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yeyinde · 10 months ago

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dangle on the leash | Simon "Ghost" Riley x F!Reader

The flimsy sarcophagus housing all his wants, his desires, cracks open when Price announces that his missus is pregnant. Ghost cocks his head in consideration. Intentionally knocking you up is amoral. Probably illegal. Somehow, even more dastardly when the reason for it is simply selfishness. Want. Greed. Hunger. But he's a rabid dog burning with the urge to bite. No one should really be surprised when he finally decides to sink his teeth into you. Unfortunately, that hail mary Price sent into the aether never reached you.

(your bird is too big for a cage— —but maybe a collar would do.)

this is a babytrapping fic lmao but please read the tags carefully. a companion piece to this (Price + babytrapping).

DEAD DOVE. SMUT. 18+

HARD WARNINGS—coercion. dependency. intentional alienation. unsafe, unprotected sex. this very much toes the line of noncon (that is still very dubcon even when consent is given) in many ways, notably: somnophilia, and condom/contraceptive tampering. intrusive, violent thoughts. mentions of violence. manipulation; slight gaslighting. implied kidnapping. references to past abuse (Ghost), brief mention of drugging/threats of drugging (ambiguous as to if it was ever followed through on or not, mostly just Ghost's internal monologue unfiltered). ADDITIONAL TAGS—smut. rough sex. unsafe sex. dom!Ghost. mean, obsessive, unhinged!Ghost. spit kink. dacryphilia.

he's feral, but he's yours. too bad for you, no one is really sure if that's a good thing or not.

One of the things Price often tells new recruits is to shove their old life into a box.

“There's home,” he huffs, fingers twitching as if he's subconsciously flexing around the hilt of a lit cigar. “And then there's work. Whatever box you decide to put this, or your family, your personal life, into is your choice. But for fuck’s sake. Keep them separate.”

Most of the new recruits are fresh off selection, shaded sickly chartreuse, and take his words as a literal gospel. Work, this; home, them. They don't start to unravel the second part of his gruff speech until much later. Until they can't wash the blood from their hands, and the scent of their mum’s eucalyptus hand soap is nauseating. Unfamiliar. When being in civvies feels like wearing skin that doesn't fit, and everyone around you is alien, foreign. They don't know. They'll never know.

It's only when they find themselves gazing at the clock on the wall of their family home, counting down the minutes until their mandatory leave is over do they realise that home is the barracks.

That's something Ghost has always understood. Maybe it was because his home life was already in ruins, tatters. Beer soaking into the knock-off Persian rug a cousin nicked from a flea market when he was nine. No fine china in the cupboards because it'll end up in shards on the floor. Plastic plates and forks and cups. Always. Howling in his head. Screaming from down the hall in his mum's room. His bedroom door creaking open at night. The anger, the curdling fear (shameful—be a man; punch him back, hit him before he hits you, you useless prick—), of not knowing whether or not it was his dad, high as hell and itching for a fight after busting their mum’s lip wide open, or Tommy sneaking into his bed at night because his is soaked in piss and he can’t sleep when they scream at each other like this.

(Funny that, he always found; neither of them could ever sleep when it was silent, either.)

Blood on the linoleum. Trying to eat burnt toast and overcooked beans with a busted lip and a twinge in his jaw—

(Fractured, they'll say later, years later, during his mandatory medical checkup when he's first recruited. Healed all wrong. Son, didn't anyone take you to hospital?)

He understands the separation between home and work—even if the former lost all relevancy nearly a decade ago. Back when he buried them all. Was buried himself—

What Ghost never really understood was the box.

Shove it into a box.

When he asks over cheap whisky somewhere in Siberia, Price tightens his fingers around his glass before bringing it up to his head. His index finger juts out. He knocks the tip of that bruised, scabbed knuckle against his temple. Once, thrice. Levels Simon with a pointed look he both can’t understand and somehow knows all too well.

“Up here."

“Paid nearly fifty quid for that,” he grouses, shaking his head. “Think I've been ripped-off, Price.”

Price scoffs, places the glass down with a hollow thud. “Don't be a fuckin’ muppet, Simon—” his real name makes his shoulders tense. Around the barracks, they know him only as the Ghost. “You put it away somewhere. Hide it. I don't fuckin’ know. But if it keeps you goin’, keeps you sane, and doesn't become a mess I gotta clean up, well—”

The implication is stark. Heavy.

Price was always good at chiselling through layers of accumulated indifference to get to the madness within, but considering Ghost’s past and his mile-long rap sheet, the warning digging into his words like a dull blade isn't unwarranted.

Old dogs, he'd called the pair of them when they first met. There was a sharp keenness in his eye when he lifted his hand, waved his cigar toward the tangled mess of scar tissue crisscrossing his face (made with a dull, rusted knife, one that gouged out deep pocks of skin, ugly fuck, looks like the badlands, don't he? like a postcard from the Grand Canyon, sweetheart. not so cute anymore, are ya, pretty boy—), and said, “well, you're fuckin’ rabid, ain't you? Better put a muzzle on that before it becomes a problem, mm.”

His problem, specifically.

And Ghost gets it. Thinks Price might understand that particular brand of madness—despite growing up on literal opposite sides of the track, his Manchester to the others Liverpool; poverty and prestige—if only just. Because Price seems to be able to curb those baser impulses in a way Ghost hadn't yet mastered (and won't for quite some time yet). He's put together. Sort of. Respected. Normal.

The men in the barracks don't look at him and flinch.

But he sees the way the man's eyes linger in the crowd, shrewd and careless, before falling on the pretty bartender in the back. The one with roses in her eyes and a smile full of dandelions. Soft, like butterscotch. It's here when they darken. When he reaches, almost angrily, for his whisky. Pats his chest with a heavy fist searching for his cigar.

She's a sweet thing, he reckons. All pretty and trusting. Birds like her make his head itch—

“Don't even think about it, Simon,” Price grumbles, and it feels like territorial posturing, a challenge he almost raises to meet with his chin, if only to make Price fluster, but it's hollow. Empty. He denies himself, too. The prick.

“How'd you do it?” He asks, and doesn't specify. Doesn't think he needs to.

When Price swallows, it looks like a grimace. “Years of practice.”

He considers the weight of it, his eyes straying back to the woman behind the bar. She's tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, wrist delicate like bone china, the kind they could never afford, and for a moment, the intrusive thoughts, the ones he gets sometimes about wanting to tear things to bloody pieces, rears—

It's stamped down in a swig of flat lager You stupid fuckin’ mutt, Price would say tomorrow morning, shaking his head. You always think with your prick?

Simon cranks his head sharply to the side instead. The resounding crack seems to echo through the empty pub.

Price just shakes his head. “Christ. No one ever house break you, yet?”

“Yeah, they did,” he rasps, staring at the bartender who gazes back at him now. Skittish, unsure. Not so sweet after all. She looks away, cowed. Her hands tremble. He leans back, and hums. “And now I piss outside, like a good ‘ol boy.” “Ain't nothin’ good about you, Simon. Fuckin' Christ—”

And he's not wrong.

The Ghost has a reputation of being a cold-hearted bastard. A Frankensteinian beast cobbled together with spare parts robbed from a jailhouse graveyard. Worst of the worst. An arm from a mass murder. The leg from a spree killer. Heart a patchwork mess of ichor and sulphur. Sutured together with barbed wire.

It's all sort of macabre. Rather trite, too.

The rumour mill in the barracks is insatiable.

But sometimes, he wakes up and he's still buried. Still dead. Dirt in his throat, lodged in his nose. He breathes in and feels pebbles scraping his lungs. Feels worms in his ears. Maggots in his head.

They crawl through his grey matter. Leeches burrowing into his thoughts, sucking the good in him dry.

Or, whatever's left of it, anyway.

He thinks with his teeth because it's easier that way. Cold, calculative instinct. Just barely boxed into a neat package slapped on the desk of Price's higher-ups.

A good man, they say, and turn him loose on the streets. One of the best we have, as he breaks jaws, and tears through jugulars. A force to be reckoned with.

They hand him a gun, a rifle, when the bloodied footprints leading back to camp become too much of a hassle to clean. Shoot from a distance. He takes to it like the bulk of metal was made for his scarred hands. Scythe to a Reaper.

It feels like bloodletting. Draining him of his anger, his fury, until a cold, gnarled indifference curls in the basin left behind. Icy, frigid. Down to the bone.

Sometimes, he doesn't remember what it felt like to be warm, even buried under a thick balaclava and layers of military fatigues.

Frankenstein’s monster. Patched together from the rotten remains of horrible men.

And as he stares in the mirror at the patchwork ruins of his face, his body, he wonders if there's some truth to it, after all. He's pretty sure if someone cracked his skull open—again—they’d find rot. Tumulus. Infested with maggots and worms. Cobwebs behind his eyes. In his nose. His brain perfectly preserved: a zombified tombstone. And oh, how it hungers.

Wants.

But in a box it goes. One shaped like a coffin. Placed pretty in the back of his broken head.

He stares in the mirror and thinks he sees something moving under his eye. Wriggling around. The temptation to claw it out rears, but the shredded tissue on his thighs reminds him of what happens when he listens to that insidious hiss in the back of his head (some amalgamation of his old man, and that bastard—) and goes searching for gold in bone marrow.

He huffs. Fingers curling around the porcelain. His head is rotten. Putrefied. He can feel the decomposing sludge press against his temples. It grows teeth sharp like a razor blade and hacks away at jaundiced bone. Ghost lifts his hand, digs his fingers into his temple. Down boy—

(Simon doesn't even want to consider what his heart must look like, then.)

Cold-hearted, sure—

But he likes sweet things.

The kind that will undoubtedly give him cavities. A spillover, perhaps, when candy bars were too expensive, and the only dessert he was given was a toffee by the neighbour when she wasn't moaning to his old man about all the shit he and Tommy got up to.

(Bruises came afterwards, the colour of liquorice. Sour cherries.)

Unfortunately for him, sweet things don't like him much—a shame, really. Simon has always had a sweet tooth.

His rough edges are too sharp for their liking, and Simon's—

Intense. Like a dog with a bone, he doesn't know when to let go. When to unhinge his jaw from the morsel between his teeth. He bites hard. Shakes his head. Tears into the things he wants until it's bloodied meat pinched in his incisors.

And so, they keep their distance. Like they can smell the rot on him. The funeral dirt. The stench of an unearthed sarcophagi.

Sometimes, though, the wiley ones will inch closer, looking to get messed up badly by a bad man, and it makes something inside his head howl when he turns them down. Following Price’s creed. Can't give in to the pretty ones, he'd said. Nothin’ but trouble.

Trouble, like a pair of shackles. A noose. Trouble, like gentle, clean hands and fragile bones. Fine china. Fine powder. The marshmallow soft kind of trouble that will melt in the acid that leaks from his pores. Aqua regia. Attacking anything that gets close.

(Breakable, is what Price means. Pretty chew toys that are beyond repair once he's finished with them.

He must think Ghost is some sort of psychopath—)

But still. He stays away. It's easier on base, in safe houses, too far out from the general public to have to worry about doe eyes and soft touches. He doesn't need it, anyway—

Then comes you.

And the forfeiture of his self-control.

You're trouble of a different kind.

Trouble, like the end of a sledgehammer. Trouble, like the grill of a car. The barrel of a gun.

In the shape of a battering ram, one strong enough to dislodge the madness in the back of his head. Where the corrosive acid should ruin you, eat you alive, it doesn't. Not with your tantalum skin.

But oh, do you pack a punch—

At first, you think he's homeless.

Some scruffed-up man sleeping on a park bench outside of your apartment.

In another life, he might have been. He isn't a stranger to bad habits, and had the military not been his only choice in life for some semblance of good (laughable, considering what he does for a living), he could see the threads of his life leading him here. Drugs. Manchester is good for it, this he knows all too well. Especially the shithole neighbourhood he's from.

He doesn't clue into this, though, until you glance at him, warily, and then shuffle into the cafè he’s holed outside of, the place where his current target gorges himself on steeped tea and crumpets.

(Price's dry text sits, open, on his burner phone: and don't fuck this up—)

It feels a bit like an omen. Made worse when you meet his gaze through the glass, and—

Well. Shit.

The impact is a collision. Hitting a pole at top speed. Metal bent around concrete.

His teeth ache (so, so bad—).

You emerge from the small building a few minutes later—the faded eggshell with chocolate trim is nauseatingly sweet against your pastel yellow raincoat—holding a takeaway bag, and balancing a tray of coffees in your hand.

He tenses. It's instinctual. There's nothing about you that's an immediate threat to his person—unless you plan on adding to his scars with the tip of your umbrella, the scalding coffee in your hand—but it's odd, isn’t it? No one approaches him. Not unless they have a reason to.

And no one, in his experience, ever has a good one.

“Hi,” you chirp, disarmingly sweet, as you come to stand in front of him. His jaw aches. Even sprawled across a bench, you're barely looking down at him. Sticky, cold fingers tap a strange rhythm down his spine. “I, um, hope this isn't weird, but I saw you sitting here, and—well. I got this—”

You wiggle the bag. He smells something greasy. A breakfast sandwich, he's sure.

It's an unusual assassination attempt. Price will be livid.

“What for?” He rumbles, sitting up in the seat. The shift of his bulk seems to make you nervous. You take a step back, and he fights the urge to follow. To back you into a corner. No escape.

You regain your footing, even if the smile on your face wobbles. Weakens under his flat stare. Some people can smell the rot on him.

He wonders if you can, too.

(Pity that. You're a pretty bird, ain't you?)

And the way you take him in lacks a distinct thrum of hesitation, fear that’s normally there. It occurs to him, then, that you see him as just another man. Just another person.

(“deader than a doorknob, this one. such a goddamn waste, boss. he was a fun one, wasn’t he? should we burn ‘em?”

nah. bury him out back—)

It's laughable, really. A joke. He has the urge to crack one—sick and awful enough to make that little smile on your face wilt. Wither away. Almost does, too, but it get tangled in his throat when he feels the weight of your stare on him.

The easy sweep of your eyes is barely discrete, but it's clinical. Pitying. But the softened edges of that empathy dissolve as your pretty head adds up all the numbers on him, coming to a standstill. Your eyes linger on his wrist. The gold of his wristwatch peeks out beneath the black sleeve of his hoodie. An intricate web of complex timekeeping that only he's privy to. A little luxury he picked up in Italy when the cash he'd been given was getting too tiresome to carry around.

Dead men, after all, don't need bank accounts.

And then—

You fluster. “Sorry, I just thought—”

It clicks, then. The pity. The soft words. The goddamn coffee—

His gums itch. He has the sudden urge to be mean about it. Pick you apart in this street until nothing but embarrassment and humiliation remains.

“That I was homeless? ‘nd you brought me, what? A coffee? ‘ow sweet of you. Some breakfast, too. Well, aren't you a lovely girl?”

You are embarrassed. It blisters across your expression. Has your hands trembling around the cardboard tray, spilling droplets of coffee down the side. Your head is bowed, cowed in shame. It reminds him of that bartender some years prior. Pulling away when the bad dog growls—

But there's a thin sheen of intrigue in your eyes, burrowing holes into the shoes in front of you; a tangled knot of want coiling in the heat of your embarrassment over this blunder. Over offending him.

Well—

That's new.

Some get off on it. On humiliation. Specifically, of the public variety. He didn't take you as the type. The way you twist, squirming in place, is odd, though. It doesn't fit as well as he originally thought. No. It's not the public shame, but—

Him.

Ah.

Sweet, sweet girl.

(So naïve.)

He reckons he could get you to do just about anything to make it up to him. You would, too. You're soft enough to be submissive, to bow your head in contrition, but there's a flicker of defiance in the jut of your chin when you lift your head.

This is a blunder and you're sweetly embarrassed, sure, but it isn't enough to break you.

And now Simon just wants to ruin you. Teach you a lesson about bad, vile men—

(Something you'd welcome with open arms, wouldn't you?)

“Didn’t know Manchester was so charitable,” he rasps. His throat is dry. Parched. He reaches for the coffee—black, with extra creamer and sugar on the side, tucked neatly in a little bag; fuckin’ hell. Ain't you just adorable—and places it on the spot beside him. “I’ll be takin’ this. Will need it for later.”

You look like you want to protest. Fight back. His hackles rise, ready for it—eager. Something anticipatory, dark, bleeds through the moulted mess of his head. Sickly. Terrible. He thinks about what you'd look like sprawled under him, shaking and begging for more, for him to stop—

Fuck. Birds usually make his head itch, but you make his fucking skin crawl.

In the end, you just huff. Roll your eyes. He wants to chew them out of your head. Pop them between his teeth. He bet you'd taste divine.

You walk away from him before he can. You don't look back once.

Pity, he thinks. Someone's gonna snatch you clean off the streets like that—

Hours later, he sends Price a text message with the coordinates for where to pick up the package Ghost left.

He considers it a blessing when the man sends him back, good job, now get a pint from me as a little reward. Can't say I don't treat my team well.

A reward, huh?

Well. With your stature in comparison to his own, Ghost easily can see you being considered a pint.

So, he follows you home, and tallies this one as being on Price.

It's easy. Too easy. He slips deftly behind you, tucked away from view, and masks his footsteps under the echo of yours until he's standing in the shadows outside of your house. This, too, feels like a blessing. It's a duplex. He waits for one of the lights to flicker on, and—

The window brightens. Room number two.

He hums, and palms his pockets for the pack of smokes he nicked off the man. Needing something to take the edge off. To quell the urge to bite.

It's even easier to engineer meetings. Random run-ins. All blamed on happenstance, chance. Of course. This towering mountain of a man with his thick manc twang—the sort of gallows humour that can only be found in the blue-collar streets of Salford from the nasty old men squatting on the corners—must have better things to do than stalk you. Surely. You're not special enough to be hunted, right?

Still. You're a touch wary of him. Distrustful. You keep your distance—six inches for Jesus Christ, aren’t you a peach?—and try to skirt the line between neutrally polite to the strange man loitering outside of the shops you frequent (your schedule burned to his memory, naturally) and that fascinating skittish intrigue from before. All simmering heat. Blunt want. The kind wrapped up in silk threads.

It's interesting to watch it play out when he steps closer and all those long-forgotten instincts in the back of your head flare up. The shaky step you take back. The inward frown of confusion when you're not sure why your body craves space, acting almost on its own. And then the sweet defiance that breaks over you. The intentional step closer. The feigned warmth in your tone as you talk to him.

