#coyote flats

[multyashka-sweet]

Fishing

[aralyre]

Hello! Thank you for stay here, I hope you like my arts, take care 💜 Who's your favorite girl? Yote girl? Yeen girl? These two cuties belong to @Readerno31142 in their first colored design! Thanks a ton for commissioning me, little bee! 🥰💕🐝

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[theotherside-oftherain]

inexplicable pain? In my joints? It's more likely that you think!

[abyssee]

Old coyote Folly & her life companion Peabrain. One's filled with mange, the other is going through her seasonal molt. They share -3 braincells when they are together (but Peabrain possesses a strong 2 when she's alone !).

This is a new version of this character! Folly was the first character I designed for Wildstories, back in 2020, before we even knew how we wanted the art style to look like. Not that we've - I've - settled on anything definitive yet, but I wanted to make her design a bit more readable ; give more the impression of brittle fur and molt vestiges ; and approximate coyote markings (especially in the reddish brown legs and ears). I've also done more research on mange, so I wanted to target the right areas and thing about where it originated from.

Between her naked spots, various bite marks, and disheveled fur, her design remains a bit more complex than what @louaseau does for his own characters, but I'm super happy on how she turned out and she's very fun to draw c:

[alnilaem]

coyote head and the body of a man — (e)

ghost/fem reader There's a killer on the loose. But your logging town is small and quaint and doesn't even appear on maps, so you know you're safe. That all changes when a gruff, big, taciturn man shows up at your workplace one day. Or; Simon is a fugitive serial killer, and you're the housekeeping girl that caught his eye.

cw for explicit content, graphic violence, possessive behaviour, size difference, cunnilingus, stalking

pinterest board | ao3 | for @spidehpig <3

Sometimes, you believe you were born in the centre of a dying star. 

Born on the crest of death and fated for a bleak life. Dead, before you even had a chance.

The universe sweeps before you. Infinite. Expansive. Hungry. You float at the mouth of the galaxy and it swallows you whole, but doesn’t seem to like the taste of you—too bland, too trite—so it spits you back out and sends you tailspinning. 

You land with a lack of courtesy. Tossed between trees and dropped in a basin. You find yourself in nowhere, Oregon. In a town flecked by a lake inlet and a clement fjord, where the moose population outnumbers the people population. It has a maritime allure but strangely enough, isn’t commercial enough to be a tourist hub. It’s too hidden in the thicket. Too deep in a borehole.

Every day here is the same. It's an abyss that yawns before you with no end in sight, lacking undue entertainment and vividness and excitement. There’s no light pollution so far off the beaten track, so oftentimes, you’ll wish upon shooting stars for someone to come for your deliverance. 

There’s a reason they say be careful what you wish for.

The day isn’t even halfway over and your bone tips already ache with hard work. 

It isn’t to say your workplace is busy. In fact, it’s the exact opposite. A cut-rate motel with more vacancies than residents found far-removed from the highway, taking only cash, no card, which is good for deterring paper trails and welcoming the transient but is bad for providing records when the police come knocking. 

You’ll get the occasional trucker, the sparse backpacker. In any case, folks stay here when they don’t want to be bothered. They’ll drive past the splintery welcome sign and stop at the diner for earthy, full-bodied coffee and a slice of famous rhubarb pie. They’ll recuperate in the motel and leave before sunrise, and you’ll be there to clean up what they leave behind, scrubbing the memory out of the fibreglass bathtub for whoever’s next. 

It’s a place where time fleets away. Hallucinatory. Where people pay their due and you hang your head because after all, you’re nothing more than the housekeeping girl. Cottony pinafore and a black dress. Mary Jane flats. Fingers desquamating from years of bleach and vinegar stuck in your nail beds. You get handed dog-eared tips and in return, you don’t ask questions. But maybe you should have.

You’re sliding the window cleaner back into its compartment on the cleaning cart just as your boss scales the veranda. He’s grinning and sporting sweat stains across his armpits. A patchy beard. A loose tie. 

Your nerves lock up tight when he grasps your shoulders. His razorous fingers and the pinchbeck of his wedding band saws under your skin. The dregs of his afternoon drinking knocks into you, and you try not to let your body betray you. Despite that, your eyes water and your nose crinkles. You white-knuckle your dress and almost pop the fabric of your pinafore. 

“How’s my favourite employee?” he grins. “Is she workin’ hard?”

There’s an irreverent innuendo somewhere in his smile. You ignore it and opt for a stale smile.

“I’m working,” you eke out. “I've got to restock the bathroom, then I’m done.”

“That’s good, peach. Real good,” he watches you collect toiletry essentials, then tacks on, “there’s a man in the lobby.”

You falter. The travel-sized shampoo bottle almost slips between your forefinger and thumb. 

“An outsider.”

It’s an observation, not a question. If the man in the lobby were a local, Phillip would have given you a name because in this town, everybody knows everybody. The fact that a name was bereft tells you your new guest came from elsewhere. Maybe he’s cutting through the main road on his way to Yachats for your town’s cascade mountains and bigleaf maple, or for the diner’s famous rhubarb pie. In any case, he's in need of a rest stop. 

“Mh. I’m gonna check him in. Just wanted to let you know I’m givin’ him this room, so try to hurry it up, okay peach?”

You blink slowly. This motel holds twelve rooms—there’s never been a need for any more—and currently, nine of those are occupied. That leaves three. There’s no reason for your boss to put up the new guest in Room 11, especially when you’re still cleaning it.

Phillip reads the question in the bend of your eyebrow. He smiles knowingly and pats your head. “He requested a room on the higher level. Room 9’s aircon is busted and Room 6 shares a wall with the Pettie’s. They’re loud.”

You sigh. “Ah.”

“Sorry peach,” he smiles like he’s apologetic, but you don’t think that’s the case. “Just get it done, alright? And add some extra coffee packets."

You furrow your lips. Displeasure flutters over you but you wash it away with a smile, refusing to irk him. You nod and pivot, bones bending against your skin for an escape as his hand whispers against your bum in an encouraging caress.

Anger simmers in your marrow. Phillip simply chuckles, disparaging.

“That’s a sweet peach.”

His voice gets muted by the tinny, rattling radiator as you make it to the bathroom. You stock it up dutifully—perhaps taking extra long to ensure he's not waiting outside for you—and spritz air freshener around the room when you finish. It’s a flaky, expired bottle of Platinum Ice which barely masks the town’s deep-seated smell of old-growth forest, petrichor and woody debris. You hope the new guest doesn’t have a sharp nose. 

You make sure to stuff the coffee station with extra packets before stepping out of the room. Off the mysteriously stained carpet, onto the veranda. You putter around with your large keyring, thumbing through the nickel-brass since you also have a key to the elementary school, post office, and city hall (aptly titled shitty hall by locals, since this town isn’t much of a city and the building’s roof is held together by nothing but rusty rivets and tassels of sprig collected in the corners). You’ve got so many keys because again, everybody knows everybody, and it isn’t rare to see the housekeeping girl at the motor lodge supplementing her income as a part-time teaching aid. 

Finally, you find the master key. You lock the room and roll the cleaning cart into the utility room before locking that too. Your wrist drags across your forehead, wiping away sweat, and you tug on your dress because perspiration has pasted it onto the pert curve of your breasts, the squish of your thighs. You furtively glance down your bodice and watch how the sweat pocks your skin, knotting your nipples against your cheap bra. Lament catches you in regards to your shower after work—it’s going to be freezing since the heating system here is so fickle—and in the paroxysm of your grief, the sound of heavy breathing eludes you. 

You don’t hear his footsteps. He’s an ambush predator. Stalking and shadowing in the tall grass, waiting for the moment your hackles melt to bite into your neck like an unripe stone fruit. You don’t see him, but you feel him. His breath tickling down your neck. The erogenous zone behind your ear. 

A gasp parts your lips and you whip around, coming face-to-face with a paunchy chest plated by moth-eaten flannel. You heft your head up, exercising the hinge in your neck. Paling at the sight that greets you.

He has a Cabela’s cap on. It’s pulled over his eyes, but a few blonde curls peek out from under the crown of his hat. He has a damaged, blistered face. A cauliflower ear. Nicks on his cheeks that distend from his skin and have turned pallid with time, rippling like seafoam petticoats on waves as he flickers his jaw. He wears jeans and mud-clogged boots and holds a duffel bag. 

His gaze unties you. You slowly find words, fitting them in an orderly queue in your mind as you avert your gaze and stare at the floor. Squirming. Preening. Sweltering.

“Welcome to Sockeye Inn, mister…” 

Silence. He lets your words awkwardly trail off. Doesn’t do anything to belay the discomfort in your belly. The man simply stares at you with brown eyes. 

Humiliation crawls up your spine and settles on your cheeks. It burns through your skin, withering you away, to which you fidget with your fingers and baldly nod towards the door.

“Your room is ready,” you murmur. “Enjoy your stay, sir. Uh– if you need anything just give us a shout. Phone’s on the bedside table.” 

Foolishly, you wait for a response again. Nothing. He towers over you, owlishly blinking, one slower than the other because he seems to have a lazy eye. You clench your skirt and softly shoulder past him, heading for the stairs as you hear him putter with the keyhole. 

You’ve halfway scaled it when a rasp distorted by what seems to be years of cigarettes stops you dead in your tracks. 

“Bring me a BLT and root beer.” 

You burn up at the muscle in his voice. The drag. Just as you’re about to reply, his room door slams shut and rocks across the veranda. 

Your dress is stickier than it was before. Perhaps an ice cold shower isn’t so bad after all.

The end of your shift slowly arrogates. 

After delivering food to Simon Riley—you glinted at the logbook while waiting for his order, reading his name—you left his room as soon as possible. You set the food down and found yourself plugging your nose. The Platinum Ice you sprayed before didn’t accost you— instead, it was pomade. Lucky Strike cigarettes. Decaying heartwood. Bleach. 

You pointedly breathed through your mouth. It didn’t actually help though, since you could taste it then. The ethanol in the air drizzled over your pockmarked tongue and glided down your throat. Collected in your stomach. 

You almost retched it back up at the sight of him.

Through the foggy shower wall, the colour of his hazy contour was striking. It seemed to be a tight fit for him, hemming in his lumberjack build. The shampoo bottle looked like a damn accessory in his large hands and his chased shoulder blades pressed soap against the glass pane, sudsy. 

Your curiosity pulled your gaze lower. Down to the heavy mass between his thighs, thick and fat. Bulbous. 

His spine suddenly went erect, straightening like a chary animal. As if by the agitated pappus of his skin, his chin lifted in your direction, and that’s when the earth collapsed under your feet and you beetled for the door. 

You distract yourself in the kitchen. Emptying the dishwasher. Taking the garbage to the bear-proof receptacles. Putting the oven on steam clean. Kate, the kitchen supervisor, stares at you oddly under her hairnet but she isn’t going to reject a set of helping hands. 

You scrub at a pan hoping it will erase the image burned into your mind. Hoping that the steel wool will have the same effect on your temporal lobe as it does on the pan. You don’t realize your hands are chafing and the pan is flaking, not until Kate is passionately complaining beside you, her spit dashing onto the side of your face.

“—fuckin’ freeloaders. They drain our taxes but can’t even do their damn jobs. Wait until one of their family gets butchered, you’ll see, that’s when they’ll start taking this seriously.”

She waves a newspaper in your face. The paper stack fans in front of you, blowing you with cool air. You’re just barely able to read the big, blocky headline. 

Connection Made Between Ventura, Gilroy and Eugene Serial Killer — Aptly Coined the Ghost.

“Eugene!” Kate slaps the newspaper, frazzled. “Not even three hours from us!”

You scarcely listen to her, her voice ripening into white noise as you scrutinize the police sketch on the newspaper’s margin. The offender is drawn with an overripe balaclava and probing eyes. Dark brown, as if his corneal opacity has laid claim before death. His eyelids have no tension, but a furl of crow's feet gather at the corners. It’s uncanny. Eerie. And even though he’s pressed on paper, you can’t help the unease welling inside you. 

A part of you waits for the other shoe to drop. For him to manifest and crawl out of the paper, dripping ink and viscous tar, ruining your Mary Jane flats and the floor you’d just mopped.

Hemlock hits the back of your throat. Lemony, sedgy. Your eyes fixate on the information detailing his crimes. Spines broken and necks snapped with inhumane strength. Pieces of flesh carved with the precision of either a surgeon or a butcher. Rigour mortis locking the victims in a scream, nail beds caked with skin which implies a struggle, but leads nowhere since the Ghost’s DNA hasn’t been found on any database.

(He’s as elusive as his name suggests. Investigators say he could be foreign, or that he has a clean record. The latter seems unlikely for the violent calibre of his crimes.)

There’s also his modus operandi—slicing off his victim’s ring finger, taking it with him. A cruel reward. 

“They say he’s taking Route 101,” Kate tacks on. “That he’s a long-hauler. How the hell will they catch a long-hauler?”

You shake your head, shrugging. Your tongue is too heavy and your gums rub against the round of your cheeks when you try speaking. The sentence gets snagged on your molars, and all that comes out are sparse words, lamely falling to the floor with how out of breath you are. 

“…They’ll catch him.”

“They better,” she shortly huffs. “I don’t want this town making the paper for all the wrong reasons.” 

Death comes to you in a cornfield. 

You’re sprinting through the crop, barefoot and scantily clad and pricked by thorns. Your clothing catches on thistle and corn husk, slowing you down, but the quick-footed trampling at your tail keeps your pace steady and stable.

Your lungs burn. Your bones rasp. Your eyes well up with how fast you’re moving, with how your retinas strain to see more in the pitch black than just reflective corn silk and the crescent moon. 

The midnight sky is close to swallowing you whole, but at this point that would be an act of mercy. The whistle of his cleaver slicing through the air and the stomp of his boots are promptly catching up, heckling you, barely whispering against the flowy cotton of your dress.

By a cruel twist of fate your foot catches on a tiller and sends you flying. Your nose softens the impact, the crack of cartilage reverberating through your skull, glutinous red spurting down your chin as you try scrambling to your feet.

But true to his name, Ghost, he slips through matter and suddenly, he’s standing in front of you.

Black, sweaty tank top. Freshly sharpened meat cleaver. Stout arms. Predatory eyes. Rotting balaclava—which at this point, you’re starting to believe was grafted onto his face, fitting him like skin. 

You raise your hands for mercy. 

But you should know dead stars have exhausted all their luminosity—that after death, they hold no power. That space is a graveyard. That’s why the Ghost poises his cleaver behind him. That’s why the last thing you see is his cleaver handle swinging towards you, about to collide with and shatter your cheekbone into a million pieces—

—but daylight strikes you with no clear trajectory. 

