seconds, their eyes will glaze over and they will take flight like a covey of doves.”

“Look down that crooked nose of yours at my investments all you want.” Pierre gestured with his cane like a pointing finger. “But mark my words, the Zeppelin is going to make me a mint. I will accept your apology when you come begging me for money after you lose all yours on that ridiculous motorcar investment.”

As they neared the entrance to the exhibit hall, they passed a gallery of lithograph posters for the Wild West Show, each advertising a different act. Pierre paused to study a poster of Chief Sitting Bull, the legendary Sioux warrior, while the women debated whether the tall King of the Cowboys, Buck Taylor, was more handsome or the bright-eyed trick rider, Fearless George. Jacques was most excited to see Annie Oakley, the pint-size lady sharpshooter heralded as one of the finest shots in the world. Jacques stopped counting performers at twenty. The show was enormous. Even some of the animals in the show were famous enough to have their own posters, from Buffalo Bill’s famous horse, Old Charlie, to wild bison and elk who had been shipped across the sea, and a proclaimed flying black horse called Faust.

Pierre accosted at least another dozen people with his walking stick on the way to their seats. A private balcony booth awaited them, offering both privacy and an excellent view of the center of the ring below. One end of the ring was covered by a tent, like a big top, but its canvas was nondescript and sand-colored, covering about ten square yards of the area. Jacques thought it was odd, but he assumed it was for an act and his attention was quickly diverted elsewhere. They were close to the action, close enough to count the buttons on a man’s coat and clearly see his expression when he stood in the center of the arena. Jacques was very interested in watching the show. Unlike an opera he knew by heart or a play he had seen too many times to count, everything in the Wild West Show was new to him. It had been on his mind the last few decades to visit America – to see for himself all the cowboys and mountain men and wild horses that were ripe fodder for the Penny Dreadfuls – but he had yet to make the journey. He figured that tonight would serve to either turn him off the idea of gunslingers and rough riders, or whet his palette and leave him wanting more.

Because Pierre knew this, he refrained from sampling his women as he usually did for his own private preshow. Instead, they discussed the snippets of American West news that made it to them across the sea while Jacques largely ignored the ballerinas pawing at him on either side.

A young, pimply-faced usher came to their booth to see if they wanted any food or drink before the show. Jacques slipped the kid a whole pound, making the youth’s eyes wide and his smile dopey. With an air of secrecy and importance, Jacques told him, “These fine ladies’ husbands might not look kindly on our taking in an innocent show. I can trust you to tell us if you see any suspicious men nosing around near our booth or inquiring about us?”

“Of course, sir,” the usher promised eagerly and bowed awkwardly. “I’ll keep a sharp watch out.”

Jacques thanked him and Pierre spoke when the usher was gone, “Can’t be too careful these days. Is it just me, or are there more and more hunters after us every year?”

“They multiply like rats in a sewer,” Jacques agreed. “I blame all the free time this younger generation has. They don’t have to toil in the fields like they used to, so how do they occupy their time? Hunting vampires down like trophy stags.”

“Between bowler hats, women campaigning to have the vote, and vampire hunters, society is really going to Hell in a handbasket.” Pierre shook his head.

“Well, we do our part to keep the hunters’ numbers down.” Jacques grinned wickedly and tipped his glass toward Pierre.

“And we have such great fun doing so!” Pierre cheered him back just as an announcer’s voice boomed over a loudspeaker that the show was about to begin.

The crowd cheered when Buffalo Bill himself rode into the ring to greet the many Londoners who had come to see his show. The man was dressed as flamboyantly as an American wildman could be, wearing buckskins with draping fringe and thigh-high boots, and his horse wore a bridle and breast collar set with shining silver conchos. His brown horse, Old Charlie, was as famous a character as any of the other performers and rumored to have the intelligence of a man. Buffalo Bill rode into the center of the ring, jumped off Old Charlie, greeted the crowd and gave them a knightly bow. Remounting, he raced Old Charlie around the ring at a dead run, save for the closed off corner, to give the opening signal for the show to begin. As the horse circled round the ring, they were joined by other performers, all following Old Charlie until they were tantamount to a stampede. The Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapahoe came out first after Buffalo Bill, a kaleidoscope of color in their feathered headdresses riding painted war horses and shouting whoops and war cries. Vaqueros from Mexico wearing sombreros and huge-roweled spurs followed, then the cowboys, all firing their six-shooters into the air. The cowboy band played the “Star Spangled Banner” as loudly as possible, trying to outdo the shouts and gunshots.

The opening was a wild scene to the Londoners, riling spectators to stand up in their seats and shout encouragement to the performers. The English had their own style of performance horsemanship, focused on control and refined power. Many had never seen this brand of American horsemanship that seemed to focus on wild abandon and unpredictability as they raced and bucked and kicked around the ring.

Jacques watched raptly, enjoying the wild spectacle. He cheered along with the rest of the crowd when Annie Oakley made her entrance and blew apart several dozen glass balls and clay pigeons thrown through the air by cowboys who rode around the ring at a gallop. She then shot playing cards flung in the air and even hit the bullseye while holding a rifle backwards over her shoulder, using a handheld mirror to aim and fire behind her. For her finale, she called her husband into the ring and shot a cigarette from between his lips.

“See the sort of things a husband must endure at the cruel hands of his wife?” Pierre said to Jacques. “Think better of it, my friend.”

“Yet the poor bastard keeps coming back for more,” Jacques said as he clapped for Annie. “Tells you the reward is greater than the punishment, doesn’t it?”

“My methods ensure a man is only on the rewarding end of women and never the punishing,” Pierre argued, stroking the thigh of his blonde. “I’m certain I can find you plenty of amiable distractions until you’re over this infatuation with your mystery woman.”

At Pierre’s suggestion, one ballerina began caressing Jacques’s thigh and the other trailed her nails down inside his collar. Jacques plucked their hands off him, frowning as he tried to watch the next act. “Good things come to those who wait, ladies.”

“Good God,” Pierre said mostly to himself. “It’s worse than I feared.” He elbowed Jacques in the ribs as a covered wagon was pulled into the ring by a team of eight horses, a dozen cowboys with lever action rifles covered it like spines on a hedgehog. “Where do we find this mystery woman of yours? If you must, I’ll help you fuck the taste of her out of your mouth and then we can fuck other women to get over her. Deal?”

“No.” Jacques grinned and added. “And if I knew where to find her, she’d be here with me now.”

Hot on the trail of the covered wagon was a troop of twenty bandits, all firing live rounds into the canvas wagon cover and near the horses’ hooves. The wagon driver whipped the team of horses into a run, making figure eights inside the ring as the bandits choused them. Both sides fired their rifles and pistols until the air was a haze of dust and gunpowder that stung the eyes and smelled of sulfur and horse sweat.

“Spectacular!” Pierre exclaimed, looking at Jacques.

“Makes me miss the days when I was the one riding out on the tournament field, lance in hand,” Jacques reminisced.

“I always envied the way you handled your lance,” Pierre remarked and pinched the brunette’s thigh to make her squeal.

When the covered wagon had triumphed over the bandits and the dust had settled, the announcer introduced the next performer. “Now that your blood is pumpin,’ raise the roof for our trick rider and one of the Wild West Show’s top all ‘round hands when it comes to ridin’ anything with four legs! Fearless George and Faust!”

An enormous jet-black horse shot into the ring at a dead run, mane and tail blowing out behind him like pennants. The horse was so large as to make the rider look tiny. Jacques wondered how the rider kept the cowboy hat on his head while riding at such a pace. The rider waved to the crowd and with apparent ease, hopped up to stand on the animal’s back as the horse continued to run. The rider was dressed in buckskin pants and a blue shirt, wearing a hat and gunbelt. Fearless George waved to those in front then turned and waved behind him, all while standing on Faust’s back as the horse ran. Still facing the horse’s tail, George dropped back into the saddle, riding backwards for another half turn around the ring. As easily as adjusting his seat on a bench, George twisted his body so he sat sideways in the saddle with his legs crossed demurely to wave to another side of the crowd. He flipped his legs over Faust’s rump again to face the opposite, cross his other leg and wave to the other side of the ring.

Faust still ran at a full gallop when Fearless George dropped from the saddle casually but kept hold of the metal pole that was fixed in the pommel in place of a saddle horn. George took a few bounding strides beside the horse, his feet barely touching the ground as he was carried along by Faust. Using the pole and Faust’s momentum, he bounded back up into the saddle with ease. Faust had now made several passes around the large ring, his black coat glossy with sweat. George pulled him into a sliding stop that threw clumps of dirt from the ring twenty feet out in front of his hooves and dug trenches behind as he skidded to a stop. Faust reared high, almost vertically, and pawed the air with his hooves. George waved to the crowd, but unlike Buffalo Bill and Annie Oakley, he did not remove his hat in a more formal greeting.

While this was happening, a few crewmen pulled a large wooden object into the center of the ring. It looked vaguely like a trebuchet, but Jacques recognized it as a quintain that was used in training for jousting. The large contraption was fitted with a shield painted with a bullseye on one end of a long swinging arm, the other side held a large heavy bag like a punching bag. To practice timing in the joust, a knight would have to strike the center of the shield, causing the arms to spin and the heavy bag to swing around towards the knight’s head from behind. If the knight didn’t have correct timing, the heavy bag would knock them off their horse. The crewman positioned other smaller shields around the ring, propped up on tall wooden posts like road signs.

The announcer told the crowd, “We have a new trick for you as a nod to the culture of our country and to yours.”

A very tall black-haired cowboy in a red shirt entered the ring holding a lance high. Fearless George spun Faust to face the cowboy and kicked him into a gallop. The cowboy threw the lance to George when he was close and George plucked it out of the air easily. Jacques suspected the lance was made of a light metal and was probably hollow. It would have been quite a feat for him to catch a solid wood lance midair with one hand and make it look simple. Fearless George did not have the build of a strong man and sat lightly on Faust while spinning the horse around again and positioning the lance.

The crowd cheered when George charged at the quintain, lance aimed across Faust’s neck. Even Jacques watched avidly, leaning forward in his seat with excitement. It had been ages since he’d seen anyone wield a lance properly. Faust arched his neck and picked his hooves high as he charged the target, looking every bit the destrier. George held the lance with a steady aim with the correct balance of firmness in the shoulder and give in the torso. He struck the target dead center, exploding the wooden shield and causing the quintain to swing around fast with the heavy bag. George dropped the lance and in the same fluid movement, flipped around in the saddle like he had done previously as he drew a pistol from its holster. Before the heavy bag could reach him, he fired a shot into it, bursting the bag also in a geyser of sand. The crowd hollered and Jacques laughed at the mix of weaponry, as George flipped back around in the saddle to face forward.

George put Faust’s reins in his teeth and filled his left hand with his other pistol. With a gun in each hand, he charged around the ring firing at the other shield targets that had been set out by the crewmen. George weaved Faust between the targets, firing left and right and filling the air with gunpowder and wooden splinters. It was a relatively simple feat of marksmanship for a competent shot, but the horsemanship was exceptional for Faust to comply with such a ruckus.

Pierre squinted his eyes to focus better when George passed near them during a turn around the ring and prodded Jacques again with his elbow, “Would you look at the ass on George? It’s enough to make a man forget he has an eager woman on each arm.”

Jacques laughed, but couldn’t help but stare. He didn’t share Pierre’s tastes in this regard, but he had to admit he had never seen an ass that enticing on a man before.

When George’s guns were empty and the targets obliterated, he guided Faust prancing back toward the center of the ring. Faust bowed deeply, going down on one knee and touching his nose to the ground. Fearless George gestured graciously, but again didn’t remove his hat. Faust stood back up from his bow and nodded his head at the crowd, seeming to approve of the deafening applause and shouts that filled the stadium. With a final high rear, George sent Faust prancing away out of the ring, swishing his tail haughtily.

“Now, we have a real treat for all you Brits!” the announcer boomed through the loudspeaker. “Following our fearless knight is our own king. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen. Make some noise for Buck Taylor, King of the Cowboys!”

The crowd cheered and hollered, boisterously enough to make Jacques’s ears ring. Pierre, too, winced from the sound. He leaned toward Jacques and screamed into his ear to make his joke heard, “What do you wager the American cowboy king has an even bigger gun than the rest of them?”

But instead of a gun, the King of the Cowboys burst into the ring on a grulla paint horse fuming in a full-blown, violent, buck. The horse stormed ahead, kicking and bucking and rearing, snorting steam like a dragon, black mane and tail whipping through the air. The man riding him was very tall with a thick mustache and long black hair that matched his horse’s mane. Both horse and rider had piercing blue eyes. His red shirt and red and white spotted chaps made from Axis deer hide clashed with the black, grey, and white of the horse and the dull dust in the ring. The man sat the horse easily, riding each buck and twist as though his horse was taking him for a leisurely trot in the pasture. He kept his right hand held high, not touching the saddle horn as he waved to the crowd. The horse squealed and bucked, twisting high into the air and flashing his white belly up to the sky. The cowboy hooted cheerily and spurred the horse when he landed, sending him into another angry fit of bucking and carousing. Horse and rider were fused together as wholly as a centaur, and nothing the horse tried no matter how frantic or vicious could unseat the man.

Pierre elbowed Jacques and smirked, “Look at this dandy! Long hair, garish attire, taking up entirely too much space and making himself the center of attention. Hardly the way a gentleman should present himself.”

“Good thing I’m never garish,” Jacques quipped as he watched the man. It was a rare man who was Jacques’s equal in stature and build, but this King of the Cowboys looked very close. He was handsome too. Jacques hated him instantly.

Eight seconds didn’t enter into this act. Buck Taylor rode the horse until the animal was too tired to buck anymore, and only had the energy to crowhop around the ring. The bucking had lasted the length of a full act as long as the others. When the horse slowed to a walk, sides heaving and foam dripping from his belly and mouth, the tall cowboy kicked one leg out of his stirrup and over the horse’s neck to easily step off his mount and land on the ground. Without missing a step, he walked toward the center of the ring, taking off his enormous cowboy hat to take a bow.

“I’ve never seen a horse buck so hard,” Pierre remarked. “The Yanks are going full-bore for us.”

“Clearly you don’t remember the time when my horse’s crupper whipped him in the flank,” Jacques scoffed and rubbed the hump in the bridge of his nose. “He bucked so hard, his crinet came lose and broke my nose.”

“Well then, I haven’t seen a horse buck so hard since the Battle of Poitiers,” Pierre laughed.

As the man straightened from his bow, Faust, the black horse from the previous act burst through the entry gate. This time he was riderless and bridleless, seemingly in command of himself as he galloped toward the cowboy. Buck turned to bow again to the other side of the ring and Faust slowed to a prancing trot. Neck arched and legs stepping high, the horse trotted up to Buck from behind. When Buck straightened from his second bow and raised his hat back toward his head, Faust bit the brim of the hat and yanked it out of the cowboy’s hand. The black horse jumped sideways when the man cursed and made a grab for the hat, and sped away in a long, elegant trot around the ring. Buck gave chase for a few steps before waving off the horse in frustrated resignation.

Faust looked back at the man and appeared to feel guilty for stealing his hat. He slowed to a walk, dropped his head in contrition, and ambled back to the man. Buck walked to meet the horse with his long arm outstretched, the large rowels on his spurs jingling. When the horse was almost within Buck’s reach, Faust yanked his head back, holding the hat up in the air like a prize, out of reach of even the tall man. The horse taunted the man, dipping the hat lower then jerking it back when the man made a grab for it.