It's easy to pocket the uglier aspects of his personality. The coldness. The indifference. The flat, droll insincerity that leaks into his tone. All of it shelved, locked away, and he's not sure if Price would be happy that he listened to what he said, followed his example, or furious that he's bastardising it to lure this pretty fish in.

)The latter, undoubtedly. But Simon gets a sick kick from it all.)

Especially when it brings you closer to him. Thaws you as you rationalise his reaction during the first meeting, gears spinning. Kicking up excuses.

Anyone would be angry, offended. It's natural. He's alright now—

It makes you look at him differently as you forcefully fight the urge to flee.

Silly bird.

Wary eyes rake over his massive bulk. Brows furrow at the series of black medical masks he wears in public. Always. That, in addition to the heavy black of his wardrobe—black jacket, black hoodie, black leather gloves—sometimes makes you glance at him with a touch of worry. Fear. Probably wondering if you brought home a delinquent.

But it changes when he rolls up his sleeves one day after you've been moaning about your broken beach cruiser (the, I don't know, chain—or something—keeps catching—), and crouches down to fix it.

There's a hitch in your breath. A distinct swallow. A guilty tinge of something shy, deliciously so, shading your eyes ruby-red when you look down at him.

And ah—

Sweet little treat snagged on the line. Ain't he a lucky lad?

It's all the better when you do the work for him. Reeling yourself in, practically throwing yourself in his cooler when you ask about his tattoos, carefully—considerately—nudging the topic away from his ugly scars.

He guts you clean as he tells you he's in the military. Top secret, pet. Don't ask because I'd hate to ‘ave to hurt a pretty face like yours—

You preen under it. Pet. Pretty. You don't even notice when he slides his knife over your scales, dices you up on his chopping board.

You're the picture of sweetness when he unkinks the chain in your bike, and sets it straight. All happiness. Smiles. Appreciative glances. You flutter your pretty eyes at him as you say—

“Thank you—”

You're waiting for a name. His belly rumbles. He could eat, he thinks, and licks his teeth.

“Simon. Simon Riley.”

The risk-reward ratio is balanced when you breathe it out between plump lips, chasing the end of it with your tongue. He wants to eat it out of your mouth. Swallow it down.

You touch his arm, hand warm, soft. “If there's anything I can do to pay you back—”

He takes you out for a kebab later on. Nudges you out of the way when you open your wallet to pay. Draft girl. Naïve, too, because he can feel the heat in your cheeks from where he stands, reaching over to snatch the bag from the man with a grunt.

You must think him quite the gentleman. So trusting.

Doesn't matter. He lets it take root. Especially when you shyly invite him back to yours to eat.

He makes a feast of it, and fucks you on your mint green chaisse after he's finished.

(Not on birth control, you say, and hand him a box of condoms, suddenly shy. It's unopened. He hums, and burns that to memory.)

He keeps his distance—an easy feat when he's halfway around the world, and you're stuck in the gloom of Manchester.

It's purposeful, of course. He made a promise to Price not to give him a reason to worry, but fuck—

You're proving hard to quit. He's never had anyone cuff him upside the head on his bullshit. Not anymore, anyway. Not as the Ghost. He likes the thrill of it, of this chase.

You don't let him steamroll you when he's in a mood to fight. You punch back, hitting him right in the mess of his guts, and fuck. Fuck. He's a little bit obsessed with it. With you. This wily little fish that acts so shy when he's got three fingers buried in your cunt, but rides him after like you're starving for it. Clawing at his chest. Scratching his arms. It's raw. Primal. He wants to break you—this fiery little kitten that bites his fingers until they bleed, and then purrs in his lap as he drives a pickaxe through your head, shredding logic into pieces. Rummaging around until he nicks the optic nerve that lets you see red.

You’re everywhere. In everything. In the back of his head, under the howling that hadn't stopped since you trailed your finger down the jagged topography of his bare chest, digging your nail into the crude x across his heart, and whispered, soft and sweet: you're all kinds of fucked up, aren't you?

A bludgeon to his self-control—

He resists. Has to. Is mean about it, too. Doesn't tell you where he's going (it's need to know), or what he's doing (would ‘ave to bash your pretty ‘ead in if I told you), but keeps you strung on the line (keep thinkin’ about that pretty cunt of yours; can't wait to come ‘ome and ‘ave you sit on my ugly mug—).

It's dangerous, this game of his. Thrilling for all the wrong reasons.

But he’s a good mutt. Good—

Until the text.

The one you send to him when you're out with friends. A picture. You're in a pub somewhere in Moss Side, a drink in hand. A gaggle of nobodies crowded around you. It makes sense, he supposes. There's that old idiom—you’ll trap more flies with honey—and he doesn't know anyone nearly as sweet as you.

His sweet girl.

(you fuckin’ mutt—)

Ghost stares at you for a moment, teeth aching. The little ensemble—a crop top and jeans—is a vision, he reckons. But it's spoiled when he catches more eyes on you than pointed at the camera. Practically spilling out of your top, aren't you?

He breathes heavily through his nose. Tastes guncotton in his throat.

Ghost commits every face to memory, and then calls you.

You're drunk. Too drunk to remember it tomorrow. Stuck in a pub on what's supposedly a bad part of town. Chatting away about going to your friend’s house. He gets the address, and something sour twits in his stomach. Shit council houses.

“That safe?” He asks, leaning back in his chair. He's already chubbed up in his slacks at the slur in your voice. “And dressed like that? Didn't take you for a slag—”

It makes you sputter on the line. “I'm—I’m not—”

You're so quick to placate him. So hasty to make him happy. Please don't be angry with me, Simon. I'm just having some fun—

The claws and fangs are tucked away when you're drunk. He shoves the information in the cache, eyes burning. Head aching. He's feverish. Hot under the collar.

Odd considering he's dead—

“Sounds like you will be.”

“It's not like that—”

“‘ow would you know? Might meet a nice fellow. Might take him home.”

“I don’t—I wouldn't—”

The sniffle makes him throb. Fuck. “Yeah? Well, ain't none of my business, I reckon—”

“It is.”

“Oh? How's tha’?”

“I—I like you, Simon—” he can taste your embarrassment through the phone. He didn't even need to bring you flowers and you're already boxing him into monogamy, confessing to him. So sweet. So tender. If he were a better man, he might have told you to sober up. To talk about this tomorrow.

Too bad for you, he isn't. And what’s worse is that he’s a loyal bastard, too.

But that's later, and right now—

He's halfway across the world, and you're vulnerable. In the den of hungry mutts.

It’s charr in his throat. Anger in his veins. “You like me? An’ you go out dressed like that?”

“There's nothing wrong with how I'm dressed—”

He sucks his teeth. “Dunno ‘bout tha’, pet. You look like you're achin’ to get fucked.”

You take a shuddering breath. “I just want you—”

“Yeah?” It's a growl. His cock spits prespend in his trousers. “Then be my good girl. Go home and wait for me.”

It's quiet on the line. He catches the hitch in your throat, the sharp exhale, like you can't really be sure if he's serious or not. He says nothing. Waits.

Where there would have been a fight—fists and teeth and snarling words—you quieten in the silence. Docile. Submissive. It's in you, he knows. He saw the glimpses back when you first met, when he'd bent down and fixed the bike he broke. All it needs is a little—

“Jus’ worried about my sweet girl, is all.”

And you relent.

Corrosive oil spills out of the necrosed holes in his head. It curls over his thoughts, liquid sin. He takes himself in his hand, blood pulsing in his veins, white-hot, damning, and bares his teeth at the urge to come to you, to push you down on the floor, and mount you like a snarling beast—

“Good girl,” he growls when you tell him you'll call a taxi, that you'll go home and have some wine with your friend instead.

Friend. Friends.

He'll have to do something about that.

(The thing about deprivation is that it bleeds into a vicious sense of possession when it's finally obtained. Greed. His wants have wants, have wants—

A perfect ouroboros. One you feed into almost destructively.)

Because the thing is—

Simon wants to tie you to his bed. Keep you locked up in the safe house he has in Manchester. Chained, shackled. A prisoner with him as your iron guard.

It isn't just fantasy, either.

The flies that congregate around you are an annoying, incessant buzzing in his ears. Remora clinging to the biggest fish.

But they're easy to scatter when he waves his hand.

(Waves off. Threatens with bodily harm, with physical aggression—

Same thing.)

The sting in his knuckles and the blood on his shoes are worth it in the end when your tantalum skin cracks. An aggregate of beautiful lines, pretty in their fragility, their brokenness. He wedges his fingers between the splints, widening the chasm to pet at the sticky-soft centre hiding beneath all that rough rock. Sweet girl. Hard candy enclosing taffy-softness.

His coos melt you to the consistency of mercury. Liquid silver pebbles along your lash line, spilling over in a dizzying display of raw vulnerability.

It makes every predatory instinct inside of him bristle. Locking onto the sweet lines of crystalline sadness that run down your cheeks. It has his heart racing. Eager, anticipatory. The thrill of the chase, of running you down into the ground until you're fine powder under him.

And it’s there, it's in his arms—the maw of a beast—where you seek comfort, lamenting the loss of your friends, your coworkers. No one wants to hang out with you anymore. They don't return your calls or answer your texts.

What did I do? You sniffle, throat bared. Belly turned up.

Flooded with tears. The lachrymal face that peers up at him makes his teeth ache. He rolls his head back, feels himself thicken in his pants.

Simon loves it when you cry.

“Fuck ‘em,” he rasps, words sticking to his dry throat. “If they can't see what a catch you are, then they don't even deserve to breathe the same air as you.”

It makes you cry harder, makes you mumble into his chest about how lucky you are to have someone like him. Someone who cares.

His breath hitches. Warm floods his veins, fever-hot.

“Thank you, Simon—”

And then you, smooth silver and wickedly sweet, cradle him in your palms as if you could hold all the broken pieces of him together.

He thinks it's cute.

Doesn't really have the heart to tell you it's a lost cause.

“Anytime, pet.”

And you're perfect, too.

You take this mangy mutt into your house, and let it eat your food, sleep in your bed. You let him fuck you stupid, and listen so prettily when he convinces you to let him spoil you. Let him pay your rent, your bills. Let Simon dote on you the only way he knows how—mercilessly possessive, and a touch cruel, mean—but you roll over, showing your belly. Submissive and sweet.

It's even better when you try to lash out at him with a collar in the shape of his teeth branding your neck, spitting and hissing like a feral cat who doesn't know yet that's claws have been clipped. Only to then curl up in his lap, purring as he strokes your fur, and carves out a place for himself in your life.

He wants to sink his teeth into you, and you think he's a big dog. Undomesticated. One who comes and goes as he pleases. A stray. A mutt.

It's said fondly. Full of love—

His mouth is full of cavities. His teeth ache. His gums bleed.

(do you know he's rabid? that the faded name on his dog tags once read cujo—)

Everything about you makes that sludge flood behind his eyes, pounding rotten fists against his temple. take, take, take; mine, mine—

The howling doesn't stop. It tells him to press you into the mattress and fuck you stupid. Tie you to the bedposts and never let you go—

He throws fists in the dark, trying to hit the madness in his head. Ends up with bloody knuckles and laughter in his ears.

(a voice of reason says, your bird is too big for a cage—)

He clings to it.

You're warm beside him. Burning hot. He syphons it from your veins when you're asleep, pulling you close just to feel something on his skin other than dirt. Other than blood.

It's easy to pretend he's fine with these little nips. Leaving teeth marks in your neck. Bloody rings snaking up your thighs.

He wraps one hand around both of your wrists, holds them high above your head, and tells himself it's enough. Shackled by him, under him, as he takes you apart, pulling at your sense of independence like the gnarled fingers of winter bringing defoliation to summer's bloom, but even with this, all of it, he still aches. Still wants. Needs—

Stupid fuckin’ mutt.

Then you bring his hands up to your throat, letting him wrap his bearish paws around your delicate neck, and he knows these little bites will never satiate the hunger in his guts.

He wakes up the next morning feeling warm. Full. Edges softened, if only just, by the sticky sweetness of your breath ghosting over his chest.

Simon curls his arm around you, holding tight. He won't let go. Won't—

Hide it. Put it away.

Ghost does neither of those things. He buries it, instead.

But in doing so, you find cracks in the foundation. Ones that are just big enough for your willfulness to slip through. To hand him back the cash he gave with a scoff, and a, i work, too, you know? i don't need your money, Simon. that's not why i’m with you—

(All he hears is, I don't need you.)

And then you send him a text. I'm going out with friends from work tonight. We're going drinking. I'll talk to you tomorrow!

In the zombified remains of his head, a new howling starts. The hisses tell him you're pulling away, running from him—

It's a big world out there. It'll eat you whole—

Like Tommy.

The thing about want is that sometimes it grows teeth, hands. Claws. Without a body of its own, it tends to mould itself after its maker because that's all it knows how to do: devour, consume. Yearn.

He shouldn't be too surprised to find that this need of his has dug itself out of the grave he buried it in.

(he did, too—)

The flimsy sarcophagus cracks open when Price announces that his missus is pregnant.

The howling in the back of his head stops abruptly. The pulsing ache in his temple abates. It's heavy, this weight. This absolute, utter emptiness—

No. It's not hollow. The chasm isn't drained, it's—

(In the silence, something growls. Feral. Possessed.)

—full. Perfect equilibrium. All of the patchwork parts of himself, the ones that don't quite fit, suddenly find synergy.

Communion.

Ghost cocks his head in consideration.

(your bird is too big for a cage—

—but maybe a collar would do.)

—after all, could you ever leave him with his name etched into your womb—

In leaving the key under the mat for him to come and go as he pleases, you've left yourself vulnerable. But—

Not anymore.

He has a safehouse he'll take you to. You'll let him, too, because it'll be the best choice for you. The three of you.

He's never entertained any ideas of family, not when the closest approximation he has is drenched in gun oil and smells of smoke from artillery fire, but the howling in his head quietens at the idea of it. He can't shackle you to the bed—stupid fucking mutt—but he can tie you down all the same. Make you his. Wholly. Always.

And the thing is—despite a pickaxe making figure-eights out of his grey matter; lead poisoning and rust giving him these sour, awful thoughts about locking you up in his house, leaving you a needy mess, dependent only on him—Simon supposes he knows right from wrong.

Intentionally knocking you up is amoral. Probably illegal. Somehow, even more dastardly when the reason for it is simply selfishness. Want. Greed. Hunger.

But in carving himself a place in your life, he failed to realise that the walls behind him closed in. No way out. And so, his only option is to go forward. To keep moving.

He'll be crucified for this, but that's fine.

He doesn't intend for you to find out, anyway. It'll be an accident. He came home early, and found you drunk. Drank with you. Your drunken idiocy merged, creating a terrible, noxious cocktail of awful, bad choices. Permanent ones. Irreversible.

(You're so sweet, so docile when you're drunk—)

It'll be easy to convince you. To play the part of a stoic man suddenly in turmoil. You'll offer to get rid of it, a suggestion that he'll flinch at—a cornered dog, a hand raising in the air. You'll whimper. Shake in his arms as you tentatively smooth over the wrinkles in his brow, murmuring out your options in a stilted breath.

You'll be a Riley before the end of your term. It's only proper, he'll mutter, stiff and uncomfortable, and you'll melt. Liquid tantalum in his palm. The fruits of his labour laid bare, seeping from the corners of his mouth. Tucked tight between his teeth. Mercury he can swallow down, keep in the bracket of his rotten ribs. Safekeeping from this world that just takes. Devours.

But not if he eats you first.

The mere notion alone serves as an anchor, locking him to the seafloor. The tumult in his head calmed at the promise of owning. Biting to claim. To have. Greedy for it. For you, and the strange sense of quiet your proximity brings him. The warmth, too.

He's a rabid dog. This he knows—has known—for quite some time. Indisputable. It pools in his mouth. Liquid sin. Makes him ache for just a sip. Unquenchable, though, because he's wary of water. Hydrophobia, but only for how it washes his efforts away. Cleanses.

The urge inside of him to bite, to infect, quietens when he gets closer to you.

(a rabid mutt licking at the window you're on the opposite side of, dreaming of just a taste—)

A byproduct of that maddening virus in his veins, the one he must have picked up six feet in the ground. Bite, bitebite—

—and give you a collar in the shape of his teeth.

He finds you in bed. A bottle of wine on the end table beside you, courtesy of your friend. The one lingering remora he couldn't snap at—one who sends you messages about how you are being manipulated. Taken advantage of. Fuck that loser, the latest one says when he picks up your phone, scrolling through the dwindling conversations housed within. Just him now, and them.

It preaches about empowerment. About how you shouldn't let a man pay your bills (textbook manipulation. he's putting you in a position of dependency. making you feel obligated to stay. it's all on Google, babes. like, fucking get a clue!!!!), or how it's moving so quickly (maybe you should come stay with me in Durham for a bit, hun. get away for a weekend. i worry about ya, is all). He hums, thumbing through the old chats.

You told her to fuck off about the manipulation, but it came after a lot of, oh, yeah. well, he's just. you know. he's different, and you haven't declined the invitation. i’ll think about it, is what you write.

It simmers under his skin. That independence he plans on stomping out under his heel. With his kin.

(sick, sick sick, wrong—)

It's desperation, this. Clawing at the walls—the dirt—until his nails are torn off his fingers. Until his skin splits, peels. Broken under rock and rubble. That animalistic need for air. To breathe. Basic training tells him not to save the person drowning unless he's sure they won't kill him in their struggle to live. But what's he supposed to do when that person is his rotting body, sinking down to unfathomable depths? When all he has is you to cling to—

Damnation built by his own hands.

You'll die together, he reckons, and tosses your phone on the hamper in the corner of the room.

Ghost can't remember the last time someone made him feel anything at all other than impartiality. Indifference. Casual apathy.

Price is the exception to this on the grounds of being consanguineous to him.

And you—

An outlier.

One he intends on sinking as deep as he can with. Anchored, maybe, by this little plan that beats and pulses in the back of his head. That clogs his throat with a want so thick, he can already taste the brine from the ocean. Water in his nose. Down his esophagus—

Better than dirt, he supposes. And it spurns him forward.

You're malleable like this. Tensile. He bends you easily with just a touch until you're flat on your back, a pillow shoved beneath your tailbone, and stripped. The loose shirt you wear to sleep is hiked up under your neck. Panties are pulled off until your sweet, bare cunt is revealed to him. All pretty and soft, and his. Untouched, he notes, and gives an appreciative stroke over your clit with his thumb.