It’s your alarm that rings, waking you up from a nightmare, telling you to brush your teeth and scrub yourself down and pop your supplements before biking to work. You do so sluggishly, standing under the shower spray as you massage your cheekbone. Burning your toast as you scour the news for developing details on the Ghost case. Ordering a cup of coffee from the local diner and gulping it down behind the motel lest Phillip catches you.  

Your nightmare—omen, prophecy, portent of death?—pursues you like the persistent stench of fish on an angler’s hands all morning. You flinch at the slightest noise while scrubbing toilets, you constantly look over your shoulder while sweeping floors.

Malaise builds in your blood vessels like creosote. It doesn’t thin into fluid, flowing in and out of your appendages and around your sex until you situate yourself in front of Room 11. Fluffing up your skirt and puffing out your chest.

You announce your presence and rap the door with your Mary Jane flat because your hands are occupied with new bed sheets. Your knuckles blanch around the linen, quivering, struggling to keep it in your grip. The sheets almost flutter to your feet when a voice penetrates the door, abrasive and husky. Rough. Grating against your spine and shaving down the vertebrae. 

“Door’s open.”

You wait a few seconds before contorting yourself against the threshold. You try the handle and lo and behold, it’s unlocked, swinging open when you press your weight onto it. 

You step inside and toe off your flats. Next to Simon’s boots, they look fit for a doll, and a dizzy spell ricochets through you at the size difference. At the stark reminder that he’s as big and packed as a thick tree stump.

You walk inside and heed the CRT television playing the news. 

It does nothing to soften the scream that rips out of you as you round the corner.

Simon is in bed, pulling on a cigarette. His pudgy tummy and bristly chest are bared, the steel wool of his happy trail disappearing into the bed sheets furled around his hips. The flat sheet is thin enough to outline something stirring. Something thick and pressed against his inner thigh. 

He stares at you, eyes of Argus. It’s so intense you’re sure he can sense the slick running down your back. The dew that settles in the gusset of your panties. 

You stutter. “I can come back later.”

Simon sits up with a groan. It rattles you. His joints must be fettered with age, or hard work, but in any case your head goes cottony with the picture of him splitting wood and hauling heavy bovine flanks. 

You swallow thick as he shakes his head. “It’s no problem, sugar. I’m not even here.”

The pet name makes you squirm. You sure do feel like it—sugar, that is—with the way you could melt on his tongue, wedge yourself between his teeth. Turn syrupy and sappy at the back of his throat.  

He takes another drag of his cigarette. You watch raptly as his jaw feathers around it, lips proffering another plume of smoke. 

He blinks. “Well?”

You eke out an apology and fiddle with your hands. 

“I’ll have to, um, change your bedsheets first.”

Simon shakes his head. He taps the ashy casualties off the tip of his cigarette and you watch as it sinks onto the bed sheet, almost burning through the floral motif. “No need.”

“Well,” you cough, forcing your eyes away from him, “if I don’t, my boss…”

Simon pricks up. The hind of his spine straightens the same way a dog would sit straight and plumb after hearing rustling in a bush. His muscles tighten, thick, and his face twists into a sneer. The bed sheet around him falls and you lock up tight lest it bare his pubic bone. 

“Is he a minger?”

“I’m sorry?”

He huffs. “‘s he a bully?”

“Oh, no,” you blandly laugh. “Mister Graves isn’t a bully. He just…”

“Makes you uncomfortable?”

There’s a lapse between acknowledging his question and spitting out an answer that makes you kick yourself. Simon already looks dubious. You hug the sheets closer to your chest and smile, your cheeks feathering like beeswax.

“He’s a kind man.”

“Not wha’ I asked,” he says. The bed creaks as he leans forward, the sheets slipping lower, scarcely covering his sex. “I asked if he does stuff he shouldn’t be doin’.”

Your heartbeat quickens. Briefly, you wonder if he can hear it. He probably can, albeit softly, due to his lumpy cauliflower ear.

“He’s a married man,” you mumble. “He doesn’t touch me if that’s what you mean. Not like that.”

“There’s only one way to touch someone,” Simon grunts. His chest starts churning a little, as if he’s agitated. “Does he put his hands on you?”

Your skin burns, remembering. A phantom scar runs through you, long and creeping, mapping all the places in which Phillip’s pinchbeck wedding ring has burned you. The suture of your spine, the pappy flesh of your neck, the rise of your hips where his palm has melted through your dress and smarted your skin.  

Your silence makes Simon grunt. 

Panic surges up your throat. You feel the need to defend Phillip, in some approximation of gratitude and fear since you’re on his payroll and you don’t want to reap the consequences should you rat on him and he find out. 

“No!” you hurry. “Mister Graves isn’t like that. He’s a good man. Honest.”

Simon’s eyes push against your skin. He scrutinizes you, tests you. Waits to see if you’ll fidget too much and flake away and sink into the carpet. 

He growls. “You fancy him, is tha’ it?”

Answering yes is the only way to shake him off your leg. You do so archly, so it seems as though the thought of your boss has you flushing when really it’s Simon. He’s fully upright, and now you can see the girthy base of his cock. Stirring, twitching. You suppress a moan.

“Yeah…” you murmur. You can feel your makeup turning blotchy, running down your cheeks. “It’s just a bit…embarrassing, is all.”

He lapses into it again. Staring at you. Razoring his way into your head and thumbing through your consciousness, searching for an Achilles’ heel. A crack he can break into a hole because he has the size for it—barrel-chested, stupidly thick fingers. 

Simon slips out of bed and disturbs the coiled aches of the mattress. He holds a washcloth over his crotch. It’s crusty and keeps shape and covers almost nothing, confirming your inkling. 

His bulbous cockhead winks at you from under the hem. It’s heavy. Leaky. Dripping precum that laves down his legs and gets caught in the wiry hair of his thigh. 

Anxiety pools in your armpits and around your groin. Or maybe that’s just arousal. Brackish and sticky, rubbing your pussy lips together, hugging your clit. 

Simon pulls on his cigarette once more and then folds it into the bedside table. You should scold him. You should tell him that he’ll have to pay for damages even though the wood is already degraded and mouldy. You should scuttle out of the room and call for Phillip, but that would be a crueler fate. Instead you stay fixed to the carpet as Simon steps forward. Cock swinging between his legs, tummy jiggling. 

You don’t know whether he’s going to pull you in for a kiss or rip off your dress or—and you’re unsure why you think of this—take you by your skull and smash it against the television stand. He has the muscle to, surely, but somehow you know he won’t. And the thought of that makes your skin hot.

You’re at his mercy.

You gird yourself for his lips or for your dress to be torn off, but your preparations flux away as Simon steps close and crowds you against the television stand. The stench of Lucky Strike cigarettes and gamey meat impair you, as he reaches behind you and increases the television volume. You want to say something but cotton fills your mouth and the news report floods your ears. It’s fragmentary—you can only heed oddments of the news anchor’s latest updates. 

The Ghost is still at large. Corpses keep popping up around California and Oregon, each with their ring fingers sliced off. The tipline has been leading investigators nowhere, shepherding them to the end of the earth and over the edge, floating, where they’ll move through molasses and will never be able to catch him. 

White male. 6’4”. 196 centimetres. Brown eyes. Heavyset. Likely military background. Likely a surgeon, or a butcher. A dangerous, ruthless individual. 

If spotted, do not approach. 

Simon’s breath fans against your neck, rousing the bristles of your warm cheeks. He turns off the television and steps back. An ether opens up in the pit of your stomach as your gaze falls on his bulging pelvis, on the purplish veins and webbing muscle, sitting like a tuft under his navel, disappearing behind the washcloth where his cock stirs. 

Simon tuts. “World’s goin’ to shite.”

You nod.

“You shouldn’t be out here anyway,” he tacks on. “Should be at home takin’ care of your man’s house. Keepin’ safe.”

You flash your naked ring finger embarrassingly fast. “I-It’s just me…and my cat.”

His eyes darken. His head tilts down at you. He purrs. 

“Better get started on mine then,” he breathes. “Put yourself to good use.”

You shyly get to cleaning his room. 

You try to ignore his hand disappearing behind the washcloth, pumping his cock. You can’t ignore the silk ruining your panties. Scarcely, you manage to ignore the caution creeping up your back. Your lower instinct that screams at you as you feel his stare tracking you across the room, burning. Smouldering. Warning. 

Daylight scissors into you.

It melts the sleep in the corners of your eyes. It clears the haze in your head. It interrupts the sultry dream you were having. Your flesh is still pocked and your clit is still peaked, as you rehash the contents of it. 

You can still feel Simon’s weight on top of you, sweat compressioning you, the sheets gathering under your slick back. Your underwear had dangled from one of your ankles, flapping and swaying as Simon pounded into you. Your head bobbed over the lip of the mattress. Your tits bounced, nipples caught between his gnashers. Your slick ran down your cunt and over your asshole, pooling onto the floral bed sheets. You just quit your job. You didn’t care about the sheets. Or the Pettie’s down the veranda. Phillip was on the other side of the door too, and he could hear everything. Your moans. Simon’s balls dragging over your furled hole. His groans—

—And the sudden tearing of cartilage and skin stretching, rubbery, as Simon shifted into something else above you. Something larger. Deadlier. His drool dripped onto your chest, and his cock was suddenly too big for your pussy, popping back out until only his tip managed to squeeze inside your puffy hole. He snarled down at you, but it got covered by a creeping balaclava. You still reached your orgasm, quivering around his cockhead. Watching him go spotty and graphite-like in your vision, as if he were a composite sketch.

You get out of bed and wash the absurd dream away under the shower. The nozzle hits your clit weakly, and you never reach your high. You show up to work pigeon-toed and sweaty. Pent-up. You scrub harder at bathtubs and almost snap at Phillip when he swats your bum. Almost. Simon is watching from the dining hall, and he makes you skittish.

The day rolls by sluggishly. There’s a Do Not Disturb sign dangling from Simon’s door, so you don’t get the chance to see him in his room. You huff and puff at the Pettie’s and give Kate attitude. It’s the peak of afternoon when you’re sent home, shoulders stiff because Phillip squeezed them and tacked on, ”I can always help out if you’re stressed, peach,” before shepherding you out the door.  

You bike into town. Indulge in the diner’s famous rhubarb pie because the motel’s cherry pie is nowhere near as good, though you’ll never tell Kate that. You polish off your treat then ride to the beach (which is more of a graveyard for birds and braided, washed ashore sea meadow), and prop your bike against the wooden bollards.

The beach is familiar with you. It sees you when you're overwhelmed by the monotonous colour of your life. You never worry about meddling kids or loud teenagers or anything, because the stench of fish usually keeps them away anyway. It's your own Shangri-La. Your little Eden. Albeit overcast and greyscale, with an ocean spray that gets into your hair and dries out your mouth.

You slip out of your Mary Jane flats and wade through the sand dunes, breathing in salt and sulfur and tasting it on your lips. You maneuver around seawrack and driftwood and eventually find yourself seated behind a tussock of seaoats, watching as the waves lazily beat against the shore.

It's easy for you to lie down and get comfortable among the scent of iodine and the feel of pillowy granules. It's also easy to let your eyes flutter shut, lulled into limbo by the ebbing tide and murmuring waves.

You stir awake with flaccid lungs.

Presentiment hangs in the air, thick, like a blanket of smog. It interrupts your breathing pattern and makes you light-headed. Vertiginous. Makes you see things that aren't there…

…Such as the off-white scleras and twists of dilated blood vessels that stare at you from the foreshore.

They approach you eerily. Two pieces of driftwood floating over the waves, jolting slightly as it hits the sand, splintery and mossy and heavy.

The man feathers toward you from the blue glow of the beach. You squint through the darkness, because maybe it's the sheriff, but you know he walks with a drunken gait and he…strides like a bear on its hind legs.

The way he lurches for you says otherwise. Perhaps he's rather a panther or a coyote, or some crude backyard breed of all three.

A large palm splits itself over your mouth. An arm lays beside you and secretes a musk of sweat and iron. A knee digs into the plush of your cunt, agitating your clit, as a warm breath fans over your pulse point.

"Waited for me, didn't you?" he rasps against your neck.

In your stupor, you brace your hands against his shoulders. A sticky substance coats his skin, too viscous to be sweat.

Nausea knots in your throat. Tremors wash over your body. You dig your nails into his flesh, and when your hands don't fall through it like you hoped, you gravely realize he's made of muscle and skin instead of your drunken, sleep-inspired imagination.

You experience a cruel loss of equilibruim. If you weren't already lying down, you'd collapse to the ground. You go limp in the sand, thawing into his hands which you unwillingly notice are caked with that sticky substance too.

"There's dangerous folk 'round here," he grunts. "What if someone else followed you? A big, bad man?"

A chord of recognition stirs in your brain at his voice. That brash accent.

"Simon…?"

He chuckles. "It's me, sugar."

You squeeze your thighs together but it's abortive. He pries them apart anyway, and cups your pussy through your panties.

He rubs you through the gauze, knuckling your soft lips. Through the darkness you barely see the misshapen silhouette of his mouth. That snarl, curling off him as if he suffers from some chronic wasting disease, slowly atrophying and turning into some vestigal cadaver.

He kisses down your sternum. Grips your hand and forces it over his crotch. Your fingers brush over the solid mass. It's hard due to both stiffened denim and his thickening cock.

"All for you," he mumbles. "Take it out, sugar."

You fumble with the metal teeth of his zipper. You pull him out with both hands and your mouth goes dry. Tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth. Deadly nightshade hitting the back of your throat. Despite you, your thighs squish together, and a rumbling chuckle slips through the seam of his lips.

He's huge. Fat and heavy, so much so you need both fingers to wrap around him.

"Give it a kiss, yeah?" he coos. "Like a sweet girl."

You spread your lips against his cockhead. You pull away and a string of precum chases you, but Simon is pushing your head back down and bucking his bristly pubic bone into to your nose.

"There it is," he grumbles. "Such a big girl, aren't you?"

You look up at him with wide, wet eyes.

The stiffs of hair on his pubic bone tickle your nose. You smell sweat and iron, but you can't tilt your head away, because the stout muscle of his arms keep you in place.

Fighting is futile. His cockhead hits the back of your throat like oleander and he holds your jaw in place, dimpling your cheeks with his rough fingers, letting his balls slap against your chin.

Just as you're getting used to his size, he pulls out, breaking the strands of saliva and precum between you.

"Take off y'panties, sugar."

You pull them off and squirm at the way the gusset clings to your pussy lips a little while longer. Simon takes it against his nose and sniffs it, running his fingers through your pussy, spreading your slick.

You don't get a warning before he's curling one of his fingers into you. Massaging your walls. Scissoring you open. Thumbing your clit.

He adds another and twists them deeper—meaner—into you. He swallows your whimpers but spits them back into your mouth when he empties his saliva down your throat. He keeps stroking the inside of your pussy, your sticky walls, and rubbing your clit.