A whistle sounded from the opposite side of the arena where a new gate had been opened. Faust wheeled around and galloped toward the whistler, hat still clenched in his teeth. The hat-stealing act had been a distraction, no one had paid attention to the woman entering the ring. A woman stood near the newly opened gate, dressed rather lewdly in only a gold bathing suit and leather booties. Her thighs and arms were bare, her lovely figure on display, and her hair loose, earning various gasps of shock and catcalls from the crowd.

At the other end of the ring, several crewmen pulled the canvas tent away from what it had covered during the show. A huge pool of water was revealed, an extra-deep diving pool. Jacques frowned in confusion, wondering at its purpose.

“Well, Folks, it looks like our trick rider has one more trick up her sleeve,” the announcer said. “George…” he let his voice trail away, then boomed louder, “George…ette. Georgette, the High-Flyer! Best ya’ll sittin’ close make sure you don’t get splashed.”

“By God!” Pierre laughed. “It’s a woman!”

“It’s her,” Jacques said quietly, almost to himself.

Pierre looked at him sideways. “Her her? What wretched luck. Well, there’s a legitimate chance she breaks her pretty neck in the next few moments.”

Only then did Jacques notice that the gate opened to a ramp near the pool. The ramp too had been covered with canvas and Jacques had taken it for nothing more than covered stairs to reach the higher seats. Now the canvas covering had been pulled away to reveal a long metal ramp, like a long livestock loading chute. It ran at a steep angle up for sixty-feet and opened to nothing but thin air high above the pool. Jacques had heard about the wildly dangerous American stunt of horse diving, but he never thought he would see it firsthand. Let alone, watch a woman carry his heart over a sixty-foot precipice with her on the back of a flying black horse.

Faust galloped toward Georgette, who looked very small and fragile compared to the enormous thundering animal. The hat dropped from Faust’s mouth and flew over his back to flutter in the dust behind him. Faust looked as if he would run right over Georgette, passing by her with only inches between their bodies and not slowing a stride. Georgette grabbed the long silver horn of the saddle and swung herself up onto the horse’s back with ease. Faust didn’t slow as he barreled into the shoot. It looked barely wide enough to accommodate the horse and woman’s bare legs on either side of him. Hooves drummed like a gatling gun up the metal ramp as Faust lunged up the steep incline. He charged as he reached the end, vaulting out into space like it was nothing more than clearing a low fence.

Jacques shot forward in his seat, all but leaning out over the rail as he watched the horse and woman dive through the air toward the cold, navy water far below. Faust’s mane and Georgett’s hair blew out behind them as they fell, Faust’s tail flowing behind him like a sail. The horse’s form was as fine as any professional diver, his body stretched long like an arrow with his front hooves tucked under his chest and his ears flattened against his neck. Georgette kept her seat on his back, clutching his mane tight. She tucked her head against his neck before they hit, burying her face in his mane.

They hit the water with a great splash, submerging entirely, and Jacques thought that both horse and woman must have broken their necks. While horses were usually fine during such stunts, it wasn’t uncommon for riders to break bones, including their necks, or blind themselves. To Jacques, it seemed like they took an eternity to surface. He sighed with relief when Faust erupted from the water, blowing water from his nose, and swam to the head of the pool where the bottom was ramped to allow the horse to trot out with Georgette still seated on his back. She whipped her head back, dramatically slinging the hair out of her face like a mermaid breaching the waves. She arched her back and waved to the crowd to a great chorus of cheers, shouts, and applause. Jacques was up on his feet, clapping harder than anyone and watching her every movement in that revealing gold swimsuit.

“All of us cowboys and cowgirls hope you have enjoyed our little Wild West Show!” the announcer called. “If you liked it, tell your friends! If you didn’t like it, tell your friends all the same!”

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After her dive, Georgette only took the time to ensure her horse received a good petting and a treat from her hand before she handed him off to a groom and hurried to her dressing room. In those few minutes, she was shivering and her teeth chattering. The cold was biting in London this late in the year, made worse by the humidity, and she felt chilled to her bones. She wouldn’t have performed a dive this late in the season for any regular show, but this was a special occasion.

Thankfully, a tub filled with steaming water awaited her. While the rest of the crew hobnobbed with the Lords and Ladies who wanted to meet the genuine American roughnecks in person, Georgette lounged in the tub. She considered this a score on two fronts. She had a rare moment to relax while also avoiding the obligatory socializing the rest of the crew underwent. Her dressing room was tiny, barely large enough to accommodate the tub and a mirrored vanity. Several bouquets of flowers crowded the vanity with a few overflow bouquets propped in one corner. The steam from the water filled the little room with an opaque haze that smelled of roses and Parisian bath salts. It was Georgette’s most relaxed moment of the day.

The near-scalding water and rosy bubbles were usually enough to relax her muscles and quell her thoughts in a few minutes, but as she lounged in the bath, she felt the odd but unmistakable sensation of being watched. It was absurd inside the little room. There was certainly no place for anyone to hide. She closed her eyes, forcing her mind to more rational pursuits, and breathed deep. Sinking deeper into the water, she glimpsed a figure through her half-lidded eyes. She shot bolt upright in the tub, sloshing water over the side, ready to fight the towering shadow she saw in the corner. But of course, there was nothing there. She saw that now, with her eyes fully open. It was a trick of the haze through her half-closed eyes, perhaps combined with the general strangeness of being so far away from home. Shaking her head at her own foolishness, she relaxed back into the water.

She was interrupted again by a knock on her door, and a voice as smooth and warm as bourbon spoke to her from the other side.

“Begging your pardon, miss,” Jacques crooned, a grin audible on his words. “I wished to congratulate the star of the show, but a rather imperious groom told me that I had to have permission from his owner to give Faust an apple.”

“I’ll relay your adulation.” She smiled.

“I would also very much like to congratulate his rider,” Jacques said through the door.

“Is this how a gentleman approaches a lady?” she replied, glaring at the door. “I was told British men had more decorum.”

“I would be remiss to represent myself as a gentleman,” Jacques said in a huskier tone. “Furthermore, I have seen enough of you to know that you would not be frightened away by a little thing like a lack of decorum.”

“I could forgive your trespass of accosting me in the bath, but I do not look kindly on you attending my show flaunting a woman on each arm.” She settled back in the tub, refusing to look at the door even if he couldn’t see her small act of rejection. “Women I gather you’ve now abandoned to come here and stand insolently outside my door.”

He was silent for a moment and she added, “My spies are everywhere.”

“They are nothing more than aperitifs.” Jacques waved his hand dismissively. “Fleeting company for an evening. Certainly not the sort of women I would pursue across the city, and plead with through a locked door.”

“You’re very open about your actions with them,” she huffed with unveiled disgust.

“I do not wish to embark on a journey with a lie when it holds the promise of something lasting and genuine.” He leaned against the door. Even through the wood, her enticing scent carried to him, heavy on the steam.

“Your words are as fancy as your tailored suit,” she quipped. “I have no doubt you can slip into the role of a Cassanova as easily as you can don a topcoat. One is just as superficial as the other.”

“How would you have me prove otherwise?” Jacques spoke to the door, his prominent nose nearly grazing the wood. “Give me any task, milady. Anything you wish.”

“Were I to give you such a task, it would certainly not be something in which I thought you would excel.” She thought for a moment. “No, it would have to be something at which you are terrible. Something utterly demeaning and embarrassing.”

“Demeaning and embarrassing?” Jacques laughed. “Well, I’ll admit that’s a first. You can’t know what a rarity it is for me to experience something for the first time with anyone.”

“A first for a man like you?” she scoffed. “Oh, I’m sure you’re quite the blushing bride behind closed doors.”

“I could sing for you,” Jacques offered with a grin. “That would demean and embarrass me.”

“It’s obvious you’re very impressed with yourself, and no doubt used to impressing women with ease. I have no interest in any of your tactics you’ve employed on other ladies like so much unsuspecting prey.” She ran a soapy sponge down the side of her neck. “You must do for me something you have never done for any other women.”

“What privilege will that earn me?” he asked in a lower tone.

“The privilege of making me smile.” She smiled to herself. “What else would you possibly expect a lady to promise in return? I wonder at the species of harlot you must be accustomed to.”

“If you’re concerned about setting yourself apart, you already have,” Jacques crooned.

“I’m flattered, but that was not my concern,” she said flatly. “You’ve yet to set yourself apart to me. Aside from your pretty face and your brass, I’m waiting to be impressed.”

“I have a pretty face, do I?” He smirked. “I’ll try my best not to keep you wanting. Give me a proper chance, and I cannot fail to impress you.”

“Admittedly, I’m somewhat impressed you haven’t barged in here,” she laughed. “You seem to go and do as you please with little regard for decorum.”

“Says the woman who rides wild horses wearing nearly nothing. I do indeed go and do as I please. But while I put little stock in decorum, I am not so much a boor as to intrude upon the intimate ablutions of a lady without her permission.” He dropped his voice to his sultriest tone. “Do I have your permission to enter, mon cherie?”

A gruff voice interrupted from behind Jacques, “This man botherin’ you, Georgie?” The tall King of the Cowboys projected his voice loud enough to be easily heard through the door. He was possessive over Georgette in a way that made Jacques think he had a reason to be. It was almost enough to incite him to murder right then and there. Sadly, that would probably not be the best approach to win the woman’s affection.

“You seem rather comfortable entering a lady’s dressing room,” Jacques said instead, keeping his words relatively innocuous while flashing a rude sneer at the man to silently provoke him. It would be beautiful if the ruffian took a swing at Jacques and gave him the opening to respond in kind. Jacques noticed the cowboy wore a gold earring in one ear, giving him a piratical look. It took great restraint for Jacques to refrain from yanking it out.

Buck didn’t bite on the provocation. He grinned and put a hand-rolled cigarette between his lips. “Who says I ain’t got a good reason to be nice ‘n comfortable here?”

“Neither of you are entitled to feel comfortable in my dressing room,” Georgette reprimanded them both through the door. “Or haranguing me from outside my door, for that matter.”

“Where, then, shall I harangue you?” Jacques persisted, casting a side eye at the other man.

“You’re quite good at finding me,” she teased. “I’m sure you’ll connive yet another inconvenient opportunity to bother me.”

“I will, that’s a promise,” Jacques agreed and grinned wickedly at the cowboy. “Until then, darling.”

Jacques straightened and Buck bristled. Jacques was satisfied to see that he stood a fraction taller than the other man when his back was straight. Holding the cowboy’s blue stare, Jacques walked past him so close they almost brushed shoulders. He made his challenge clear and belligerent. What great sport it would be if the beastly American took the bait.

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The sights of London were almost overwhelming for someone from Colorado where a paved street was a novelty. Colorado Springs was one of the few towns with a modern brick street down the center of town. Georgette had ample experience with mountain lions and wild horses, miners and mountain men, and gunfights with two men walking out into the street and only one returning. But the sights of London were unlike anything she had experienced, they were fantastical to her. To see gas lamps illuminating shiny cobblestone streets well into the night, and even the occasional building lit with electric light. She was determined to see as much of the spectacular city as she could while she was there.

Georgette preferred to take in the city in the afternoons and into the evenings. The crowds were diminished during those hours and, more importantly, she wanted to minimize the risk of her being recognized. The best part of her act was her change from Fearless George the trick rider to Georgette the horse diver. It never failed to earn a riotous applause from the audience. Likewise, she didn’t ride out in town on Faust, although she would have preferred to, so he could not be recognized as the trick horse from the show who flies off the high dive platform.

The sun was sinking toward the Western horizon as she strolled down a lively street on her first day off after the remarkably successful weekend shows. Steely clouds crept across the sky, making the waning sunlight look like a bloody wound seeping through grey gauze, and the evening air was cool on her skin. She was not in the habit of wearing a bustle – in the American West, high fashion was still something of a novelty outside of the biggest cities. She had come prepared with fine dresses and accoutrements should the occasion call for it, but for her sightseeing outings, it was convenient to dress simply and it eased her movements. She kept a brisk pace with no bustle to hamper her and only a modest front-lacing corset that didn’t constrict her breathing.

Gas lamps lining the street had been freshly lit casting glimmering light on the city slick with foggy dew. Carriages trotted up and down the street filling the air with the cadence of hooves on stone and the vague smell of horse sweat and leather mingled with the damp smell of the city. Clothing stores displayed the most stylish fashion in their windows, but what caught Georgette’s eye was a striking lithograph poster advertising a magician show. She paused in front of the poster of Kylo the Malevolent, looking into the magician’s eyes that were penetrating even on poster stock. She was reminded of a short story she had read ages ago called Vampyre. She thought it would be nice to take in a magic show, or visit one of the famous cabinets of curiosities in the city.

The familiar sounds of the dwindling chatter of the evening carried on behind her, mixed with the clatter of horse’s hooves. One pair of clattering hooves grew louder, the horse coming close to her. The hooves stopped suddenly as she whipped around, startled. Georgette came face to face with the soft muzzle of a large dapple-grey horse, standing so close she could feel the heat of its breath. Seated on the animal was a large handsome man, grinning down at her devilishly with mischief gleaming in his vibrant eyes.

Jacques Le Gris tipped his head back to look up at the gloomy evening sky and held his gloved hand out as if to test for any rain. He returned his eyes to hers, grinned again, and told her, “A perfectly fine evening to harangue a lovely lady, is it not?”

“I already have my evening planned, I’m afraid,” she said coyly and continued walking down the sidewalk on her way.

Jacques kept his horse facing her as she walked, making the horse side-pass perfectly down the street with his front hooves inches from the sidewalk. He sat straight and poised in the saddle in the English style, his commands to the horse almost invisible. “You’re not the only one with tricks, mademoiselle.”

“Men and their tricks are almost always tiresome. If I wanted to see parlor tricks, I would take in the devious looking magician’s show,” she said dismissively as she walked ahead without sparing him a glance. “I believe I told you I would enjoy seeing you perform some embarrassing act for me? I would have been much more impressed if you had appeared riding a donkey with your laughably large feet dragging the ground.”

“You’ve not yet given me the chance to properly embarrass myself,” Jacques countered, still commanding his horse to prance sideways and keep him facing her as at ease as if he sat in his favorite chair. “I thought you might enjoy your conquest more if you were to embarrass me yourself.”

This piqued her interest, and she turned to cock a curious eyebrow at him.

“I took you for a lady who would want to seize victory herself,” Jacques said. “Anything less would be a pyrrhic victory, would it not?” He gestured down at his horse and gave his voice a teasingly haughty air. “You’re quite an impressive rider. For a woman. I wonder how you’d fare in a race against me.”

“Since I am afoot at present, you have me at a disadvantage,” she huffed.

“And if you were astride that black beast of yours?” he asked as his horse danced sideways, snorting impatiently.

“I’d wipe that smug grin off your face in less than a furlong,” she said without batting an eye.

Jacques had timed it perfectly because as Georgette finished her statement, she reached a cross street. Standing at the curb where the cab carriages usually waited for customers was Faust. Georgette stopped short, shocked to see her horse saddled in her western gear, his ears pricked forward to greet her. The foulest looking man she had ever seen held Faust’s reins – if such a deformed monstrosity could be called a man. The wretched creature looked like he had been plagued with leprosy, but that the disease might have improved his features.

“What the hell is this?” she asked angrily as she rushed to her horse and yanked the reins away from the loathsome man who looked at her with hazy black eyes. “Did you steal him? I hope you did, because if not, I’m going to skin that horrible little stable hand alive!”

“I had to bribe him so well, I am the man who is the victim of theft,” Jacques laughed. “Don’t be too hard on the stable hand. I can be more persuasive than most.”

“Persistent does not equate to persuasive,” she quipped, satisfied that her horse appeared fine.

“If you want to reprimand me,” Jacques smirked. “You’ll have to catch me.”