It was something you were whining about the other day, panting in his ear as if he wasn't a continent away. Pleading with him on the phone to please, please let you come.

Simon likes the way you cling to him when it's been a while since something has wrecked you as thoroughly as his cock. When your spoiled pussy was neglected for a few days, weeks, and starved for attention. You were so sweet to him then, cooing in his ear how good you've been, how much you want him and only him, need him. Begging so prettily for it.

He's almost sad to spoil himself in your cunt when you can't weep for it. Can't bully him closer. Try to claw his eyes out. That delicious push-pull where you hiss at him for pulling away, but whine when he gets too close.

Sad, but—

Not enough to stop himself.

You're not wet enough for him to slide inside unprepared—his cock too big, something that makes his bones tremble—and he rectifies it by leaning down, letting saliva pool between his teeth and lips. He holds it there for a moment as he spreads your folds apart with his thumb and forefinger.

And then he spits on your bare cunt.

It hits your clit, the thick glob siding down your slit. He reaches between your thighs, pawing at you. Slides his fingers through the slick mess he made, teases around your tight rim.

Simon usually likes to take his time with you. Lapping at your pussy for hours until you're a weeping, snot-nosed mess whining in the sheets. Spoiled rotten. Begging him to fuck you already, Simon, you can't take it anymore—

He's mean. Cruel. Edges you for hours until your legs shake, trembling around his ears. He never lets you reach that peak—doesn’t let you come until he's buried inside of you.

Coming on his tongue, his fingers, is rarely a privilege you ever earn. Too much of a spitfire, a spiteful little kitten, to give in and do what he demands. So he keeps you on the precipice until he's ready to fuck you, ignoring your bribes, your bargains. Simon doesn't give in even when you beg, when you relent and tell him you'll finally be good.

You never are.

Spoiled, he always huffs. Down to the fuckin’ bone.

Like now. Pulling away from him. Him, the only person in your life who stuck around. A little bullying (bones breaking, splintering under his fists; the wet, hot smear of blood on his hands, skulls smacking against the pavement—an’ if you tell anyone, he cracks his battered fists and it sounds like a snarl, a gunshot, your parents will be cryin’ over an empty grave—) shooed the gnats away. He took a more clandestine approach to others. Birds that kept circling you tight. Protective, shrill. They made his head ache, but—

(don't want to start nothin’, but i don't want to be alone wit’ ‘er. tried to kiss me, is all. ain't like that, pet—)

It was a test. And they all failed. All but him.

Yet—

come to Durham.

i’ll think about it.

Ungrateful. It's his fault, though. Simon doted on you too much, cosseted by his affection, when he should have clipped your wings from the beginning.

Ah, well—

Lesson learned.

You're wet enough now. He pushes in two fingers, scissoring them apart. You'd be yowling at him, kicking up a fuss if you'd been awake. But you're not. It thrums through him. Thick, heady. He likes you like this—probably more than he should. The heat simmering in his veins bubbles. Pops. Sap on charring wood. It clogs his throat with his smoke until it burns, a dry forest fire.

He needs you. Needs to be in you. He's tired of waiting. Impatience burrows into him like a maelstrom.

Simon adjusts his hold on your leg, fingers curling behind your kneecap. Steadying himself. His fingers slip out of your cunt with a sloppy squelch that ghosts across his spine. Anticipatory. A touch anxious. He wants you. Wants you bad—

He takes himself in his hand, and slides the weeping tip over your slit. Taps it once, thrice on your clit. And then guides it to your centre. Your warmth bleeds into him. Eager, he shuffles forward. Feeds you his cock. Eyes drilling into the place where his head slips in, swallowed by your sloppy, wet hole. The glands make you stretch around him. Rim pulled taut.

The sight alone must have been crafted by some Luciferian dream, dangled before him in the shade of nirvana.

take a bite, it urges. and then take more—

Like this, passed out with your legs hitched over his shoulders, drooling into the pillow unawares, you're just a doll.

Made for him, and—

“Fuckin’ hell—” He presses into you—cock splitting tight, warm heat—and tries not to lose himself to the sensation of being bare, raw, inside of you.

—“A perfect fit.”

It's always been condoms. You're not on birth control. Ink blots in his eyes. He goes a little feral with it. Instincts unleashed. Unfettered.

Simon bullies his fat cock into you until his hips tap the back of your thighs, buried as deep as he can go. It's molten heat cocooning him—a warm embrace. For the first time, ever, he thinks he understands the meaning of home. Sliding home, in particular.

(Welcome home. Home. Home. He'll make a house out of your body. Sleep inside the brackets of your thighs, head pillowed on your chest—)

As good as you feel around him—slick, wet, and tight—and as much as he wants to saviour the sight of you, passed out on the pillow, cunt split by his cock, he has a goal, a mission, to see through.

His hand falls, slick and tacky, to your lower belly. Palm pressing against the subtle bulge in your abdomen, the outline of his cock. You always whine and hiss that he's too big for you. That you can't take him to the root.

Hurts, you complain, hand against your naval. Fingers knotting over the place that aches.

He presses his fingers there instead, feeling himself under your skin. Changing your anatomy to make room for him to fit—

It lights him in fire. Spurns him on. He bucks into you, pace sloppy, clumsy. Selfish. He's unrelenting as he splits you apart, drilling the full length of himself into your supine body, supple flesh relaxed under him, practically melting into the sheets.

The thread keeping his resolve, his self-control, sprung up tight begins to quiver. Each piston into you has delicate fingers drumming across the strings of a harpsichord. It reverberates through him, echoing in the stifling, suffocating, silence of the bedroom, overtaking it. Clouding it with the musk of his desire, his devotion to you, to this dream blooming in the prison of his mind.

Everything narrows into a needlepoint.

There's just your burning flesh beneath him, softer than it's ever been; pillowy. Welcoming. And the sounds of him fucking into you—lewd squelches, slick and wet; the sound of his cock finding home in the basin of your spread thighs; his heavy breaths, his groans and growls that seem to rattle the bed. The noise breaks, an incomplete requiem of sin in his head, and he loses himself in the lulling notes, dragged under in the bestial beat of taking what his—

A sudden noise shatters through the room. Beneath him, you stir, gasping wetly. The sound mangled in your throat.

There's confusion in your sleepy, hazy gaze when you peer up at him, lashes clumping together. You moan, whimpering, as you struggle to latch on to the threads of cognisance that he's content to fuck out of you. Your hand lifts, falls to his wrist still pressed against your lower belly. The grip is lax, loose. You’re not pushing him away, but clinging to him. Centring yourself.

It makes his blood thicken. Has him burning red-hot.

“Wha’s a’matter, pet?” He taunts, grinding his cock into you hard enough to make your dazed eyes water. Your hand tightens around him, holding steady. “Don't like it? Not fuckin’ you hard enough?”

“Simon—”

His name tapers off into a keen when he angles hips, and starts pistoning into you with a mean, merciless fury. The desperate noises that spill, unhindered, from your slack mouth is the perfect accompaniment to the lewd sound of him fucking your sopping cunt; the piece he was missing when this started. His requiem, complete.

It's a serrated blade to his self-control, already frayed and threadbare as it is. The pressure makes it snap.

“C'mon, sweet thing. Thought you wanted this?”

There's a place in hell just for him. It's sealed when you blink your tired, sleepy eyes up at him, mind a slurry of lingering somnolence and the heady alcohol on your breath, and offer a shuddering whimper. Always so soft for him, so agreeable when you’re drunk.

“So’ry, Simon—”

You can barely string words together. Poor, pitiful you—vulnerable under him. Breakable. Malleable. Anyone else could have tricked you into this same position when he was away. Got you beneath them like this, compliant and unawares, and took what belongs to him.

(The only thing in this destitute existence he claims for himself—)

Not anymore. Not ever again.

It's almost callous when he grinds into you. Hateful. Brutish. Furious. And dazed as you are, you barely even flinch at the snarls that spill, unfettered, from the back of his throat. The low groans of him making promises with devils unknown; constructing shackles from brass, iron.

Entrenching his future in motion, cupped protectively between the parentheses your thighs make around his hips. It's almost a vicious sort of poetry, one laid bare in the odious ruins of that broken thing he calls a heart. Etched into his rotten pericardium. Necrosed devotion. He'll see it through—however noxious, and putrid, you might find the miasmal stench of it spun tight in his web.

It's for your own good.

And as if you agree, you answer him in perfect euphony, moaning sweetly as you tilt your hips up for more.

Ghost groans low in his throat, bestial and spinning rapidly out of his control. He feels everything spinning, slipping; the trudge to the finish line narrows into a pinprink. He needs something to cling to, to hold on to with broken hands—

The only purchase he finds is in your demise.

His hand lifts, shaking yours loose. He reaches up, fingers dig into your chin, forcing your pouty mouth open. You blink at him, sluggish, but he catches the thin gossamer of awareness spooling thin cobwebs over darkened crevasses, covering the canyons in your eyes with cognisance. It makes him leer.

“Stick your tongue out, pretty girl,” he rasps, words sticking together, muffled under the mask. Crushed aggregate stone under the weight of his own desire. “Tha’s it. Open up nice and wide—”

He lets spit gather again, pooling on his tongue. It's degrading, you always say. Gross. But you swallow it down like a good girl, anyway. Always. You come at him with fangs and claws, but somehow, you always merge in a perfectly dizzying polyphony.

Ghost spits on your tongue. Lets it land right in the middle of fleshy pink. A sick, twisted pleasure thrums in his veins at the sight.

There's checking the boxes of an established kink, and this. Horrifically proprietary. Ownership that ignites a fire in his marrow, setting him alight from the inside out. Turns bone into blackened char, cinder. He can almost taste it on his tongue.

It's made worse, turned frenzied, when you—sweet, perfect, you—bracket it protectively in the curve of your tongue. Completely dazed, head filled with a heady slurry of somnolence and alcohol, but still aware enough to know, even if only through muscle memory, what you're meant to do when he spits in your mouth.

If anything, you're more obedient like this. Little doll. Coddling it lovingly, this little piece of him that he gives you.

And it might be the madness speaking—these fraying thoughts take on a vitriolic edge, corrosive aqua regia pooling in his throat—but Christ. He's been stabbed in the guts, repeatedly, and it somehow packed less of a punch than this.

He wants, wants—

Family never crossed his mind, was never even on the table or something to be considered, but with you it brims. Blooms in rot. Roots in tenebrous.

He has this insatiable urge to devour you whole so you'll always be with him. The waves of his desire are monstrous. The waters below are rapacious. A gaping maw eager to eat you up—

Pity it’s not an option.

But he’ll make do. Buy a ring tomorrow. Something pretty that matches your eyes. The curve of your smile. Sanctioned ownership. A collar in gemstones and gold, glimmering and shining bright enough that should any light fade from your gaze, it’ll illuminate in the gloom; twilight made in sorrow. The prettiest blues—

Said eyes water. Ghost’s hold on your face relaxes when you give a muffled keen, cheeks bubbling up against the pressure. Tongue still stuck out even as he takes his pleasure from your supine flesh. Suspended in motion, stasis. Such a good girl for him—

He swallows. Tastes poison, rot, on his tongue. “Swallow.”

You're a little sluggish, a little slow, but you follow his command all the same. He knows, then, that it could only ever be you.

No one gets under his skin like this. No one makes him itch, want, crave, as much as you do—

You make a face, twisted up in some amalgamation of pleasure and confusion. It nudges the ruins of his chest and feels almost like a heartbeat when it pulses in his flesh.

“Simon, Simon—”

His name is all you can say, and he's not sure if you're begging for mercy, or muttering it out into the scant air between your heaving breaths like an obsecration, an orison, but he eats it all the same. Bites down on your pleas, your cries, your prayers, and chews them up between fangled teeth. Takes them down into the swirling pits of his belly where they're eaten alive by what grows in the decay.

(belly full of dirt:

he heaves, and heaves, but nothing comes out even though he can taste humus in his throat, feel worms using his organs like a playground—)

“Somethin’ you want, pet?” He taunts, and shifts his hips back just enough to drag a few inches of his cock out of your drenched cunt. A tease—cruel and mean. He’d get lobbed upside the head for this had you been in your right mind. A tap to his temple, shaking the cobwebs loose. He would have bent down, and sunk broken teeth into your jugular. Merging violence with love until bloody knuckles feel like a kiss. “All you ‘ave to do is ask. Use your words, pretty thing—”

You whine, low and drawn out. A lazy whimper in the back of your throat. “Pl’se—”

You can barely speak. Tongue too thick. Sleep too heavy in your veins. Alcohol, too. A lesson, perhaps, for his willful little pet come the morning when you struggle to measure just how deep into his gullet you’ve let yourself fall.

He can’t help rubbing salt into the shallow cuts, if only because he likes the way you pout.

“C’mon, sweetheart. You can do better’n that.”

And damn him—damn you—you do. Your hand curls over his wrist, pulling it close to your mouth where you place a kiss against his palm. Tender. Chaste. Midnight blooms in your eyes, casts shadows under pale moonlight. His breath stutters in his chest when you lean your head back, letting his hand fall to your bared neck.

Your heavy, lidded eyes gaze back at him, cutting through the shade of night that sews the air like satin. Etched in the file silk is threads of trust in stark white. The kind that bleeds for him; hungers. One that aches, always tender like a bruise. The throb of it echoes between mouldering ribs. Booms between his ears.

Ghost doesn’t fall into pieces. Doesn’t shatter. No. Something in the splintered remains shifts. Settles. He wraps his fingers around the thick of your throat, thumb notched tight against your pulse, and he feels complete. Whole. Remade from the ruins.

Your breath hitches. The sound is a gunshot in his ears. He squeezes down, a gentle press. Just enough to make the air spill out of your lungs, to let your eyes water. Lachrymose, eager. It does something to him when you cry. He feels tipped upside down, torn inside out. Left all askew, asunder. He wants to drown in the pebbling river growing against your lashline. Wants to drink it down until it quenches his neverending thirst. Wants, wants—

He feels his name spill from your lips. Brassy and broken, trembling against his palm. A plea—

More.

And he gives it to you.

Simon hitches your ankle on his shoulder. Adjusts the grip he has on your throat. He settles over your body, blanketing you under his bulk. Stygian beast devouring the maiden whole. The thought amuses him even as it knocks the air from his lungs.

He anchors himself into the mattress with his knees, steadying himself, curls his other hand around the iron ring of the headboard. All the while, you look up at him—glossy eyes burning coals in the dark, in the gloom. Wanting, hungry. Mouth held open as if you’re waiting for his scraps—

And then he bucks into you, the leverage giving his thrust a savage edge.

The whines are snuffed out under his palm. Your eyes widen, tears now spilling down your temple, soaking the pillow below your head.

He groans, head rolling back. “Fuckin’ hell—ain’t you a pretty sight?”

Tucked under him, throat swallowed by his palm. Split on his cock, slick and wet. The tears streaming down your face makes him feel wicked, foul; but the spit running down your slackened jaw quells any doubt. The hand on his wrist holds him tight, tighter still, to your flesh.

You want this. His spoiled rotten bird.

So, he gives it to you.

Simon’s almost ruthless when he snaps his hips into yours, cooing viciously into your ear about how you feel, how you look, how you sound—so pretty wrapped around him, under him; his little doll—

“S’where you belong, pet—” guttural words spill, flintlike and savage, from his mangled throat. Reinforced with the hateful way he blugeons his cock into you. Times it perfectly with the firm squeezes against your jugular, never letting you catch your breath. Your eyes roll back, legs trembling. Shaking. But you don’t move, don’t struggle. The hand on his wrist is a shackle, and it makes him smirk, scars pulling up in a gnarled mess of mirth; ugly and mean. “Right where you belong. Ain’t tha’ right?”

He leans down, babbles nonsense into your temple. Promises you the heads of gods, the ichor they bleed. Swears he’ll build a shrine for you in Durham.

But for as mocking as these words he murmurs into your ear are, they’re tremulous. Raw. A current roars beneath; a steady stream, a plea, all full of need: stay, stay staystay—

(please)

He buries his nose into your hairline to stem the ravening ache in his guts, breathes in the heady scent of you—of sex, and wine, and sweat. Drags it into his lungs in harsh, angry gasps to stain his skin with the smell of you. Of him.

It goes right to his head in a heavy rush until he’s dizzy, almost sick, with the swell of it flooding in. An animal, he thinks, drunk on merging pheromones that make him mindless. Unfettered.

It’s as if he’s driven on instinct alone; his frenzied pace ebbs, grows sloppy. The air around him feels thick. Syrupy. Stifling. The balmy breath in his chest is nearly as unbearable as it is addicting. Sickeningly sweet. Still—

His chest expands, taking as much of the potent miasma into his lungs as he can, filling them up, up, until he feels the edges threaten to brust. It’s only then, when ink moults across his vision, that he lifts his head just enough to shove his mouth against yours, a broken snarl ripping free from his throat as he forces the infectious air into your mouth, down to your lungs. Polluting you with the same sickness. The same rot.

Little hiccups tumble past your lips as you swallow it down, taking everything he gives you, and he catches them on his tongue. Plays with them between his teeth, basking in the salty tang of you—brine, loam; peatsalt. Ashes, guncotton. Molasses. He’s not sure if he wants to drown you in him, or crawl into the warm, wet cavern of your mouth that pulses around his tongue like a heartbeat.

Both, maybe. Everything. All of it.

Always—

But he’s chasing pleasure on fumes. Trying to run with broken legs. There’s nothing refined about this. About the way he cudgels the head of his cock into the places that make your mouth twist away from his greedy lips in a silent scream. His weight is crushing you, he’s sure, but you cling to him harder, holding him tighter. Almost afraid to let go. And fuck—the notion alone is a kick to the chest, harsh and heavy. He nearly gags on the litany of broken moans spiling out of his mouth, landing on your tongue.

Driven mad, maybe (or pussy-drunk, and high off of his own poison); but in that madness, he discovers this:

Nirvana exists between your thighs.

Home, too.

(well—

not yet.)

Pleasure fissions down his spine. The paroxysm taking him deeper into the battle-worn depths of his demise until the walls narrow, closing in. Crushing. No escape. But—

He won’t climb out of his hole he dug. Not until he makes a bed from your flesh; shelter out of your bones. He wants to ingrain himself as deep within you as he can, arsenic subsumed down to your marrow. Poisoned with the fill of him, too sick to let go.

(Bone nausea.

A death sentence.)

It metastasises inside of him, filling the barren spaces up until it leaks from his pores.