He squeezes your cheeks together and gives you a big kiss. He coos condescendingly into your lips, and licks away your fresh track of tears. "It's supposed to hurt, baby. Don't be mad, alright? It'll feel good soon."

He gets deeper and deeper. Knuckle-deep, when he curls his fingers inside you. You lock up tight and thrust your hips through the bulk of your orgasm, trembling and quivering around him.

Your lips quiver around a plea when he pulls his fingers out. It's a lapse of judgement on your part—you know it—but you can't help it anymore.

"Please what?" He grins. It's ugly. Like a truss of stitching falling off his face, mangled and chewed up.

"Can you g-go…" you squirm when he rolls his tumb over your clit, agonizingly slow. "Can you go–"

"C'mon baby," he whispers against your lips, "spit it out. Big girls use their words."

"Canyougodownonme?" you gasp and grip onto him, bucking your cunt into his palm.

He chuckles against your mouth. He kisses down your chest. He crinkles his nose against the husk of your pussy. He deeply inhales and vibrates at your scent. He darts his tongue out and flattens it against your dewy folds, licking a stripe up your slit.

You writhe but he holds you in place with those big, thickened hands of his. They're wet but at this point you can't tell if it's your arousal or that mysterious substance on him. You can't even think about it, not with your thoughts melting away, escaping you like the humming waves.

Simon's a bit too aggressive in how he eats you out. It doesn't come from a juvenile attempt influenced by sex-on-screen with undue emphasis, but rather his tongue spelling devotion into the fat of your cunt.

Your fingers flex into his blonde head of hair. It's closely cropped, but you still manage to pull him closer, grinding yourself down on the bumpy bridge his nose. You pull on his hair and he growls and sends a quake up your spine. He wraps his lips around your clit and swirls his tongue further into you, softly suckling your juices out.

The waves fold over each other, beating against the shore. They crest and crash and just as they race up the sand dune, teasing your flexing toes, your second orgasm crashes into you too. You twist and twirl Simon's hair in your grip and almost miss the feel of something cold being slipped onto your finger.

You're shaking, trembling, as you raise your hand. You're hazy and the moonlight is shrouded by clouds. It makes the mystery object look smeared across your vision, blotchy and spotty.

You hold it a little closer to your face, examining the twinkle as Simon massages your thighs to ease the quiver.

You turn your hand over and whisper your thumb over its curve.

You bristle when you realize what it is. It hangs off you a little loosely, burning your knuckle.

A pinchbeck wedding ring.

Stained with red, and still warm from the body it was pulled from.

Bile gathers in your throat and burns your mouth. Tears gather in your eyes. A small gasp parts your lips, billowing out of you like the mushroom-head of a flare just as realization fully commits itself to you.

You shiver. Both through realization, and your orgasm. "…What did you do to him?"

"Took care of him," Simon grunts, caressing your hair. "I'm supposed to handle the monsters under your bed, ain't I?"

You spare him a glance. You heed the white of his teeth and a smudge of—you know it's blood—across his cheek. His eyes, hidden in the shadowy canopy. His nose, bent out of shape and speckled with blood.

"You're not going to hurt me."

He brushes your hair back. "No."

You pant into him when he captures you for a kiss. "…Why?"

"I'm supposed to take care of ya," he grunts. "That's what couples do, no?"

He pushes something in your grasp—a folding knife. Your thumb slips over the two initials engraved into the handle—your initials.

"How do y'feel about Kate?" he asks.

Your coworker flashes into your mind. "I like her"

Simon—the Ghost—grunts. "And what about that bloke at the diner? What's his name?"

"I– Franklin?"

"Hn. Does he bother you?"

You thumb through your memory. Perhaps what you say is an embellishment, giddy of what Simon's going for.

"He did steal my bike once…" you mumble.

Simon pricks up. His chest puffs out and squishes against your arm. "He married?"

"Yeah, um," you swallow, "for about ten years."

"You want his pretty ring? Or his wife's?" Simon asks, then kisses you. "Anythin' you want."

Your lips stretch into a smile.

Simon cups your cheek, blood rubbing off on you. For the first time ever, you feel exhilarated at the thought of the future. At the thought of being taken care of. Doted on.

Suddenly the town doesn't feel so cold anymore. It doesn't feel like an invisible barricade is hemming you in. Simon is your ticket out of here, and a ticket to your new life.

You can abandon your pinafore and Mary Jane flats and maybe he'll spoil you with frilly socks and a cute sundress. Maybe he'll fuck you in his truck or in gas station bathrooms as the corpse of a man who wronged you rots in the truckbed. Maybe you'll get caught but at least you'll be together and at least your name will finally be known.

Not as the housekeeper girl, but Mrs Riley.

[bluepoodle7]

#RoadKillPlush #RoadkillGrayCoyoteDogSquishedFlatPlush #FlatPlush #UniquePlush #Plushies #HandmadePlush

Thinking about this Roadkill Gray Coyote Dog Squished Flat Plush and how unique this is. I wonder if this is handmade and who made this?

Images is not mine but link is there.

RARE ROADKILL GRAY COYOTE DOG SQUISHED FLAT PLUSH STUFFED ANIMAL TOY | eBay

[unfinishedslurs]

eddie's flat ass (steddie)

Dustin whips around as soon as they’re alone. “Steve!”

“I’m Eddie.”

“No, I mean you and Steve. You like him.”

“Of course I like him, Henderson,” Eddie says flatly, pressing a little harder on the gas in hopes of getting to Dustin’s house before he admits something he regrets. “We’re friends. Best buds. A couple of dudes being bros.”

“You’re full of shit,” Dustin says. “I’m not stupid. I saw that. I wish I hadn’t, but I saw it. You’re, like, stupidly into him. I don’t know how I didn’t see it before.”

“Jesus Christ,” Eddie mutters. His street can’t come soon enough. 

Dustin pushes through. “When are you gonna ask him out?”

“Uh, never?”

“What?!”

“Close your mouth, you’ll catch flies,” Eddie rolls his eyes. “Nothings going to happen, Henderson. Yeah, I’ve got a stupid fucking crush on your babysitter, it doesn’t mean that Steve’s interested in me. He likes girls, Dustin, did you miss that part in the dossier? He thinks we’re a couple of straight guys horsing around, if he found out I was flirting with him I could be thrown into Hunt the Freak 2: the thrilling sequel.”

Dustin’s mouth snaps shut, and he laughs nervously. “Right,” he agrees. “He likes girls. But, uh, hypothetically, if he was into guys…”

They roll to a stop sign, and Eddie turns away from the road to tell the little shit off. But Dustin’s fidgeting, staring steadfast at the road and refusing to meet his eye. 

“You know something,” he realizes. 

“Uh…”

Eddie’s about to shake it out of him. “You’re hiding something, you little shit. What is it? Tell me.”

“I’m not,” he squeaks. 

“Bull-shit you aren’t. What is it? Is it about Steve?” Eddie pales. “Shit, does he know about me?”

“Well…”

“What the hell?!”

“I didn’t tell him!” Dustin yelps. “If you didn’t want him to know, maybe you shouldn’t have been so obvious!”

“Check your tone,” he snaps, hand shaking as he pulls on his hair. “Shit, shit, shit, okay, it’s fine, I just need to flee the country—“

“Why?”

Eddie is this close to throttling the kid. “What do you mean why?”

“Why is this such a big deal?”

“It could get me killed!” He shouts, banging a hand against the steering wheel. “He could—he could fucking tell somebody, and—“

“He wouldn’t do that!”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know that? You think someone’s a good guy until you’re interested in them, and then it’s all ‘You’re fucking disgusting,’ or ‘Freak,’ or ‘Don’t touch me, you fa—‘“

“Stop!” Dustin shouts, white knuckling the armrest. “Eddie, stop. He’s not going to tell anyone. It’s gonna be okay. It’s fine.”

“It’s not.”

“It’s fine,” Dustin stresses. “Steve doesn’t care if you’re gay. He definitely doesn’t mind you flirting with him.”

“You don’t know that,” Eddie says. 

“Yeah I do.”

“How?”

There’s that deer in headlights look again. Then Dustin takes a deep breath, and his expression turns guilty. 

“I know you’re not supposed to tell people this,” he says, “but you’re freaking out really bad and I’m, like, 99% sure Steve thinks you already know.”

“Steve thinks I know what?”

Dustin tells him. 

Two hours later, he’s still laying on the floor in the trailer, looking up at the ceiling. 

Bisexual. Steve Harrington, the man Eddie’s always hailed as the patron saint of heterosexuality, likes men. 

Might like Eddie. 

“Are you flirting with me?” Eddie blurts out, and immediately tries to bolt. 

He runs face first into a wall and ends up on the ground, wishing the demobats had just killed him. 

Steve appears in his line of vision, standing over his sprawled body. Eddie is treated to a wonderful view, eyes moving from his long, athletic legs to his crotch to his chest and broad shoulders, and finally reaches his face. His very amused face. 

Eddie’s entire body lights on fire. 

“What the hell was that?” Steve asks, laughing. 

“Uh…”

“Wile E Coyote over here. Seriously, man, that was some Loony Toons shit. I’m embarrassed for you.”

“Oh my God, shut up,” he groans. “Just let me die.”

“No way in hell. Sorry, Munson, I put too much work into saving your flat ass to throw it away like that.” Steve grins, holding a hand out for Eddie to take. He ignores it, rolling over so Steve can’t see how red his face is. 

“My ass isn’t flat,” he mumbles into the carpet. 

“Oh, it is,” Steve says cheerfully, nudging said ass with his foot, because he’s a bastard. Eddie doesn’t know why he likes him so much. Everything he does is catastrophically bad for his continued survival. “It’s cute though. I like it.”

“Henderson said, uh, that you were…umm…maybeflirtingwithme?” Eddie finishes in a rush. 

“What?”

Steve’s face is open, automatically tilting his right ear towards Eddie. Eddie doesn’t know if he’s aware that’s something he does. Robin says it’s because of all the concussions, his left ear just isn’t what it used to be. 

Eddie sags, unable to lie to his wide-eyed confusion. “Dustin said you're flirting with me.”

Steve stares at him. 

Eddie fidgets under his incredulous gaze, growing more anxious by the minute. Oh God, Dustin was wrong. Dustin was wrong about everything. Steve probably doesn’t even actually like boys, Jesus. The whole thing is obviously a bust. Eddie needs to cut and run, maybe make some bullshit excuse about his uncle needing him home even though Steve knows Wayne’s working right now—

“You needed Henderson to tell you that?”

[miraculan-draws]

I know I've said this before but I cannot make myself vibe with "cured" Astarion stuff. It falls a little flat for me—like there's a spark missing. There's like a bit of silly mischief that I read from being a "creature of the night," like foxes and cats and coyotes, something dark but with a shameless whimsy that I very heavily associate with him. He's a vampire elf. What a fun vibe!! You'd think it would be entirely contradictory, but it isn't! BeCAUSE of his personality.

That's the whole point of him is to subvert a lot of the moody broody vampire tropes! We watch him BREAK FREE of those implications. And if I had to guess, he was probably a ghoulish little freak (affectionate) when he was alive too. I don't think Astarion HAS vampirism, I think he IS a vampire. I think a guy named after a starry sky can absolutely thrive at night. He's having FUN he said so himself.

Like all his dialogue about blood is even delivered like a little gremlin. He is a raccoon sniffing around for snacks. He lets you dump nasty old blood on him flash dance style and he doesn't even startle he's like "it would be better if it was fresh".

I don't know maybe I'm thinking too deep into it. But Astarion being a nasty little creechur is important to me.

[ms-demeanor]

Why do you like the desert?

good smells, good sounds, good animals. I like how dry the air is and I like sandstorms. I really really love it when it rains in the desert and the whole world smells like creosote and all the flowers open up in the morning. I like how clear the skies are and I like big tall stacks of thunderclouds and I like how bright the moonlight is and I like how many stars you can see. I like red rocks and sand dunes and the big cracks in dry lakebeds. I like lizards and roadrunners and big rangy hares and rattlesnakes and owls. I like going out on moonless nights to look for scorpions, because there are more of them out when the moon is down because it lets them hunt better and you can look for them with a black light and watch them glow. I like random people on ATVs buzzing past and letting the air out of the tires a little bit to get through the canyon. I like finding cabins that are getting eaten by the wind and are full of rat's nests and old books with the words weathered away. I like the way the line between the sky and the earth turns pink and blue at the beginning and the end of the day. I like seeing the milky way and watching meteors and hearing echoes and hearing nothing and hearing cicadas cicadas cicadas.

When my Uncle died, I drew these two pieces because locating him in my memory took me to these two places; a backyard with a fence between us and the coyotes as we looked up at the stars and a red rock canyon quiet and full of dark shadows.

The thing that I didn't draw is a man standing in a sandy flat surrounded by creosote bushes holding a kite-string in his teeth teeth and splicing it with his fishing line so that I could fly my little pink kite higher in the big blue sky than it was really meant to go.

goddamn do i love the desert and miss my family.

[mutant-distraction]

Highway in Death Valley National Park,

Death Valley National Park, located in eastern California and partially extending into Nevada, is known for its extreme landscapes and unique geological features. It covers an area of about 3.4 million acres (13,650 square kilometers) within the Mojave Desert. Key features include dramatic terrain like salt flats, sand dunes, badlands, canyons, and mountain ranges. It is home to Badwater Basin, the lowest point in North America at 282 feet (86 meters) below sea level. The park experiences extremely hot summers and mild winters, with temperatures reaching record highs. Major attractions include Badwater Basin, Zabriskie Point, Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes, Devil's Golf Course, and diverse desert wildlife such as bighorn sheep, coyotes, and kit foxes.

source: First Alert Weather

[caramara3]

Just Friends...? [1]

a Damian Priest x Reader Imani Cove fic

Summary: After a drunken night out, WWE Superstars and estranged friends Imani Cove and Damian Priest wake up to find themselves naked in bed together with no recollection of what happened the night before. They both choose to go on pretending as if nothing ever happened, but soon find out it’s easier said than done, especially when the lines of friendship begin to blur around them…

Warnings: plot, slow burn, angst, language, mature sexual content 18+, ofc, fluff, semi-friends to lovers

Word Count: 2.5k

**Partially Edited and Proofread**

**Interactive**

Notes: Thank y'all so much for reading!! Leave a comment, heart, share, and enjoy the ride!!!

Italic writing signifies an inside thought.

Inspired playlist for story

Chapter 1: The Morning

~Morning after Backlash Puerto Rico~

“Uugh… oww.”

You groan softly and shift your body, regretting that decision almost immediately. It’s not like being a wrestler for almost 12 years now, you weren’t used to a little soreness and tension after a match, especially one as rough as last night’s Last Woman Standing match against your current and all-time favorite feud partner/bestie Bayley. 