“What are you thinking?” she asked exasperatedly. “That I will just happily climb onto my horse after you stole him, and engage you in an impromptu race? While wearing a dress, I might add.”

“When you put it like that, I can see how it could be too much for you.” He grinned wider.

“Nothing you can throw my way is too much for me,” she scoffed at him and at herself for succumbing so easily to his provocation. Backing down from a challenge was not a form of restraint she had ever mastered, nor ever cared to. She glanced quickly down at her dress. It was not a split skirt designed for riding and she wore heeled boots instead of riding boots, an outfit entirely ill-suited for riding.

“I promise to keep my composure even if you’re risqué enough to hike your skirt up and expose your ankles,” he teased, looking pointedly at the hem of her dress.

“I don’t need to ride astride to best a braggart,” she said as she walked to the left side of her horse, preparing to mount.

“Do you need a hand?” he asked, edging his horse closer.

“Certainly not,” she huffed and swung herself up into the saddle. She kept her left foot in the stirrup and hooked her right over the saddle horn to sit in a makeshift sidesaddle. To ride astride, she would have had to pull her skirts up around her thighs, which was probably exactly what Jacques was hoping for and she would never give him the satisfaction. Glaring at Jaques, she smoothed her skirts primly, ensuring they draped down past her ankles and exposed no skin.

“I wasn’t expecting so much modesty from a woman who bares her legs in front of thousands of spectators to ride bareback and plunge into water,” Jacques teased, bringing his horse close to hers.

“We both know I’m safer exposed in front of a crowd of thousands than one dangerous man,” she returned, holding her horse in place as he pawed his front hoof in anticipation.

“Any danger within me is no threat to you,” Jacques told her seriously. “I would never harm you.”

“Neither my person nor my reputation?” she asked with raised eyebrows.

Jacques grinned and shrugged without answering.

“Just what I thought.” She smiled back. “I’m sure you have more tricks up your sleeve than that Magician on all the posters.”

“I do. He’s an amateur,” Jacques dropped his voice. “But if you wish to be awed, I’m sure I can think of something to accommodate you.” When she only replied with a bored expression, he cleared his throat and told her, “Hyde Park isn’t far. It has a nice dirt track running along its south side called Rotten Row. We can race around as many times as it takes you to win.”

“How boring,” she said dismissively. “I’ll race you to Rotten Row from here instead.” With that, she poked her horse in the shoulder and clicked her tongue in some practiced cue. Faust pinned his ears and struck out at Jacques’s horse like an angry cat, landing a painful bite to the other horse’s rump.

Jacques’s horse squealed indignantly and jumped forward like he had been rudely whipped. Georgette laughed and kicked Faust, sending him into a gallop in two powerful lunges. Jacques cursed his startled horse as he reined him back under control, then laughed deeply as he watched Georgette gallop away from him. Jacques kicked his horse, making him rear then jump into a run after his opponent. The horse slid when his front hooves struck the cobblestone with a riot of sparks, giving Georgette another few strides lead. Georgette cast a look back over her shoulder to see how far ahead she was and laughed heartily at her early lead. Jacques caught her eye and winked. His horse was powerful and used to races and steeplechase, and he gained ground fast.

The horses flew the length of a block in seconds, sending the ghostly evening mist swirling around their legs. In the second block, Jacques’s horse came even with Faust’s haunch as the beasts galloped against each other. Jacques was close enough that could have reached out and grabbed the hem of Georgette’s dress as it billowed behind her leg as she rode sidesaddle. An alley branched off the street on their left. Georgette could see little inside it but shadows in the lateness of the evening. When Faust came to the alley, Georgette reined him, forcing his back hooves to slide on the cobblestone as he sat back his haunches to make the tight turn.

“Do try to keep up!” Georgette shouted over her shoulder.

The alley was narrow, barely wide enough to accommodate a horse and rider. Jacques had to sit back on his reins and bring his horse into a skid to slow enough to make the turn, grinning as he did at having such fine sport. He did not have the masculine weakness of being unable to admit when he met a woman who was his equal or even his superior, albeit this was a rare occurrence. He was pleased and enthused to have met one now, at least when seated on the back of a horse. Georgette tucked her toes against Faust’s side, wary of them striking some protrusion she couldn’t see in the dark. Fortunately, horses have better night vision than humans and Faust avoided any obstacles in his path. Georgette barely saw the pile of crates that had been carelessly discarded in the alley until they were nearly upon them, but Faust gathered himself for the jump and soared over them with ease, landing without breaking the stride of his gallop.

Of course, vampires could see even better in the dark than horses. Jacques’s sight was equal to a wolf or panther or any other nocturnal beast. The pile of crates was as visible to him as white bones in the desert. He saw every detail of the black horse ahead of him and his beautiful rider. Even as his horse took the jump, Jacques’s eyes were fixed on the way Georgette kept a perfect seat and the lovely view he had of that seat devoid of a bustle.

“Bear right if you wish to keep your lead to Hyde Park!” Jacques boomed over the cadence of hoofbeats when Georgette reached the end of the alley.

The alley emptied onto a street through a business district lined with closed shops and nearly devoid of traffic as nightfall approached. One shop owner who was late in closing up glared at them through his window when the pair of horses thundered down the cobblestone in front of his door. Jacques’s horse was shod and the iron shoes sparked on the cobblestone making him look like a silver beast fueled by hellfire, snorting with every stride. A lone cab drawn by a single horse trotted down the street toward them. The horse startled when Jacques and Georgette each flew past him on opposite sides, and the driver cursed them and threw in their mothers for good measure.

Neck and neck, they barreled into Hyde Park. The pair of horses tore down the dirt track called Rotten Row, kicking up clods of dirt under their thundering hooves. Rotten Row was a popular lane for riders, but in the gloaming Jacques and Georgette were alone. Trees grew close on either side of the lane, their branches hanging close enough to grasp at them like witches’ claws. Both horses were large and powerful, not running fleetly like thoroughbreds, but charging ahead like destriers ridden by knights of old. As they neared a bend in the track, Jacques kicked his horse to get a small burst of additional speed. He swept his right hand through Georgette’s skirt and laughed as he passed her, surging into the turn just ahead of her.

Darkness had settled over them while they had raced through town and the stars winked down through the veil of clouds leaving them in shadows and the light spectral mist as they charged down the row.

A violent crack tore the soft belly out of the night, as sharp as the bite of a bullwhip, and the trees at their side thrashed into the lane like an army of living branches. Jacques’s horse buckled when he hit the rope strung across the lane, catapulting forward over his head and neck in a macabre somersault. And rolling over Jacques as he did. A rope attached to a mostly sawn-through tree was run across the lane, acting as a boobytrap to bring a tree down on top of a rider unlucky enough to hit it – if the rope didn’t behead him first.

A ton of tree trunk and barren branches as sharp as spears came crashing down on the crumpled mass of Jacques and his horse as they both thrashed and kicked painfully over the ground. The last sight Georgette had of Jacques was of his magnificent chest being crushed between his horse’s neck and the unforgiving ground as his horse rolled over him, and his flesh being lanced by branches before the tree crushed down upon both horse and rider.

Faust stopped on his own, not needing a command from his rider to dig his hooves into the dirt and slide to a stop before colliding with the fallen tree. It was fortunate Faust took care of himself and Georgette because she was paralyzed with horror, a scream trapped in her throat tight enough to strangle her. She vaguely registered noises in the trees on either side of her, but her mind was at once both reeling and numb. Faust stomped his hooves and shifted nervously as Georgette slid off his back and stumbled awkwardly on wavering legs. She clutched Faust’s reins in a shaking fist and her chest felt tighter than the most unforgiving corset. The tree that had crushed Jacques and his horse thrashed on the ground in front of her, no doubt from the wounded animal pinned beneath it. She didn’t want to get any closer to it or see what horror it had caused. But she had to help Jacques. Even if she knew he could not possibly walk away from such an accident, and likely not survive it.

Suddenly, the trees on either side of the lane erupted with dark snarling bodies bursting from them and charging at Georgette. A pack of large hounds leapt at her from the foliage, their teeth bared, snarling their intent. She recognized the roman noses and bristled fur that belonged to Irish Wolfhounds as they charged her and Faust. She heard the shouts of their master’s still inside the trees. The nearest dog leapt at her, teeth bared, and she whipped the reins she held across its eyes as she ducked sideways. The hound yelped and stumbled, missing his aim for her throat. A second dog caught her sleeve, growling as it tried to yank her to the ground. Faust struck out with his front hoof and hit the dog in the head, knocking its jaw slack. He reared and pawed down onto the hound’s neck, driving it into the ground and killing it instantly.

A pack of several dogs were digging at the fallen tree, braying and snarling like they were hot on the scent of their prey. Two dogs attacked Faust from behind, biting his heels and hocks in an attempt to cripple him. The horse kicked and bucked, inadvertently yanking Georgette off balance from her hold on the reins. One dog he kicked loose switched its attention to Georgette and jumped at her with open, bloody jaws. On instinct, she raised her arm in front of her face and felt the sharp crunching pain of the dog sinking its teeth into her forearm as the weight of the large hound knocked her backward onto the ground. The dog weighed as much as an average man and muscled her to her back on the ground with its weight. Despite the pain in her forearm, she wedged it deeper into the dog’s mouth, using it as a barrier between the ravening beast and her face.

It must only have been seconds since Jacques’s horse fell and the tree crushed them both, but time had dragged on as agonizingly as the pain spearing Georgette’s arm. Something broke out of the fallen tree with explosive force, like a lion breaking free of a wooden cage. Branches and splinters flew through the air like shrapnel and several dogs howled with fear and yelped with pain. Georgette could see nothing but the mottled fur and beady eyes of the dog above her, and then with sudden brute force, the dog was ripped away from her with a pained squeal and thrown across the lane as though it were a stuffed toy.

Jacques stood above her, his shoulders hunched in a fighting stance, wearing a snarl more ferocious than the hounds. His fists weren’t balled, his hands open instead, as if he was hoping to rip living bodies apart with them. There were tears in his jacket, across his back and shoulders, and his undershirt was scarlet with his own blood. Blood streaked his face and ran from his lips, but she didn’t see any obvious injuries. His eyes raced over her body, assessing her injuries quickly without diverting his attention from his attackers. One of the braver hounds lunged at Jacques’s face, but met with his hand as Jacques caught it in the air by its throat with his crushing fist. Another dog took the opening to jump onto his back, snapping down at the back of his neck and trying to paralyze him like a wounded animal. Growling with rage, Jacques shook the hound off his back and threw the hound he held by the throat into the other, sending them both careening over the ground and running away with terrified yelps.

Jacques stepped over Georgette, placing himself between her and whatever other danger still lurked in the trees. Though his movements were not frantic, he moved with unnatural quickness. He appeared to not even be hurried, yet the lines of him were blurred with his swiftness, like a striking viper. His eyes were narrowed and vicious, focused on something in the trees that Georgette couldn’t see. Slowly, he knelt beside her and took her arm. He didn’t spare the time to examine the dog bite as he pulled her up to her feet. Though she was perfectly capable of standing, walking, or anything else that was needed of her, Jacques lifted her into his arms and swung her up onto her horse. He placed her foot in her stirrup and let his hand linger on her calf.

“Run, darling,” he told her as he squeezed her leg. “Run out of the park. I’ll deal with them. They won’t catch you.”

“Who’s they?” she asked as she gathered her reins to control Faust as he danced nervously in place.

“I’ll come to you after I’ve handled this.” He didn’t answer her question.

Jacques turned to face the trees, shoulders bunched and teeth bared wolfishly. A growl rumbled in his thick chest, an inhuman sound that raised the hairs on Georgette’s neck. Faust reared in fright and tried to bolt away from Jacques, but she reined him back. The black horse kept his composure amid gunfire and battle, but he reared and spun in place now, rattled with such fear that his body quivered, his nostrils flared, and his eyes rolled until they showed white as he side-eyed Jacques. It unnerved Georgette to see that it was not the hounds nor the attack that had terrified her horse, but Jacques. Georgette saw it too, the way Jacques looked ravenous and bestial with his wild hair and predatory stance. His eyes were no longer amber, but glinted a lupine yellow, his lateral incisors had grown to points and his canines were long, sharpened fangs. Images flashed through Georgette’s mind, conjured from the tales and legends she had heard growing up in the Wild West – tales of skinwalkers and werewolves.

She didn’t have long to ponder it.

Something shot out of the trees faster than the eye could follow. With great swiftness, Jacques twisted sideways and caught the thing out of the air as it flew past his head. A steel arrow with brutally hooked barbs was trapped in his fist. Attached to the fletching was a steel chain that was drawn taught, leading back to a crossbow designed to hook its prey and drag it back to the hunter like a whaling harpoon. Jacques yanked the arrow and attached chain toward him, snarling with delight.

A shout came from the trees followed by the thrashing of foliage as Jacques dragged a man out of the brush like a salmon on a fishing line. The man still held his crossbow, trying futility to gain the upper hand with Jacques. Two other men charged out of the trees holding weapons unlike any Georgette had ever seen, something like snub-barreled shotguns with multiple, large-bore barrels. She didn’t hesitate. Georgette pulled her tiny pepperbox derringer from the garter on her thigh and fired two of its six barrels into the closest man, blowing his head apart like a ripe pumpkin. As the first man collapsed, blood spurting from the blown-open side of his face and empty, gaping eye socket, Georgette fired another round into the second man. The bullet flew straight into his open mouth and blew out the back of his head in chunky pink mist.

Both men were on the ground twitching in the second it took Jacques to reel in his attacker. Jacques whipped his hand across the man’s face, hooking his thumb under the man’s jawbone like hooking a fish, and violently ripped the poor bastard’s jaw completely off with one swipe. The man’s eyes bulged almost comically and his tongue twitched from side to side in a gaping bloody hole, free and confused without its seat in the jaw.

Still clutching the man’s detached jaw, Jacques held it at eye level and addressed it like Hamlet’s skull, “What else should I rip off your owner for attacking a lady and casting a pall over a rather promising evening?”

The man’s eyes widened impossibly further and a wet gargling screech hissed from the hole in his face when he guessed Jacques’s intent. Jacques flipped the jaw in his hand so the lower teeth faced outward and rammed it with all his brute strength into what remained of the man’s face. The man’s own lower teeth cut into the bridge of his nose and ruptured one of his eyes. As the man staggered backward, Jacques grabbed his lapels and yanked the man toward him. Jacques bent forward and attacked the man’s neck, tearing into it like a rabid beast and ripping the flesh of his throat apart.

Georgette had never seen such gruesome violence. She was unable to look away, her eyes still locked on Jacques when he turned to face her, his beard and chest coated in viscous, dripping blood. Faust trembled beneath her and the remaining wolfhounds brayed mournfully over their dead owners. The gun in her hand moved with a mind of its own as it drifted toward Jacques’s chest.

Jacques raised his bloody hands and grinned, flashing sharp canines shining scarlet. He approached her slowly, the way he would a frightened animal, and held out his right hand. “May I?” He gestured for her derringer.

Wordlessly, she handed him the little pistol. Whatever he was, Jacques had protected her, so she rationalized that she needn’t fear him. Jacques took the gun and walked back to the opposite side of the fallen tree. He knelt and stroked the dapple-grey neck of his horse, still trapped beneath the tree and breathing with difficulty. “Au revoir, mon ami,” he said with hoarse regret as he soothingly petted the horse’s neck with his left hand and fired a shot into its head to end its misery. He straightened and looked down at his horse for a long moment until he was sure no tears would breach his eyes before he walked back to Georgette.