He wants it: this dream so tantalisingly close.

Simon lifts his hand from your throat, and reaches out, grasps at it with a shaking paw—

All it takes is a few crass, careless swipes of his calloused thumb across your clit, cock angled toward that spot that makes you rake your broken nails down his back, yowling in his ear for more, there, please, Simon, please—

You clench like a vice around him. A pretty bow tied up at the base of his cock. He bows over you, grunts spilling from his chest as he sinks his teeth into your nape, splitting skin btween his teeth. The warm, ozonous tang of your blood flooding his tongue is euphoric, eclipsing his mind in a haze of pleasure that crackles and burns at the base of his spine, spitting smoke up his body and into his skull.

The harsh whine you let out—all prey, all animal; wounded, stuck under his muzzle—has some part of him, basal and inborn, rearing up. Roaring in his ears, ripping talons across the jagged remains of his head.

(mine, mine, mine—)

He answers your scream with a growl, one caught in the smoke clogging his throat. It sounds inhuman when its wrenched out of his mouth—more animal than man: the devastating howl of a forest on fire—but the feel of it vibrating between his teeth is connatural. Innate. It belongs between his incisors; fits like a puzzle piece in his broken muzzle. Unleashed now. Finally free from this ill-fitting cage he housed it, this goddamn box—

Cobbled together from palm ash and brimstone, ichor and salt. Sewed up with copper sutures in the shape of a man for a perfect fit.

Every cell in his body screams that he was made for this. To be over you, in you. Maw filled with your blood. Pussy stuffed full of his cock.

He might not have clawed out of the dirt for you, but this mossy, gnarled lump in his chest beats now only for you. Apodictic. Ironclad. His teeth in your jugular, your life pulsing wetly on his tongue.

It’s his apotheosis. His end.

His hips stutter. White noise in his head. It drowns out the shrill screams, the hisses. Everything is just—static. Pleasure of a silent kind, humming, buzzing, and molten. Ghost buries himself inside of you as deep as he can, until his cock is fit snug against the plug of your womb, and lays his claim by branding it with the potency of his name.

Tidally locked, you’re dragged down the summit with him, tumbling to your demise. Too dazed, too wound tight in his arms, his embrace, to see the jagged rock at the bottom of the hungry chasm thirsting for your blood, you just cling to him. Refusing to let go.

(silly girl—

His pretty little perigee.)

His body aches in ways that cruelly remind him of his age. Joints stiff, stomach quivering. His knuckles sting when he unfurls it from the headboard, skin pink and raw from the tight hold he had around the metal.

It’s made worse when he heaves a harsh breath, and pulls away from you with a long, drawn out groan. He settles back on his haunches, eyes searing into the space between your thighs. Messy with his spend. It dribbles down your slit, your ass, pools on the sheets below.

Your chest shudders, legs splayed out how he left you. He thinks, viciously, of gazelles, and wonders if the blood he feels drying on his mouth looks anything like the muddied mane of a lion after eating its fill.

“Fuckin’ hell—”

He should clean you up, hide his crime, but he burns the image of you into his head (another tattoo over scar tissue), and drops to a heap beside you. The moment his back hits the mattress and all thoughts of moving are erased in silk, in smoke and clover.

Chest heaving, slick with sweat, he feels the thrum of his victory in his veins. The high of the chase abates, and he nearly purrs with contentment. Hangs his pride on a pedestal, and doesn’t think about the absence of any guilt. Doesn’t even entertain the thought, not when victory dries between your thighs. When you roll over with a huff, reaching out for him.

It's as if you're trying to bury yourself inside of him, crawl into the safety of his ribs.

Ghost grunts, feels his sensitive, spent cock give a feeble twitch on his sticky thigh. The idea of you, blissfully unaware, seeking comfort from the man who writ your body with his virile spend, irrevocably changing your life and entwining it so deeply and so messily with his own that to severe either of you from each other is nearly impossible, floods him with satisfaction so deep, euphorically heady, that his chest seems to shudder. Resounding with some amalgamation of a purr, a grow, so utterly primal, that he sounds more beast than man.

His roots run deep within you, now, and every misaligned piece of his patchwork body seems to sag and shiver in an almost perfect parallelism. Congruence ascertained with the cupping of you between its mismatched maw. Shackled in a baleen prison. Nestled, safe and sound, between white teeth.

Ghost pulls you close, holding tight, and hums. As you drool on his shoulder, dripping with his spend, he knows he'll keep you there forever, until you're nothing but bones.

There's a cloud of confusion hanging over you the next morning, a twinge of uncertainty gnarling across the gaps in your memory. The pieces of a puzzle that belong to a different set. He watches you scramble through them, filling in blanks. Oscillating so deliciously between wariness and discontent.

“‘morning,” he greets, as if his spend hasn’t dried on your thigh last night. Tucked up nice and tight against your fertile, unprotected womb. As if he couldn't taste brimstone in the back of his throat when you wince as you walk, achy and battle-worn from the weight of his desire crushing you all night.

“Morning,” it's a sticky rasp in your throat. He wonders if you taste him on your tongue. “When did you get in?”

“Las’ night.”

You nod, but it's absent. Flickering through the timeline of events that aren’t drenched in black, shaded over like a heavy bruise. Your expression is fractured. Raw. Pensive. Something untouchable, unchartable, and yet he reads you as plainly as the tea leaves at the bottom of his cup.

You don’t remember. Don’t know what to make of this chasm, this fissure, that looms, icy and deep, before you. There’s no anger, though. You don’t demand recompense for what he stole, what he took. The lashings he deserves are tucked quietly between your teeth. Hidden under layers of normalcy to prevent yourself from seeing him as is: a beast.

“Well, um. Some homecoming, huh?” You joke, but it's hollow. Flat. Fragile like fine glass. You're digging for more. Rooting around to connect these vague, absent dots that linger, lost in the vacancy of your memory.

He almost purrs.

He wants to chew you up. Spit you in the palm of his hand. Maybe tuck you in his breast pocket, nestled against the lump in his chest—the one those silly enough to dream might call a heart. Keep you there forever. Hidden in the barrel of his loaded gun.

“Bit rowdy.”

It’s horrifically vague, but you cling to the prevacation he proffers to you; a lifeline in the turbulent sea, letting it overwrite the absence, the itching in your skull that must be clanging on the walls, begging for you to run.

“Sorry,” it's sheepish. He knows the ferality in which you sometimes come at him when he's buried deep inside you is something that makes you twinge with embarrassment. Little kitten clawing at the old dog trying to get it to play. Rolling over immediately when it growls. Docile, sickeningly sweet.

But even naive kittens know to watch out for the frothing, foaming maw.

“Did you use a—?”

He dips his chin. “I might ‘ave.”

And you take it as gospel. As truth. Why would Simon have any reason to lie to you about this?

Relief shudders over your shoulders. You relax, inching toward the seat across from him. Gazelle making a home for itself in the lion’s den.

The spell of unease is broken, now, and you quickly fill the chasm with chatter about your day. Your plans. Asking him how he’s been.

You shove at the warning signs until they’re hidden away, and ignore the bones of your brethren scattered around you. All because you trust him.

He aches with the urge to crush it between his teeth.

And he will one day soon, he’s sure, because it’s just as easy to enact his plan as it was to get you to open the door.

It starts with him convincing you to drink with him after dinner. Jus’ a glass. Got this fancy bottle. Reckon we should ‘ave some.

But—

Can’t drink forever—no matter what his dogshit dad thought.

So, he pokes holes in the condoms you hide in the bedside table, a little wary now. A touch fretful about your contraceptives in a way that makes him preen. You have good instincts, but rarely do you listen to them. Your head must be filled with sirens, but it's futile, he supposes. He's already stuffed cotton into your ears.

It only feeds into that gaping chasm that bellows up from the depths that this world is not good for you. That it will tear you into pieces, into shreds. You need him. Need the Ghost to protect you.

Case in point:

You’re needy beneath him, panting and mewling into the sheets as he teases your clit with his thumb. So wet, it almost feels like hot oil on his skin. Syrupy thick.

In your desperation, you cling to him, throat bared. Fragile fine china. Belly up. Vulnerable.

You barely notice when he pulls off the condom, crumpling it up into a ball and shoving it in the pocket of his slacks.. Don’t even react when he shoves his bare, raw cock into you.

You don't even notice.

(or when he slurs in your ear about how badly he wants to knock you up—breed his pretty girl until she’s stuffed full of him, making life with what he offers. salvation in the form of creation. ain’ tha’ a thought? he huffs into your ear, humid mirth curling over your skin. a stain. and the way it unfetters you—tightening around him, gushing slick—he finds his answer, one reinforced in the rolling of your eyes as your common sense, independence, trickle out of your ears and down your slackened jaw—)

And when that fails, he just slips you a sleeping pill. There's always an easier way to the finish line, he finds.

(stupid fuckin’ mutt—)

Nothing bleeds from the cracks he wrought, or slinks from the shadows cast by his machinations until weeks later.

Life just goes back to what it once was—Simon coming and going, letting himself into your home with the door you leave unlocked. You go to work, and chatter aimlessly about this vision you have about a home in the countryside, near the ocean. Saving up—uselessly—for sheep and goats, and the sought-after Highland cows. Chickens and ducks first, you say, and barely notice when his gaze drops, drilling holes into your stomach. Watchful. Leering.

He can almost scent the change on you. Nose pressed to your skin; bloodhound sniffing the ground.

Ghost keeps time in the slow, susurrus drawl of your voice sifting through the cotton in his ears, waiting for those precious decibels to catch on, to tilt up at the end as your eyes skim the calendar he keeps scratching x’s across in red, almost delicate, innocent even though it's from his sanguinary hand. A countdown to something you haven’t yet caught on to.

And it’s all so sweet.

—the waiting game, the subtle changes, the desperate way you cling to normalcy—

Sweet, like the way you carve this life out for yourself, filled with stuffed animals full of idealism. So much so, that it's almost bitter. Acrid. He watches the light glow in your eyes as your plans take shape, moulding putty between your hands, and like a pit viper, he coils in on himself. Frenzied. Fearful—

But only just.

The excitation has run its course. He’s drifting, languid, into his scheme. Content. The notion of you slipping from his fingers is a thought that rarely crosses his mind these days, especially when that house on the prairie grows from an occupant of one to two—

“And, you know… when you're not out saving the world—” your eye roll and air quotes make his lips twitch, tugging at the scar tissue, the acid burns, splashed across his mouth. An ugly fucking Pollock. “—maybe you can come visit.”

“Never fancied myself a rancher,” he drawls, just to watch you squirm. Brow furrowing into a deep ravine as you struggle to make your intentions known without actually giving them sound. Skirting around the issue of wanting him there, of planning a home with him.

(Too much, maybe? Or too soon—?

if only you knew—)

He finds it charming, really.

Still—

“It's just a thought,” you mutter, downcast. He wants to choke on your misery. Your sadness. Drown himself in your anger. Float in your happiness.

Fuckin' Christ—

All this playing daddy in his head has thrown him off his rocker. Made him soft. Sentimental. It's probably why he yields to you. Offers a lazy shrug and another smarmy twitch of his lips.

“Sounds like a plan,” and the way you brighten is a dagger to his chest.

And the thing is. It does. It sounds like a dream, a perfect vision. Just—

Maybe not in the way you'd want.

He's been looking into places unmarred by human hands. Ghost towns, uncharted territories. His home here isn't perfect for it, not like the vast geography of Mexico. The uninhabited wilderness of Canada, places so remote that it's almost untethered to modern civilisation. Islands of forest, mountains, all on their own.

Vast corners and crevasses where someone can disappear and never be found.

But those won't work in tandem with his flighty lifestyle. While he plans on keeping you barefoot and pregnant (common sense in the back of his head screams that he's foul, vile, monstrous—), he will continue to work. Has to, really, to avoid suspicion.

So—

Home it is.

But he gets inspiration from the Highland cows you coo on about and purchases a plot of land in the Western Isles. Gives this whim of his—yours, really—a concrete foundation made of the abstract. The filament provided by his newly christened Sergeant—an overeager mutt that bleeds warning signs from his pores.

(don’t get close, reactive dog. will bite—

the little mutt is a great pyrenees, ain’t he?)

But bless Johnny’s bleedin’ heart, he thought as the man prattled on about this cabin he owns. A place of solitude. Could fire a gun and no one would even peek out the curtains. Beautiful, the way all of Scotland is. The highlands, he breathes in that shade of catholic madness only the dutiful soldiers of god's right-handed wrath can be, is where he keeps his home. A place chiselled from stone, surrounded by wilderness that eats tourists alive.

(he didn’t ask at the time why Johnny was so keen on finding these places scattered around Scotland, ones with little traffic and a nearly negligible amount of souls within the vicinity, but he finds its best not to get too close to mutts crossbred with wolves.)

But Simon is nothing if not devoted, and so.

You’ll get your fantasy ranch in the middle of nowhere. Your highland cows, your billy goats, your chicken, sheep, and ducks. A baby in your arms, too. One that shows its hand the next morning, dashing all your carefully laid plans. These paths of independence of yours run parallel to his whims but never converge. There’s the potential in this for these fraying threads to split, and diverge. Separate.

(But it’s all put to rest at the sound of you heaving in the adjoining washroom. His path eats yours until it’s overtaken. Consumed.

The evasive, unfettered little bird trammelled, caught. Wing-clipped, and all his.)

Any misgivings the part of his gyri not buried under the frothing mess of his polluted grey matter might have is vitiated by the unwavering certitude that, despite his own gains in this, it really is in your best interest.

And maybe it's something that should have come earlier in your relationship—however threadbare that word is in conjunction with the unhinged desire blooming in the pit of his chest; madness masquerading as love or some obsessive, desperate facsimile of it. Maybe a proper man, a better one, might have dug down and fully laid out the reality of intertwining your life with the living dead. That the idea of danger, death, and revenge are all everpresent threats scratching at the walls of this sickeningly sweet fantasy you wrap around yourself.

He’s a dangerous man. A creature of devastation—manmade, bent into, or congenital is yet to be unearthed—which, in itself, brings about a certain lifestyle. One with fewer people around, and always shrouded in secrecy. Friends, family—none of that matters when death curdles gnarled fingers around his jugular.

You’ll get used to it. Eventually. The only other choice is to let you, his now flightless bird, go. Released back into the wild vulnerable and reeking of his stench.

You’ll be devoured before daylight, ripped into pieces—only if they’re feeling generous, that is.

Simon has his own twisted remora. Ones with claws and fangs and a hunger that runs deep. Insatiable. Any scraps that fall from his mouth are devoured before they can touch the sea floor. They’ll crush you in their maw and dangle your mangled body from the gaps between their teeth.

You’re not made for the wild. Not anymore. You’re meant to be protected. You—this fragile, delicate thing. He’ll hold you close, keep you secure and safe in a mausoleum of your own making.

This little glass jar domicile.

A billet in the mountains.

He’ll fill it with the finest things—silk linens, fine china; mahogany and teak, pink ivory; a bed of soft, downy feathers, sherpa, Egyptian cotton; (sticks and stones and grass and moss). Buy you whatever you need. Chickens and ducks. Sheep and goats.

They’ll keep you company when he’s away.

(and if that fails, he can always plan playdates for you with whatever dirty secret Johnny’s been keeping tucked away in the woods.)

He draws an x in the empty, white box of the calendar, the tip of his red marker gliding silkily across the glossy surface. Something unfurls in his guts. Blossoms in his bones. There’s an almost indescribable sense of satisfaction—primal and animalistic—that grows from the upturned dirt in his head. Life composted from rot.

Ghost hums to himself when he turns, the sound nearly a purr—bestial as it is, suffocated under sulphur. It reverberates through his chest, trembling across the brackets of his ribs that expand with his deep, heavy inhale—breathing in the sight that greets him like a lover’s kiss

The kebab he ordered lays untouched on the table across from the television—some trashy reality show playing in the background while you tried to eat; a dating show, you’d said when he merely shrugged, having other things on his mind over what to watch while you ate. It all seems to be preserved in time. Frozen in on the exact moment when you’d sniffed the döner kebab he got for you—the same thing you order each time—and then promptly wrenched yourself back, gagging. The sandwich was flung back in the takeaway box before you slapped your hand over your mouth, rushing into the washroom.

If his phone wasn’t in the other room, he might have taken a picture. A little memento to remember this moment. Framed it in iron and perched it on the desk they gave him back in Hereford, the one just down the hall from Price.

(ah, speaking of—he’ll have to send that caustic bastard a fruit basket, or something, won’t he? maybe some pretty flowers for his lady.)

His reverie is shaken when the door to the washroom creaks open slowly, and you emerge through the gap with sweat on your brow, knots across your forehead, and a shaking hand resting over your churning stomach.

Shame, he thinks. He really should have brought his phone—

You lean against the wall, taking in deep, shuddering breaths to steady yourself, confusion and worry knitting over you like a thundercloud. It tastes of ozone when he inhales. An approaching storm. In the blue gloom of the living room, illuminated only by the light flooding out from the washroom behind you and the static glow of the television, you look etiolated. A wilting flower.

His budding rose.

He coos. “You alright?”

You glance sideways at the kebab on the table, mouth pinching into a grimace as if to stem the nausea still rippling through you. You stare at it for a long moment, seemingly trying to make sense of the reality sitting in front of you on scratched, old pine; confusion runs laps over the dawn cresting in your eyes. This puzzle is too unfathomable for you to piece together; the keys and slots all askew.

The air around him grows still. Silent. Anticipatory. A tiger crouched low in the tussock. A little fawn roaming too close.

There’s a heaviness in your eyes when they flicker back to the wall where he stands, drilling holes into the x. Something implacable frissons over your threadbare expression, fracturing across sallow cheeks.

The air is electric. It pulses across his bare flesh, irritating scar tissue, acid burns, and scorch marks. His skin prickles at its whisper.

“Feelin’ sick, pet?” He ponders, playing pretend. He’s viciously, deeply amused at the desperate denial splashing across your cheeks. The thin shade of askance that unfurls like the leaves of a flytrap when you look at him. “Mus’t’a been the kebab. Bad meat, I reckon?”

You offer a weak nod in response, pinching your lips tight together. The matter seemingly concluded, brushed aside. Pocketed for later.

And you say nothing else for the rest of the night—gaze unseeing, turned inward; pensive—but he purrs in contentment as if everything was alright, sprawled across the couch with his head pillowed against your churning stomach as if he could hear the whisper of another heartbeat from within.