But Lord was this a different kind of sore. 

Every single muscle in your body felt like they had been stabbed with the tiniest needle ever created while also being set on fire. Your back felt like you’d been thrown through plexiglass over a dozen times. In your mind you made a mental note to have your chiropractor send Bales his thanks for keeping him in business.

“Ow… oww… argh, ow!”

You wince at each small movement as you open your eyes only to be met with a soft but heavy material. You begin to pull it from over your head and are immediately met with the morning sun shining its insanely bright ass through the hotel window.

“Ah, oh God! Absolutely not!”

You grimace and pull the material back over your face, sinking deeper and deeper into your fluffy fortress as you wait for the throbbing pain in your head to subside. 

Great, you thought to yourself. Sore and hungover: the perfect combination. 

You lay your head flat against the mattress as you try to remember the events of last night. But as you did everything felt like a jumbled and confusing blur.

Tequila is an evil bitch from the depths of hell…

You can remember leaving the arena and catching a ride back to the hotel with Zelina as well as getting ready with her to go out for the night to celebrate. 

And though you really didn’t want to, you remembered the call with your lying, cheating, bastard of a now EX-fiance Marcus before leaving the hotel, demanding that he have all of his things cleared out of your home by the time you came back. 

Fuck you Marcus…

You can remember getting to the club late and having shots immediately pushed in your face, the thought alone made you feel queasy as if you could still smell the Don Julio. 

You can remember getting pulled onto the dancefloor by… wait was it Cruz?? No it was Carmelo.

Or maybe it was Santos. 

Knight??

You can remember when your best friend Rhea arrived alongside Dominik, Finn, and JD. 

More shots.

You remember kicking your shoes off somewhere on the dancefloor cause the DJ was on one that night, playing banger after banger after banger. Was this when Finn was dancing with you??

But wait, was this before or after JD stepped on your foot while you were trying to teach him how to salsa??

More shots.

You remembered some random drunk guy trying to feel up on you and Rhea. And how he damn near started a brawl with every guy on the roster because of it before getting thrown out on his drunk ass.

More dancing. More shots.

So. Many. Shots.

Dancing on the bar with Samantha & Zelina like you were in Coyote Ugly and damn near slipping off the bar.

Getting cheered on in the ladies room while you flushed your engagement ring down the toilet.

Again, fuck you Marcus.

You hadn’t seen him come in with everyone, but at one point you noticed Damian Priest sitting over in a corner all by himself. You remember… pulling his stupidly large self on the dancefloor to dance with you? 

Why in the world would you do that? 

Or was it some other outrageously tall good-looking guy who resembled a younger Undertaker but Puerto Rican and from the Bronx…? 

Even more dancing. 

Shots. Shots. Shots. 

Ugh, god why did I keep letting Rhea feed me all those damn shots? I swear I’m gonna kill her next time I see her. But how did I get back to the hotel?  

Suddenly a flash of a memory appeared through the blurry fog of your mind. Lights. You remember seeing lights, streaks of gold and white racing past you. Was this from the time when you were in the cab? You wrap yourself in the memory, hoping more would come back.

Touch. You remember hands. Rough, calloused hands with the softest and most gentle touch brushing against your skin, pulling you onto their lap. Their touch traveling up from your neck down your spine before resting on your bottom, kneading your ass firmly. Caressing your skin as if it had been made of silk.

Taste. You could still taste his lips on yours. You felt them traveling up your neck to your earlobe, nibbling on that tender spot that makes you weak in the knees. Your shoulder, along your collarbone, in between the valley of your breasts, softly biting your nipple, trailing down your stomach… the action sending vibrations up and down your body.

Sound. A deep and foreboding voice in your ear, whispering the dirtiest things you could ever imagine, you softly moaning against his chest as his fingers… his fingers…

“Ugh.”

You let out a soft groan and go to rub your temples, a wave of nausea washing over you as the after effects of your night out for the first time since waking up begin to set in. Just like that the memory is gone, leaving you even more frustrated but also turned on. What and who did this to you?

You can’t remember the last time you’d gotten this drunk. Yes you can, two years ago during the weekend that Marcus proposed to you. He had booked this gorgeous resort in Barbados for the two of you with a private pool overlooking the beach. The night he asked you to marry him, the two of you had gotten so drunk you ended up running down to the beach, stripping down to nothing but your bra and panties, jumped into the ocean & then…

At that thought, your eyes widened in terror and you felt your heart drop down to your stomach.

Oh. Oh god no…

You lift up the side of the ivory comforter to glance over the edge onto the floor and see clothes, namely a lacy purple thong, ripped and strewn across it.

No, no, no. Imani Jade please tell me you didn’t…

That nausea from earlier began to creep up once again. You knew you had to look, but you didn’t want to. After a few moments,several deep breaths, and inner monologue pep talks, you psych yourself up just enough to do it. You release a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding and slowly lift the comforter and gaze down at your body.

Fuck. Me.

It was bad enough that you were as naked as the day you came into the world, but from the look of things, whatever you got into last you had a pretty good time doing it. Your eyes follow down your body, navigated by the trail of small purple marks decorating your lower half. 

There was one just above your collarbone and one along the valley of your breasts, thankfully blending into your sternum tattoo. One hiding just under your left nipple, two or three up the side of your hip bone just near your tattoo, and then several decorating all along your inner thighs.

Shit, shit, shit. What the fuck Imani? You’ve only been newly single for all of three days and this is how you decide to celebrate? By getting shit faced and letting some random dick cover you in hickies?!?!

You ignore your body practically screaming for you to be still and move into a seated position in the bed, hand raised to shield you from any amount of sunlight creeping in. A soft hiss leaves your mouth as you feel your bare back press itself against the cold wooden headboard. On sheer instinct you grab the sheet from the bed and pull it up to cover your body. 

Oh, now we wanna be modest. It’s a little too late for that don’t you think?

You looked over to your left, expecting to find your phone on the nightstand charging, alongside your iPad with the light purple leather cover and your glasses. But your phone’s not there, neither is your purple leather covered iPad or your glasses.

Oh no. No no no no...

You look around the room, your eyes widening in shock upon the realization: this was not your room. 

In fairness, after spending nearly a decade on the road it gets to a point where all the hotels you stay at begin to blend together. But no matter what you were always, ALWAYS, able to tell which was your room and which wasn’t. And this was NOT your room. None of your things were here: your gym bag with your backup ring gear for last night weren’t laid out on the couch near the window, your laptop wasn’t sitting open on the desk just as you had left it before leaving, there were no makeup or various hair products stretched out along the top of dresser, and your lavender carry-on and backpack were not tucked away in the corner by the couch. 

This wasn’t your room. It was the same hotel, but a different room.

What you did notice was your purse, your dress and your heels from last night alongside a very large set of men’s clothes creating a trail that starts at the door and leads towards the foot of the bed.  

You also couldn’t help but notice that there were not one… 

not two… 

BUT THREE shiny, reflective, and OPEN gold foil packets tossed along the ground and nightstand.

Three? Goddamn Imani… I mean, at least you were safe right? That has to count for something… right?  

You let out a soft groan and bring your knees up to your chest, placing your head atop them as you try yet again to remember what happened last night.

Come on Imani, think. What exactly happened from leaving the club to getting back to the hotel that got you here? How did you get back? Who did you ride with?? Please tell me he was at least hot and very well-endowed. 

Stadium. Club. Dancing. Shots. Bye bye ring… blank space.

Stadium. Club. Dancing. Shots. Bye bye ring… nothing.

Stadium. Club. Dancing. Shots. Bye bye ring… nada.

“Ugh. This is a nightmare.”

This wasn’t like you, you were not this kind of girl. Sure, you had a couple hookups here and there in your early twenties, not to mention the “hot girl summer” during college, but you quickly outgrew that! You were a grown-up now, and grown-ups don't do nothing so crazy where you can’t remember it actually happening! And they especially don’t hook up with random strangers while technically on a goddamn work trip!! 

Through all the emotional and mental chaos currently going on in your mind, you felt a sense of heaviness across your pelvis. For the first time since waking up you notice a very large, very muscular, and very tatted arm stretched across your stomach. The sound of soft snores now filled the once quiet room, like a faint rasp blending seamlessly with the stillness of the moment. 

You took a breath, held it, and slowly turned your head to the left. You didn’t see a face, but rather a large figure sleeping peacefully, engulfed in the warmth of the hotel linen. 

When you went to move your hand to remove the blanket, a low grumble stops you dead in your tracks. The body under the blanket suddenly shifts and turns over on its side, their back now completely facing you, before settling after a few seconds. You froze and wait for a few seconds for the sound of soft breathing to know they were still asleep. 

You hadn’t the slightest idea what you would say to if he were. It had been a long time since you’d had a one-night stand and weren’t really sure if the rules were still the same. 

Do you start with a “hi” or “Good Morning random dude?” Do you thank Mr. Random Dick for the sex? Could you possibly try and sneak out before they wake up?? 

Like, what was the standard practice and protocol here??

Once you were absolutely sure he was asleep you grip the blanket and slowly pull it away until the whole of his back was revealed to you. You gasp loudly and practically jump up off the bed and right onto the plush carpeted floor, landing hard on your ass with a heavy thud.

“Ah, son of a bitch!” you shriek, wincing at the pain of the impact.

But you ignore the immediate pain and spring up to peek over the bed, your eyes peering over the edge of the mattress as Mr. Random Dick on the bed started to wake up. He groaned and moaned, stretching his body out as if he’d just been awoken from a long deep hibernation. You couldn’t move, all you could do was sit there like a weirdo, buck naked on the carpet watching him. He sat up and stretched yet again, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. You watched as every single muscle on his back spasmed and flexed from the movement.

But your eyes were fixated on just one thing: his back. His back had looked like he’d gone ten rounds with a mountain lion and lost. Indents in the shape of crescents decorated the back of his shoulders while the sides of his back were painted in streaks of pink and red. Some welts looked like the result of being hit with something multiple times, others looked like the result of fingernails being dragged down his skin. But your eyes couldn't help but keep going to the giant piece of art that was etched into the center of his back.

From afar someone could easily mistake it as just a standard skull tattoo, but up close it revealed something more. The skull made way for the inside art, resembling that of a dark grim reaper.

You’ve seen that grim reaper before. Many times in fact.

I mean why wouldn’t you? After all, the two of you worked together.

And up until about ten months ago, you had considered him to be one of your closest friends.

His eyes began to open and you quickly ducked your head back down, pressing your back to the carpet and covering your face with your hands like that would actually hide you in this moment.

This was a joke. This had to be a joke.

Some sick, twisted, perverted version of a prank that the universe was playing on you. Of all the men in the world you could have slept with, all the random dick being slung around desperately begging to be some woman's drunken mistake... why did your drunken mistake have to be with him?!?!

The room had gone a little too quiet for your liking so you peeked through your fingers, gasping as his head emerged from over the edge of bed to look down at you. His dark brown eyes widened in shock at you lying on the floor of his room; naked, disheveled, and covered in purple marks. 

“Oh my god-,” he began to trail off, the panic and exhaustion seeping to the surface. His voice cracked slightly, the usual confidence he exhumed nowhere to be found.

“Imani?”

Your eyes tried to avoid his gaze, but couldn't look anywhere but his eyes. You slowly release the breath you hadn’t realized you’d been holding all this time, your voice soft and shaky as you spoke.

“Hey Damian.” 

Tag List:

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[pinescent-and-gingerbread]

Can I request a drabble where Arthur comforts a female reader who has a broken heart? The reader's ex-boyfriend cheated on her and left with another woman.

Here we go! I took the liberty to name Reader's ex Jim (pretty random name for that place and time so I thought it would fit alright.)

I hope you'll like it anon!!🙌

࣪ ˖✧ The World is living.

✦ Pairing: Arthur Morgan x Fem!Reader ✦ Warnings/Tags: Mention of cheating, reader's ex is a loser (boo him), reader is in a pretty bad mental state but Arthur is here to save the day, cursing cause he's mad as hell someone hurt you. ✦ Words: 1,5k ✦ a/n: As Anon had requested a drabble I tried to keep this short! Takes place in Clement's Point because the lake is so good for that kind of work, reader is part of the gang. Clearly this drabble is a big hug to all my sis out there who have been poorly treated by their ex🫶🏻

You were sitting by the shore, just behind camp. Flat Iron Lake was always beautiful at that time, just before dawn. Frosty, pastel colors on the sky and the water surfaces, melting into a soft shade of pale lavender and teal blue. You could only hear the occasional chirping of birds, splashing of an adventurous fish jumping out of the water, and lonely howls of coyotes.

The World was living.

You couldn't understand how. How did the World was still turning while you were hurting that much? It should have stopped. It should have. This was the only option after what you had been through.

You felt tears watering your eyes again. You couldn't sleep, as often lately, so you just had decided to come and sit here in the sand to do something, anything else than just lying in your cot, alone in the cold night, alone in the cold silence, alone in the cold emptiness. Alone, so alone even though you were surrounded by people at camp; it didn't mattered. He was gone now, and everything felt tasteless without him, everything looked drearier, even the beautiful morning scenery under your eyes.

You were now crying hard. Damn it, you didn't even knew you still had water in your body for it. You had cried so many times in the past few days your eyes were permanently red, your cheeks scarred by two trails of dry tears; you felt like one of those oranges that people squeeze to get the juice, leaving behind only a corpse of fruit devoid of all substance.

You couldn't do it anymore, it hurt too much. You buried your face in your hands, sobbing once again, trying to let out the sorrow that was eating you up from inside like a noxious parasite since he had left you.

"Y/N? Is everythin' okay?"

You tilted your head up, a slight feeling of panic and shame crashing on you as you searched for your interlocutor.

It was Arthur. He was a few meters away from you, empty bucket in his hands. He probably was on his way to the lake to fill it, but had heard you crying. You weren't too surprised to see him this early, Arthur had never slept much, he was always up before you in normal time, already helping everyone around camp.

He looked at you in the eyes, waiting for an answer. He seemed genuinely concerned; you realized you hadn't seen him for a while since he had been on a difficult job for weeks, he probably should have came back during the night, but you were far too deep in your own dark thoughts to have noticed it. He was clearly clueless and surprised about your state, his arms hanging awkwardly by his sides, his blue work shirt's sleeves rolled up carelessly.

"N-no..." You only answered, trying to wipe what you could of the literal torrent of tears flooding out of your eyes, but it just wouldn't stop, you felt even more ashamed. You must have looked pitiful right now.

Arthur let go of the bucket, letting it fall on the ground without an ounce of care. He then slowly approached you, and sat down in the sand next to you, leaving a little space between your two bodies. He didn't look disturbed or annoyed, but almost as stoic as usual. Except for his eyes. His eyes were telling a hundred stories even if he didn't wanted it. Their azure color bright and deep, you almost recognized a hint of sadness in them, as if he was pained seeing you like this. 