Four wolfhounds still circled them, heads lowered, watching them warily. Jacques rolled his shoulders and growled at them more vicious and rumbling than any canine, so guttural his hair seemed to rise like the hair on the hounds’ backs. The hounds whimpered and dropped their heads in submission before backing away slowly and deferentially.

“I told you to run,” Jacques said with gravel in his voice when he again stood beside Faust.

“I don’t run scared. And I damn sure don’t follow orders,” she said firmly. “I’m sorry about your horse.”

“So am I.” He handed her the derringer and rested his hand on her thigh to comfort himself.

“Are you a werewolf?” she couldn’t help but ask.

“Christ, no!” Jacques spat, almost hissing as his hackled rose like a cat sprayed with water. “I will tell you on the ride home.”

“Home?” She frowned.

“I keep a home in town,” Jacques gestured at his blood-soaked clothing. “Imagine how the rumors will run rampant if I am seen looking like Jack the Ripper.”

Without waiting for an invitation, Jacques swung up onto Faust behind Georgette and looped his arms lightly around her waist. His breath was hot on her ear and smelled of coppery blood. Wet heat seeped through her clothing on her back from Jacques’s blood-soaked chest pressed against her.

“Is the blood yours or theirs?” she asked as she turned Faust away from the chaos.

“Mine, mostly. Felling a tree was a nice touch. New to me.” Jacques grinned mirthlessly. “It’s nothing to trouble yourself over.”

“I’ll find a doctor,” she said with concern.

“That won’t be necessary.” He tightened his hold around her waist. “My home is on Park Lane.”

“Tell me what exactly I just lived through tonight,” she said and kicked Faust into a canter.

*******************************************************************************************

The home Jacques kept on Park Lane, dubbed Brook House, was grand and elegant, standing five stories above the carriages that trotted by on the cobblestone street. A footman in a sharp uniform rushed out to meet them as Georgette brought Faust to a stop at the front door. The footman looked up at Jacques with the same black haze in his eyes that the obscene valet possessed, and took Faust’s reins. Jacques dismounted with the flair Georgette had come to expect from him, his movement devoid of pain or injury. He offered her his hand to step down from her horse, then moved his hand to her waist possessively when she stood beside him. Jacques stopped her when Georgette made for the door to his home.

“If you come inside, I may never let you leave,” he said and tightened his hold on her waist. “I’ll have my carriage drive you home.”

“Don’t be absurd! You’re badly injured,” she protested. She was still digesting what Jacques had revealed to her about his nature during their ride to Brook House.

“Am I?” He grinned devilishly. “I would love nothing more than to feel your healing touch, but I will not have it under false pretenses.”

“Have you lost so much blood you’re delirious?” she scoffed, eyeing how his shirt was plastered to his chest with drying blood.

“See for yourself,” he purred as he leaned in closer and pulled the lapel of his jacket aside.

Tentatively, she reached to the top button of his white shirt and began unbuttoning it. The way he smirked at her uncertainty eliminated it, and she looked brazenly into his eyes as she deftly unbuttoned his shirt down to where it was tucked into his trousers. His pale skin shone red with blood, but she saw no injuries. She ran a hand over his chest to convince herself by touch what her eyes told her, feeling the thick ridges of warm muscle. It was as though he had just emerged unharmed from a bath of blood.

“I’ve done that too, in another life,” he teased. He brought his fingertips to her cheek and caressed her skin. “Your thoughts are loud when you worry. I hope this has put your mind at ease.”

“At ease is the wrong term,” she couldn’t help but laugh.

“It occurs to me I should have suggested a kiss from you would heal me a few moments ago,” he said huskily, leaning in slightly closer until only inches separated them.

Georgette tilted her chin up and smirked at him, challenging him to not only kiss her but to impress her. Jacques trailed his hand from her cheek down to her throat, letting it rest there and using his thumb to angle her chin as he wanted when he brought his lips to hers.

His plush lips were so much softer than she had imagined. He kissed her gently, his lips caressing hers with indulgent passion, making her body melt against his. It was she who parted her lips first, an invitation to deepen his kiss that Jacques hungrily took. The heat of his tongue seared through her entire body, and the heady masculine taste of him made her shudder pleasantly. His chest rumbled with his approval as his lips moved against hers. It was clear that he was a very skilled lover, so easily raising a rash of goosebumps down Georgette’s spine. When she finally pulled back from his kiss for breath, her eyelids were slow to flutter open and return her to reality.

“Your lips could raise a man from the dead.” He smiled down at her, swaying softly as he held her in his arms.

“Be more cautious in the future so they never have to.” She pulled him back down by his lapels to kiss him again.

“Ah, but you already have, ma belle dangereuse,” Jacques crooned, his voice rumbling thickly in his chest. “You’ve made my deadened heart beat so frantically I could dance to the rhythm.”

“And yet you want to send me away tonight?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Unless you wish to stay forever,” he told her without a hint of teasing.

“I’ll think on it.” She did tease because he was too serious not to.

“While you do, join me for an intimate soiree at my dear friend’s home.” His nose was still so close to hers that she could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin.

“Will I have to fight a harem of women for a place on your arm?” She pulled back to watch his expression when he answered.

“Never,” Jacques assured her. “No one compares to you.”

“Surely, you must have as many lusting women hunting you as you do vampire hunters,” she said. “No doubt plenty of them would have my head on a spit as readily as a vampire hunter would yours.”

‘The number of those hunting me doesn’t matter.” He trailed a finger down her cheek. “There is only one I will let catch me.”

“What if I dispatched with any trespassing women with the same finality you did the hunters?” She smiled, looking up at him through thick eyelashes. “What if that’s how I expect you to deal with them so long as I keep your company?”

“If it piques your fancy.” Jacques grinned wickedly, flashing his pointed canines. “I do love a bloodthirsty woman.”

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Logistics regarding the soiree Georgette had agreed to attend with Jacques had not been discussed. It was a bit disheartening when she didn’t hear from the persistent man for days. She felt she should be worried, given the injuries she saw him sustain, but she also saw them heal. When a man had all the time in the world – and seemingly all the women – perhaps, he felt less urgency. She was not prone to pining and she felt her thoughts were unnaturally occupied with Jacques. Moreso, it was almost as though she could feel his presence in her mind when it was quiet; when she was in her bath or lying in bed. It felt like he was peering into the window of her mind like a voyeur trying to catch a glimpse of her skin.

She would have to ask him about that.

She had expected Jacques to initiate another run-in with her or an ostensible chance meeting that was obviously premeditated. Instead of surprising her in person, Jacques arranged for a package to be delivered to her room, surprising her by its presence on her bed when she returned one evening. A large box with a crimson ribbon beckoned her, quashing all the irritation she felt at someone breaking into her room. She tried to purge the image from her mind of that horrible creature, Carroughes, tromping around her things.

Sitting on the bed, Georgette ran her hand over the box, untied the ribbon, and lifted the lid. Gasping excitedly at the sight of its contents, she sprang back up from the bed and pulled her gift from the box. The finest scarlet fabric she had ever felt cascaded down from her fingertips, as she held aloft the most elegantly decadent gown she had ever seen. She couldn’t resist hugging the gown to her body and twirling. A small white card fell to the floor from its hiding place within the folds of the gown. Folding the dress carefully and returning it to the box, she bent to retrieve the card. Written upon it in graceful black calligraphy was a simple message.

My Belle Dangereuse,

Have this dress on by 7:00 tomorrow evening. Or have no dress on at all. The curtains in my carriage are impenetrable.

Your servant, Jacques.

*******************************************************************************************

From her window Georgette saw a carriage drawn by a pair of prancing black horses arrive outside the hotel at 6:45pm. The carriage must belong to Jacques, with a coach in funerary black and black harnesses on the black team of horses. Silver accents on the carriage door, harnesses, and bridles glinted in the gas lamps that lined the street, and the curtains were black and silver brocade. Although she was fully dressed and coiffed, and had been for fifteen minutes, she wouldn’t let Jacques know that.

At five ‘til seven, Jacques stepped out of his carriage. The evening breeze ruffled his hair and made his tailcoat flutter around his long legs as he leaned his back against the coach, tapping his walking stick on the cobblestone. Georgette watched him through a slit in her curtains. He was dressed all in black, save for an ascot the same color as her dress, and looked particularly towering with his slim pants, long coat, and top hat. She decided to make him wait longer.

She walked outside at five after wearing the dress Jacques had gifted her, but barely any of the scarlet silk was visible beneath the long astrakhan-trimmed coat she wore. Jacques smiled broadly at the sight of her as he took off his hat and gave her a regal bow with a flourish of his coat. He opened the coach door and tossed his hat and walking stick inside while Georgette walked to him.

“Have you ever been to Switzerland?” Jacques asked, taking her hand and raising it to his lips.

“Is that where your coach is taking us?” she teased.

“I’ll take you there, or anywhere else, on your whim.” Jacques kissed her hand. “The air there is so clear that at night the starlight shimmers on the glaciers like diamonds and the moonlight makes everything glow. You’re beautiful in the same way, shimmering and glowing. A dancing light in the darkness.”

“Says the man who has never seen me dance.” She smirked. “Thank you for the dress.”

“It is thanks enough seeing you in it.” He kept hold of her hand, stroking his thumb over her skin.

“It fits suspiciously well,” she mused. “How did you get my measurements?”

“Would you rather hear that I have an eye for certain qualities, or that my spies are everywhere?” He grinned and guided her into the carriage.

The plush leather seats were rich oxblood and the interior was dark red velvet. The coach dipped when Jacques climbed inside and took his seat across from her. Sitting so close to her, Jacques could feel the heat from her body radiating inside the coach, hear every beat of her heart, savor the sweet scent of her. It was an exquisite form of torture, a sensory overload influencing his body to respond against his will. He crossed his legs, his movements slightly awkward inside the cabin that was made for a smaller man.

Grinning wolfishly, he flashed his vampiric canines at Georgette. The cadence of her heartbeat quickened at the sight and her pupils widened – signs imperceptible to a human, as was the way her scent changed subtly, tinged with a hint more invitation. Jacques’s grin bloomed into a full broad smile when he saw this confirmation that he had read her correctly. She liked the danger about him. Rather than being frightened, she was aroused by that part of him.

“Refreshments?” Jacques asked, reaching below the middle of the seat to pull out a concealed drawer filled with decanters, chocolates, and fruits. “I have scotch, wine, coffee, and tea, and a range of delicacies that pair well with each.”

“I’d best start with coffee and keep my wits about me as long as possible,” she teased. “It surprises me you have it here in the land of tea-drinkers.”

“I have not just any coffee.” He retrieved a pair of teacups and a decanter with contents as black and thick as molasses. “Turkish coffee.” He handed her a cup and poured the strong-smelling sludge into it. “My favorite.”

“It’s a bit presumptive for you to be scheming to keep me up all night so early in the evening.” She raised the cup to her nose. She had never smelled coffee so strong.

“My sinister schemes have no bounds.” Jacques grinned as he filled his own cup and returned the decanter to the drawer.

“Tell me about these plans,” she succeeded at sounding coy until she took a drink of the Turkish coffee and coughed as though she had downed a shot of whiskey. “My god!” she said as she wiped a tear from her eye. “This might keep me awake for the entire weekend.”

“Even better.” Jacques’s eyes crinkled at the edges with delight as he sipped from his cup. “At the risk of shocking you, I’ll warn you my schemes involve conversation and camaraderie. I’d like to learn more about you and reveal anything of me you wish to know.” He took another drink and winked at her. “No matter how sundry and salacious your request may be.”

“Spoken like a man who has all the time in the world.” Georgette’s next drink was invigorating now that she expected the strong bite of caffeine on her tongue.

“That I do, and I don’t want to waste a second of it.” Jacques fixed his unnerving eyes on hers, and Georgette thought their gleam was more citrine tonight, more firelight in them than amber. It was likely a trick of the gas lamps the carriage trotted past. His eyes danced when he added, “I aim to capture your heart before the sun rises.”

“Is that all?” she laughed and sipped her coffee, finding she now enjoyed it very much. “I admire a bold man.”

“I, too, admire boldness, which makes me defenseless against you.” His eyes shimmered, almost hypnotically, making her wonder if this was another vampiric talent. He pointedly looked away out of the carriage window before he began to lose hold on the bestial part of himself. When he returned his eyes to hers, they had mellowed to the color of whiskey. “Tell me what makes a beautiful woman want to live so dangerously? What compels you to travel the world in the company of rough men for these shows?”

“Your question presumes I don’t need to do any of those things to live a perfectly satisfying life.” She held out her cup for him to refill it. “I disagree. Most women I know want nothing more than to marry and start amassing a litter of children, which frankly, sounds like a prison sentence to me. I would like to marry one day, because I feel life is better when shared with someone, but there are limits to how tethered I will ever allow myself to be. There is much I want to do first, like this,” she gestured at the carriage window and the buildings passing by outside. “I want to see the world, and I can do that this way, by travelling for shows, and with relative safety and only a little scandal. Otherwise, to travel so, I would be at the mercy of a husband.”

“Fair enough,” Jacques agreed. “But what in all infernal hell compels you to ride that horse off a diving platform?”

“I enjoy it. There is no more to it than that, and there doesn’t have to be. One day, I’ll be too old to have adventures and danger, and all I’ll have is my story. I’m trying to live a good one.” She smiled sincerely and added, “One of my favorite writers said it best, ‘Ride, boldly ride.”

“’The Shade replied,’” Jacques added the next line for her, playing the role of the Shade. “I too am always searching for cities of gold, in a manner.”

“I’ve all but told you that what I fear most is a cage and infirmity,” she said somberly. “What thoughts trouble a man who never need fear such things?”

“Loneliness,” Jacques answered quickly and sincerely. “Facing the ages alone is a daunting prospect.”

“That doesn’t strike me as an insurmountable problem for you,” she laughed.

“More so than you think, cherie.” Jacques again opened the drawer and returned their empty cups inside. He uncovered a dish of fruits and chocolates, and plucked a pitted black cherry by its stem. “You’ll love the taste after coffee,” he crooned and held it to Georgette’s lips.

Although he sat across from her, Jacques was so large there was little space remaining between them when he offered her the cherry. Leaning tentatively forward, she took the cherry between her teeth, allowing her lips to brush his fingertip when she closed them around it. She closed her eyes in satisfaction at the burst of flavor that complimented the lingering taste of coffee. Jacques watched hungrily at the way her lovely throat moved when she swallowed and the way the cherry had left its stain on her lips. He couldn’t resist tasting them and captured her lips in a soft, savoring kiss. Georgette brought her hand to the back of his neck, her nails sending sparks down his spine. He almost lost control of himself when she wove her fingers into the hair at his collar and pulled him closer.

The world outside could have burned around them, the ground quaked beneath them, and Jacques couldn’t have been bothered to care. There was no world to him now but the intoxicating woman in his arms. Her scent and taste surrounded him, flowed over him and into him until he felt like he could drown in her. Moving his lips to the silken skin of her neck, Jacques moaned headily as he lavished her with kisses.

A rude jolt of the carriage sent Jacques lurching against Georgette, shoving her back against the seat with unintentional roughness. Fortunately, she laughed as the carriage rocked again and Jacques pushed himself off of her and back into his seat.

“Stupid bastard,” he snarled about his disfigured driver. Jacques reached for the window to shout at the man when he realized they had arrived and were parked near a portico framed by fat columns. He hadn’t noticed when the carriage had passed the imposing wrought iron gates and turned onto the long oak-lined driveway leading to the Georgian monstrosity that was Pierre’s London home.

Sitting back in his seat Jacques grinned a little sheepishly at Georgette. “I must tell my driver to slow the horses to a walk on our return. The drive passed too quickly.”