In the saturated blue light, he catches your eyes listing toward the calendar every so often. Wary. Nervous. He thinks you might say something, might ask, but you don’t. It’s caught on a stilted breath. A harsh swallow.

All you do is bring your hand to his shorn head, and raze the stumps of your clipped claws against his scalp. It’s almost as if you’re trying to soothe the madness from within. Scratching that itch deep inside until it goes away. Gentle hands play pretend and dress up as a panacea. Affection to scrape the illness away.

He thinks you should know better than that, even as he leans into it with a soft exhale, more relaxed than he'd ever been his entire life. Content. Unassailable in his conquest.

Simon has always been more scar tissue than man, and no place is damaged more than the upturned tumulus inside his head.

But oh. How you try—

His sweet, sweet girl.

The look you give him the next evening is, in parts, brumous.

A polynya of dread, worry, guilt, fear that frissons across the deep valleys in your eyes, shaded in plumes of darkness, filled in deliciously with the weight of your beleaguered uncertainty. It yawns out before him, this heavy gloom.

So close he catch the embers in his hand.

“Simon… We should—talk. I, uh—”

You hold up a little rectangle, dismay, misery, etched in the blue tinge spreading across your face. It seems to steal the words from your throat, turn them into ash. What else are you meant to say, he supposes, when you look out at the world now from the gape in his maw?

But there’s a veil of wonderment that hides below the tidal wave; this precious, deadly, undercurrent that rents the air, splits his chest in two.

The happiness, however meagre, thin, it is right now (just a sunken boat on the seafloor), is there. Ripe for salvage, and he sees that it’s handled with care. Cupped between his palms, nurtured by his own conviction to do what’s right, an’—fuck, pet—know this ain’t what we planned, but—

but:

The howling quiets, turns to a low growl, and then a susurrus hum, when you shakily utter the words he was waiting for.

“Yes, Simon—”

You shudder when his fist closes over your wrist, pulling you into his purring chest. Shaking like a prey animal in the jowls of a beast, bested and ensnared. It has a profound, almost predatory, sense of satisfaction curling over his bones. He knows this was the right choice, and is sure, in time, you'll come to realise that, too. You’re in the early stages, he knows. Prodromal. You need to be handled with care to curb the lacrimation, the hyperesthesia.

And there’s no one better than him to guide you through the throes of it. To lead you to the unequivocal end.

He leans down, and whispers in your crown—

“Good girl—”

—and the sound of his voice is gravel encased in sticky, sweet honey. Dark, smokey molasses. The very same cadence as a key sliding inside of a lock; metal grazing metal. Turning—

“If it’s a boy, we’ll name him Tommy.”

Click.

(he gives you that ring he promised when he takes you to the mountains. you smile wide, and tell him it fits like a gyve.)

Simon stops shovelling his want under the cold dirt and starts burying it inside you instead. Makes a domicile from your flesh; a place where he can rest his aching head every night until the howling scraping down fractured bone stops— (paralytic)

#simon riley x reader #simon riley x you #ghost x reader #goddd this is foul #and was supposed to be up hours agooo but Nahanni closed at 5 today oops #cod #call of duty #simon ghost riley x reader #cod smut #simon riley smut #simon riley cod #ghost call of duty x reader #ghost cod x reader #in many ways this is a psa on the symptoms of rabies

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that-weird-thing-in-the-woods · 3 months ago

Text

You all know what time it is ( and body dysmorphia is mentioned a few times just thought I would let you know!)

🐍Snake empress Danny🐍

Ok let’s go, So you all know the drill Danny has to booket it out of amity ( GIW, Bad Fenton) and just for a bit more angst everyone who he loves ( Sam, Tucker, jazz) got caught up in the nasty burger explosion and the GIW hit Dani and as a last minute decision Danny has to grow her in himself and because he has the organs for baby incubation ( trans! Danny let’s go! ) so now we have a heavily traumatized teen who is going to be a teen mom and just loss his whole support system and everything he’s ever known yeah we going angsty today anyway so when Danny gets to the ghost zone he a immediately goes to clockwork to help him so after Danny gets healed up a bit and calm down the best he can right now and

now let’s move the pov for a sec so clockwork can’t really take care of Danny and he needs to fine someone who can that’s when he remembers the little pocket dimension that is a little bit hard to go to if your not looking for it so clockwork brings Danny there and on a cliff top there is a abandoned castle that is overgrown and has trees all around it and a healthy population of snakes that equally watch over the place and keeping outsiders OUT and do not tolerate people who are not a part of the …. Group, pack? Wtf do you call a group of snakes { ok so I just looked up what a group of snakes is called and apparently it’s called a den, pit or nest so I’ll be using that information} den and are very picky about who is in the nest and who isn’t but surprisingly the little danger noodles decide that Danny’s friend shaped and now his part of the nest ( also before I forget to mention there is a big ass snake that is the main protection for the others and the castle itself ) and he’s mostly doing things around with the snakes wrapped limply around his neck and shoulders or his arm and or legs they just like hanging around Danny for the most part

And for the JL side of this well you remember that this place is its own little pocket dimension well it is connected to the JL universe and it sorta feels like your in a Fea area not uncomfortable just different, it has a passage in Gotham City to a overgrown manhole cover so somehow Damien finds this manhole in the garden of Wayne manner and Bruce grounded ( aka benched ) him and Alfred is shopping and nobody’s home so it’s just him and he decides to go into the manhole cover it leeds down to a large tunnel so big it is a surprise nobody has found it yet so Damian walks down it for about 2 to 4 minutes before he sees another cover and has to use a lot of force to open it and as he climbs out he sees that it was overgrown to the point that the vines were wiring the thing shut and as Damien looks around he dust himself off he sees that he is in a large forest almost to large if this place was really Gotham than this would have been cut down years before it got like this so he walks around and than he gets to a lagoon it looks like no pollution got here as well that’s when he sees them a person the person has long white hair that looks to be in some kind of braid with silver chains and their wearing what seem like a bunch of white fabric at first glance but is you really look it seems to be a dress but that’s not what really brings his attention to this person it is the snake that are wrapped limply around them one black one that hangs off their shoulders and looks some what of a necklace and they are holding what seems to be a large black marble bowl ( the bowl is for some of the aquatic plants some birds ended up eating most of the aquatic plant and there are almost none left so he’s getting some from the lagoon)

And that’s all for the moment. Now on to the details of this bitch!

I’m thinking Danny looks a little bit like this

The reason he wears this is because it’s easier to walk around in ( not to mention the moment the rest of the den realized he was with fetus Dani ( or Eleanor I like that name better for her it gives her a bit of her own personality instead of just Danny clone) the big snake who were going to call Vesper ( you get it ) started to carry him around and while sleeping he would wrap around him to keep him warm ok got a bit off track

And for his hair I’m thinking he lets it grow out a bit and the little danger noodles like to bring him bits and pieces of things they think he might like so he ends up with this

But instead of gold I’m thinking silver

Also just some pics of what I think the castle will look like in some places

Anyway that’s all from me byeeee

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on-leatheredwings · 10 months ago

Text

False Pretenses (18+)

Yandere ! Damian Wayne x (Fem) Reader

romantic, 18+ > summary: Damian needs an heir someday, and he knows your body can provide that. > tw/cw: stealthing/baby trapping. there is consensual sex under false pretenses, so this could (and should) make this fall under dub- or non-con! there is also a brief mention of somnophilia. Plus, some breeding kink, praise kink. Also some weird thoughts about (cis) women who are fertile being ‘ideal’ and a preference for biological children. Just a warning. > word count: 5088. jesus christ. > [a/n: (smokes a blunt). ] > again 18+ only, damian wayne is 21

So, Damian has a breeding kink.

You sit in bed (his bed), knees to your chest, trying not to smile.

The covers are wrapped around your bare body as you recall the night prior’s events.

Last night was the farthest you two have gone physically. You’ve made out, of course. That was in short order after officially becoming a couple, the both of you starved for the other. You’ve groped each other, both over and under your clothes… You’ve given him a handjob… (To his utter dismay that you’ve brought him to orgasm first rather than the reverse.) And last week, you took him in your mouth for the first time. But yesterday night was the first time you had been on the receiving end.

Now, you are no virgin, but the memory does make you clutch your metaphorical pearls. You didn’t know simple fingering could be so… perverse.

Damian’s two middle fingers are thrusting back and forth into your trembling cunt. Your ears are steaming at the resulting noises filling the air. They’re lewd, and entirely involuntary on your part. Sweat on your temple drips, your torso heaves with shaken breath. Your damp back lies flush against his hard chest, two perfect puzzle pieces. Damien’s chin rests on your shoulder, allowing him to have a beautiful view of the mess you’re making on his slender digits. Viridian eyes have their entire focus on you, utterly fascinated.

The look in them is enough to make you blush, even if two of his fingers weren’t in you right now.

Sinful, reverent whispers into the shell of your ear marvel about how well you’re doing, how prepared you’ll be to take him afterwards. Damian’s free hand rests on your abdomen, pointedly over your womb.

He’ll fill you. Breed you. After all, you can handle that. You were basically made for it. He knows you’d be perfect at it.

Chin resting on the palm of your hand, you come back to the present.

Yeah, that was really turning him on, you mull, with almost academic interest. Your lips curl into a catlike grin. How curious!

Hey, you aren’t judging! You can see the appeal. After all, you hadn’t exactly been complaining last night… just caught off guard.

You sit with your thoughts as Damian washes up in his restroom.

It is in his bedroom you currently lounge, absentmindedly fiddling with satin sheets. His bed is large enough to drown in. His room is a wash of dark emerald greens and deep blues, with golden accents. On a table sits a sheathed sword, its grip a beautiful gold.

Both of you are college students finishing up your last semester. During the school season, Damian stays in his penthouse. Yes, his penthouse. Why he couldn’t just stay at his billionaire father’s mansion, you don’t know. Bird has to leave the nest sometime, you suppose.

Slowly lowering your knees and letting your back hit cool sheets, you lie down. You get lost in the ceiling – a beautiful Arabesque pattern is subtly molded across its expanse. Damian’s culture is so cool. Such was a sentiment you had communicated in such words, and he simply kissed your knuckles with a proud curve of his lips, and thanked you for the compliment. You blush.

Ugh. Damian is so cool.

You start pulling up every uncool thing about him in your mental reservoir. You can’t have him getting a big head, after all. Or rather, can’t have his head getting any bigger.

Hmm… breeding kinkster, breeding kinkster, thy name is Damian Wayne.

You blink dumbly.

Breeding... breeding…

Pregnancy.

Your body stiffens.

Wait. Does this… does that mean something? Is that like. A thing? What people call foreshadowing? You sit up, disturbed.

At that exact moment, Damian saunters out of the washroom. His eyes catch yours immediately, as if drawn by magnetism. He is still shirtless, navy blue sweatpants looking entirely artful on his tall, bronze body. His usual shrewd expression relaxes at the sight of you.

At the sight of him, your heart skips a beat, and not out of admiration for his looks. It was like you had been caught red-handed, speculating things. Sometimes you swear he knows what you’re thinking.

He stalks toward you, eyes loving. He places a kiss on your lips, punctuating it with “Good morning, my love.”

“G-good morning,” you return, painfully aware of your nakedness under his sheets. He doesn’t seem to mind, though. He places kisses on your bare shoulder, trailing down until he’s kissing your hand. While normally you’d be melting, you remain stiff.

Damian pecks one last kiss when you blurt, “Do you want kids?”

You inwardly smack your forehead. Well, you weren’t one to shy away from a tough conversation. For better or worse.

Damian stirs, blinking at you.

You continue, trying not to wilt, “Do… Do you want kids? I-is that something you want? Like, someday?”

How the hell did this not come up sooner, you don’t know.

… Well.

Perhaps it hadn’t come up because your relationship was fairly new. You’ve known Damian for five years now. And for the last two, your relationship had been under a taxing, soul-sucking ‘will-they-won’t-they-it’s-complicated’ vague denomination for quite a while. Both of you knew each of you had feelings for the other. But Damian confessing his vigilante secret and his assassin past was quite the double whammy.

Damian was resolute in keeping you and himself safe and alive, but you had to think critically about a future with him. Eventually you said fuck it, throwing caution to the wind because you loved him, and you wanted him. And he, you.

Officially, it’s only been three months of dating – and you both are young. You both are in your last year of college. Talking about kids felt … fast.

Damian remains silent, face tentative. Having been leaning over you, he now sits on his bed, looking thoughtful.

“... Is that something you want?”

You sigh. Of course he’d turn it on you.

“I…” Your throat feels tight. God, why can’t we just enjoy a damn honeymoon phase… “I mean…? I’m… open to it. But yeah, it seems kinda… Like. I don’t know. That’s a lot right now.” Your voice is uncharacteristically small and meek.

You should stop there. Keep it vague. Keep things light. But you know which side of the fence you’re leaning on, and so should he.

“A-and you know– like, you know I didn’t have a good relationship with my mother– I just. Don’t know. If ever. I guess?”

You sit in awkward silence with him. You pray God just decides to smite you where you sit, because Christ. That was horrible.

Things like this could break a relationship, you know. And your chest clenches painfully at the thought of separating from Damian.

Damian takes in your words, nodding. He’s usually so easy to read – you’re well-versed in Wayne-nese by now, having spent a lot of time with him and the rest of his family. But he seems to be withholding his inner thoughts intentionally from you. Your heart sinks.

You nudge him with your feet.

“Damiii. Do you?”

Damian’s eyes glimmer with characteristic haughtiness, instantly making you warm. He crawls forward, hands sinking into the bed by your hips. He nips at your nose before locking lips. It’s a sweet, sweet kiss that’s like candy, until you feel the stroke of his hot tongue. You moan freely, not caring that he’ll likely tease you later for being so easy.

He retreats, licks his lips.

“You fiend,” you blurt. The insult rolls off him.

“What I want is to be with you.” You swallow dryly, heart thumping like a chorus line. You wouldn’t be surprised if Damian could see literal hearts in your eyes.

He puts a hand on your knee, stroking softly. You feel mollified at the action. Damian only did that when everything was alright.

“We’ve got class. If you get dressed fast enough, I’ll buy you that confectionary you’re always wanting.”

You stick out your tongue. “It’s a frappe,” you say, adding before he could say otherwise, “and yes, it is real coffee.”

Back from class, you decided to read on his living room recliner while he drew in his study. Damian indeed sketched, as he did everyday. Unsurprisingly, you were the subject, along with your favorite flowers. But Damian chose his study, rather than drawing you from life, because he also wanted to check if today was the day he thought it was. He opens the drawer of his wooden desk, papers neatly filed. He picks up a sleek black folder that spends most of its time laid in hiding underneath.

…

So, for the record, Damian did not lie.

He merely obfuscated an answer with a truth.

He does want to be with you above anything, and if children were out of the question due to natural causes… sure, he would learn to get over it. His brothers are all adopted and are as legitimate heirs to his father as he. But as it stands, Damian needs an heir someday and he knows your body can provide that.

… A not-insignificant part of him quietly admits that he simply wants his children to be blood-related. He’d never express this to anyone. His brothers are adopted, so how could he? But instilled from infancy into Damian was that he was the result of two genetically perfect individuals.

So why shouldn’t his child be the genetic amalgamation of you and him, both of whom are also two perfect beings? The thought of impregnating you sounds… good. Ideal. Natural, even. Call him a romantic.

When opened, inside the folder is a calendar for the year, with no notes or writing. Some days are blank. Some are highlighted in either red or green.

His eyes skirt down to the current day of the calendar, and Damian's pleased to see it is indeed among a week that's painted in green. Today is within the ideal window leading up to your ovulation.

You've said in passing that your cycle is pleasantly regular and Damian's past investigations have proved this to be true. Not that he asks anymore. He snorts, remembering how last time you looked at him incredulously and asked if he was a Republican, since he was “all up in your womb.”

However, you do keep menstrual products in your bag when he’s predicted it. You also spend quite some time at his place, so he does note when there’s pad wrappers in his bathroom trash bin.

Last year, the day he knew you were the one – his One – he brewed you a tea before bed. Its sedative contents ensured you wouldn't wake, and you were out like a light within minutes. So, Damian pulled off your pants, and collected a specimen from you as you slept. Of course, he did so with sterile, sexless precision – Damian wasn’t a pervert or deviant. He sniffs. He’s better than that. Even if his hands did linger.

Test results proved you were healthy and fertile. He recalls this with pride. As expected, you were perfect in all things. Damian closes the folder and ruminates in his seat.

Damian had assumed so, but now you’ve confirmed with him that you’re unsure about raising children based on your history with your own family. He hears you. As if he doesn’t have his own slew of mommy problems. If you bring it up again, he’ll wave you off. You’ll be an amazing mother. You just need a push, and you’ll be confident soon enough.

His fingers steeple. Hm… There’s the issue of having children before marriage… He doesn’t know how you feel about children outside of wedlock, but it’s not as though you’re very traditional. You don’t seem to have a problem with the fact that’s how he was conceived. It’s not a big concern regardless, because Damian is going to marry you anyway. If it’s an issue, you both could marry in as soon as a month.

It all works out.

It’s perfect, he thinks.

Damian puts up his sketchbook and folder alike, heading to his bedroom to change. It was about time he put his plans into action, and he knows just how to usher it into fruition.

“That doesn’t look like a very satisfying read,” Damian says, folding his arms and leaning against the wall.

You don’t look up from your book, your cringing face only deepening.

“Well, that’s because it isn’t. I was lied to! By my favorite Youtuber! By BookTok! And fuck it, by the government–”

"My love."

“You ask for one slow burn rivals-to-lovers and instead you get him fawning over her within three chapters–”

“My love,” he repeats, though amused.

“And let’s not even start about how this prose is abysmal–”

“My love.”

Since it was said oh-so-sweetly, you look up from your book.

Damian is... oh. He's in that outfit he knows you like. The League of Assassins one that's sleeveless, dark, and form fitting with gorgeous gold trim. It turns his body into a marvelous painting of black and gold on the tanned backdrop that is his skin. And you’ve told him so… Except his eyes. His beautiful, intense green eyes. He straightens from how he leans against the wall, stepping closer.

You toss your book, not even watching its trajectory. It takes out a vase on the way down and you still don’t spare it a glance.

"Damian Wayyyyyne," you sing, hopping up to stalk toward your prey. Your hands land on his chest. Hello, tig ol' biddies, you cheer internally. It takes considerable restraint to keep from saying it aloud – you know Damian gets all flustered with his delicate sensibilities. “Why, are you trying to seduce me?”