"What's happenin' to ya, miss?" He inquired, voice deep and maybe a bit more empathetic than usual. He wasn't extremely expressive in usual times, so yet you could feel just by his presence how he cared about your well-being.

"It's Jim... He... He slept with one of these pretty girls from the Parlour House and he left me for her..." Saying it was making it all even worse. It was making it all too real. You struggled to get those words out, your tone cracking up as if they were crushing your vocal cords.

More tears, your eyes shutting close in a pained expression, the ache in your heart physically hurting you, as if someone had opened your thoracic cage and was crushing it with his bare hands. In a way, that's exactly what he had done to you.

"Goddamn piece of shit..." Arthur mumbled before looking at you, his intense indigo stare fixated on your face. He felt genuinely sorry, and outraged for you. Who in the world could have to audacity to hurt such a sweet girl like you? He was starting to clench his fists, feeling his blood boiling, a silent kettle on a burning fire. After a few seconds of hearing you cry, he couldn't hold it anymore, empathy getting the better of his rage, and opened his arms to gently pull you against him.

His strong, wide body enveloped you, and you let him. You buried your face into his chest, not really thinking about it, your hands wrapping around his waist, and gripping tight on his shirt. Looking clingy or odd was your last concern, you were way too blinded by your pain. You started crying loudly, wanting to make everything go out of you, your pain, your sadness, Him, everything.

"Yeah, that's it girl, let it all go..." He encouraged you, in a calm and quiet whisper. One of his hands had found its place behind your head, gently caressing it, the other resting around your waist. He carried you, as you screamed your pain to the World, as you poured all these gnawing feelings outside of you.

"He's a damn fool, Y/N. You deserve way better than him, lemme tell ya." Arthur murmured to you, voice still deep and caring. You could also hear behind that a hint of genuine anger in his tone, as he truly was pissed at Jim for having harmed you like this. "And you're gonna be okay, alright sweetheart?"

You slightly nodded into his chest, barely able to answer something properly. His scent and warmth were enfolding you, and you felt like you were somewhere else now, somewhere sunny. Somewhere pleasant. Somewhere better.

As the minutes went by, and his embrace didn't loosen, you slowly started to get out of your personal darkness, breath calming, thoughts clearing. You were taking in the fact that usually, Arthur wasn't frankly fond of hugs or other physical attention, and you felt thankful. He was doing this just for you.

"You're gonna be okay." He repeated like a silent vow. You felt like he was going to make sure of it. And for the first time in days, you honestly believed these words. You were going to be okay. It would take time, of course, but you just knew you would, as certain as the Sun was rising and setting every day.

You gently pulled back, both of you still holding each other in your arms, sitting on the sandy shore, but not as close, so you could look at this face. Your tears had soaked his shirt. You tried to apologize for it, but he quickly opposed it, telling you he had been covered in far worse than your tears. You smiled a bit, knowing he was right.

"Thank you so much for that Arthur..." You told him, genuinely feeling so grateful.

"Eh, I may be a cold-hearted killer, but I wouldn't have let a sweet lil' flower like ya cry..." He asserted, a slight grin on his face. You noticed how he looked a bit reassured himself, less worried. Maybe, just like his affection towards the other members of the gang, Arthur actually cared much more about you than what he was letting everyone see.

He carefully wiped the last tear from your cheek, thumb feeling rough but gentle against your skin, before getting up, his hands leaving your body but not going too far away as he proposed one of them for you to take and help you get up. You gladly took it, enjoying the warm contact of your fingers on his skin.

"I just feel like... I'm not enough..." You concluded with a pained tone, your eyes looking down at your feet. The fact that on top of having broken up with you, Jim had left you for another woman, was absolutely destroying you, making you feel like you were worthless. It was also this feeling that was so hard to handle; so hard to live with.

"Listen t'me." Arthur told you a bit more firmly, his eyes searching for yours. He knew how you felt, he felt bad about himself every day of his life. He didn't wanted you to feel like this in any way, ever. "Don't let this bastard make ya feel shitty. You're a beautiful, sweet, kind young woman, that is the truth." He asserted, his hands squeezing yours in a comforting gesture before letting go of them.

"Thank you, Arthur..." You said once more, feeling like you were repeating yourself, but he didn't seem to mind. He was walking back to where he had left the bucket, grabbing it to finish his chore.

"Ah, no worry, miss." He said to you with a smile, now feeling better as you felt less depressed. "Let me tell ya, this piece of shit better be far by now, 'cause I'm goin' to beat the Hell out of him if I ever see him again." He added, still smiling, but you knew he was being dead serious, and he was way more than capable of it. You almost chuckled, thanking him for the third time and telling him you wouldn't mind if he did.

He noticed the little grin that had curled up your lips. He loved it. His days at Clement's point weren't the same without your bright smile and your pleasant presence.

The Sun had completely risen now, the camp slowly emerging from its slumber. The first drowsy voices of your companion softly filling the air, yawning, saying greetings, some already teasing, merging with the sound of nature around you.

The World was living.

And now, so you were.

[homoquartz]

you've heard the scary story about the loneliest man in the world, right? it's a short spooky story people tell around campfires and such.

the story goes that one day, a terrible cataclysm wiped the human race off the map. it didn't destroy any of the buildings or the land or the animals, but all of the people in the world suddenly dropped dead. maybe the cause was a contagion or chemical warfare gone out of control. it doesn't matter anymore.

there is no one left on earth except for one man. he was just lucky, or perhaps unlucky, enough to survive whatever had killed everyone else in the world. he doesn't know why.

he lives in a cabin in the middle of nowhere. somewhere where the ground is flat and stretches for 100s of miles without reaching the ocean. he runs a little homestead for himself, well-supplied with his chickens and goats, as well as a vegetable garden.

it sounds peaceful, but humans are a social species, and his total solitude weighs on him more and more each day. every night, he listens to the insects and the coyotes, missing the background hum of human life. you never notice it until it's gone. and it will never come back. he is completely and utterly alone.

and then one night, he hears a knock at the door...

do you think he would be more surprised to open the door and find a walrus or a fairy?

[goldenseresinretriever]

False Confidence: Chapter 7

Pairing: Javy “Coyote” Machado x Reader

Part of the San Diego Dogfighters universe

Summary: The Athletic named Javy Machado the fifth sluttiest player in the NHL last year. He’s a known playboy who leaves every game with a different girl. As far as he’s concerned he’s living the dream, playing his dream job with the dream lifestyle. Unfortunately his friends and bosses don’t agree. At 33, they think it’s time for him to settle down. You’re a kindergarten teacher at an esteemed private school. You don't expect much when you finally accept your colleague’s invitation to attend her husband’s hockey game but when you accidentally get separated in the post-game rush, you find yourself in a compromising situation with the last person you’d ever expected to meet. When his PR rep suggests a mutually beneficial agreement, your hands are tied. How long will you have to keep up the act? And how long will you be able to?

Chapter CW: 18+ ONLY, swearing, angst, fluff, fake relationship, mentions of death, suggestive language, anxiety, school system inaccuracies, hockey inaccuracies etc. There will be individual chapter warnings. No use of Y/N.

Word Count: 3.8k

A/N: This one’s kind of quick but it is what it is

Previous Chapter // Series Masterlist // Next Chapter

When you wake up on Wednesday, the shame and anxiety that clawed your heart to sleep last night have melted into simmering anger that licks into white-hot fury as the day goes on. Last night when you’d left the bar, you’d felt so stupid. Stupid for believing that Javy respected you enough to be loyal to your agreement even if he didn’t have to be loyal to you. That’s the thing, the women didn’t bother you. You’d known what you were getting into the second Javy shoved his tongue down your throat the day you met. That and when you’d made it clear that you had no intention of warming his bed, you’d acknowledged that someone else probably would be. You’d just hoped he would respect you enough to have a little discretion. Zam was right, the bar was full of people with phones, cameras, and social media that would have eaten photos of Javy and those girls right up.

This time when you pull into the parking garage at Hard Deck Arena, your hands don’t shake as you hold back the urge to slam your car door as your flats slap against the concrete floors and the sound echoes through the space. You wrench the door to the arena open and trust your feet as they guide you to the door marked with the pink plaque. You knock on the door and thankfully a voice from inside calls out for you to enter. You barely wait for the door to shut before the words are out of your mouth. “I want out.” Zam looks up from her computer, pink lips parting slightly in surprise, though whether that’s due to your unexpected visit or what you’ve just said, you’re unsure. When she doesn’t answer, you enunciate the words again. “I. Want. Out. I’m done with the contract.” That seems to burst whatever bubble she’s trapped in.

“Roadie…” She says and you shake your head.

“No Zam, I’m done. I mean it.” Her lips purse into a thin line and she nods slowly. “Is there something I need to sign or anything? I can’t exactly afford a lawyer right now but I can try and figure out something if I have to.” You’re running out of steam now that Zam’s confirmed that you can get out of the contract. Relief washes cool through your veins, soothing the anger that’s been powering you all day.

“No, no, nothing like that. It’s not like you’re on our payroll or anything. The contract was more of a formality for the legal team in case things went sideways for any particular reason. “Consider it done unless you want to rip the physical copy up for closure.”

You’re surprised when you nod. “Yeah, I think I would actually,” she smiles faintly at that as she nods and gets up to root around in a file cabinet. She pulls a familiar sheet of paper out of a pink manila folder before she hands it over to you. You take a long look at the contract, unable to stop your eyes from wandering to the bottom of the page and tracing your and Javy’s signatures. This is for the best. You grip the top of the paper and rip. The sound seems to echo in the quiet of the room. That is, until the door swings open without warning and Javy walks into Zam’s office unannounced.

“Zam have you heard from-“ he blinks, surprised, as he takes in the sight of you, blinking back at him wide-eyed. “…Roadie.” You’ve moved to tear the contract smaller and you break the silence with the sound before you’re attempting to make it past Javy to the door of Zam’s office. Javy sticks an arm out to grab the door that’s still in the process of swinging closed behind him, effectively barring your path. “Hey Roadie, I’ve been trying to reach you all day.” You blocked his number last night once you got home. Originally you’d planned for it to be temporary while you gathered your thoughts. Now you doubt it’s a decision that will ever be undone.

You suppress the urge to roll your eyes and school your features, pressing the torn pieces of the contract into his chest which he has the sense to grab with his free hand while you duck under his arm, making your escape. You don’t look back as you call out to him. “Goodbye, Javy.”

***

Javy leans on the doorbell with a force that he should be concerned about, but he can’t find himself to care. The sound of a chorus of barks makes him slump with relief until the door swings open and it’s not who he’s looking for. Bugs is standing in the doorway, arms crossed across her chest as Pudding and Taz squirm from where they're sitting behind her legs, no doubt commanded to remain there by their mother. Her brow is furrowed and she’s glaring at him. While Javy’s been on the other side of Zam’s wrath, he’s had yet to cross his best friend’s girlfriend and somehow her wrath is scarier than his PR rep’s. He swallows, hard.

“Bugs,” he acknowledges and her brow furrows deeper but she doesn’t say a word. “Listen, is Jake here?” He asks, scratching the back of his neck, the tension making him uncomfortable. She hums in a way that gives him nothing before stepping back from the doorway and jerking her chin towards the living room, a silent invitation for him to come in.

He steps into the house and Bugs directs the dogs to move for him before she leads them off to where he assumes she’s planning to keep them while he and Jake talk. Javy’s surprised to find the living room is empty when he gets there, however, and just as he’s about to turn around and search for either of the house’s inhabitants, Bug’s voice startles him. “Sit down, Javy.” The firmness of her tone doesn’t leave room for argument so he sits down on the couch, awkwardly. She stands across from him. “Javy, four months ago you were asking me not to hurt Jake and now I feel like we’ve reversed roles here.” Her anger melts and Javy gets a look at the tired woman behind her anger. “What you did was cruel, Javy. I don’t know why you did it, and maybe I don’t deserve to know, but she does, Javy. She deserves closure even if she can’t have your respect.”

The sound of the front door breaks the silence followed by the sound of Jake’s voice. “Bunny, I’m home, are you here?”

“In the living room, babe, we’ve got company.”

Jake appears in the living room a few moments later, hair pushed back and damp with sweat. He looks like he’s just gotten back from a run. “Javy,” he says and Javy nods to acknowledge his best friend. Jake looks between Javy and Bugs before he tilts his head towards the back door. “Come for a walk with me?” He asks and Javy nods again, wordlessly before he stands and leads the way to the back door.

Jake doesn’t say anything until they’ve made it halfway down the beach behind the house. “So, Javy what are you doing here?” He asks like he doesn’t already know.

“Look, man, I…” Javy trails off, letting his eyes follow the water as it laps up against their bare feet. “I fucked up. I know that.” Jake shakes his head.

“You didn’t just fuck up, Javy,” Jake says, and Javy flinches at the bitterness in Jake’s voice. “You made a promise to Roadie. You signed a damn contract, and then not only did you embarrass her, but you did it at an event YOU invited her to. What the actual FUCK, man? What did that sweet girl ever do to deserve that?” He shakes his head. “Hell, Javy I signed off on this, I let this happen, and you went and did something not only extremely rude but it was cruel. And I know no matter what happened between the two of you, she didn’t deserve that, Javy. Not from anyone, and certainly not from you.”

“I know I just…”

“You just WHAT, Javy?!” Jake snaps finally and Javy looks up, surprised. Jake’s genuinely upset with him. “I’ve kept my mouth shut for years man, because no matter what you were doing at least it was mutually understood between you and whatever girl you were fooling around with that it wasn’t serious. No one was getting hurt so I kept my damn mouth shut and let it happen. I thought one day you’d wake up from whatever daydream it is you’re stuck in and decide to grow up even if you didn’t want to settle down because I respect that if that’s not something you want. And then Roadie got involved and I thought maybe it was the start of something new and maybe she’d be the catalyst that got you to change and not only did you not change but someone actually got hurt this time, Javy.”

“Don’t pretend that you understand,” Javy grits out, fists tightening next to him.

“Understand what, Javy? What is there to understand? I’ve been begging you to explain it for years and you refuse to-”

“Because you wouldn’t get it!” Javy snaps, turning on Jake. “And don’t you dare pretend to understand because you don’t!”