“Do you have enough cherries for a longer drive?” she teased as she smoothed her dress and hair.

“Plenty. I can spend hours eating a cherry,” he thrummed huskily and grinned.

*******************************************************************************************

Thousands of flickering lights inside the mansion made its myriad of windows shine like a burst of sunlight in the dark grounds. From its columns and ornate cornices to the statutes watching from stone corners and among lush hedges, manicured to precision, the estate was awash in opulence. The celebration inside gave its masonry glowing life.

Georgette looked out of the carriage window in awe. She had never been to such a grand estate, nor what promised to be an elegant ball. Excitement mingled with nervousness and an unusual shyness. This was not an experience many American westerners were prepared for. Her nerves would be calm and her hands steady if she were rousting a bear out of her grandfather’s cabin in Montana or inside a saloon with men drawing guns on each other or riding a horse at breakneck speed under a full moon. But dresses and dancing and dining under the strict code of English etiquette? It was enough to make a strong man quail in his boots.

“You’ll find no one here stands on formality. No one who matters anyway,” Jacques said soothingly, watching her with the lupine yellow again glinting in his eyes.

“We’re going to have to come to terms over you prodding my thoughts like this,” she said with mild embarrassment.

Jacques grinned and opened the carriage door. Georgette hadn’t noticed the footman patiently waiting outside. The man was apparently trained to wait for the carriage door to be opened from the inside so he did not disturb whatever might be happening in private. Jacques stepped down and whipped his long coat to the side as he donned his top hat, giving him the appearance of a magician on stage performing his act with flourish. He offered Georgette his hand as she exited the carriage then placed her hand in the crook of his arm as he led her to the grand entrance.

“There’s no need to be nervous.” Jacques leaned toward her and she felt his arm flex beneath her hand. “A lady on my arm is the guest of honor. Nothing else matters, nor does any other opinion.”

His comment had the effect of settling her nerves, but not for the reasons he hoped. Georgette felt a flush of anger and a tinge of jealousy at the thought of how many other young women must have made this walk before, treading on the swirled marble floor of the entrance hall on the arm of a handsome man – perhaps even this very same, centuries-old man – full of excitement and hope at what the evening may bring. Where were those women now? They had been as fleeting as a firefly lighting the night with its beauty for one instant only to be forgotten in the next.

“None of them were you,” Jacques said in his most alluring timbre, again holding a conversation with her inner thoughts.

“How many of them have you told that same thing?” she asked cynically.

“I cannot tell you none, but I assure you there have been very few.” He placed his free hand over hers, comforting and warm. “I do not believe there has been more than one woman a century who has truly captivated me as you have done.”

“What became of them?” She looked up at his angular profile, gauging his response. She was surprised to see a passing hint of pain.

“They made a choice, and it was not the one I’d hoped,” he answered cryptically.

“What choice is that?” she pressed.

“One that may soon be presented to you.” Jacques met her eyes and smiled warmly as he led her into the ballroom.

The ballroom glimmered in white and gold. The high ceiling was beautifully decorated with Georgian plasterwork, like sugary icing on a decadent cake, gilt accents glinting across it like stars in a frosted sky. Two pendulous crystal chandeliers sparkled with the light of hundreds of candles. Notes from a string orchestra carried through the room giving elegant couples a rhythm as they danced, men in mostly black paired with women dressed in a kaleidoscope of color.

Georgette took Jacques’s offered hand and smiled when she saw in his eyes a shared anticipation. His hand at her waist felt like a hot iron burning through her dress, making her skin tingle. When Jacques began twirling her to the Danse Macabre her corset felt too tight and her breath came short. She could feel the restrained power of him in every movement. His body seemed particularly large as he deftly led her in a dance across the ballroom, his skill and power making up for her lack of both. Their dance was not just a series of steps but a conversation between their bodies, an intimate exchange and a promise of what could pass between them. Each twirl and dip brought them closer, their bodies pressed together and their faces inches apart, their breaths mingling in the charged air.

At a quick appraisal, the ball was lavish, filled with beauty and romance. The longer Georgette watched the dancers, the more details she noticed. Details that made her skin prickle with something between excitement and a primal sort of fright. Pointed canines nipped at jawlines and dragged along the throats of dance partners. A few couples were actively engaged in biting each other in lewd displays that morbidly mirrored heated kissing. Claws traced lines over exposed skin, and some innocuous movements were too fast for Georgette’s eye to see. Most unsettling were the eyes. There were eyes colored blood red, bone white, and coal black. Retinas colored in tones usually only found in cadavers, eyed their partners hungrily. Some, like Jacques, had eyes that nearly glowed with vibrant color. Those were both the most striking and the most unnerving. A redheaded man watched her with eyes as orange as a sunset and a startlingly beautiful woman with rich violet eyes looked at Jacques from across the room. Georgette saw no other eyes with the enticing, predatory gold that glinted in Jacques’s.

Vampires. They mingled with the crowd, their numbers few compared to the humans, like a pack of wolves weaving through a herd of cattle.

Vignettes came to Georgette in a flash as bodies moved across the dance floor, hiding one couple engaged in an act of depravity as another was revealed.

A vampire, his glacial eyes as piercing as they were cold, held a young woman close, his lips trailing kisses along her neck before his fangs sank into her flesh. The woman’s gasp was one of bliss, her body arching into his as if seeking more of the exquisite pain. Nearby, another vampire, a striking figure with sterling silver hair, pressed his lips fervently to his partner's wrist, the crimson trickle of blood staining his mouth as he drank deeply. The vampiress with violet eyes dragged a pointed fingernail across her clavicle, releasing a drop of ruby blood. Keeping her eyes fixed seductively on Jacques, she collected the blood on her fingertip and licked it away. Jacques held Georgette tighter and bowed his head to trail his lips affectionately and possessively along her cheek.

“You’re safe here,” Jacques told her to put any distress at ease. “Pierre’s parties are friendly to all. Even if they were not, a vampire would squander the long years of his life by crossing me.”

“That’s a bold statement,” she laughed, but relaxed a little inside his arms.

“You happened to mention you fancy a bold man.” He winked at her.

“Only if his boldness is not misplaced.” She laughed.

“How do you judge me?” Jacques raised his eyebrows.

“I’m reserving judgment.” She ran his hand from his shoulder down over his chest.

Vampires and humans swirled together in a seductive waltz, their movements fluid, with an intoxicating, ethereal quality. Their partners, the humans, seemed entranced, their faces a mix of ecstasy and drunkenness as they succumbed to the allure of their immortal companions. The air seemed to shimmer with the quality often confined to dreams, and it was only because of her exposure to Jacques and the mental effects he could induce that Georgette realized it was a product of the combined hypnosis of the vampires there, creating a dreamlike state among the humans. She wondered then if Jacques was keeping her lucid, or if she had a tolerance simply by being aware of the phenomenon’s existence.

A boisterous laugh sounded through the throng of dancers. Georgette saw a flash of red among the crowd and Jacques scoffed with irritation. She recognized Buck Taylor easily, the second tallest man in the room wearing a bold red shirt. He danced with a diminutive woman, all but slinging her around the floor in his arms. Now that she watched the other dancers more closely Georgette recognized other men from the Wild West Show, most of them part of Buck’s Rough Riders.

“Pierre finds great amusement in your American cowboys,” Jacques explained with distaste.

“They can always be trusted to liven up an event.” Georgette saw that several men wore their gunbelts and revolvers peeking out from beneath their rented tailcoats. One of the bumbling cowboys bumped into an elegant vampiress. The pale vampire hissed at the tan cowboy, but he was too focused on his dance partner to notice. Georgette remarked, “I’ll bet your friends can liven things up too.”

“Pierre enjoys spectacle.” Jacques kept his attention on Georgette, unconcerned with the sights around them.

“Did you bring me here because I fit in with the spectacle?” she was only partially teasing.

Jacques shook his head subtly, rustling his long hair. “If this is a circus, you are the ringmaster and I am merely your dancing bear.” He grinned and twirled her unexpectedly, holding her tighter when he brought her back into his arms. As they moved across the floor, their bodies communicated in a language all their own. A subtle shift of Jacques's hand on her waist, the gentle pressure of Georgette's palm against his shoulder, the synchronized glide of their feet. Jacques brushed his lips against Georgette's skin, his breath warm and tantalizing as he savored her exquisite scent. The sound of blood coursing excitedly through her veins was as clear in Jacques’s ears as the orchestra, beating a rhythm to which he would never tire of dancing.

The haunting melody curled around Jacques and Georgette like mist rolling in with the evening breeze. The world seemed to fall away as Jacques's grip on Georgette tightened, pulling her closer. He lowered his head to capture her lips in a kiss that was both tender and consuming. Georgette felt the world around them blur into insignificance, her senses overwhelmed by the softness of his lips and the heady taste of him. Her fingers curled into his hair, pulling him closer as the kiss deepened, their movements growing more synchronized and passionate. Jacques's hands roamed her back, sending shivers down her spine, while her own hands explored the breadth of his strong shoulders.

Jacques’s chest swelled with pride when he pulled back from their kiss with a smile on his lips. He gave her another ebullient twirl. Georgette should have been equally buoyed, the emotion was certainly there. But there was something in the way so many unnatural eyes watched her; the way their fangs glinted when they grinned. The small hairs on the back of her neck prickled with unease. She had never felt herself weak or any semblance of a victim, but now she felt like a doe who had wandered into a den of wolves. Where there had been excitement minutes before, it was now tinged with trepidation. Jacques seemed wholly unaware and entirely absorbed in her alone. She wondered for a dark moment if it was an elaborate ruse to bring her here so he could have her at a disadvantage, but she couldn’t think that of him when he had been nothing but kind to her. He also had no need of placing her at a disadvantage to do anything he wanted to her, if he wanted to act brutish. She couldn’t pinpoint precisely what was amiss, unable to consciously articulate what piqued the primal part of her mind.

“Is it too much trouble to ask for some fresh air and a drink?” she asked instead, using thirst to explain why her mouth had gone dry.

“As you wish,” Jacques assured her.

Taking her hand, he raised it to his lips, keeping his gleaming eyes on hers as he placed a kiss on her skin. Many eyes watched them as they weaved through the crowded ballroom, giving Georgette another prickle of concern like panicky ants crawling up her spine. Buck Taylor watched too, watched her, his eyes narrowed. Buck could be jealous of her, although never enough for him to lay any official claims on her, but he had never been aggressive or mean spirited before. The sight of him unsettled her further so that she clutched Jacques’s hand.

Jacques led her to a grand staircase at the far end of the ballroom and up to the third story. A short walk down a hallway lined with oil paintings found them at a pair of doors opened to a large balcony. They walked to the stone balustrade, taking in the view of the gardens dappled with moonlight. Jacques rested his hand on the small of her back.

“I’m not accustomed to crowds so large.” Georgette inhaled the fresh night air then turned into Jacques, placing her hand on his chest. “Perhaps the drink would taste better someplace else. Take me away from this ruckus and let us enjoy a more private evening.”

A sound rumbled in Jacques’s chest, as if he had forced a groan back down into his gut before it escaped his throat, and his fingers dug into the fabric of her dress. “I didn’t bring you here tonight with that intention, but my god, darling, there’s nothing I want more.” He did groan now, remembering the obligation to his friend. “But first, I’d very much like for you to meet my friend and our host, Pierre. He must be, ah, occupied for a short time. Let me fetch you that drink and then we’ll reassess. One should never attempt anything amorous on a dry throat.”

He stole a lingering kiss then walked from the balcony in a brisk, long stride. Georgette leaned over the balustrade, breathing deep to try to steady her nerves. Cheery sounds of the ball carried to her and the night was beautifully serene. It didn’t help. Men she had known and traveled with for years were acting strangely and this mansion with its elegant veneer and sinister undertone had to be playing on her nerves. It would be irrational for such a set of circumstances not to. She realized too that the man she felt safest with and trusted most was the man she barely knew. She smiled when she heard footsteps approaching her across the balcony.

Her smile faded when she turned and faced a stranger.

An extraordinarily handsome man walked toward her, tall and muscular with dark hair and viper green eyes that gleamed like radium. Four sharp fangs flashed inside his dashing smile. He had the look of a lion stalking his prey when he approached her, gracile but powerful, the chilling, malicious smile only a façade to keep her from taking flight. There was nowhere for her to flee even if she wished it, unless she wanted to charge past him to the only door or fling herself over the balcony. And she didn’t run from fright.

“I had to see for myself what all the fuss was about,” the man said in a rich seductive voice. Meeting her at the railing, he leaned his hip against it and drummed short but pointed nails upon it, as he let his eyes openly travel her figure. “You’ve caused quite a stir in our little cloister.”

“It’s the dress, isn’t it?” she asked to make light, but she didn’t return his false smile.

“Le Gris hasn’t flaunted a human in a very long time,” the man said, a hint of menace dripping from his words. “He has his dalliances, as do we all, but such things are to be kept discreet. It’s frowned upon, you know. Humans are our hounds and cattle. You can see how taboo that makes it for us to entangle ourselves with a human. Let alone to openly cavort with one.”

“Does my standing alone on a balcony constitute cavorting?” she asked brusquely.

“I can smell him on you.” The man leaned too close, bringing his nose near her throat and inhaled lewdly. “As well as the perfume you’re wearing. Tuberose and jasmine. It pairs well with the scent of arousal you cannot hide from us, but clashes with the vanilla fragrance sprayed upon your dress by its maker. The scent left on the fabric by her aged fingers taints the ripeness of your skin.”

“You make my skin crawl.” She looked at him defiantly, a hair’s breadth away from pulling her derringer and firing a bullet into one of his venom green eyes.

“That is not all I could do to your skin.” He snatched her arm, yanking her to him as he brought her arm to his mouth. Georgette couldn’t twist her arm free from his iron grip, forced to watch with revulsion as the man licked the inside of her wrist.

“I, for one, have never had to capture a struggling woman to taste her,” Jacques’s voice boomed across the balcony from where he stood in the doorway. He held a glass of champagne in each hand and walked nonchalantly toward them. Only his aurous eyes, glinting murderously, betrayed the ferocity boiling inside him. “Do you not have a lady of your own to charm this evening, Slyvester?”

Slyvester kept his eyes on Jacques but spoke to Georgette, “Do you know that whomever of us bites you first will have claim to you forever? No matter where you go or how many years pass, or how many other lovers you take, you will carry our mark forever. Much like branding a horse is to you cowboys.”

“Just like branding a horse, it’s a good way for you to get kicked in the teeth,” Georgette spat.

Still holding Georgette’s arm brutally tight, Slyvester dragged it out until her arm was stretched out over the balustrade in a clear threat as he looked at Jacques. “You haven’t bestowed your curse upon her yet. Humans are so fragile, their lives so fleeting.”

Jacques’s lips curled in a snarl matching the menace in his voice, “Whereas it takes a great deal of violence to kill us.” His exposed fangs looked longer to Georgette than before, or perhaps it was the viciousness about him that enhanced his frightening appearance. “If you want to find out firsthand, I’ll accommodate you.”

“You’re past your prime, old man,” Slyvester said venomously. “You peaked during the Enlightenment.” His eyes drifted up toward a window another story above them. “Just like Pierre, you’ve grown content and weak.”

Without warning, Jacques lunged at Slyvester. His movement was almost too fast for Georgette to see – a blur of bared teeth, wicked eyes, and wild hair, shoulders bunched and black coat flapping around his huge body. Growling bestially, Jacques tackled the other vampire with jarring force, sending both men plunging over the balcony to the garden three stories below. Georgette gasped, helplessly watching them plummet. Horror slowed the moment for her, and it appeared to her that they fell in slow motion, clawing at each other and twisting in the air like angry cats.