An elegant, thick brow rises in amusement. Well, that was exceedingly easier than expected.

“That depends entirely on whether it’s working.”

“Oh, it’s working,” you say, running your hands down to his abdomen. His hands rise to capture yours.

“Tt.”

Damian takes steps backward, leading you by the hands into his bedroom. Your leer grows even bigger. Oh, yes. You two lock eyes the whole while until you reach the foot of his bed, merriment and attraction dancing in both pairs.

You push him onto the bed, on all fours above him. You dive down for a deep kiss, tongue eager for a dance. Eventually it’s you who separates to breathe, panting lightly. The sight below you is one for sore eyes, Damian Wayne lying with eyes glazed with lust. He’s acting awfully agreeable, and you can’t say you don’t like it.

“Habibti, I want you.” Damian slides his hand to cup your crotch. You shiver, at his touch and his words.

“And you have me,” you say, voice warm. “Habibti.”

He smirks, probably thinking your accent could use some work.

“It’s Habibi, coming from you.”

You nod shyly, but you can have a lesson later. You’re about to slip off your pants when he brings your hand in between your bodies, placing it on his crotch. You sharply inhale. He’s hard, and straining against sinful, elastic tights.

“... And I mean, I want all of you.”

Your brows rise. So, he wanted to go all the way today? You feel your cheeks and crotch flood with heat. You find it easier to nod your head rapidly, lest you start barking. At your agreement, Damian’s face washes over with anticipation. You’re glad it’s not just you over the moon at the prospect.

You both rip your clothes off manically, laughing and elbows butting into each other’s sides. Damian expertly flips positions, boxing you in with his knees. You exclaim in surprise, a sound that drifts into shaky breaths and mewls of pleasure as he runs his fingers over your breasts, your stomach… He wets his fingers with his mouth before his digits start circling your clitoris.

You inhale sharply, mesmerized by the cyclical motion. Never until Damian has sex felt so flustering. Just watching his administrations was overwhelming, let alone the feeling– Your head reels back from an electric shock of pleasure. You gasp into the air.

"W-wait... wait, you have a condom, right…?" you whisper, though you have half a mind to just go without. You need him.

Damian tensed.

"I... I don't like how it feels." You raise a brow. You've heard condoms can feel like a second skin, especially nowadays. Then again, men were always complaining about them. It's not like you had the necessary equipment to confirm, so hell if you knew how it felt.

You place your hands on his cheeks, and his hands ghost over your wrists. You bite your lip.

"Well… Just this once? And if... it's that important to you, maybe I'll get on birth control–"

His head jerks as if struck, his brows furrowed.

“No.”

You stare, agape. There’s a small pause, both of you staring at the other. Damian’s face looks as though he’s betrayed himself. Your boyfriend didn’t strike you as so… traditionalist, to say the least. Lord knows you wouldn’t be with him if he was… so you will hear him out before nurturing any suspicion.

Sitting up on your forearms, you ask, “... What do you mean ‘no’?”

"I mean… I…” Damian sighs, looking utterly frustrated with himself. “I mean, you don’t need to.”

You blink and raise a brow, unimpressed.

“... Because?”

Damian’s jaw hardens. He grits out, “Because, I'm… sterile."

You flinch, purely from surprise. Damian merely stares, eyes narrowed in what you presume is annoyance at himself.

Uh. Okay, hello brand new information? Why hadn't this come up before? Well, it is pretty sensitive information. And since you hadn’t had penetrative sex yet, why would he have brought it up? And today was the first day you had even thought about kids. It… makes sense.

"Y-you are...?" You settle down, much like a cat whose hair is lowering from standing on end. "Okay… okay...” Damian remains stony, but he cringes at your clear relief.

Mistaking it as embarrassment, you quickly stroke his cheek. “No, baby, I'm sorry about that." You could assume it's quite emasculating. Men and their complexes about performing and wow, suddenly the breeding kink makes sense.

“So, you can’t…” you trail off. Knock me up? remains gracefully unsaid.

Damian nods stiffly. He really does hate lying to you like this. "I've been told it's very... unlikely." In reality, Damian knows his sperm count, and he's verified there should be no issues with reproduction. You both are in peak condition.

Despite the heat raging in your pants and your body begging can we just fuck already, you furrow your brows. All of this sounded fine, but it was still just… you needed specifics. To be safe. After all, there’s no rush, is there? Even if your pulsating cunt would beg to differ, painfully aware that two naked people were in a bed not doing naked-people-things.

"When did you get tested? And w-why? I mean, you're only twenty-one."

He waves his hand, snorting with his typical condescension. "I'm an heir to a dynasty – as soon as I was of age, it behooved us to know."

Us. That’s not a you-and-me “us”. You cringe, thinking about Talia and Ra's Al Ghul making it their business to know Damian's fertility. What an invasion of privacy for him… And no wonder he thought nothing of being in your body’s business as well.

"Well, unlikely is still possible, right?” You fear any surprises. Lord knows it would be just your luck to get fertilized by the un-fertilizable. You point at him. “And we should be using condoms anyway! It's not just pregnancy we should be afraid of."

Damian wants to assure you how insanely low the chances are of an infertile male getting anybody pregnant, and is about to do so, when his eyes narrow.

"Is there a reason we would need to protect against venereal diseases? There are none between the two of us." You flinch at his tone, colored with the acidity of jealousy. Suspicion.

The implication (accusation?) causes you to glare at him.

“...Yeahhh, okay,” you reply coldly. “Moment's ruined.”

You push him off you, but in a panic, he hisses your name. You flinch. At your wary expression, the color drains from his face.

“I… I’m sorry,” he says, brows furrowed and looking utterly ashamed. “I… I’m sorry.” You don’t meet his eyes, simply nodding. He places kisses on your wrist, shoulder, nose. Damian sometimes had his moods, although he was truly confusing you today.

“It’s fine, really,” you reassure. And it’s true, it was mainly the heat of the moment. You were sure Damian could never really scare you.

Your words don’t persuade the shame and fear out of his eyes or lighten the heaviness of his brow. You smile, huffing. Taking his face into your heads, you kiss him chastely on the forehead, nose tip, both cheeks. Until you punctuate the action with a kiss to his lips.

“Damian, really.”

Damian nods stiffly. He’ll never truly forgive himself, but he’s probably okay enough for now.

You shift on the bed, and there’s the telltale sensitivity between your thighs. Damn it. You still want him. You two stare at each other, still very naked and aroused. You turn the idea in your head … He’s sterile, right? And pregnancy is your only reservation.

As if hearing your thoughts, Damian’s face fills with determination.

“... I-it’s–” okay, let’s have sex anyway, you are going to finish.

“I’ll do it,” he interrupts. You blink. He leans toward you, close enough that you can see the flecks of gold in his eyes. You’re sure he’s about to kiss you, when he suddenly withdraws.

Your eyes catch the glimmer of some metallic object. He holds a silver square wrapper in between his fingers, likely plucked from beneath his pillow.

You look at him, and he says frankly, “I’ll do anything for you.”

You melt… before grinning, catlike. “My, my. So it seems Mr. I-Don’t-Like-Condoms still prepares a contingency plan. Very Son of Batman of you–”

“Shut it,” he groans, dotting kisses along your neck to make you do just that.

You feel relief flood your bloodstream. Then it is quickly replaced with raging desire. Oh, finally.

“Lay back,” he says, too soft to be an order. You do so without fanfare, a little curious as to why he’s not following you. Then you see him scoot back, feel him hike up your lower half, and you feel a thrill of excitement.

You squeak, feeling your ass leaving the bed entirely. A pillow is quickly placed underneath, and you are feeling quite pampered.

There’s curious licks along your labia, to which you twitch.

Damian finds his way to your clitoris, suckling and stroking heavily with his tongue.

“Hhnngh,” you speak. Keep going. Right there.

“Truly, a poet,” Damian’s voice says, muffled. You bite your lip, unable to retort because it feels too good. Damian is curious, experimenting. You know he’s gamifying this, responding and changing his strategies entirely on what draws the most unintelligible noise out of you. He slips his tongue in, and you grasp at his hair. He responds by pumping it back and forth.

Eventually, you do fear he’ll bring you to orgasm with this alone, when you both have more plans for the evening.

You wipe a layer of sweat from your temple, panting. “I’m ready. I’m ready,” you say, tugging meekly at short black locks.

Damian hums, and the vibration hits you straight in the clit. He sits up on his forearms, lips delightfully messy. His cheeks are ruddy and his brows are pinched with effort, chest heaving for breath. He looks very good like this.

“I’m ready,” you say again. Damian doesn’t need to be told twice. Your head hits the back of the pillow, and you close your eyes as you catch your breath. You hear the rustling and discarding of a condom wrapper. Damian positions himself accordingly, hands sunk into the bed on either side of your waist.

“Ready?” he asks. His eyes hold… shyness, if you can believe it. You stroke his cheek, grinning.

“Always ready for you,” you respond. You make sure to sit up. You want to see.

You watch, fascinated, as the head of Damian’s cock slowly disappears into your body. The consonance between seeing it and feeling it only stokes the fire of your arousal.

You moan openly, the sound making your ears heat. Damian dares to chuckle, and you claw his back in retaliation.

“Oh, shut up, and go deeper,” you breathe, eyes fluttering with pleasure. You didn’t realize how much you missed this. The feeling of being filled, of being full. You didn’t realize you could miss something you never had as well – Damian felt like he belonged in you. You feel every inch of you work to accommodate his sudden presence.

“And how can I deny such a request?” he gasps aloud, voice strained.

You feel more than a little pride that you were among the few who could make Damian bend to your whims with this (or any) level of subservience. The proud, proud Damian Wayne. The same Damian that sinks into you further, into your tight, hot wetness. He finally bottoms out and you exhale.

“You’re… a perfect… fit,” you say, dazed and in between pants.

Little do you know the resulting pang that shoots into his groin at that statement. He grasps you harder, maybe even enough to bruise. He needs you badly. He needs to fill you badly.

Damian leans even more forward, and you squeal. You’re just along for the ride at this point. He does all the necessary machinations to fold you in half, thighs bending back.

"W-wait," you stutter, but it falls on deaf ears.

He’s really stretching the limits of your flexibility here. Before you know it, you’re in a mating press.

“Damian,” you moan, because you’re too overstimulated to say much else.

“You’re perfect,” he says into the shell of your ear. “You can take this. You were made for this.” You nod, slack-jawed. He rocks into you, skin slapping against skin as your pelvises meet. Your eyes flutter and roll back.

“I could spend forever filling you up. I could spend forever watching it spill out of you.”

You close your eyes, cheeks aflame, much too embarrassed by his perverse whispers. You feel … almost ashamed at how much it arouses you. Almost. Majorly, it’s fulfilling a dark fantasy you didn’t know you liked.

“... Come inside me,” you breathe, unable to say anything more. You were embarrassed enough. He was using a condom, it was assumed he would be. But hopefully he’d see you were participating in his little fantasy, that you liked it too…

His thrusts are unyielding, and they only get harder, faster, more desperate as the time passes. Damian finishes with a groan, his abs clenching and flexing with effort.

You welcome it, taking it all because he’s right, you were made for this. In this moment, it’s like you were entirely made for this.

To your surprise, there’s sudden stroking on your throbbing clit, and that brings you to the finish line as well.

Your head jerks back violently, body snapping to attention as you ride the wave of an orgasm. A gasp by your ear. You’re clenching around Damian’s length, wringing him dry.

He collapses, narrowly keeping himself from squashing you flat. The two of you are a tangle of sweaty limbs, chests heaving.

“You’ve got to get out of me sometime,” you tease.

You’ve both been lying like this, too taxed to move for maybe ten minutes now.

“Is that so? Honestly, I could die here without complaint,” Damian says, and you get the feeling he’s dead serious. Nevertheless, he rolls away. He does not let you go far, wrapping his arms around you. You shiver at the feeling of him unsheathing himself, suddenly feeling empty.

… And wet. Wetter than expected.

You keep from flushing. Damn, you were really enamored with him, it seems.

You rub your thighs together, relishing in the feeling. Until you pause.

… No, like, you’re really wet.

You slowly sit up, investigating. To your surprise, you’re leaking… cum. And clearly not just your own. It’s smattered down your thighs, sticky. When you pause and can literally feel the cum drip out of you, you exclaim.

“Fuck… fuck.” You put a hand to your dripping cunt, and are surprised when it indeed comes back wet and pearlescent white. It’s for real.

“What’s wrong?” you hear, but you hardly register it.

You pull at a scrap of wrinkled plastic, pulling it out. The condom is shredded. It broke.

“Damian. It broke.”

You stare at it dumbly. It broke. You feel the onset of fear creep by… it’s held at bay, when you feel Damian hushing you, stroking your shoulders.

Damian holds you, asks why are you worrying…? He told you there’s no way. He can’t, he’s sterile.

You dumbly nod, combating fear by reasoning with yourself. Well… you were about to have sex without it anyway, after all. What does it matter if the condom broke?

You suppose it’s just the shock of a failsafe… well, failing to save you. So why do you feel so disconcerted? What’s this niggling feeling, you wonder. You stare at your inner thighs. His cum paints you like a mark.

“It’s nigh impossible,” Damian states. He’s doing what he does best – nullifying your emotions with facts. He pulls you back into his arms, your back against his chest. “The condom was really for your peace of mind. It’s not like it did anything.”

You don’t speak, simply staring at the condom in your hand. You nod.

“Really, there’s no point in wearing condoms from now on anyway. They break.”

Damian’s fingers trace circles on the bone of your shoulders. “I mean, they’re practically pointless. And either way–”

With his long reach, he grabs his phone off the nightstand. He pulls up an article, illustrating the likelihood of him successfully inseminating you.

“See?” he says. “It’s not a factor.”

Unwilling to let whatever strange funk you’ve entered ruin the afterglow of your orgasm, you nod again. You turn your head halfway, smiling. Of course, without missing a beat, Damian kisses you sweetly.

To hell with the condom. And to hell with getting stuck in your head. Lord knows you overthink everything. It’s as Damian says.

His fingers dance on your abdomen, and it tickles.

It’s impossible.

#yandere damian wayne #yandere batfam #damian wayne x reader #girllllll #i just have to post this already im tired #mine

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juletheghoul · 5 months ago

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if you are still taking requests for the general can we PLEASE see what would happen if reader were ever in danger or threatened or kidnapped? to see marcus’ reaction and him do whatever it takes to get them back?? and his reaction to when he does?? 😭😭 i’m shaking askingthis omg,,

You're so right for this nonny, you're practically in my head. I was working on a chapter of the General, and it's basically this so here we go!

Warnings; 18+ no minors, vague but big-legal age gap, piv sex, dirty talk, violence, attack on the villa - you are hurt and Marcus gets serious, hurt/comfort, creampie, master / slave dynamic (power imbalance), Marcus calls reader Girl, reader calls Marcus Dominus, let me know if I missed any!

Unbeta’d, any mistakes are my own!

Pairing: Marcus Acaciusx F!Reader

word count: 2.8k

reblogs are appreciated

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Your fingers cramped, his tunic had been more damaged than you’d initially thought and what you’d imagined would only take a few minutes, had taken the better part of an hour. With his tunic mended, you used the small knife to cut the thread and blessedly stretched, wincing at the ache in your back from being hunched over. An odd feeling weighed down the pit of your stomach and it was hard to place until you realized how eerily quiet the house was. Not just the familiar quiet of night, but an all-encompassing hush that seemed to cover everything like a blanket.

No crickets chirping, no night birds singing, even the breeze seemed to have stopped. An icy finger followed the line of your spine and when his dogs began barking loudly, it almost made you jump out of your skin.

You ignored the unease in your stomach and reassured yourself, the hour had grown late, and all of the chores had been completed. All that was left to do was fill the water basin in his private chamber, as well as yours. The dogs still barked as you made your way through the peristyle, irritated that despite being well trained, they did not relent. It was unlike them to ignore a command from your dominus and with a frown you belatedly notice one of the house's guards lying prone.

You gasped, rushing over to him to help him, hoping it was only the heat that had gotten to him. You turned him, struggling to reach his face when your hands felt something wet, and with a barely contained scream, you saw that he had been attacked, and had not survived. The realization hit you like a knife to the belly, there was someone in the house, someone intent on sending your Dominus to the underworld.

Ice crawling through your veins and with your heart in your throat, you ran towards his chambers to warn him.

The halls were dark and quiet as you ran as fast as your legs could carry you, praying to Diana to bless you with swiftness, to Mars to bless Marcus’ sword, and to humbly beg Pluto to stay away.

Diana did not listen, and a shadow caught you unawares in the dark hall outside his chamber, cutting off the scream before it left your mouth. Your vision blurred as the faceless hulk behind you all but lifted you by the throat, making you squirm in his grip until he pressed the sharp tip of his blade to your back.

“Silence!” He hissed into your ear, pain radiating from your neck, and where his knife cut shallowly into the skin of your back. You tried to scream, to kick and struggle out of his grip but it was iron, and when he slammed you back against the wall the world turned on its head. You choked on the coughs stuck in your throat, vaguely making out the angry words he hissed in your face.

“Where is he? Where does he keep the valuables?” The fight was going out of you, your eyes, felt like they were going to pop out of your head, and your hands had surely been weighed down with something. Warmth ran down your back.

Your vision blurred and a sinking realization hit you.

I am going to die here.

Everything faded for a moment before you fell, hard, onto the ground. Breathing in felt like swallowing fire, your body was so heavy, and you couldn’t be sure how much time passed before you took in the scene. The man that had attacked you was on the floor before you, his eyes open, but never to see anything again.

“Are you hurt?” His voice is like a balm and it’s with frantic hands that you clutch at him where he’s crouched in front of you.

“Dominus-” Your voice comes out like gravel, your throat burning so much so, tears fill your eyes and he shakes his head, shushing you softly.

“Quiet girl, do not speak if it pains you, simply nod, are you hurt anywhere but here?” His hand is wet with blood, but it touches your neck soft as silk. You nod your head as he helps you to stand, holding you close to his warmth, his eyes scan over all of you, frowning when he sees the blood seeping through the back of your tunic, and flowing down towards your ankle.

“Let me see.” He lifts it, turning you in his grip and an angry sound fills his mouth.

Your heart fills with something huge, something unknowable, unnamable.