“Why, why wouldn’t I-”

“BECAUSE YOU LEFT!” Javy snaps and Jake has the good sense to look surprised. “You left Arizona and you never once thought about how that affected everyone else, about how that affected me!” His chest is heaving as the anvil that’s been sitting on it for years lifts. “And I didn’t hate you for it, I really tried not to. You had a chance to be close to home and you took it and I couldn’t be mad, I really couldn’t. You were amazing and you were destined for greatness and maybe it was childish of me, but I always thought we’d be great together.” He shakes his head, trying to ignore the sting of tears threatening to push their way to the surface. “And then, after I’d finally made peace with it, you got hurt, left Dallas, and came to San Diego, knowing I would be there, and you didn’t even bother to give me a heads up. You were my brother, Jake, I always considered you one. But somewhere along the way, you reminded me that I’m not, not really.”

Jake has the good sense to look embarrassed. “Okay, Javy, I fucked up, and I’m sorry. I didn’t realize me going to Dallas meant so much to you. And I know I’ve already apologized for what happened when I came here and I know I can’t do anything to make up for what I did, but I’m going to work every single day to try and make up for that.” He shakes his head. “But why does Roadie have to pay for my mistakes?” He asks and Javy feels his chest squeeze uncomfortably.

“I never knew my dad,” Javy whispers and he hates how quiet his voice sounds. “You know that.” He swallows, hard. “And my uncle passed when we were in college. The two most important men in my life were gone before I even turned 20. And then you left too. Everyone was leaving and I didn’t know how to cope with it. I didn’t want to be alone. I hated the way it made me feel and I didn’t want to feel that way anymore. I didn’t want to be alone, but I also didn’t ever want to be the reason someone felt the way I did.” He shrugs, lightly. “So I made sure that couldn’t happen.”

“By keeping things casual.” Jake finishes and Javy nods. “The problem is, someone actually got hurt this time.” Javy sighs deeply.

“Yeah, someone actually got hurt this time.”

“If you don’t want to hurt anyone, why did you do it?” Jake asks, but all the malicious ferocity from earlier has left his voice.

Javy shakes his head. “It was supposed to be fake, you know? It wasn’t supposed to be real, but damn it, it started feeling real. Or at least as real as I can remember anything feeling. I didn’t think, I invited her to karaoke without really thinking about it, and then the moment I had a moment to actually think about it, I panicked. Then those girls were there and it was just so easy to slip into old patterns so I did it without thinking.” He takes a shaky breath. “I didn’t mean to hurt her.” He hates how weak his voice sounds. “And I don’t know how to make it right.”

“Do you want to?” Jake asks, finally looking at Javy and Javy forces himself to meet the other man’s eyes.

“More than anything.” He pauses for a long moment. “She told Zam she wanted out of the contract. She ripped it up and threw it in my face.”

Jake lets out a chuckle, “good for her.” Javy finds himself matching the smile.

“Honestly, yeah,” he lets his mind drift for a second before his smile widens. “You know, she threw Josie Fitch’s expensive-ass shoes off the edge of the freeway?” Jake barks out a laugh and Javy chuckles in response.

“Did she really?” Javy nods.

“I think that’s the moment I fell in love with her,” Jake’s mouth drops open slightly before he attempts to school his features but Javy catches it. “If you ever tell anyone I said that, I’ll use your spare key and murder you in the dead of night.” Jake mimes zipping his lips before throwing the invisible key into the ocean.

“So what are you going to do to get her back?” Jake asks and Javy smiles to himself.

“I think I have a plan.”

***

It’s been two weeks since you ended the contract. Two weeks since you’ve been to Hard Deck Arena, and two weeks since you last saw Javy. For the most part, your life has gone back to the way it was. Well, except that everyone still thinks you’re dating Javy, not that you’ve done anything to correct them. In your defense, the conversations have never been directed to you so much as at you as you walk into the teachers’ lounge too quickly for the conversation to die before your arrival, or some people simply feeling shameless enough to quiet their voices in your presence.

Today, however, you don’t have time to worry about the whispers as you struggle to accommodate the horde of adults crowding into your classroom that’s never felt small until this exact moment. You try to push down the feeling of embarrassment that’s been plaguing you all morning. In your rush this morning, you’d opted for a cheerful top and jeans for comfort and ease but now, surrounded by suits and smart-looking dresses that make your classroom smell faintly of starch, you feel severely under-dressed. Both students and parents alike are buzzing with excitement as you try and finalize a lineup that allows for the busier parents to get back to their jobs as soon as possible when a knock at your door makes you look up.

Your heart stops in surprise as you see the faces on the other side of the glass. You wave the unexpected visitors in before you can stop yourself and suddenly your room is even more full as two hockey players make their way into the room. Javy gives you a rueful smile while Jake is full-on grinning as he waves at the kids who are gaping at the players. Jake’s simply dressed in his jersey over jeans but Javy’s fully suited up except for his skates that he’s holding in one hand while the other is carrying an equipment bag.

“Mr. Machado!” One of the kids calls out and you push past a group of parents currently snapping photos of the players.

“Jake, Javy,” you shake your head as you try to wrap your head around the situation. “What are you doing here?”

Javy shrugs. “You asked if I would come to Career Day. I know you the deal is over but since I got dinner and lunch, I thought I owed you at least this. And if not for you, then for the kids.” He adds on quickly and you nod before you can stop yourself. Just because you’ve gotten a little braver in the last month doesn’t mean you’re ready to have a fight with your ex-fake-boyfriend in front of your entire class and their parents.

“Okay, okay. Um, just have a seat over there,” you motion over to where the other parents are gathered. “Oh!” You remember as they’re walking past you. Both boys turn to you. “Are you good with going last or do you need to get back to work?” Your brain is screaming at the idea of having to reorder the schedule, especially when a mom in a pantsuit who’s scheduled to go first is currently glaring daggers at the back of your head for the holdup. Jake shakes his head.

“We’ll go whenever you’re ready for us.” You give him an appreciative look and mouth a thank you at them as you head back to the front of the room.

***

An hour later, the last busy parent has just escaped your classroom after waving hurriedly back at their kid and you let your shoulders slump slightly in relief. Of course, there are a few parents remaining that have taken the day off to be here and they’re chatting amongst themselves. You motion over to Jake and Javy who’ve honestly been holding the attention of your class the entire time. As much as the other parents had tried to sway them, their tiny minds were in awe of the bright jerseys and Javy’s equipment.

The boys make their way to the front of the classroom and the class cheers. “Hey guys, it’s nice to see you all again!” Javy greets them and a chorus rises across the classroom.

“Hi, Mr. Machado!” Jake mimes grabbing his chest in response and they all giggle as he introduces himself and enjoys his own hello. You watch on fondly as the boys explain what they do for a living, Jake using Javy as a mannequin to explain the different parts of hockey gear.

Then they move on to the bag Javy brought and then the boys are handing around hockey pucks, one for each one of your students. They’re emblazoned with the Dogfighters’ logo and you watch as your students turn them over in their tiny hands, eyes wide in awe. Your heart aches at the kindness and thoughtfulness of the gift. These kids will remember this moment forever. Javy and Jake are holding up hockey sticks and showing off how to hit a puck with the stick.

Once the demonstration is over, Javy and Jake patiently field questions from the kids and while Jake’s explaining why they can’t wear their skates in the classroom, Javy turns to look at you and you feel your face heat as you’re caught staring. You give him a tiny wave and the corner of his mouth quirks upward and he gives you a tiny wave back. He turns back in time to answer a question from another one of your students.

By the time the bell rings for lunch, your students are still on a roll peppering the boys with questions and you have to corral them into a line and out the door. When you get back from dropping them off, you thank the parents that are left and see them out before you turn to your surprise visitors, crossing your arms across your chest as you regard them warily, the unease creeping into your mind now that you’re alone with them. “Thanks for having us today, Roadie!” Jake says goodnaturedly, as he collects the equipment they brought with them. He turns to Javy, “You should get changed.” Javy nods and gives you a nod before he heads towards the door.

“Oh! If you want, the staff bathrooms are a lot more private. Here I’ll get you my key-” You reach for your neck, rummaging through the keys on your lanyard as a knock sounds and you turn to see Josie leaning against the doorframe.

“Hey boys, I thought I heard familiar voices in here.” She says as she takes in Jake and Javy. You continue to fumble with your keys as speak up. “They came by for career day.”

“Did they now?” Josie says, a thoughtful look in her eye as she regards you a little too cooly and you abandon your key struggle.

“Actually, I should probably walk you down there myself.” You gesture for Javy to follow you, and you try to ignore the knowing look that Josie gives you as you pass her and she steps into your classroom. Once you’re out of earshot you turn to Javy to kill the silence of the hallway. “Thanks for coming today, I can tell it meant a lot to the kids. They’re going to remember today for the rest of their lives, and the pucks were such thoughtful gifts.”

“We actually wanted to bring shirts, but I wasn’t sure what everyone’s sizes were and Josie could only really just get us a head count.” Your heart squeezes slightly at the thought that Javy had reached out to Josie to ask for her help. “I was thinking, and Jake said we could talk to the front office about it, but maybe we could arrange for the kids to come to the arena for a field trip? They could hit some pucks and maybe watch practice? It could be fun.” Your heart squeezes tighter.

“I think they’d like that a lot. I can talk to our front office too and see what I can do on my end.” You say, giving him a tight smile as you reach the staff bathroom. You unlock the door and hold it open for him and you have a sudden thought. “Are you going to need any help with… any of it?” Javy chuckles and shakes his head.

“Don’t worry, Meep, I do this every day, I’ve got it, but thanks for asking.” You take your lanyard off and hand it to him, trying to ignore the fact that he’s still using that name.

“Here, so you don’t have to worry about rushing because I’m waiting. Just lock up when you’re done.” You show him which key as you place the lanyard in his outstretched hand.

“Hey, Meep?” He calls out as you turn to go and you look back at him. “Do you always worry about other people like that?” You tilt your head to the side slightly, surprised by his question.

“Yes, why?”

“It’s nothing,” he says and then he pauses before he speaks up again as you’re about to walk away again. “Isn’t it hard? Worrying about everyone all the time?” You feel your cheeks heat as you shrug in a way that probably looks more like a grimace.

“I’m used to it.” You say simply before you walk back to your classroom.

A/N: I know that this one leaves off on a bit of a cliff hanger but it was a lot to try to jam into one chapter.

[writeforfandoms]

Vicious

Find my CoD masterlist

Looking to expand your territory, you find a military group in more or less the middle of nowhere, and spend a few days observing them. Of course, things are never easy, and soon you find yourself a permanent guest of one Commander Graves.

Coyote shifter f!reader x Phillip Graves

Warnings: Smut, unprotected sex, piv sex, teasing, biting, dirty talk, blood, injury, gunshot, emotional slow burn, enemies to lovers, eventual happy ending. PoV does shift.

Everybody thank @sprout-fics for literally plotting this out with me I don't even know how long ago. Thanks for infecting me with the Graves brainrot, love.

Word count: 11.5k (might wanna go grab a drink)

You approached the base with caution. You'd circled around the base for a few days before deciding to approach. You wanted to know what this was since it was in your territory. Well. Sort of. It was kind of right on the edge of your territory, but since there was a very rude pack of wolves pushing on your territory, you were looking to expand. 

Thus, investigating. 

The base was big and mostly flat, several buildings set up. You could vaguely see a hanger in the distance. Hmm. Interesting. 

Trotting along, you lifted your nose to sniff the air. Lots of scents - men and gunpowder and oil. Hmm. Not terrible, but not great. 

Maybe you should look elsewhere to expand.

There was a thunderous crack and a line of fire erupted across your back. You yelped, scrambling away, even as warm wetness seeped into your fur. You bolted, ignoring the pain, ignoring the blood. You needed to get somewhere safe to shift back and get medical attention. Or at least hide until you healed. 

If the wolves found you like this, they'd kill you. 

You made it away from the shooter, getting as far as an abandoned-looking building before you collapsed. Your legs gave out with a wobble and you whined softly to yourself. Your back hurt, a solid line of fire that pulsed steadily with your heart. 

That was probably bad. You must have gotten hurt worse than you thought. 

Jaws parted as you panted, you debated your options. You could try to sleep here, you could try to get somewhere safer, or you could shift back. 

Even the thought of shifting made you hurt, and you laid your head down. 

You needed medical attention. And liquids. And rest. 

But rest would have to come first, because your body refused to cooperate with you otherwise. 

As much as you knew it wasn't safe here, as much as you longed to get back to your own den… you closed your eyes. 

Just a nap. Just enough rest to get you back on your feet to get home. 

–

Graves had had a good day. Drills had gone well. One of his boys had shot at a coyote. All was well. He'd even authorized a couple boys to go find the coyote and put it out of its misery. 

The last thing he expected was to see those two boys come back with a woman bundled between them, passed out cold and wrapped in one of their jackets. Her legs were bare beneath the jacket. 

"What the fuck?" He muttered to himself, standing up straighter. 

"Found her out in the middle o' nowhere," one of them said, flagging Graves down. "She's bleeding." 

Graves frowned. Bleeding, unconscious, left in the middle of nowhere? Sounded like she'd run into some trouble. 

"Bring her to medical," Graves ordered, already striding over to pull the door open for them. "And for fuck's sake find her some clothes." He held the door for the two and his gaze dipped down to what he could see of her. Mmm. Nice legs. Nice ass, too. 

He resisted the urge to follow them to medical, trusting that they'd get her there. Instead he went to start on the necessary paperwork. 

Medical paged him once she was cleaned up and dressed, and he told them to alert him as soon as she woke. Fingerprints hadn't gotten any pings yet, which was a good thing. 

But still. He needed answers. 

Graves huffed softly and leaned back in his chair. Nothing he could do about her for now but wait. 

–

You woke slowly, warm and not sure why that felt wrong. Not at first. Then the smell registered. 

This was not home.

You sat up quickly and then groaned softly, clenching your teeth. Oh, ouch. Your back fucking hurt. 

"Oh good, you're awake." 

You jerked your head to look at the door, eyes wide. A good-looking man stood there, eyes raking over you. He looked military - the way he stood, the cut of his clothes, the subtle bulge of a gun tucked in the back of his waistband. Oh fuck. 

"How you feelin'?" His voice was mild as he grabbed a chair, pulling it over closer to your bed. 

"Back hurts," you answered carefully. "Where am I?" 

He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes, which remained cool. "Medical. I have a few questions for you." 

You noted he didn't ask if you were up for it. Clearly this man was used to getting his way. You swallowed. His scent wafted to you, warm and a little spicy and far too alluring. "Okay." 

"Do you know where my boys found you?" 

You narrowed your eyes a little, thinking. Right. You'd been shot and ran away, and had collapsed outside that abandoned building. "Sort of?"

"Do you remember how you got there?" His gaze was more intense now and he leaned forward. 

You had two options here that you could see. Make up some lie, or lie and say you didn't remember. 

"I… don't remember." You swallowed hard, shifting your weight. Your back hurt and tugged a little. "What happened to my back?"