The men hit the ground far below with bone-shattering force. Georgette leaned far over the balustrade, as if the few extra inches she gained would help her see better. On the ground, the men rolled over one another, a mass of frenzied punching and biting. Their growls and hisses and curses carried to Georgette, along with the sounds of flesh tearing under sharp nails and fists pummeling into meat.

Tearing herself from the rail, Georgette ran as fast as she could to the nearest staircase that would take her down to the garden where the men fought viciously.

*******************************************************************************************

Jacques fisted Sylvester’s lapels as he tackled him over the balustrade, holding the bastard beneath him as they fell. He ensured that Slyvester hit the ground on his back with Jacques landing on top of him, driving his fists down into the vampire’s flesh with all the force of his heavy body and gravity. Jacques felt Sylvester’s collarbones shatter and his shoulder blades beneath splinter – a minor injury for a rapidly-healing vampire. Sylvester squealed with rage and pain, thrashing beneath Jacques to unseat him.

Sharpened fingernails slashed across Jacques’s face, temporarily blinding him, and giving the other man a moment’s advantage. Bucking his hips and twisting his body, Slyvester knocked Jacques off and rolled up to his feet. Jacques immediately sprang up into a fighting stance, perfectly balanced, with his fists clenched tight. The ragged claw marks across Jacques’s face healed in seconds, leaving blood streaking down his cheek.

“Can you blame me?” Slyvester asked flippantly as he spat blood from his mouth. “She is enticing. For an appetizer.” He swiped a clawed hand at Jacques the way a boxer used a jab, to gauge distance and create space. “What does Pierre think of her? How is Pierre this evening?”

For the first time that evening, it concerned Jacques that he hadn’t yet seen Pierre. That Sylvester was remarking on it now meant something sinister was afoot. Slyvester shot out a low kick at Jacques’s knee. Jacques jerked his leg up enough for the kick to miss, then stomped his boot down on the front of Slyvester’s knee, digging the tread of his boot into flesh and peeling skin away from the vampire’s skin. Slyvester shrieked with pain as the bone crunched, but even this was little more than a nuisance to a vampire. Slyvester shook his injured leg once and when he returned it to the ground it was healed.

Jacques circled his opponent in another semblance to boxing. Slyvester held his hands high to guard his face. Jacques kept his fists lower but ready, inviting a strike at his face. He even leaned in, making his invitation sweeter. Slyvester took the bait, swiping viciously at Jacques’s face with all his force, putting his body into the blow. Jacques bobbed his head and shoulders to dodge the strike, his timing perfect, and caught the arm Slyvester was foolish enough to give him. Anchoring Slyvester’s wrist in his fist, Jacques slammed his opposite forearm into his enemy’s elbow, shattering the bone. In the same savage motion and with the same arm, Jacques whipped his hand to Slyvester’s face. His thumb caught under his enemy’s nose and his fingers dug into his far eye socket. With a cruel wrench of his hand, Jacques broke the man’s nose, ripped the flesh from his cheek, and popped his eye from its socket. Slyvester howled and fought against Jacques’s hold on his arm like a pheasant flapping in the jaws of a hound. The crippling blow had been executed in less than a second.

Slyvester’s eye dangled from its stringy optic nerve, looking like a bloody yellow string of snot connecting the bobbing eye to the empty bloody socket. Grinning evilly, Jacques snatched the eyeball, yanked it off its string with a pop and crushed it in his fist like a grape. “That won’t grow back.”

Mercilessly, Jacques planted his bloody hand on Slyvester’s shoulder as the crippled man howled in pain and outrage, scratching ineffectively at Jacques with his free hand. Using the arm he held as leverage, Jacques spun his opponent until he faced away and Jacques was able to bring his arm up behind his back, bent unnaturally like a chicken wing. With a brutal yank, Jacques forced the man’s arm far past the range of motion for the joint, wrenching the shoulder out of its socket with a sickeningly wet gurgle of tissue and bone scraping against bone. It was hardly more difficult for Jacques than pulling a drumstick from a roast turkey. Slyvester’s arm dangled limp and useless inside its sack of skin. It would heal quickly once the joint was realigned, but this was not easily and quickly done by a man inexperienced in such matters of field medics, and it would dangle like a tassel until then.

Now, one-eyed and effectively one-armed, Slyvester swayed on his feet and whimpered feebly. Blood, snot, and drool mingling in a dripping mess from his face. Jacques shoved him away, sending Sylvester stumbling. Jacques straightened and smoothed his lapels. He cast a glance at the huge bay windows that looked into the candlelit interior of the mansion. The sounds of the ball had grown louder and more raucous.

“You forget, mon ami,” Jacques snarled ruthlessly as he ran a hand through his wild hair. “I spent centuries at war. Hundred Year’s War, Byzantine Wars, Muscovite Wars, Hessian Wars, Napoleon’s War. I returned from the Transvaal less than a decade ago. War and women are all that have held my interest throughout the centuries.”

“I haven’t forgotten,” Slyvester sputtered. “It made you arrogant.” He grinned, showing a broken-off canine.

Jacques narrowed his eyes at this misplaced reaction.

A crash inside the mansion drew his attention. He jerked his head to the sound, but saw nothing inside the shimmering ball other than a flash of the expected horde of moving bodies. Something rustled on Jacques’s opposite side in the garden. A white streak shot out of the dark with great speed from among the hedges and flowers, aiming for his head. Jacques ducked and snatched the thing out of the air, realizing it was a rope when he clenched his fist around it. The rigid sort of latigo rope used by cowboys. Jacques’s hand instantly burned as if he had grabbed a red hot poker out of a fire, and his skin began to sizzle, filling the night air with the scent of burning skin and something metallic.

“Silver?” Jacques frowned as he sniffed the smoke rising from his palm to confirm his suspicion. Silver wouldn’t kill Jacques as it would a weaker vampire, but it burned like hell and it rendered many of his vampiric abilities impotent. Silver interwoven into a rope could render him as useless as a mortal. He didn’t release the rope despite the pain in his hand, and instead wrapped his fist around it multiple times to get a better grip and yanked the rope toward him, reeling in the man holding it. The flesh on Jacques’s hand burned and sizzled like steak on a grill, but the pain didn’t stop him. Another rope flew at him from his other side. He saw it just in time to catch it with his left hand, instantly scalding that palm too.

Just as Jacques realized Sylvester had been a ruse to lure him out into the garden alone, the bay windows exploded. Glass and iron framing shot out into the garden, stinging Jacques’s skin like angry wasps. A dozen vampires and humans burst out of the broken window in a frightened stampede, the humans screaming and vampires hissing. Hot on their heels was one of the cowboys, a man with a handlebar mustache and drawn pistol in hand. The cowboy aimed and fired at a male vampire Jacques recognized as one of Pierre’s acquaintances. The vampire seized when he was struck in the back, his mouth open in a rictus of pain. Other party goers ran around the injured vampire, too scared to care about him. The bullet didn’t exit the front of his chest and must have settled inside his ribcage, because his chest began to burn from the inside out. Charred flesh crept up from his collar up his throat to his jaw and over his face, until his features resembled a sizzling mummy.

Jacques watched, confused. Bullets didn’t have that effect on vampires. He’d been shot dozens of times to little more effect than a bee sting. In the few seconds he watched the bewildering scene unfold, he felt his great strength seeping away. The ropes in his hands felt like they were attached to Clydesdales instead of the men holding them, and he felt his arms being slowly drawn apart as his muscles quivered with fatigue. One of the men who had stepped out from his hiding place, approached Jacques with his gun drawn as he tried to get his rope back and take another shot at catching him in a more effective hold.

Handlebar Mustache stood just inside the broken window, one boot planted on the window frame. He trained his pistol on Jacques.

Jacques summoned a burst of strength from his faltering muscles and yanked the rope held by the closest cowboy. The cowboy stumbled toward Jacques, who dropped both ropes and grabbed the cowboy by the throat with lightning speed. Jacques spun the cowboy in front of him as a shield just as Handlebar Mustache fired at his chest. His strength was already returning as the bullet struck the cowboy in the chin, level with Jacques’s heart, and tore off his face. Jacques grabbed the man’s pistol and shoved his body away.

A woman staggered away from the melee inside the mansion, clutching a wound on her thigh that spurted blood in time with her pulse. She weaved in between Jacques and Handlebar Mustache, blocking his shot. In that same second another lasso shot at Jacques from behind, catching him around the neck and instantly cinching tight. Jacques choked as he was yanked backward off his feet and dragged across the ground, the gun in his hand bouncing wildly with no target in sight. He forced the fingers of his free hand in between his flesh and the rope that was choking him, burning through his throat, and leaching his strength all at once, as his back scraped over the ground. Twisting his head, he saw another cowboy mounted on a horse with the rope dallied around the saddle horn. The cowboy was trying to aim his pistol at Jacques’s head while his horse backed quickly away to keep tension on the rope as he was trained.

With a shaking hand, Jacques tried to aim his pistol at the man before his opponent could get a shot off. Jacques flinched when a shot crashed in his ears. But it was the mounted man’s head that burst open, sending a spray of pink chunks out from the side of his temple. The man slumped in the saddle and another shot rang across the garden, catching Handlebar Mustache in his open mouth as he shouted something that would never be heard.

Jacques’s eyes were blurry when he tried to aim his gun toward the gunfire. He could only see the hazy blood red outline of a woman walking swiftly toward him out of the shadows of the mansion. Georgette aimed over Jacques’s prostrate body and fired again, killing the other man who had roped him. His vision was clear enough to see the deadly focus in her eyes when she trained her tiny derringer dangerously close to his head. Her fourth shot burst in Jacques’s ears and the rope around his neck went slack with a twang.

Coughing violently, Jacques rolled over and pushed up to his hands and knees. He shoved the rope off over his head and breathed deep, feeling his strength return quickly. He got to his feet unsteadily and tucked the pistol into his waistband as Georgette ran to him. Grinning painfully at her he said hoarsely, “A woman of many talents.”

“That’s nothing,” she replied breathily. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to shoot another admirer down from the gallows before his neck snapped. That’s pressure, I tell you.”

She didn’t run to Jacques but to the horse who now stood nearby, riderless and panicky. Grabbing the reins, she paused to pet the animal, letting him know she meant him no harm. She called to Jacques over her shoulder, “You might hurry! I only had four shots, and you’re lucky I didn’t miss any of them.”

Georgette swung up into the saddle, keeping a tight hand on the reins so Jacques could clamber onto the horse as it shied from the mayhem surrounding them. Jacques had barely locked his arms around her waist when she kicked the horse into a gallop. He had to shout in her ear to be heard above the rattling gunfire and screams inside the mansion, and the horse’s drumming hoofbeats, “Here you were worried the vampires would cause trouble.”

“I recognized some of those cowboys,” she said as she brought the horse in a tight whirl around a circular fountain, using it for cover before charging down a lane between hedges. “They’re hired guns. Gunslingers.”

“Not amateurs either,” Jacques agreed. “Their weapons are rigged to target our weaknesses.”

“So then, it was a vampire causing problems. One of yours gave the gunslingers some inside information.” She cocked her head to the side to look at him. “Don’t worry, you won’t have to spend much time around me to learn I’m always right.”

“Sylvester must have made a deal with them,” Jacques gritted, his arm tightening around her waist. “Pigeon-livered bastard.”

“Lucky for you, the man isn’t alive who can catch me when I’m riding a horse.” She kicked the horse into a run down the hedgerow. For Georgette, the hedges were very dark, aside from the faint light that reached out from the mansion, casting strange angular shadows among the hedges. The fighting was centralized in the mansion, quickly fading behind them. With the start they had and a fast horse, they could easily ride to safety.

Jacques squeezed her and put his hand over hers on the reins. “I can’t ride away from a battle. And I have to find that damned harlot, Pierre, and keep him alive.” He pulled back on the reins from behind, slowing the horse. “I’ll get off here and go back. Keep riding until you’re safe. I promise I’ll find you before the sun rises.”

“Says the man who was just hogtied and bleeding into the grass,” she snapped angrily. “Just hold on.”

Sitting back in the stirrups and leaning back against Jacques’s chest, she pulled the horse into a sliding stop in the dewy grass. At the press of her heels, the horse wheeled around with catlike agility. Instead of dashing back down the hedgerow, Georgette aimed the horse straight at the hedge that separated them from the mansion. The horse sailed over the hedge with ease. Jacques grunted when the horse landed. Having no stirrups to support his weight, the seat of the saddle hammered him rudely in the crotch.

“If we vampires didn’t heal quickly, you might have just ruined one of my finer talents,” Jacques grumbled in her ear, trying to adjust his painful seat on the horse’s running hindquarters.

The lights of the mansion blasted her eyes like an explosion in the darkness, matching the chaos inside. Many windows were shot out or broken, and straggling guests, human and vampire alike, ran terrified from the broken windows and torn-off doors. Gunshots and screams had both dwindled, but as with any battle, the silence following was more grim.

“Tell me where to find your friend.” Georgette set her jaw, aiming the horse at the large, shattered bay window.

Jacques fumbled with the pistol in his waistband, clumsily checking the number of rounds in the cylinder. “Five shots.”

“Do you know how to use that Colt?” she asked as she tried to spy the part of the windows least covered with toothy shards of glass.

“I’ve never had much use for a revolver,” Jacques answered as he closed the cylinder and returned the gun to his belt.

“Wonderful.” Georgette kicked the horse when it balked at the window.

The animal had more sense than its rider – entering a broken window into a room that echoed with gunfire and smelled of blood, gunpowder, and fear seemed like a bad idea to any rational horse. Georgette yanked the reins when the horse tried to turn away from the window and kicked it again. Squealing in frustration, the horse reared in protest at the window then launched himself inside with enough gusto to clear a five-rail fence. Polished hardwood floors were slick as ice under a horse’s hooves, and the horse landed in a barely controlled skid. An unlucky cowboy running toward the window with his gun drawn was caught between the horse and the wall. The horse careened sideways into the man, crushing him against the wall and shattering his ribcage. Jacques gave him the coup de grace by kicking his heel harshly into the man’s temple. His body slid down the wall leaving a bloody smear. Jacques had to duck low to avoid the doorframe when they charged through the double doors of the ballroom.

The ballroom that shimmered with elegance and anticipation earlier was now mayhem, filled with the dead, the injured, and those who were still fighting, while bullets shot across the room. Gunsmoke hung in the air, mixing with the smell of blood and viscera. Broken shards of crystal littered the floor, twinkling especially bright where they sat in the scattered pools of blood. Bodies of vampires lay partially charred, still smoldering, contorted in agony, and humans lay broken and bleeding. A toppled candelabra had caught the dress of a dead woman on fire, leaving her body ablaze on the ballroom floor.

A cowboy trained his pistol on a vampire dashing toward the nearest doorway and fired. The vampire seized when the bullet caught him between the shoulder blades before his flesh began to sizzle then burst into flames across his back. A lady vampire with blazing blue eyes hissed like an angry cat at the cowboy as he fired a round that just missed her head. He fired again, the hammer falling on an empty chamber with a snap. Terror flashed across the cowboy’s face when he realized he was out of bullets, and he fumbled to quickly reload. The vampire launched herself at the cowboy, sinking her claws into his chest. He screamed until it was cut off abruptly as she tore his throat out with her teeth in a geyser of blood.

“What the hell is in those bullets?” Georgette asked, kicking the horse into a gallop across the ballroom. The horse vaulted over a pair of dead dancers, splintering the wood floor with his hooves when he landed.

“I’ll be damned if I know,” Jacques said in her ear. “More than silver. Silver was woven into that rope, and you saw what that will do. This is something else.”