“Can you walk?” The strength in him rears its head, and he practically holds you up, you nod your head yes and he nods back once, pressing his bloody finger to his lip to keep you quiet before tucking you in behind him. He picks up his sword and slowly, you both make your way through his halls, hunting those who dared threaten him. He pokes his head around a corner and is confronted with a small group of his attendants, the older women, the toughest of them has a knife in her hand.

“Hide yourselves, I will find you once the threat is removed. Go to the cellar and bar yourselves in.” He nods once and they obey, trusting him to protect those who are alive. You move to join them but his free hand holds you tight. “You stay with me, girl.”

You nod and hold onto his arm like an anchor.

He finds them in his library, rifling through his things and for a moment your heart drops at the sight of them. There are four of them, and they turn in unison, dropping his parchments and smiling to see him alone, and worst of all, accompanied by an injured slave.

Wordlessly they begin to circle and with your throat burning, you begin to pray once more.

One of them advances too quickly and Marcus slices him from throat to groin without blinking. The blood splatters onto Marcus and then spreads from where the man falls on the floor and you feel as though you’re stuck in a nightmare.

“I will give the rest of you the chance to keep your lives if you leave now.”

“To what end? You’ve seen our faces, you will just come looking for us.” One of the braver ones spits it back in his face, looking to the others for support. They advance but he doesn’t let them close enough to hurt either of you. You see why he’s earned his reputation firsthand, and your brain rebels against itself. Part of you is terrified to see such violence outside the arena, in the place that is your home no less. Another part of you though, rejoices to see him fight for his house, for you. His sword moves swiftly, as fluid as water as he cuts his way through them with terrifying ease.

He drips in their blood, unfeeling, unseeing, until there is one left on the ground, clutching at his wounds.

“Mercy, I beg of you!” He holds his hands up, eyes shining with a fear you have never seen.

“The time for mercy has passed.” He blocks your view, but you hear the sound of flesh parting, a sickening gurgling sound, and then silence.

You stand there in the dark room, still as a statue until he blocks your vision again, his bloodied hands holding your face softly. He says nothing, only holds your gaze and you cannot help but press yourself close, gripping onto his arms if only to convince yourself that he is healthy and whole before you.

Wordlessly, he leads you away from the gore of the room. He completes his circuit of the house, finding the guards that survived the attack as well as other attackers, none of them having survived their attempt.

He thanks them for fulfilling their duty to protect and orders them to dispose of the gore corrupting his home. He orders them to find the others hidden away, to let them know the house is once again safe. Your hands tremble, but you cannot be sure if it’s from fear or from the way he has not let you go since this whole ordeal began. You look down as he speaks his commands, to see the way his hand sits on your hip, wrapped around you, pressing you close to his side. The blood on his hands has seeped into the fabric of your tunic, it is smeared all over your arms and your neck. You swallow and the pain is still there, and when you shift his hand tightens around you, pressing into the shallow cut and you wince.

He feels the way you shy away from the pain, and promptly dismisses his guards, advising them that fresh water and linens are to be brought to him at once.

“Come girl, let me tend to that.”

The shaking does not stop, neither does the feeling of ghostly fingers wrapping themselves around your neck. Neither does the pain. Your fingers itch to do something, but with your Dominus cleaning and bandaging your wound, you can do nothing but stand in front of him, and tremble like a leaf.

He does his best to soothe, but his gentle touch and soft words can only do so much. There is anger in you, a sharp clawing desire to break something, to hurt those that hurt you, those that snuck into his house like rats to do naught but harm. If your throat didn’t hurt so much, you’d scream. His lips bring you back though, where they press to your back when he is done bandaging you up.

You watch him, wild-eyed with the blood still pounding in your ears, and wonder how he can be so calm, cleansing the blood off his skin like he’s done it a thousand times. But hasn’t he? The reality of him becomes crystal clear, this was nothing to him. His eyes are focused on the task at hand, they move methodically, dipping into the water and scrubbing at his face, and his arms. He undresses to the skin and continues his ritual, only looking to you once he is satisfied with his state.

“Come, girl, undress.” Your body falls into its usual rhythm, obedience.

You strip, careful of the wound and your neck, and once nude, you walk over to him. Silently, he dips a new cloth and sets about his task. Your face is first, gently but thoroughly cleaned of every drop of blood. Your arms next, and then your neck. You wince, but stay still. Handprints that had seeped through and marked your hip, your back, all of them wiped away like they’d never been there. He crouches and follows the trail of your blood where it had slid down the swell of your ass, down the back of your leg towards your ankle. Not a drop is spared, and then he is done.

“Thank-” It's a harsh whisper that comes out of your mouth, and he doesn’t let you finish the sentiment.

“Do not speak, I would not have you in pain. Your throat must heal and the more you speak the longer it will take.” He pressed a soft kiss to your brow, but you held him close, cold all of a sudden as you stood there in his chamber, both of you bathed in moonlight and damp from the cloth. He lets you clutch to him, lets you press yourself into the cage of his arms, and wraps you up in them. He is the cure, you do not tremble when he holds you like this.

An ache builds, the need for comfort, for warmth, for affection. For love, whispers a tiny little part of you, a part you ignore.

You stand on the tips of your toes and press your lips to his, hoping he can sense what you need.

“Are you not in pain?” His fingers curl around the long line of your neck, feather-soft, holding your gaze as you try to kiss him again. You nod, but try again anyway and he holds you still. You mouth the words, exaggerating the shapes of them in your mouth so he will understand.

“I need you.”

He searches your eyes and is satisfied with what he finds, nodding once and then finally giving you his mouth, his tongue, and the loveliest of sounds from deep in his chest.

You take charge and push him to sit on his bed, guiding him to lie on his back and he follows where you lead, arranges himself exactly how you want him, and lets you climb onto him. You straddle his waist, fitting his hardening cock between the lips of your sex. He bites his lip, eyes focused on the way you rock yourself along his length and despite giving you control of this encounter, his hands land heavy on your hips. His fingers dig in, sliding up to hold onto your breasts, both fingers pinching and stroking at the peaked tips of them in the way he knew you liked, the way he knew would turn your cunt into a fountain of arousal.

“Use me, girl, do what you need, take your pleasure.” One hand stayed on your breast, the other went to his lips and he dipped his thumb into his mouth, wetting it before sliding it between where the head of his cock peeked out from between your legs and slipped it over your clit. A heavy sigh leaves your mouth, the pain in your throat mingling with the pleasure between your legs.

You bend forward, pressing your mouth to his with an urgency that claws at your very being. The desperation isn’t just in you though, there’s something of the caged animal in Marcus, a tremble in his fingers when they dig into the meat of your hips that conveys an itch to take control. You need this now though, so with his tongue in your mouth, you lean forward and lift your hips enough to give your hand room to grasp the weeping head of him, and notch it at your soaked entrance.

It’s almost too much, the way he fills you, the slick head of him almost too deep. His cock twitches and you cannot help but clench around him, your cunt flooding with waves and waves of arousal for him. His hands are charged like the air before a storm, roaming from your thighs, to your hips, up to thumb and strum at your nipples. Moans and whimpers slip out despite the pain in your throat.

You roll your hips, the pressure against your clit radiates out and the pleasure builds. It makes you frantic, the slip of him inside made all the better with the way you soak his lap. You speed up, chasing the friction and the pleasure just there, despite the burn in your thighs and the sweat beading on your brow with the effort of your movements.

“That’s it girl, fuck me-” Your stomach drops with the dark thrill of him letting you take, your nipples so sensitive under his thumbs, it’s almost painful. You want to go faster, but you’re losing steam, and you let out a sigh in frustration, pushing past the discomfort.

“Come, let me give it to you.” His hands slip around your back, and he pulls you forward, so you lie onto his chest folded into his embrace. He wraps his arms around you, fully, holding your arms to your sides so you can do nothing but take, and then he gives.

He plants his feet, and thrusts up hard, and fast enough to make your mouth fall open in a silent scream.

“This is how you want it, hard, you want to feel this cock for days don’t you girl?” He grunts out the words, and despite the red, violent haze of his love, you cannot help but marvel at the strength in him.

“Yes, please Dominus, don’t stop-” It comes out whispery, into the crook of his neck but he shudders all the same, and somehow, he fucks up into you harder. You turn to liquid in his arms, shuddering when the climax hits you hard as a punch to the gut. He lets out a guttural sound, but fucks you through it just the same, drawing out the orgasm until it takes him under.

He comes hard, rope after rope of his release painting your insides. Hot and messy and it almost makes you purr like a cat.

He lets go, both of you breathing hard, and sticky with the sweat of exertion.

“Give me a few minutes.” He breathes hard, while you press soft kisses, and kitten licks where the salt of him collects, “I will fuck you again, I am ravenous for you, girl.” His hands reach down, and grab at the meat of your ass and you smile.

“Yes Dominus.” It doesn’t hurt as much as it did, and you’re sure that by morning, you’ll be right as rain.

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#pedro pascal #pedro pascal fanfiction #gladiator 2 #gladiator ii #marcus acacius #general acacius #general marcus acacius #gladiator 2 fanfiction #marcus acacias x reader #marcus acacius smut #marcus acacius x reader #marcus acacius x you #marcus acacius x female reader #marcus acacius x y/n

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woso-dreamzzz · 4 months ago

Text

Carnival

Mary Earps x Child!Reader

Summary: Mary takes you to the carnival

Lockdown was both the bane of Mary's existence and the best thing in the world.

The worst thing because it meant confusion and fear and no football for a while. The best thing because it brought her you.

She fostered at first before moving to adoption when she found that she couldn't be parted from you.

With the lockdowns tentatively over now, things had started opening up again.

Like the carnival.

"They're rigged," You tell her.

You're still little but you speak well for your age, well advanced when compared to any of your peers.

"Rigged?" Mary laughs," Where've you heard that word?"

"I read it," You say," In a book."

"Oh. I forgot I was taking a genius out."

You make a little noise of acknowledgement before turning back to the carnival game.

It's most definitely rigged.

All of them are.

This one is one of those basketball toss games where you know the ring is only just wide enough for the ball to get through. If the throw isn't perfect then it'll hit the rim and bounce away.

Mary is looking at it with concentration though and you snag her belt loops, tugging lightly.

You hadn't meant to stop in the first place but you'd caught sight of one of the prizes.

One shot in got you a keychain.

Two shots got you a little inflated ball.

Three in meant the prize was a small toy.

Four was a medium sized toy.

Five was a big toy.

The big toys are displayed at the very top of the game. A lot of them a bears or big puppies but a handful of them are birds. They're in lots of different colours.

Yellow seems to be the most prominent colour but then it's pink. The one that caught your eye is blue though.

You like the look of it a lot but you also know the odds of winning it are slim to none.

Five perfect shots in a row is very difficult especially when the backing board behind the hoop is angled at a way that means if the ball hits it, it won't go into the hoop in the slightest.

"Mary," You say, tugging," Let's go."

Mary doesn't move though. "You want the bird?"

"Yes."

"Then let's try."

"No."

"You don't even want to try?"

You shake your head, scuffing your foot into the dirt. "It's not worth it, Mary."

"Would it make you happy though?"

"Yes."

"Then let's try."

"But-"

"Come on, birdie," Mary says," We'll try a few rounds and if we get it, we get it but if not that's fine too."

It costs five pounds for five balls and Mary fails abysmally for her first round.

It stokes something in her though, especially when your eyes dart away from the toy with every missed shot.

You've had a rough go of it, Mary thinks as she pays for another few rounds. Before her, you'd had a failed adoption. The couple had wanted you but then the wife had gotten pregnant and they realised what they actually wanted was a biological child.

It had fallen through and you'd bounced for a few days before being fostered by Mary.

She'd worked hard with you on understanding that she wasn't going to abandon you. She'd worked hard to get you to accept her as a maternal role in your life.

But that illusive word still evaded her.

She didn't need it, not truly. She knew what you thought of her and you knew what she thought of you.

She'd do anything for your happiness, including draining her bank to win you this stupid blue bird.

Your eyes had lit up when you'd seen it but you seemed fairly realistic for such a little kid.

These games were rigged but Mary refuses to let that stop her.

You want this stupid bird.

She'll get you this stupid bird.

Her hands are sweaty as she grabs her last ball. The others, surprisingly, have all gone in after nearly fifteen rounds of this stupid carnival game and it slowly dawns on her that this is the last shot.

She wipes her hands on her shirt.

"Mary?" You say and she looks down at you," Are you okay?"

"I'm just fine, birdie. One last shot and we can get your bird."

You glance down bashfully, fingers still threaded around her belt loop. "It's okay if you can't make it. We can go on the teacups instead."

Mary frowns, dropping to her knee so she can cradle your cheek in one of her big hands. "You don't want the bird?"

"I do," You say," But...I don't want you to feel bad if you can't get it in."

"Trust me," Mary says," I just want to make you happy."

You look into her eyes, searching for any hint of untruthfulness in them but you find none. You nod. "You should move slightly to the left," You say," And spread your fingers out a little more."

"Thanks, birdie."

She does as you've said and shoots.

The ball goes in and Mary breathes out a sigh of relief, already leaning over the counter to talk to the poor minimum wage worker that's had to sit through all her attempts.

"Yeah," She says," The bird. The blue one. Up top. Yeah, that one."

He has to get a big stick with a hook on the end to get it off and Mary takes it from him triumphantly.

She presents it to you and you gently stroke your hand over the fur.

She's still holding it but you bypass your new favourite toy completely, moving to hug her as tightly as you can.

"Thank you, Mummy."

Mary tries not to let you finally saying the 'm' word affect her, forcing back the tears that want to fall as she hugs you back, raining kisses onto the top of your hair.

"It was my pleasure, birdie."

#woso x reader #mary earps x reader #mary earps #woso community #woso imagine #woso fanfics #woso

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eowynstwin · 5 months ago

Text

the flood / neighbors

On a cold winter's day in the early morning hours, you knock on your neighbor Captain John Price's door to make a noise complaint. - “All yours,” he says roughly. “Every inch, love.” - ao3

You taste the salt-sweet essence of yourself on his lips as John, still kissing you, hauls you off the chair and against his body, hooking you under the knees and standing to his full height. You should not be surprised by his strength—he’d demonstrated it, after all, that night at dinner—but you are anyway, a little sound escaping the back of your throat like a startled bird. John chuffs, amused, and hoists you upward like it’s nothing at all. He takes you across the room in a few long steps, into the open door of what turns out to be his bedroom.

The details of it—decor, furniture, wall colors—are lost to you as suddenly you’re flying; your back hits the mattress too soon for you to cry out, and then there’s John, dropping his whole body over you and crushing you to the bed.

The full weight of him knocks the air from your lungs. His size has always been apparent to you—he’s always looking down to meet your eyes—but you realize now you had never fully reckoned with his enormity, his solidity. His entire body eclipses yours in its proximity, and exerts so much gravity that the both of you sink deep into his bed.

He kisses you again, hard, hands fisting in the sheets beside your head as he bullies his tongue into your mouth, knocks your knees open to settle his hips against yours. You roll your mons against the line of heat in his trousers, hands finding the divots of his lower back. His skin is softer, it occurs to you, than it has any right to be.

His teeth close around your bottom lip briefly before you push at his shoulders; you half expect him not to move, but he lifts away from you, panting hard.

“I need—” you pant, blood pounding fast through your veins, shaky hands moving to the buttons down your dress, “just—just a minute—”

He only lets you undo the first button before his hands are replacing yours, sure and steady, quick like he doesn’t even need to think about it. Far too quickly for you to prepare for the moment when he’s done, as he parts open your dress to bare your stomach, thighs, and naked pussy.

You want to squirm as his eyes devour you, big hands opening over your bare skin. They travel upward, from navel up to the underwire of your bra, and he looks you in the eye.

It’s supposed to be a question. You can tell that much. But the heave of his chest, the flex of his stomach, the long line in his trousers lend something sharp to his gaze. Something too intent on your consumption to really mean to ask.

A tremble works its way along the back of your neck, and you shuffle up onto your elbows, turning your arms awkwardly to unhook the closure. He takes the shoulder-straps between thick fingers and draws them gently down, more gently than he looks capable of right now. Then the garment is off, set aside somewhere in the ether, and you have to turn your head away from John as he looks at you.

You can only wonder what it is he’s seeing. A body like yours, sedentary, only lightly utilized by daily walks to and from the train station. Domesticated in its entirety. So different from him as to be entirely foreign.

What does he see in you?

Big hands cup the sides of your breasts, push them together as his face lands between them, mouth open, shoved down to your sternum between them. His thumbs flick across your nipples as his tongue delves into your cleavage the same way it had between the folds of your cunt. Your back arches, the same way it had before, mouth dropping open in soundless pleasure.

“Not—”you stammer, “not fair!”

“Mmm,” John rumbles. You search for the hem of his shirt with unseeing hands, pulling it upward, and clumsily the both of you get it off of him, baring his chest to yours. You find the coarse tangle of hair on his pectorals with questing fingers and dig them in, muscles twitching and flexing beneath your touch.

Then John pulls away from you, to your whining consternation. He sits back on his haunches, hair mussed, face and neck flushed.

Looming over you like this, John himself looks larger than life. You can’t fully believe he’s real and here with you now. Everything about him—the trim waist and soft, pillowed chest; the long, strong arms and broad shoulders; the steady line of his mouth and the honed, confident gaze of his eyes on you—is too much. He’s too right, too aligned with what you, in your quietest, most ashamed fantasies, might construct for yourself out of smoke and stardust. It makes your desire uncomfortable, feverish; like a craving that can’t be satisfied even when it is fed.

One big hand returns to your pussy, fingers softly stroking the down of your pubic hair, ghosting too lightly over the slightly parted cleft. Shivers run all over your body, hot and cold at the same time.

“I think I should give my girl one more,” John murmurs, “just so she’s ready for me, hm?”

You despair. “I’m ready, John, please.”

One brow lifts over dark eyes. “Mm.” His fingers press in, slide into the slick still coating your sex, and holding your gaze John pushes one finger into you down to the knuckle. You inhale sharply, feel yourself flutter around the intrusion.

His finger curls experimentally. You jerk on the bed. Without preamble, John adds another finger, and lays his thumb over your clitoris, still tender from his mouth. Your eyes roll back a bit at the stretch.

(Somewhere, in the back of your mind, you marvel. You’ve been here before. Different hands, a different bed. Merely enduring, instead of relishing, though the touch was no different at all.)