"Nice long scratch. Had to put in some stitches to keep your skin together." He didn't even flinch at the description. Not that you did either. You'd spent enough time as a coyote to see your fair share of blood. 

"Thank you." You forced yourself to meet his gaze. His eyes were pretty. Alluring. Dammit. 

"You're welcome." His smile was all arrogance now. "I'd appreciate some information in return." 

"Like what?" Your gaze darted to the door nervously. This was bad. This was very bad. You needed to get out. 

"Where were you before this? How did you get hurt?" 

"I don't remember." You eyed him now carefully. You were injured, but maybe you could get the drop on him…

"Well. That's a damn shame, darlin'." He pushed to his feet, gaze fixed on you. "I'm afraid I need some answers before you can go." 

"You can't keep me," you immediately retorted, twisting to face him. "That's not legal." 

His smile turned condescending. "And who's gonna stop me?" He spread his hands out from his body, still smirking. 

You tensed, gauging, and then lunged at him. You couldn't shift, not here. But maybe you wouldn't need to. You slammed into him, pain lighting up your back, and tried to shove past him. He recovered fast, faster than you expected, grabbing you and hauling you back to him. You growled, low and angry, and bit his shoulder. Hard. 

He shouted, jerking under your teeth. But he didn't let you go. Just yanked your wrists behind your back, securing them with one hand before using his free hand to get a grip on your hair and yank. 

"Feisty, huh?" His grin showed far too many teeth. Even for a human that was a clear threat. "'S alright, sweet pea. I've got time. I'll have you singing before long." 

You whined when he tugged your hair again, forcing your head back, exposing your throat. He held you easily, not even breaking a sweat as he kept you contained. 

You'd miscalculated. Badly. 

The room he escorted you to was plain and not comfortable. Little more than a concrete box with a cot bolted down, the room lacked any warmth. 

"I'll give you some time to think about your answers," he told you before he pushed you into the room. You stumbled, off balance from the shove, and the door slammed shut. 

The lock clicked, loud and ominous in the room. 

You had really, really miscalculated. 

–

Graves walked back to his room before checking the bite, which was already blooming color on his skin. "Fuck," he muttered, half impressed and a little turned on. "Helluva bite." He sucked his teeth, fingers rising to press gently to his skin. The little bloom of pain made him groan softly, arousal rising. Damn but he liked that. 

He wanted to tame this one. 

"Damn, sweet pea," he muttered, pressing down again, ignoring the blood rushing down to his cock. For now. "Damn." 

–

You were brought food regularly, so at least they weren't starving you. That would be bad, on top of your injury. 

And the asshole came back at least once a day to ask you the same questions. What happened to you? Where had you been? How did you end up out here? Who hurt you? 

You, at least, stuck to your line. You didn't know. That was all he was getting out of you. Nothing else. 

You didn't try to bite him again. At least, not for the first few days. 

Then he got mean. 

"Y'know, sweet pea, I could make this so much nicer for you," he murmured. "Or so much worse. I've been generous, you know." 

"You call this generous?" You curled your upper lip, hands curling into loose fists. 

"Coulda left you to my boys." His smirk was downright nasty now, eyes glinting with mean amusement. "I'm sure they'd appreciate you." 

You stiffened, a low growl rumbling in your chest. Excitement sparked through his scent and his lips stretched wider. "Don't you fucking dare." 

"Then gimme what I want," he purred, leaning closer. "Or a good reason not to." 

You lunged. He was prepared this time, though you still got your teeth in his shoulder before he grabbed you and twisted. You yipped, startled, as he manhandled you face-down on the cot, pressed up tight to your back to keep you down. 

The hardness pressing into your ass made you jerk. 

"Told you," he growled into your ear, breath hot against your skin. "Give me a good reason not to." 

"Fuck off," you snarled, trying to buck him off, ignoring the hardness of him. 

"Rather fuck you." His teeth were sharp on your ear. 

You snarled, deep and rumbly, squirming under him. But you couldn't deny the thrill of arousal at how he held you down. He was strong. Very strong. 

"Fuck," he muttered, pressing his hips harder into yours. "Better hold still, sweet pea, unless you think you can take me." 

"I dunno, you think you can handle me?" You couldn't resist taunting him, baring your teeth. 

He huffed a little laugh and shoved one knee between your legs, leaning his weight onto you. "Oh I can handle you, sweet pea." He shifted, biting down on the back of your shoulder. You moaned, almost startled at how much you liked that, how good it felt. "Yeah? Pretty girl likes it a bit rough?" 

"You all mouth?" You shot back, managing to free one hand. You reached back to claw at him, not sure if you wanted him closer or wanted him off of you. 

He swore softly when your nails caught skin under the sleeve of his shirt, dragging down. "Feisty pretty girl," he growled. He grabbed your wrist again and shoved it back down to the bed, pushing you harder into the mattress, his chest to your back. One hand let up, but he compensated, keeping you trapped under him. "Guess you don't wanna get fucked tonight." His free hand slid slowly down your side to your hip, and he pulled you back and down onto his thigh. 

You gasped at the feel of his thigh firm between your legs, fanning your arousal. You squirmed, hands twisting, tilting your face to the side. "Mm, feels like you're all teasing and no follow through." 

"Good girls ask nicely." He lifted his hips away from yours, using his grip on you to push you further into the bed, away from the warmth of him. 

You snarled into the bedding, twisting harder. But he didn't budge, didn't give you an inch. He was absolutely infuriating. 

But he was also possibly going to fuck you, and you possibly wanted him to. 

"I don't do nice." You kicked out with one leg, and he grunted as you pushed him off balance enough to have him crashing back into you. You could admit to yourself that though he was an ass, you wanted more. 

"You will, sweet pea," he grunted, fingers tightening around you. "You'll beg me for it." He rocked his hips into yours and you arched, no longer trying to get him away or get him off. No. Now you wanted more. 

When he pulled back again, your lips parted in a snarl, and you almost asked what he was doing. 

Except you felt fingers at your back, pushing the shirt they'd given you up until it bunched under your arms. His fingers were warm and a little rough as they slid along the path of your injury, just to the side so he didn't actually hurt you. The nurse had insisted on leaving the bandages for another day, although you didn't really need them - you healed faster than a human. 

"One day you'll tell me," he murmured, low and promising. "And I'll be here for all your secrets." 

A shudder ran down your spine and you squirmed. "Keep it up and I'll think you're actually interested in me," you quipped. You needed his attention off your back, needed him to leave it alone. 

"Oh but I am," he purred, lowering himself again so you could feel the press of his shirt against your back, the flat plane of his stomach leaving you nowhere to go. "You're just too temptin', sweet pea. I can't resist." 

You sucked in a breath when he bit down on the back of your shoulder again, a little gentler this time. But the feeling of teeth in your skin, even with the shirt in the way, only made you want more. You bucked into him, struggling, a low whine escaping without permission. 

"Sound so sweet like that," he murmured, too pleased with himself. "Let's see what other pretty noises you can make for me." 

"Arrogant," you shot back, wiggling your ass back against the bulge of him. 

"Confident," he corrected, grinding into you. "Now, you gonna be a good girl if I let go?" 

"Define good." You grinned into the sheets, hiking one knee up to get leverage to push back into him. He only pressed you harder into the cot, pulling a groan out of you. 

"Guess that's a no," he huffed, nosing the side of your neck. "Shame. I'd love to take my time with a pretty thing like you." 

"Sure know how to make a girl feel special." You squirmed again, trying again to free your hands. 

"Baby, I'll make you feel so good," he promised, low and crooning. You shuddered hard, twisting one hand free and reaching back to pull his head closer, fingers scratching through his hair. He huffed against your neck, warm and damp. "Still gotta ask for it." 

You gritted your teeth, digging your nails into the back of his neck. "Make me." 

He groaned softly, pressing his bulge harder into you. He was a flurry of movement, pushing your shirt up over your head but leaving it tangled around your arms. "Such a little brat," he growled, teasing. "I can fix that." 

"Such an ass," you gasped as he yanked your sweatpants down, leaving them pooled on one ankle. 

"All you gotta do is ask, baby," he murmured, hand smoothing over your ask. "I'll fuck you real good if you ask." 

"Not on your life." You whined softly when his hand dipped down between your legs, teasing, testing. 

"Oh yeah?" He huffed an amused noise. "We'll see about that, sweet pea." One big finger slid into you and you gasped, legs shifting further apart to give him more room. "Knew you liked this," he muttered victoriously, his finger making a lewd noise as he moved it. "Fuckin' knew it." 

You opened your mouth to snipe back at him and ended up moaning instead at the stretch of a second finger. “Fucking tease,” you managed, tilting your hips to allow him deeper. 

He huffed. “Already told you what you have to do,” he murmured, pumping his fingers faster. The coil of pleasure in your belly grew tighter, and you rocked your hips back into his fingers. Not yet willing to give him the satisfaction of hearing you. But the scent of his arousal, his clear enjoyment of this, was near dizzying. 

You bit your lip hard enough to taste blood as you got close, eyes shuttered, determined not to give him satisfaction while getting your own. 

And his fingers slipped out of you. 

“What–?” You started to demand, pushing hard against him. 

“Told you,” he said, amused now, even as you heard his belt buckle clink. “Gotta ask, baby.” He nipped the shell of your ear and then groaned softly. There was a soft, wet noise. 

Your eyes blew wide and you froze. He was stroking himself, slow and rhythmic, his knuckles just brushing your ass. He was just going to leave you like this. 

Unless you asked. 

You clenched your jaw for a moment before you gave in with a little whimper, tilting your hips and ducking your head down against the cot. “Please,” you murmured. 

“What was that, sweet pea?” He sounded unbearably smug, even as he brushed his knuckles over your skin a little more firmly. 

“Please,” you repeated, pressing your forehead into the cot. The smell of him was intoxicating and a little addicting and utterly ruining your composure. 

He hummed, teasing, and the noise stopped. Still-damp fingers pressed to your ass and then curled around your hip, guiding you into a better position. “Please what?” 

You growled a little, debating kicking him off and taking care of yourself. But damn he’d gotten you riled up, and now you wanted him. “Please fuck me,” you ground out, tone far from pleading. 

But that must have been good enough for him. “Good girl,” he cooed, condescending and overly-sweet. You fought down the urge to bite him again, mostly because you could feel him beginning to press into you. 

He did not go slow, and he was not gentle. Which was fine - you didn’t want gentle. You didn’t want slow. You wanted him to fuck you hard enough that you saw stars. 

He was relentless, searching for your g-spot and then hitting it as often as possible. He released your hands to fist your hair, tugging your head to the side so he could kiss and nip at your neck. His groans vibrated against your skin, making you whimper. 

“Yeah? Feel good?” He nipped sharply at your skin and soothed the spot with his tongue. “Tell me, sweet pea.”

You resisted. For a moment. “Feels good,” you agreed with a gasp, getting one hand behind you to scratch through his hair, keeping him exactly where he was. “More.”

“More what?” The words were growled into your skin, his grip tightening on your hip until you thought you’d have bruises. 

“Need more,” you gasped, bucking your hips back into his. “Please.”

“Knew you could be so good for me,” he crooned, far too pleased. But he did move his hand to rub your clit, not giving you a chance to mouth off to him again. 

“Fuck!” Your fingers scrabbled at the sheets and fisted in them, shaking a little. 

“Good girl,” he murmured, lips brushing your ear now. “Come on, baby. Come for me. Come on, come on, baby.” 

Later, you’d be humiliated, but you did. You came with a shout, body tensing under his, hand in his hair clawing down the back of his neck. He hissed, shuddering hard against you, and roughly pumped into you a few more times before he spilled in you. 

“That’s it,” he murmured, almost dazed sounding. “Fuck you feel good.” He ground against you, probably just to hear you whine. 

He didn’t quite collapse on you, but it was close. Fortunately, you got to just melt into the cot, breathing hard. 

“Have fun, sweet pea?” He slid out of you smoothly and stood, fixing his clothing. You kind of hated him for that, even as you turned your head to glower at him over your shoulder. 

“Still an asshole,” you grumbled, stretching out. You needed to move, to wipe yourself off. But you couldn’t resist the moment of tormenting him with the sight of you on display. 

He chuckled, undeterred. “Better rest up, sweet pea,” he advised, smirk clear in his tone. “I’ll be back later.” 

The door locked behind him as always. 

Fine. You’d just bide your time. Someone would slip up eventually. 

It took another week. A week of acting more compliant, of not trying anything. Graves didn’t come back for that entire week, either. Why, you didn’t know, but you weren’t going to ask. 

Finally, the soldier that brought you food forgot to lock the door. 

You waited until you couldn’t hear him anymore before you crept to the door, cracking it open just the tiniest bit. Nothing. No sound near you. 

You had to sternly remind yourself not to just go tearing off, you had to do this smart. So you snuck out of your room, shutting the door again. Hopefully that would keep them from looking. 

Getting out of there was perhaps one of the most stressful things you’d ever done. You listened hard for people, and once had to duck into a cleaning closet to avoid a couple chatting soldiers. Your heart pounded against your ribs the entire time, so loud you had to focus to hear past the blood rushing through you. 

But you did it. You made it outside. The sun was setting, the land open around the base. You’d blend better if you shifted, and you’d be faster. 

A quick look around showed you were the only one in sight. Moving fast, you nearly threw your clothes off and shifted, landing on four paws. 

This was so much better. 

You left the clothes where they fell and started trotting off, away from base. You were more careful this time, darting between bushes and generally being stealthy. 

So when something tackled you from the side, you yelped, totally caught off guard. You struggled until a firm hand grabbed your scruff, holding tight and lifting you a little. You whined and went still. 

“Well, well, well,” Graves murmured, smirking down at you. “I’ll be damned.” 

You lifted your upper lip to growl at him, hoping he’d take the hint and back off. Instead, he fearlessly wrapped his free hand around your muzzle. 

“You’ve already bitten me before, sweet pea,” he said, looking over you again, awed and not at all scared. “Not gonna let you with bigger teeth.” 

You stared at him, fear a cold wash down your spine. You realized with perfect clarity in that moment that not only had he put together exactly what you were, but he was never going to let you go. 

Graves carried you back to your room, shutting the door behind the two of you before he released you. You skittered away, putting some distance between the two of you. “Go on, sweet pea. Show me.”

You were momentarily confused, ears twitching as you looked at him. But he didn’t move, didn’t step away. 

“Don’t get shy on me now,” he teased, smirking like the bastard he was. “Already seen all of you before.”

Understanding dawned, and you briefly pinned your ears back. But if there was one thing you knew about Graves, you knew that he was stubborn. 

So you shifted back. 

“There you are.” He grinned, wide and satisfied and distinctly smug. “Quite a trick you got there, sweet pea.” 

You crossed your arms over your chest, glowering at him. “Why did you grab me again?” 