“You better not get shot,” she told him. “If it doesn’t kill you, I’ll do it myself.”

“Indeed.” Jacques grinned and raised his hand in front of her, pointing at the large staircase. “If Pierre is anywhere inside, he’ll be in his favorite bedroom on the second floor.”

A cowboy standing near a wall fired a shot at them, just missing Georgette’s face. It passed so close she felt the air sizzle as it flew by her ear. Jacques aimed his pistol over Georgette’s shoulder and fired. The wood next to the cowboy’s head exploded, sending splinters stabbing into the side of the man’s face. Jacques had missed the man’s head by a foot, but his shot was lucky. Howling with pain, the cowboy clasped his ruined face. Georgette aimed her horse at the man and kicked hard, making the horse charge into the cowboy at a run. The horse plowed over the man, crushing him beneath pounding hooves.

“Save your bullets if you can’t shoot straight,” Georgette snapped at him.

Georgette made for the staircase, passing near the toppled candelabra where it lay across a woman’s burning corpse. As they ran past, Jacques shoved the pistol back in his belt and leaned far to the side, holding Georgette’s waist for balance as he reached toward the floor. Jacques grabbed the candelabra, twirling the long metal pole in his huge right hand as he righted himself behind Georgette.

“This suits me better,” he said with a laugh as he held the three-pronged end upright like a lance at the ready.

The horse took the stairs gamely, lunging up them like a hillside, taking four and five at a time as splinters flew up from the battered wood beneath his hooves. A cowboy rushed toward them at the top of the stairs. It took him an extra few seconds to decide where to aim at the strange spectacle of man and woman riding double on a horse bounding up the stairs. Jacques drew back his right arm and threw the candelabra like a javelin, flinging it ahead of the running horse and straight into the cowboy’s chest. The iron rod impaled the cowboy with its trident head with such force that it sent him stumbling backward, dead on his feet. As Jacques and Georgette rode past the man’s twitching body, Jacques plucked the candelabra from the man’s body where it stood upright like a pin in an entomology specimen.

The horse galloped toward the closed pair of doors at the far end of the hallway. Georgette wanted to charge straight through them, but the horse balked, sliding to a stop at the last second and whirling to the side. Cursing the animal, Georgette brought him alongside the door. Jacques kicked the door but it held fast, locked from the inside or even barricaded. Raucous voices could be heard inside the room beyond. Georgette spun the horse around until his rear faced the door. Jacques understood and smacked the horse hard on the rump. With an indignant squeal, the horse kicked back in response to the rude smack, kicking through the wooden doors as effectively as a battering ram.

Georgette kicked the horse to burst through the broken doors, scattering the people inside in every direction like a covey of quail bursting haphazardly from cover beneath the nose of a hunting hound. Women’s screams and men’s shouts filled the room along with the clamor of glasses dropped to the floor. Jacques aimed his candelabra lance as the horse ran inside, choosing a cluster of three men who loomed over a pair of frightened women. It angered him more to see all parties were mostly naked, thinking of what violent acts against the women he had interrupted. The trident tip hit the nearest man high in the chest and simultaneously the man beside him in the shoulder, finally thrusting through to the man behind, catching him in the guts. The charging horse forced the three skewered men backward, as they futilely screamed and flailed, until their backs collided with the latticed windows. With a final heave on the lance, Jacques shoved the three men out of the window to meet their death two stories below, impaled together. They made for a garden decoration that would have been the envy of Vlad Tepes.

Pierre was shouting something from a far corner of the room where he huddled with three women, naked and waving his arms wildly. Jacques paid him no mind beyond reassuring himself that his friend was still alive, albeit in some state of nude disarray. But that was not an uncommon state for Pierre.

Georgette brought the horse around to face the room, leaning low against his neck to shield her from any gunfire. Jacques jumped down from the horse, landing fully in balance and descending into a crouch in a fluid movement with feline agility. He assessed the room faster than a heartbeat. Two men stood in the corner near Pierre and his women, also mostly nude. One mostly dressed, very tall man stood alone by a large fireplace, fumbling to draw his gun from his gunbelt that was undone along with his trousers and flapping around his hips beneath the hem of his red shirt. Jacques sprang at the pair of men by Pierre, covering the room like a panther, his fangs likewise bared in a bestial snarl, eyes gleaming aurous and merciless. He caught the men before their sluggish human reflexes could avail them. Jacques’s right fist slammed into the nearest man’s teeth with inhuman strength and all the forgiveness of iron, nearly bursting through the back of the man’s skull and killing him as quickly as a bullet to the brain. With his left hand, Jacques caught the other man’s throat, digging his nails into the feeble flesh and ripping his throat out, severing arteries and tendons and windpipe all in one vicious motion.

Using his body to block Pierre and the shrieking women near him, Jacques straightened to face the one remaining cowboy. The tall man in the red shirt. Buck Taylor, the King of the Cowboys and, Jacques suspected, a rival for Georgette’s affection. The snarl on Jacques’s lips turned upward into a malicious sideways smirk. With Jacques’s heightened senses and hyper-fast reflexes, events inside the room seemed to move in slow motion. Georgette had aimed the horse at Buck, trying to run him down. Pierre was shouting something undoubtedly not worth listening to. Buck had retrieved his pistol from his gunbelt, drawing it on Jacques with the famous lightning-quick speed of an American gunfighter. Jacques drew his own pistol, fanning the hammer with his left hand to circulate a fresh round into the chamber as he simultaneously raised the gun with his right hand. Jacques fired when the front sight moved across Buck’s heart, a fraction of a second faster than Buck could finalize his aim.

The bullet caught Buck under his collarbone on his left side, an inch too high for a killing shot, but enough to send him reeling backward. He stumbled toward the broken window as Jacques fanned another round into his revolver and fired again, faster this time and more errant. The second bullet embedded itself in Buck’s hipbone, knocking him nearer the window. Following his momentum, Buck dove out of the broken window, taking his chances with the drop to the ground below instead of Jacques and his gun.

Jacques’s narrowed eyes followed Buck out of the window, the grin still on his lips at the prospect of the hunt. He stumbled when Pierre struck him hard in the back from behind and shouted angrily, “What in the hell are you doing, you raving madman!?”

“Huh?” Jacques sputtered dumbly, taken completely off guard. Confusion knotted his brows when he turned his head toward Pierre.

“Can you not be invited to any decent occasion without wreaking utter fucking mayhem?” Pierre seethed, spittle flying from his mouth, his chest blotchy red with waning arousal and mounting anger, his vampiric eyes gleaming deep mahogany. “This was the most promising evening I have arranged in years, and here you burst in like a goddamn lunatic? What are you thinking? And shooting? Why in the Nine Circles of Hell are you shooting inside my mansion!?”

Still holding the pistol, Jacques gestured from the broken window to Georgette to Pierre, his mouth gaping – a very rare event in which he was lost for words. Blinking through the confusion, he asked, “What exactly were you doing in here with those cowboys?”

“What was I doing?” Pierre laughed bitterly. “What does your towering intellect tell you?” He gestured at his nudity and his now unimpressive flaccidity. When Jacques still looked dumbfounded, Pierre continued with the same inflection he would use to speak to a very stupid child, “I had four cowboys in here – the biggest of the bunch of them, I might add – and not enough women to go around. The big one, Buck, is a fairly tolerable stand in for you. Since you have never agreed to have a properly fun and debauched evening with me, I have been forced to finagle it in other ways.” He stomped his foot petulantly, making his limp dick flop humorously against his thigh. “This is the nearest I’ve been to enjoying just such an evening, and this – this – is the pallor you cast over it!”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Jacques shook his head, his brow furrowed. Then he started to laugh. “You had the cowboys in here for a goddamn orgy?”

“It sounds so cheap and vulgar when you say it like that,” Pierre huffed. “Just because they’re beastly Americans, that’s no reason for you to be rude. It was going to be a marvelous evening. One for the books, I tell you!”

Georgette’s expression was a mixture of aghast and amused when she looked at Pierre, as if her features were unsure of which emotion to settle on. She kicked her leg over the horse’s neck and dropped to the floor. She looked at Jacques for guidance, but he was of no use at present, still dumbfounded himself.

“Did those men accompany you here to your bedroom?” Jacques wiped the back of his hand over his sweaty brow. “Have they been here all evening?”

“They came here in a raucous sort of hurry a short while ago.” Pierre was still so irritated, he hadn’t yet bothered finding his pants, as if he was still hopeful for the brand of action he wanted. “But then I convinced them – without much difficulty, I might add – that I could give them an evening far superior to any other they had planned.” He tapped his temple in a knowing gesture.

Jacques couldn’t stop the laughter that bellowed from his throat. “You seduced the fucking cowboys? Men come to kill you, and you seduce them. I bow to your superior skills of self-preservation.” Jacques did bow, low and mockingly, with a flippant flourish of his tailcoat.

“You’re stark raving mad.” Pierre planted his hands on his hips and looked accusatorily at Georgette. “Have you poisoned him?”

Jacques looked at Georgette too, his eyes luminous with laughing tears. “All vampires have unique gifts. Whereas I can be persuasive and intuitive, as you have seen, Pierre can seduce anything that walks, crawls, or brays.” Looking around the destroyed room he laughed again. “Or shoots six-guns and throws lariat ropes.”

“Hear the jealousy in his voice?” Pierre asked Georgette sardonically.

“Have you any notion of the destruction wrought upon your guests and your mansion?” Jacques asked, wiping a tear from his eye. “It’s utter havoc downstairs. Did you not hear the screams and the gunfire?”

“Still raving, I see.” Pierre threw his hands up, finally capitulating. He located a pair of pants and awkwardly pulled them on while still berating Jacques, “Since when have you become such a namby pamby about a little havoc? It was only two centuries ago that my castle was under siege, and you couldn’t be bothered to stop fucking that infernal redhead while the entire West wing and tower were blown to smithereens!”

“The cowboys you invited here tonight were hired guns, sent to dispose of us.” Jacques tried to purge the laughter from his voice. “Hired by that jealous little bastard, Slyvester, and no doubt led by another jealous bastard, Buck Taylor.”

“Ludicrous,” Pierre said adamantly as he searched for a shirt. He retrieved a white frilly one and pulled it halfway over his head before realizing it belonged to one of the women and was much too small.

Jacques flipped open the cylinder of the pistol he had used. There were still two rounds remaining and he pulled one out. Using his thumbnail, he dug into the soft lead tip of the bullet. A silky silver substance oozed out, glimmering in the candlelight. It was like piercing a cherry cordial housing sticky liquid inside a chocolate shell. Jacques wrinkled his nose at the scent of it and the tip of his thumb sizzled until he wiped it off on his trousers.

“Mercury,” he said with extreme distaste. “That does a number on us, let me tell you. You can see for yourself when you venture downstairs. Do you think your average American cowboy has mercury filled bullets?”

Pierre studied the silvery oozing bullet, frowning. “Well, if they were indeed mercenaries, they weren’t very good ones.”

“They were pretty damn good, actually,” Jacques said, laughing again. “But the murderous bastards weren’t prepared for being bamboozled by the biggest harlot on the continent.”

“It will take more than flattery to redeem you from this travesty,” Pierre crossed his arms over his chest. “Even if what you say is true, you could have had the decency to allow me to have my fun first before causing such destruction.” He looked at Georgette with something that might have been jealousy. “Especially since you get to have your fun with your American.”

“Are you not going to appraise the destruction downstairs?” Jacques asked incredulously.

“I have maids and butlers who are paid to deal with such nonsense.” Pierre waved his hand dismissively. He looked at Georgette and grinned. “For a cowgirl, she’s hardly bovine at all. Perhaps we can still salvage the evening.”

“I intend to salvage our evening.” Jacques winked at Georgette. “Preferably someplace less overflowing with mercury and orgies.”

“What a boring way to live.” Pierre shook his head.

*******************************************************************************************

The second time Jacques took Georgette to Brook House, his home on Park Lane, he didn’t waste a breath inviting her in. When his carriage rocked to a stop, Jacques swept her out of the coach, down his foyer, up a marvelous staircase and along hallways lined with artifacts gathered from the far reaches of the world. It was an impressive feat that she could spare a portion of her awareness for the magnificent artifacts filling Jacques’s home, even while anticipation and arousal coursed through her body and the hot weight of  his hand pressed insistently on the small of her back, guiding her toward a night of excitement, perhaps filled with even more intensity than the vampire ball was fraught with death. She resolved to study these in detail and hear the story behind each tomorrow, or whenever it may be that she desired to leave Jacques’s bed. Upon further consideration, that might not be for days.

She smiled at the thought. Jacques must have intercepted her mental process because he laughed heartily, his voice booming down the long hallway. His hand at Georgette’s back snaked around her waist and he hoisted her off the ground with ease and slung her over his shoulder like a barbarian claiming his spoils of war. When he reached the doors at the end of the hallway, he shouldered into them then kicked them shut behind him, twirling with Georgette as he crossed the room toward the inviting canopy bed. Instead of dropping her onto it, Jacques returned her to the floor in front of a grand fireplace set into the wall adjacent to the bed. Dancing flames gave the room a sultry glow and made Jacques’s eyes gleam like honey.

Taking her hand, Jacques raised it to his lips in a softer overture than Georgette had expected. He fixed his eyes on hers as he slowly drew his lips higher, pressing them next against her inner wrist. She had never been kissed in that sensitive place nor with such delicacy. It was a simple action but it sent a flutter through her. The tip of Jacques’s nose rested on her skin and he inhaled her scent. The sheen in his eyes deepened until they shimmered with the same otherworldly aurous quality Georgette had only seen in them when he was looking at her desirously or ripping into living flesh.

“You want to bite me.” It was a statement because she could see the answer plainly.

“More than I’ve ever wanted any worldly pleasure,” Jacques purred. “But I won’t until you ask me.”

“Not tonight. Not yet,” she said but her voice wavered. “Worldly pleasures first, if you please.”

Jacques trailed his plush lips and coarse beard from her wrist up her inner arm, holding her eyes while his mouth caressed her skin. His next kiss was to the inside of her elbow as he raised her arm to rest her wrist on his shoulder. Georgette twined her fingers in the thick hair hanging down the back of his neck, pulling him closer. His lips relished their way up the length of her arm, pausing next on her shoulder with lips slightly parted so she felt the hot tease of his tongue. A shiver passed through her when his mouth reached her collarbone, and she laughed at her own sensitivity to his touch. Jacques grinned against her skin and lingered there for several kisses.

When he reached the base of her neck, his tongue met her skin before his lips and his hands dug harshly into her flesh. A guttural rumble rolled through his chest, a dark ravening brand of arousal. He felt impossibly large with his body pressed against her, looming over her to kiss her. The laces of her corset felt as if they had been tightened by an invisible hand and the luxurious silk of her dress felt as itchy as burlap on her skin. The thought of ripping the fine scarlet dress apart just to be free of it flashed through her mind.

Jacques ran his hands up from her hips, over her nipped waist, to the top of her bodice. He pulled back enough to give her a devilish grin. “I could rip this off as easily as tissue paper.” His forefinger teased her bosom above the bodice. “But you’ll think me a villain when your head clears. Women and clothes, you know.”

Instead, he turned her so her back faced him and ran his long fingers over her bare shoulders down the laced back of her dress. Jacques grabbed the top of the dress on either side of the laces and ripped it open as if it were nothing more than frail gauze, but causing no damage aside from the torn laces and a few warped hooks and eyes, several of which skittered away across the polished wood floor.