His other hand fits itself over your hip, and he works his fingers inside of you with his whole arm, shoulder rolling as he watches your body move and writhe, shuddering like a house during an earthquake. You cant your hips into his hand, more instinct than thought, and that red cherry of heat blooms around his touch yet again.

“John, I’m—” you gasp. “Please, I want you—I want—”

The words keep getting stopped up inside you. You have very little practice asking for what you want, nearly as little as knowing what that is.

But John’s hand slows. He strokes your hip, and withdraws his touch, fingers going to the closure of his jeans. He undoes it as deftly as he had your dress, revealing no briefs underneath; just dark, curly hair, abundant around the base of the cock he withdraws.

Sounding piteous, he says—perhaps more to himself than you—“Gonna spoil you rotten, I am.”

Your hand lifts, and then falls on his thigh bracketing your hips. Shy to touch him suddenly. He’s long, thickest around the middle, and flushed russet at the uncut head, which is pearled with a bead of moisture. John laughs, a short breath through his nose, and takes your hand, bringing your fingers to his length. He’s blazing hot to touch, such that you might have whipped your hand away, afraid of searing your skin, if John wasn’t holding it in place.

“That’s your doing,” he murmurs, stroking the back of your hand. “All you.”

You run your fingers along his cock; you can’t tell if the steady, heavy pulse you feel is the rushing blood keeping it erect, or the twinned flow thrumming in your own veins. The shaft twitches at your touch, the pearl expanding and then, too big to hold its shape, collapsing, dripping and silvery down the length.

“All yours,” he says roughly. “Every inch, love.”

“Please,” you say, barely above a whisper.

John leans over you, cock laying along your stomach as he kisses you hard down into his pillow. You hear him reach out and open the drawer of his nightstand, fishing something out—when he pulls away again, you see he has a condom in his hand.

“Oh,” you say, without thinking. You can hear the disappointment in your own voice, and it surprises you.

John’s eyes flash to you, bright and sharp. “You on anything, love?”

You swallow and shake your head.

He nods. “Then this is what we’re doing. Don’t tempt me.”

Part of you knows it’s an incredibly good thing that he went for the condom both immediately and voluntarily. But another part of you, greedy and selfish, cries out at the deprivation. If this is all for you, you want all of it.

“Will it feel okay?” you ask. “For you?”

John’s gaze is heavy on you. He takes the condom between his teeth, seizes his cock with one hand, and shoves the tip against your clit, precum lubricating the tight circles he bullies it with. Whimpers flutter from your throat; your legs flutter helplessly over the bed.

“Quit worryin’ about me,” he growls.

John grabs the wrapper and gives it a yank, tearing it open, and then spits the torn edge off to the side. You watch as he centers the condom over the head of his cock. You do not expect the spike of heat that shoots through your body at the sight. The latex stretches to envelop him, tight and shiny and thin around the veins and ridges. The end of it does not reach the base.

A shiver works its way across your bare skin.

Job done, he seizes you under the knees and pulls you to him, sliding your rear up onto his thighs. He meets your clit with the end of his cock again, gentler this time, teasing.

“Poor girl,” he rumbles above you. “Been needin’ me since that first time, ain’t ya? I know, it’s hard to ask. Hard to—” and his brow furrows, as he nudges your entrance, pushes in just so you engulf the head. “—Hard to know you’ll get what you want, when you’ve never gotten it, aye?”

Your response is a whisper, an exposed nerve. “Yes.”

Thunder cracks again outside, chasing unseen lightning. John’s hands spread over your hips, slide into the valley between pelvis and waist to hold you steady as, in one smooth motion, he pushes all the way in.

Your mouth drops open—he’s big. Bigger than merely seeing him erect had prepared you for; big enough to fill space in you that you didn’t know you had. There is nowhere inside you that his cock is not pushed right up against, insistent, invading, erasing any place you might hold onto as a refuge.

In response your body tightens around him as if reshaping itself in his construction. John groans low and rough as he gives an experimental roll of his hips, drawing out slowly—your body clutches at him, loathe to let him go, and he makes a choked sound as he works his hips again, and again, thrusting short and hard.

“Like y’were made for me,” tears from his throat, “me n’you, for each other—fuck—”

You crane your head to watch the movement of his body, the undulation from chest to stomach to his hips between yours, the gather of his pectorals between broad arms. His hands tighten on your hips; his mouth hangs open as he gazes down at the connection of your bodies, where you cunt swallows his cock over and over again. His hair, mussed earlier by your clutching hands, hangs disheveled along his forehead, touching the line of one brow.

It’s a moment, you realize, that he’s lost in. Just briefly. The knowledge wraps itself around your insides and squeezes. You’re seeing John, for once, while he is not seeing you. Something about that makes anxiety beat nervous wings in the back of your head; suddenly you feel very alone, just for a moment, and it makes you reach for him, putting your hands on his.

He looks at you then. Eyes sharp and bright. Knowing. Your chest contracts; no, he hasn’t forgotten you at all. His mouth curls; his thumbs rub circles into your stomach. The thrust of his hips deepens, lengthens, drawing the full length of his cock in and out of you, biceps tightening as he moves your body in tandem with his, the round slopes of his shoulder muscles shifting in the dim light.

He watches you watching him. You almost believe he can read your thoughts, simply looking into your eyes.

“I’m right here,” he purrs as he bottoms out, proving you right. “Right where I belong, aye?”

The heel of his palm meets your clit, grinds up and down as the breath jumps from your chest. You arch into it, eyes rolling back, hands flexing futilely, nails pressing into John’s skin.

You feel as though you should be saying something, doing something—some kind of simpering to stroke his ego about how good he feels or looks. Ben had liked that. And now, it wouldn’t even be a lie. But the notion is bitter on your tongue with a different kind of dishonesty. It would feel like trying to be something you are not, performing something you’d once tried to enjoy and failed at.

“I wasn’t very good at this,” you admit to him instead. “Before, with—with—”

He saves you from having to say your ex’s name in bed with him. “Being good at it’s got nothin’ to do with it, aye?” He shifts, lowers himself over you with forearms on the mattress, mouth falling on your temple.

“I just—” you manage, “it just, always seemed like this was supposed to go a certain way—ohh!”

John had pressed deep into you, so deep that he lifted your hips a little with his own. “S’posed to go however you like,” he murmurs, kissing the corner of your mouth.

You turn your head so your lips meet his. “What about what you like?” you ask.

He kisses you suddenly like a snake striking. Hard, almost disciplinary.

“I like this,” he growls. He angles his head and kisses you again, deeper. His hands move to dig into your hair, fingers pressing into your scalp. “I’m a simple man, darlin.’ Long as my woman’s under me, I’m happy.”

You shudder at my woman, like a fish caught on a line. “I—I like this too,” you whisper, and it isn’t a lie in the slightest.

His hips grind against you. His mouth moves from yours to the soft, fragile skin of your neck. “I can tell. You’re wet all down my thighs.”

Hot embarrassment sears through you, flash fire after a lightning strike, but still you clench around John with pleasure. You turn your face away from him, covering your eyes with the back of one hand.

“My shy girl,” he purrs against your neck, laving a spot with his tongue. “Fuckin’ adorable, you know that? Drive a man crazy thinkin’ what it’d take to make you scream for me.”

A trembling breath leaves you as John circles his hips, doing interesting things with the angle of his cock inside you. You scratch at his back as he keeps doing it, whimpers tumbling from your lips, and then John begins thrusting in earnest.

He settles the whole of his body onto yours, bricks piling on foundation, pinning you with his weight to the mattress. The whole bed shakes with the power of his hips driving into yours, back and forth, the reverberations so strong that they rock through your entire body. One big hand comes up to tilt your head to the side to give him even more access to your neck. Your perception of the world narrows down sharply, finding nothing important to pay attention to outside of the heat of John’s body. You feel his chest hair against your breasts, rubbing along your sensitive nipples as his whole body moves with the piston of his hips. Shoulders rippling as he puts his back into it.

His mouth falls again on your neck, and this time you feel the clench of his teeth. You swear you can feel every tiny blood vessel break open as he draws your skin into his mouth, and when he’s left his mark, as his hips snap against yours, he moves to the side and bites down again. And then again. Searing lips and knife-sharp teeth. The drive of his cock deep into your cunt, the blaze of it just kissing your cervix. Inside and out, John paints you as his, lays claim to every part of your body that has space for him.

(You wonder, somewhere behind the ache and the heat, how much of you will be left over once he’s through.)

“John,” you gasp out, “John, I need—”

“I know,” he growls, “I know, darling, I’ll give it to you. Just a little while longer. You belong here. I’ll give you everything. Just—mmm—just keep taking it—”

Throughout, the heat that had banked after John finished you with his mouth steadily grows. You had not known pleasure could manifest the way it does now throughout your body, something feverish that shakes you outwards from where his body joins with yours. You feel it echo down every limb, seizing nerve endings all the way to foot and fingertip until you’d swear the lightest touch to your clitoris could set you off, if not for the face that John’s pubic hair crushed against it with every thrust and still left you ever on the precipice.

His teeth close around the delicate skin at the base of your throat. You roll your hips weakly to meet his, nails drawing long, red lines over the broad expanse of his back, keening desperately. This does not seem to encourage him along; he’d spoken the truth, after all. It’s only yours to take what he has to give you, and trust that what he’ll give is exactly what you want.

Thunder lashes again overhead, filling what little room there is left over in your ears beyond the space taken up by the heave of John’s breath and the clap of his thighs against your arse. You are shaking apart beneath him, the borders enclosing what is essentially you breaking open. You need more. You need more of him, even despite the fact that you can barely get your arms around him properly, that his cock inside you leaves no room left over whatsoever.

It is a hunger you feel in your stomach, in your skin, at the base of your throat and in your hands. It’s behind your knees, in the creases of your bent legs that you wrap around him, calves slippery with sweat against his flexing buttocks. And it’s in your head, suffusing your neurons with urgent, blaring alerts that something is missing and you need it right now.

Foreshocks so intense wrack you that you know that John feels them. Sharp, blistering hot sensation catches fire between your thighs, and he adjusts to slide his hand down between you, wetting his fingers with the slick free-flowing between your folds and then laying them along your clitoris. Knees planted in the mattress, he thrusts into you long and deep, to the hilt, and with the rough movement of his hand John floods your body with what it screams for.

It seizes you like the last one hadn’t. Huge and powerful, it shakes you from the inside, and you clamp down so hard on John’s cock that you’re not sure whether you will draw him even deeper or force him out. Your limbs lock up around him, nails press so hard into his back they might break skin. You don’t know—you can’t tell. Your mind is everywhere and nowhere, whited out, every nerve ending hijacked.

There is nothing but the awareness of your own body, as pure sensation, sweet and sharp, courses through every vein and muscle fiber, lighting you up in a blinding flash. It illuminates warrens and niches that until now have been purposefully ignored or completely undiscovered, finds everything you’ve hidden away and exposes it directly to what it only ever knew in the abstract. It leaves nothing untouched by its passing, slamming the outer reaches of your body and subducting back inward, rushing again to center, relentless, unceasing.

“There it is,” John snarls into your ear, “there it fucking is.”

His hips stutter against yours. Your awareness expands to the rhythms of his body as your climax helps him find his own. His muscles tense under your hands, belly clenching up along your own, cock twitching inside you before he buries himself as deep as he can and groans long, rough, and loud, hands tightening on you as he fucks you through it. It blooms hot inside of you, and somehow this notion that your pleasure has catalyzed his whips through you, seizes you again before, finally, you go limp beneath him.

You are empty. Scraped out. Flayed open as the two of you breathe hard, breaths mingling.

John sighs, deep and contented, and props himself up on his elbows. His cock is still inside you, softening—you can feel it—but he makes no move to pull out. He strokes a few sweat-stuck hairs away from your forehead with one big hand. His eyes are very soft on yours.

You’ve never understood what it was about you that made John so happy. But here, now, he is. Far happier than you can understand.

“My girl,” he murmurs, and softly kisses the space between your brows.

And in the eddies of paroxysm, you grasp the truth.

John makes you more than you are. His every glance suggests you hung the moon and salted the sky with its stars; that when you speak, gems fall from your mouth. He anticipates you like the first clear days of spring or the balm of summer rain, welcomes you like a warm embrace in the fall and winter. He casts unknown augury and gleans from you favorable auspices that you have no idea how to find in yourself.

There is another version of you entirely that exists within John Price’s mind.

There must be.

The silence between you is interrupted by another lash of thunder across the sky, so close you’d swear it beats against the roof of John’s flat. It punctuates your shared, labored breaths, and the both of you lay still as it unfolds and then moves off in a rumble.

You begin to tremble beneath him. And John feels it.

“Was gonna offer another round,” he says, “but I think you need a hot bath, hm?”

His voice is so low, warm and comforting. It cottons up your ears, spreads to enfold you—a smothering, heavy blanket. A bead of sweat slips down your jaw; his or yours, you’re not sure.

You nod. You have no idea what expression is on your face right now as he gazes down at you. It must be nothing concerning, because John’s demeanor doesn’t shift to respond to it.

Right?

“Use whatever you need in there,” he murmurs softly, “I’ll turn down the bed.”

Oh. Because you’re sleeping here, then.

The bathroom’s layout is a duplicate of yours in reverse, populated in different places by John’s various toiletries and accented in dark, masculine hues. It’s close enough, though, that it feels strange, strange in the same way that furniture moved only a centimeter away from where it originally was might.

In the bathroom mirror, it’s hard to look yourself in the eye. Surveying yourself in the nude, you half-expect your body to have taken on some other shape. Something sculpted by his hands, things added on or removed, clay extruded this way and that. It would reflect too appropriately the way you feel on the inside; unfamiliar to yourself, a foreigner in your own body.

But no—the only proof of himself that John has left behind are the indentations of his teeth all around your neck. Crescent lines of smaller crescents. They’re going to bruise by morning.

You turn the shower on and step under the flow on shaking legs. The water pressure is good, a bit better than yours, and the hot water bathes your skin with profound relief even as you still tremble. You feel too hot inside of yourself, a pinless grenade with the lever held tightly down. Maybe, if you just stand here long enough, everything inside you will die down, fizzle out, and drain away alongside your rinsed-off sweat…

After some time, John knocks on the door.

“Need a hand in there?” comes his muffled voice.

“I’m almost done,” you call back. You haven’t touched anything, haven’t lathered his bar of soap between your hands. You turn off the water and step out. There’s only one towel available, so you wrap it around yourself and leave the bathroom.

“Better?” John asks, hands squeezing your upper arms.

You nod.

“Good. Laid out some clothes for you,” he says, gesturing with his head. He kisses your forehead and claims the bathroom; the shower starts again.

On the bed, you find a large shirt and what looks like a pair of men’s boxers folded together. Both are old, time-softened. His clothes, obviously; happily provided, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

And isn’t it? Isn’t that what men do for their women? This won’t be the first set of men’s clothes you’ve worn; you’ve read this playbook before. You’ve acted your part out as dutifully as you could.

You remove the towel and pull the boxers up your legs, the shirt over your head. It’s a band shirt, from the looks of it, although the graphic on the front is faded enough to make it hard to tell which. The collar is wide, the opening settling mid-shoulder and exposing most of your neck.

Although your shower helped, you’re still trembling. You’d thought to retrieve your suitcase, go digging for your skincare, soothe yourself with the ritual of serum and moisturizer, but just now you want to stop moving. There is something painful happening in your limbs, an ache that treads the same pathways your earlier climaxes had forged. Can orgasms make your whole body feel used up afterwords?

You crawl into the sheets. They’re soft, still a touch warm from the heat of your combined bodies. You shift to the furthest edge of the bed and turn away from the bathroom door.

Eventually the shower shuts off; the door opens, and you hear John’s footsteps behind you. You hear him pick up the towel, dry himself off as he opens drawers, pulls on what sounds like underwear and nothing else. The lamp switches off; he slides into the bed, cozies up to your back. A heavy arm winds around your middle, and his mouth falls on the back of your neck.

“Mm,” he hums, “I think you might be sick, darling. You’re a bit warm.”

You make some noise—you’re not sure what you want it to mean. To your ears, it sounds pathetic, weak.

“It’s alright,” John murmurs, “take care a’you in the mornin’, yeah? Don’ worry ‘bout anythin’, just rest.”

You make another noise.

“Shhh,” he purrs behind you, already sounding halfway asleep, “y’right where you need to be. Where you belong.”

You lay there for what feels like hours. You feel the rhythm of his breath even out, deep and slow, as overhead the storm quiets, moves off.

You have made a terrible mistake.

You don’t understand the shape of it. You can’t grasp why. All you know is that your fingertips sting and your legs ache with prickling energy, and try as you might you cannot get your own breathing to slow down. John’s arm around you feels like vice. You’re hot, far too hot, and he is a blazing furnace behind you threatening to swallow you whole.

You finally have to extricate yourself, digging out of the blankets and escaping his hold. You sit on the side of the bed, the room dim around you, the details murky. You hadn’t bothered to look at the room much before John had turned out the lights. It’s disorienting; you know, of course, that like the bathroom it should be a perfect mirror of your own room, but the furniture is all wrong. The smell isn’t the same. You don’t trust, that if you got up, you wouldn’t knock into something if you tried to walk around.

You bury your face in your hands. You don’t want to feel this way. Why do you feel this way? Nothing bad happened! It was everything you could have hoped for! More! Your body still hums with pleasure even as pain radiates up your stomach and suffuses your chest. So why, when you look back at John, does guilt strike you down the middle?

A question appears like a whale surfacing to breathe.

What does he want from you?

John’s breathing remains deep and even behind you as your bare feet press against the carpet. Your vision has adjusted a little; you can see well enough to get to the door. On your way, you notice that he’s brought your luggage into the room, left it at the foot of the bed for you with your clothes folded on top of it. You unzip your suitcase as quietly as you can, shove them inside, and take the whole thing with you.

You’re coming back, you tell yourself. You’re just taking your luggage over. That’s all.

It’s harder to believe the lie when you make sure the lock on the front door handle is engaged when you close it.

Your home is chilly when you walk in. You step lightly as you move through it, bringing your suitcase to your bedroom, flipping the heaters on. You’re cold now, trembling violently—it had taken you a few tries to get your key in the lock.

For half a moment you think you might start unpacking, but in your bedroom a wave of dizziness threatens to take you to the floor. You sit on your bed instead—you’ll just wait until the shaking stops. Then you’ll go back. You’re sure John won’t mind getting the door again. Leaving it locked is an honest mistake.

Any moment now. Just when you’re warm enough.

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