The small act of aggression loosened the tether on the wilder part of his nature that Jacques wanted to restrain during their first encounter. His hands turned more demanding, his mouth hungrier. He locked a strong arm around her waist from behind and kissed her nape as he hoisted her fully off the floor to extricate her from the thick pile of dress she stood inside. In the same fluid motion, he crossed to the bed and laid her on the thick duvet.

He was less considerate of her undergarments. Leaning over her, he ripped her corset open to the tune of tearing silk and snapping whalebone, making her laugh excitedly. He was gentler with her chemise in an effort to savor the moment, unwrapping a gift he’d earned with his blood. There was a simple bow at the top of her chemise, securing a decorative stitch along the neckline. Jacques bowed his head until the tip of his prominent nose pressed her skin and hooked his canine in a loop of the bow to pull it undone. Georgette smiled and arched into him, encouraging him. Jacques took the dip in the neckline between his teeth and, paired with his left hand, ripped the chemise open down the center. He nuzzled into her exposed breasts, kissing and licking the flesh that pillowed around his lips and nose.

“You have me at a disadvantage,” Georgette purred, pushing back lightly on Jacques shoulders. When he raised his head and looked at her with lusting but uncomprehending golden eyes, she tugged his scarlet cravat loose and pulled the silk out of his collar. “You’re overdressed for the occasion. It seems unfair that your clothing should meet with a more civilized fate than my poor corset.”

Jacques pulled back from her and stood from the bed. He shrugged out of his tailcoat and appraised his torn and very bloody shirt. Flashing his teeth in a grin, Jacques gave her the show she wanted and ripped his own shirt open with exaggerated flair, puffing out his enormous chest and shaking back his wild hair. His pants were brusquely discarded as his eyes roamed her body, devouring the sight of her before his hands and mouth would devour the feel and taste of her. He crawled over her slowly, kissing his way up her body starting on her thigh. He met her eyes when he reached her sex. Pushing her thighs apart, he licked a fat stripe up her center and kissed her pussy as indulgently as he had kissed her lips. Bringing a hand to her breast, Jacques rubbed his calloused palm over her nipple as he squeezed her supple flesh. The sensation made her back arch, offering him more. Jacques lavished her with his tongue until her thighs were quivering and she was writhing beneath him, dripping into the sheets. He continued up her body, kissing over her navel and breasts on his way to her throat.

Jacques allowed some of his heavy weight to settle on her, pinning her beneath him. He caressed her thigh as he lifted her leg back to hook over his hip. His thick cock teased her entrance when Jacques brought his lips to hers. He kissed her ravenously, swallowing her moan, as he thrust inside in one swift motion. With her arms wrapped around him, she could feel the powerful muscles in his back and shoulders flex and tense in time with the rhythm he set. She dragged a hand through his hair and fisted it at the back of his neck, using her grip to direct his head down to her neck. The feeling of his lips and tongue on her skin and pulse point combined with the dangerous knowledge of what he could do to her there was exhilarating.

Georgette held him tighter as she trembled with pleasure and his breath became hoarse, puffing on her neck like a locomotive. The orgasm that wracked through her left her almost delirious with pleasure. Jacques dutifully pounded her through it, thrusting hard, wringing all the pleasure he could out of her body. He came with a rumbling groan, his massive body shuddering. Breathing heavily, he relaxed over her, pleasantly crushing her into the duvet while he spent several minutes kissing her indulgently.

Rolling onto his back, Jacques pulled her to drape over him. That massive chest of his made for a wonderful pillow. His voice was rich and husky, “I warned you once that if you came inside my home, I would never let you leave.”

“Is that a threat or a promise?” she purred.

“What do you want it to be?” he teased, running his large hand over her hip and the dip in her waist.

“An invitation.” She pressed closer to him, relishing the feeling of the length of his hard body.

“Stay with me,” he dropped his voice to a smoky octave just above a whisper. “Stay forever.”

“Forever would require me to be a vampire.” She looked at him with a cocked eyebrow.

He lifted head to kiss her cheek and rumble in her ear, “Shall I make you one tonight? Say yes, ma belle.”

“What other vampiric weaknesses do I need to be aware of?” she asked, lazily trailing her fingers over the faint lines on his shoulders and chest left by the silver-woven rope. They were mostly healed now and look like they were weeks old instead of only hours. “Do you burst into flames at the sight of the cross?”

“Why would a cross have any effect on us?” he scoffed. “I’ve no doubt vampires existed long before crosses were considered holy.”

“Prior to meeting you, all I knew about vampires I learned from Penny Dreadfuls.” She shrugged.

“What else did you learn from those ridiculous tabloids?” HIs hand continued soothing and caressing her.

“That vampires have no reflection in a mirror,” she answered.

“Do I look like a man who cannot see himself in a mirror?” Jacques grinned.

“I’m bored with talk of vampires, and it feeds into your preening too much.” She propped herself up with her arms on his chest. “Far more interesting than vampires are werewolves.”

“Werewolves?” Jacques raised his eyebrows.

“The Penny Dreadfuls have a story about a pack of werewolves far up north in the Yukon.” She toyed with a tendril of his hair. “They like the cold.”

“Naturally.” He smirked. “It would be prudent for me to make you a vampire before you go werewolf hunting.”

“Perhaps if we were going werewolf hunting, I’d let you,” she returned then added wistfully, “I’ve always wanted to travel there.”

“For the werewolves?” he teased.

“The northern lights are said to be beautiful.” She ignored his flippant remarks. “My father believes there is gold there too, up in the Klondike. A few miners have struck gold in the Yukon.”

“Werewolves, northern lights, and gold?” Jacques raised his eyebrows. “You’ve sold me, mon amor. When shall we leave?”

*******************************************************************************************

© safarigirlsp 2025

Tagging some buddies! @babbushka @in-silks-and-flesh-and-leather @mrszimmerman24 @mrs-gucci @iamburdened @gabesprincess @rynwritesstuff @candycanes19 @caillea @cas-backwards-tie @queeniebee @mythrielofsolitude @ghoulian13 @icarusinthesea @reyloaddict55 @heartlight-starlight @thepalaceofmelanie @reveluving @vedavan @reylokisses @queen-of-elves @kyloremus @vixenofcourse @napiersmirk @lumberjack00fantasies

[diejager]

if youre okay, can we get a fluff fic/backstory with big brother! simon and reader, except when they're younger?

Cw: fluff, shenanigans, soft!Simon, protective!Simon, tell me if I missed any.

You giggled quietly, palms covering your mouth in hopes of quieting your laughter. Your cheeks flushed and swollen from trying to keep your breath whilst laughing when you hid from Simon and Tommy. Your small shoulders shook from the force of it, eyes squeezed tight in your big effort to both hold still and stay quiet. You could here Simon walk around the room, mumbling out your name while Tommy screamed it, calling out loudly from another room: probably the bedroom your three shared.

You’d always been the best at playing ‘Hide ‘n Seek’, slipping through the smaller cracks between and under furnitures, hiding away where no one would think to find you or reach. It helped that you were smaller than your brothers, their lanky but tall figure made it easy to find them whenever - which you rarely did now - you were it, cheekily stealing glances at the odd shadow on the wall or the shapes dancing across the floor with every subtle movement. 

You watched Simon’s socked feet walk across the room from your little nook under the couch, the space big enough to climb under, but too small for either of them to fit in. You heard him call your name once more, crossing from the living room entrance to the middle of the room. You gazed at his feet as he slowly and teasingly made his way towards your hiding spot, taking big and taunting steps until he stood right over you, his toes dipping into the shadows of your spot.

He gentle crouched down, on one knee and elbow, his pretty blond mop falling over his brows as he tilted his head down to smile at you. Though the healing bruise of his cheek made the scene so morose, the smile on his lips and the bright gleam of his dark eyes brightened your moment. His hand reached under the sofa, fingers fleetingly touching your cheek with a gentle mumble:

“Found you, Sweets. Com’ out, now.”

After being found, you let out your chuckle, cackling loudly as you climbed out of the darkness, crawling with your stomach flat on the floor and were pulled out by big hands once your hips crossed the couch. Despite already being out, Simon still kept his arms around you, wrapping them around your waist and keeping you still against him. He was big and warm, something you loved and craved the same, the male figure you were deprived of being found in Simon’s protective and caring embrace. 

You melted in his arms, your stubby, little hands finding purchase around his neck and pulled him down to your height for better access. To better hold him meant to better show him how much you cared for him, how much love you could give him when he stood tall and gave more than he ever took. Lost in your warm moment, lost in each other’s arms, you missed the loud steps running towards you, forgetting the world around you when another pair of arms joined you.

Tommy cried out your name, his embrace pushed you into Simon’s chest in his little fit of laughter and joy, completely lost in the moment of childish happiness and fun. You were all so, so happy, even just for a few minutes.

Taglist: @sae1kie @yeoldedumbslut @bvxygriimes @distracteddragoness @konigsblog @im-making-an-effort @daisychainsinknots @h0n3y-l3m0n05 @danielle143 @tuttifuckinfruttifriday @notspiders @brokenpieces-72 @petwifed @randominstake @haven-1307 @shironasumi @sparky--bunny @bloobewy @cod-z @sweetnanah @aldis-nuts @evolutionarry @kaoyamamegami @cassiecasluciluce

[inloveinsickness]

❝ HAPPY ACCIDENTS ❞ — kuroo tetsurou

cw. f!reader, fluff, cliche meet cute, strangers to friends to maybe more down the line — wc: 1.3k~

to cheer @nekomacheercaptain , my giftee ♡ for the hq x reader secret santa by @lale-txt

the winter breeze is brutal.

coupled with the featherlight flutters of falling snow, there’s nothing you want more than a mug of hot coffee, hot chocolate, hot anything. not hot enough to scald, not lukewarm, just right — warm to the touch of your hand and a heat that reaches to the depths of your bones and every crevice.

your gloved hands are shoved into the pockets of your coat, hanging heavy on your shoulders with a nice weight akin to a grandmother’s hug. god knows you need one right now, the colder days haven’t been kind to you and just getting yourself up and out of the house is a struggle all on it’s own. maybe some fresh air will do you some good, but it doesn’t feel like it when the snow’s crunching under your feet and soles of your shoes barely find purchase on the pavement as you take slightly faster but cautious steps towards alchemy’s brew.

the soft chime upon stepping in welcomes you with a sweet tune, the warmth that envelops you causing a sigh to slip out. this place was always a cosy visit no matter the season, a little nook that was a pleasant surprise to find and become your regular caffeine pick-me-up spot. you shoot a smile at the young barista working the counter as she greets you, walking over to a small table which is seemingly the only one unoccupied in a quiet corner.

small items prove difficult to handle with gloves on, let alone dollar bills and change as you fumble with your belongings. dusting away flits of white and gently tugging the fabric off your hands finger by finger, you drop them off on the table and turn around only to bump straight into a firm surface, eyes widening at the flash of jet black before you can stop your movements.

“oof—“ “woah watch ou—“

kuroo isn’t having the best day, well morning, the day just started. emails and emails, did i mention emails, bombarding his inbox and gods it’s his day off, do they even see his out of office notice? surely they can read.

it’s cold out and he much prefers the warmth of his apartment but alas, he is driven by a caffeine addiction. corporate norm if you will. he’s been meaning to try out this cafe since he moved here but he’s been so caught up with everything and everywhere in between that it just became a forlorn thought at the back of his mind, months passing and it still remains an untouched pin on his map.

he needs to step out and put his laptop away from his line of sight before he breaks his personal “no work on my off day unless it’s an emergency” rule, why not take the chance?

so he finds himself at the front of the line of alchemy’s brew, slipping the barista change and a polite smile, turning to find a seat while his hands warm up from a delicious hot drink, head in the clouds and lost in thought. maybe things are looking up.

until he completely fails to see ahead of him and collides into a smaller frame.

“i am so sorry!” you and the unfortunate individual that you ran into blurt out simultaneously, minds in sync to the horror of the scene in front of you, marked not by splotches of red, but a rich brown against tan vinyl.

your eyes quickly scan his clothing, letting out a held breath at its unstained appearance. finally bringing your gaze up to his face, the first thing you note is his very tussled hair, it resembles the ruffled feathers of a bird, or maybe more like a black cat that’s just had its coat aggressively petted and you can’t help but let the corner of your lip quirk up in amusement for just a split second before returning to a concerned frown. poor guy just wanted to have a peaceful morning and a hot drink and you probably ruined it.

what looks like a hot chocolate sloshes in the cup in his hands, slowly coming to a still after the sudden movement just a moment ago. what you assume was once full now stands half empty, and you meet his gaze with a wince, mustering up the most genuine apologetic smile you can, hands twiddling in nervousness.

“really, i’m so sorry about that, i should’ve seen where i was going.” you gesture towards his drink, “can i get you another—“

you visit this place regularly enough that you can easily get a new one for free and having made friends with the barista on shift today. you’d be willing to pay either way, it would be the right thing to do. you just want to move on from this situation as quickly as possible, the stares from the other customers starting to get under your skin.

he’s quick to cut you off with a panicked wave of his hand, “no, no, you don’t have to! you had your back turned to me, you couldn’t have known. if anything it’s my fault really.”

the way his eyes widen and words spill from his lips hurriedly doesn't quell the guilt, and instead makes you double down even more, unable to stop yourself from wanting to make it up to this seemingly sweet soul, lord knows you'd be on the verge of a breakdown if the same thing happened to you. “oh my god please, it’s the least i can do.”

"no, no, no, ok how about this— since we're both alone, or at least i assume you are? correct me if i'm wrong—"

the cafe's unexpectedly pretty busy on this saturday morning, a steady stream of customers and quiet chatter filling the air. there’s something for everyone here no matter the vibe or purpose, a solace standing the in midst of the cold like a crackling fireplace, a sanctuary.

as nice as the place is, you'd think no one in the right frame of mind other than yourself would be willing to get out of their warm bed and come outside in the snow — no one in your circle is at least, and you're certainly not waiting on anyone.

"i am!" you sound almost too chirpy affirming him about that and he thinks you so adorable.

"okay perfect, you can repay me with your company then."

"oka— wait what. are you sure?"

"i promise it's fine, you seem nice and i uh, would like to get to know you! i-if that's what you're comfortable with—" kuroo leaves out the part where you were settling down in the table he was eyeing before this whole thing happened, but he's slightly flustered, usually certain and sure but now thrown into a loop by the pretty girl that crash landed into his day, not that he's complaining. well other than maybe his spilled drink but that’s totally on him.

now that the initial shock is over, meeting his hazel eyes with a smile, you only just notice how pretty they are and compliment the rest of his features well, finally taking note that the man before you is actually very handsome and suddenly you're slightly bashful and even more embarrassed about what just transpired.

thankful that your scarf covers a little bit of your newly flushed demeanor, you nod with a shy smile and eyes averted, "i'd like that."

with a matching grin, he puts his cup down and pulls out a chair for you, and as you try to subtlety squint your eyes to peek at a scribbled name somewhere on his cup, he notices and laughs, a sound you think may be the music to your reddenned ears for the next hour or so. you’re not sure if the colour is still a reflection of the cold or a growing interest in this unnamed man, but who are you kidding, it’s more likely the latter.

“it’s kuroo, well—my name’s kuroo.”

it surprises yourself that as you sit across kuroo, this man that you just accidentally met in the middle of a cafe on a wintry morning, you think that there's nothing more in the moment that you want than to make him laugh again.

gen taglist. open (link to form) @wyrcan @urslytherin

networks. @the-all-stars-network @houseofsolisoccasum

notes. hi~ it’s been a while~ i’m a little rusty, so cheer, i hope you like this and to everyone out there, happy holidays ♡

© yogurtkags. please do not repost, plagiarise, or translate my work.