“Can’t let such a fascinating little thing run off now can I?” He finally took a step closer to you, gaze fixed on your face. 

You clenched your jaw. “Sure you can, it’s easy.”

He chuckled, taking another step closer, until he was just outside your space. “Oh sweet pea, told you I’d be here for all your secrets, and I meant it.”

You swallowed, not sure how to react to that. He held all the power here, and you both knew it. But you didn’t want to yield, didn’t want to bare your neck to him. So you bared your teeth instead. 

“Mm, that too,” he purred, not at all deterred. On the contrary, he reached for you with one hand, licking his lips. 

You took a step back, eyeing him. “Do I get any say in this?” 

“I’m not a monster,” he told you amicably, allowing you some space. 

“No. You’ll just keep me here.” 

He shrugged. “You know too much,” he said easily. “And knowing what you are? I’d be a fool not to use all advantages I can get, and I ain’t a fool.” 

You puffed out a breath. “I think you overestimate how much I know.” 

He smirked. “Perhaps.” He took a step back finally. “Tell you what, sweet pea. You behave and I’ll get you a nicer room to stay in.” He didn’t give you a chance to answer (or object), just turned and left, locking the door again. 

You groaned softly and fell back on the cot. Well. Fuck. That had gone the opposite of how you’d wanted. Now not only were you stuck here, but Graves knew what you were. 

Hopefully he wouldn’t try to do anything awful. 

Graves visited you every day for the next several days. He never asked for anything. Just seemed to be enjoying the power he held over you. Sometimes the visits were short, mere minutes, more check ins than anything else. Sometimes he’d stay for longer, chatting, slowly getting to know you.

As you were getting to know him.

You didn’t pretend to understand his interest in you, but you didn’t exactly discourage him, either. You only snapped playfully at him. You didn’t try to kill him. You also didn’t spend more than a day or two feeling sorry for yourself and being sullen and mopey.

Coyotes were adaptable creatures. It’s how they’d become one of the most successful predators in North America.

So you adapted. 

“Brought you a little somethin’.” Graves was in a particularly good mood tonight, eyes bright, smirk firmly in place. 

“Oh?” You didn’t even bother to get up, staying seated with your back to the wall, book still in your lap. (He’d finally caved the fourth time you’d threatened to die of boredom.) 

He crouched in front of you, holding out a bracelet. It was simple metal beads, though just from looking at it you guessed not all of them were so simple. He looked far too smug, putting you a little on edge. 

“This has got a tracker in it,” he told you, letting it dangle from one finger, swinging gently and catching the light. “And a couple little surprises. Gimme your wrist.”

You huffed softly but held out one arm for him, watching him fasten it on you. “And what stops me from just taking it off?” 

“One of the surprises.” He smirked, thumb rubbing the soft underside of your wrist, pressing briefly against your pulse. “You can test it, but I wouldn’t recommend it, sweet pea.”

Curiosity warred with caution, and caution won. You puffed out a breath. “Alright, so you can, presumably, track all the time I spend sitting here reading. Wow. Fascinating.” 

He just grinned, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a way that was absolutely not endearing. At all. Not even a little. “Well, I was thinking you could come on a walk with me.”

“Seriously? Not yanking my chain?” You raised both eyebrows at him. 

“Seriously.” He stood straight again, using his hold on you to tug you up with him. “C’mon. Lemme show you around properly.” 

Curiosity won out over caution, this time. You followed him. 

The base was larger than you’d initially guessed. Graves kept you close to his side as the two of you walked, which didn’t stop you from looking around. Several of his men saw the two of you, but none of them approached. Hm. Fine with you. 

Graves probably enjoyed showing off the base a little too much, although you realized he was also showing you off with a hand on your lower back. Conniving man.

You could respect that. Especially if he was less of an ass. 

“Wanna go explore?” 

You side-eyed him at the offer, and especially at the grin he shot your way. “Eager to see if your little gift works as promised?” you drawled. 

“Nah. You’re not a fool.” His eyes gleamed as he watched you.

You huffed softly, amused despite yourself. “Well, you’re not wrong.” Not giving him a chance to retort, you walked away. You heard his chuckle behind you, but he didn’t follow. 

Exploring by yourself was… interesting. But not in the way you expected. The men looked at you, yes, but none of them approached you. One or two even stepped out of your way. 

Very interesting. They were not exactly a pack, humans didn’t work that way, but they clearly had their own pecking order. 

You made your way towards the fence, looking up at the guard posts. Considering the way the land stretched out flat before you for miles, the base sticking up like a sore thumb, you were both surprised and not. Only one actual road in and out of this place, and you didn’t bother going towards that gate.

Instead you started towards the nearest guard post, determined to get up the ladder and see the view. 

“Uh, ma’am, you can’t go up there.” 

You looked at the young man in front of you - not as tall as Graves, definitely younger, a little uncertain. Adorable. He looked more like a pup than a man. 

“Graves told me to explore,” you drawled, dry as dust. “I’m exploring.” 

“You still can’t go up there.” He pulled back his shoulders, trying to intimidate you. Aw. Cute. His radio crackled, and very faintly you could hear Graves on the other end. Just his voice, not what he said. But the soldier nodded once and stepped aside. “He said it’s okay.”

“Thanks.” You kept your tone dry and purposefully made noise going up the ladder. The guard on duty glanced at you but didn’t say a word, allowing you to take your fill of the view. 

This area had been your home for a long time. Sure, not here exactly, but, well… You’d been wanting to expand your territory anyway, hadn’t you? This wasn’t a bad expansion. Especially if you could convince Graves to let you go hunting properly. 

You could come to see this as home. In time. 

Coyotes were adaptable. This would not break you. 

Graves’ hand at your back didn’t even startle you this time. You’d heard him coming, after all. 

You’d ask him about hunting some other time. No need to push too fast, after all. 

You had time to win him over. 

–

Graves was pleased - the tracker worked exactly as it should. And you behaved perfectly, exploring, poking your nose places. All without even trying to leave. 

He’d gentle you to him yet. 

Eventually, he’d be able to move you into his room. But not yet. 

For now, he contented himself with dinner with you, watching your barely restrained curiosity. He didn’t quite chuckle to see that curiosity mirrored in his men, but it was a close call. 

"Enjoying, sweet pea?" 

You scoffed softly. "Yes, well, meals in my room were rather dull." Your teeth flashed in a grin. 

He chuckled. “Don’t have to do that anymore,” he offered, watching you. “Long as you behave.”

You tipped your head, and he could see the predatory gleam in your eyes. But you nodded once. 

He’d definitely be keeping an eye on you. Not that he minded - you were a pretty little thing, after all. 

Maybe he’d get his hands on you after dinner. 

–

Days passed faster now that you were no longer confined to your room. Graves let you have free roam of the compound - nothing was off limits to you. 

Which is how you stumbled upon a training exercise. 

Graves beckoned you to join him without looking away, arms crossed loosely over his chest as he watched two teams with paintball guns attempting to get each other out. 

"Training?" You guessed, stopping next to him, observing the game closely. 

"Mmhm." He didn't look at you but his hand settled just above your ass, thumb stroking gently. "Paintballs only." 

You nodded. "Just trying to tag each other out?"

"Timed game," Graves told you with a flicker of a grin. "Team with most people left standing when the timer goes off wins. My boys are competitive." 

You hummed acknowledgement, watching them dart around. It looked like this entire section of compound was open - the terrain and buildings were all being used in the game. 

When the timer went off, Graves took you with him to see who had won. You only half paid attention, admittedly, busy examining the ones who'd been counted as out. 

"Looks like somethin's on your mind, sweet pea." Graves smirked down at you. 

"Let me play."

He blinked. That was clearly not what he'd expected you to say. "What?"

"Let me play." You bounced a little on your toes. "It looks like fun." 

Graves blinked, giving you a quick once-over over. You were smaller than most of his men, and untrained. But he knew your secret. "Alright, but don't cry when you get out first." 

You grinned, showing far too many teeth. "No tears," you promised, low and silky. 

It took no time to get outfitted with a vest and a paintball gun. Graves even graciously gave you a one minute head start. 

You darted away, finding a good hiding spot. Your aim was not the best, and you usually did your hunting with your teeth, but you'd make do. 

A timer went off, signaling the rest of the teams were being released onto the playing field. Graves hadn't actually told you which team you were on…

Guess that meant everyone was fair game. 

Your teeth showed in a grin as anticipation raced through your veins. Finally. A hunt. 

The first pair you spotted were clearly on the same team and patrolling together. You waited until they passed and got both of them in the back. (One shot went totally wild, but you elected to ignore that.) 

They both looked surprised to see who had shot them but moved off the playing field. 

After that, you slunk away to another good hiding spot. This time you managed to get four - another patrol of two, then a single man a few minutes later, and another single man passing close enough for you to get him. 

Your smaller stature served you well, letting you get into smaller spaces than they could. And you knew how to hunt, to wait, to be still and focused. 

By the time you'd gotten your tenth "kill", your heart was thrumming, easy confidence in your eyes. 

But you paused when a PA system flicked on with a crackle. 

"Change of plans, boys," Graves called. "First man to take her down gets a prize." 

Fuck! That wasn't the game! But you had to admit… the change thrilled you. 

Teeth showing in a grin again, you abandoned your current spot to climb. You needed to get up higher to see what you were up against. 

Roughly ten men remained, some having been knocked out by other teams. You could briefly see them as they split up. 

Good. Make this a real challenge. 

But you had one advantage they didn't. You could hear them coming. 

That was your only saving grace as one tried to corner you. You could hear him coming, and escaped around a corner before climbing to get away. 

He swore extensively when you managed to shoot him. 

Two of them got smart and tried to flush you towards a third. It might have worked, except that you spotted him up ahead, and threw yourself through a bush to get away. 

Unfortunately, that only worked until one of them got physical, tackling you to the ground. Your yelp was more surprise than pain, and you had to resist the urge to bite him. 

Graves would not be pleased if you made his men bleed.

"Caught, sir." The man who'd tackled you hauled you to your feet, and you narrowed your eyes at him. You were no misbehaving pup to scruff! 

Graves sauntered up to the two of you, smirking. "Well, well, well," he hummed. "You did better than I expected." 

You smirked right back at him. "Next time, you will not be so surprised." 

He laughed once, short and amused. "True," he agreed. "Now, for your reward."

The man released you and you turned to see who was left. Only eight. (Either you'd miscounted or there had been a bit of foul play among the remaining players.) You memorized their faces. 

You'd take them out first next time. 

You didn't bother to pay attention until Graves had a hand at your back, guiding you forward again. The training seemed to be over, as most everyone was putting away their gear. 

Graves didn't lead you back to put away your gear, though. He handed off the paintball gun to one of his men and pushed you back towards your room. 

Fully aware of what you were starting, you bit him for being pushy, growling low in your throat. He just swore, hands clenching around you, and bit you back. 

Honestly, you were a little amazed the two of you made it back to your room before the clothes came off. 

–

Graves had never expected you to do so well at paintball, but you did. You were light and fast, hard to hit when you were on the run, and clever. Not trained, but clever. 

He threw you in the paintball games as often as he could, now, just for the joy of watching you. 

And the fun afterwards. 

Finally, though, they got called out. He debated bringing you with, but… there was no easy way to explain your presence, and he wouldn't risk your life. 

You'd just have to stay and be good. 

You took the news better than expected, honestly. Only a little growling and biting. (And Graves really, really didn't mind the biting.) 

But then you did something very unexpected. 

You saw him off. 

You stopped in front of the group, eyeing them all. Graves noted with amusement how they all straightened - you'd gained a lot of respect by joining in training. 

"I expect I'll see you all again soon." The look you leveled at all of them made it clear that was an order, not a suggestion. 

The various noises of assent just made Graves hide his grin. 

You nodded once and looked at him, one eyebrow raised. But you did lower your voice, at least. "Bring me back something sweet." You winked and walked away. 

From this angle, it was easy to see that you were a predator, stalking through his base as confidently as if it were your own. 

Graves tried hard not to think about that too much, because if he did, he'd have to haul you back and fuck you on the plane. 

–

You kept yourself busy while Graves was gone. There were still people on base, so you weren’t alone. You thought briefly about going hunting, but you didn’t want to distract Graves at a potentially vital moment. 

So, you kept yourself entertained by poking your nose into every nook and cranny you could find. 

That lasted you a few days. Watching several movies lasted you a few more. And finally, just when you thought you’d risk giving Graves a heart attack just to go for a proper run, they returned. 

You did not rush them as they all disembarked the plane, standing back with your arms crossed over your chest. Some of them were injured as they got off the plane, but they were all back. You counted. Twice. 

And then there was Graves, directing his men, making sure everything got done. You met his gaze across the distance and couldn’t help but smile, just a little.

There was no sense of challenge in meeting his gaze. No fear. Just the visual confirmation that this asshole hadn’t gotten himself killed. 

He finished up quickly and made his way over to you, swagger uninterrupted, gaze fixed on you. 

He surprised you, though, grabbing your hand instead of your wrist to tow you back to his room. His, not yours. Not that he gave you time to look at much before he was kissing you like he was affirming he was alive. 

It wasn’t until much later, after you both lay sated and warm, that he grunted like he’d just remembered something.

“Brought you back something,” he murmured, moving away from you and ignoring your displeased huff. Not bothering to put any clothes on yet (something you very much agreed with), he stepped over to his duffel bag and bent over to grab a box. He smirked at you over his shoulder. “Close your eyes.”

“What?” You blinked at him, caught off guard.

“You heard me, sweet pea.”

You rolled your eyes pointedly and then closed them. This was silly. But you were willing to play along, for now. 

To your surprise, you heard the box open, heard Graves step closer. “Smell,” he ordered softly. 

You sniffed, head tipping in curiosity. You could smell the sugar, absolutely, and something floral. You huffed softly, amused at the little game. 

“Sugared flowers?” you guessed without opening your eyes, leaning a little closer. 

Graves chuckled softly, and the box rustled as he did something. “Open,” he murmured. 

You briefly made a face but you did as he asked. He put a single piece on your tongue, fingers brushing your skin as he retreated. The flavor was more intense than the smell, and you hummed in satisfaction, eyes fluttering open again. Graves licked his lips, watching you as he pulled another piece of sugared flower from the box. This time, you accepted it and sucked on his fingers, swiping your tongue over the tips to get every last bit of sugar from his skin. The scent of his arousal quickly overpowered the florals, and the box dropped to the pillow next to you. 

Somehow you both missed dinner. 

–

Graves had been considering how to tell his men about his coyote. Oh, sure, they all knew that you were his, but they didn’t know you were a shifter. And that could become dangerous, if he didn’t tell them. In case of emergency.

(The fact that he wanted to tell them had nothing whatsoever to do with the fact that he wanted to show you off more. Not at all.) 

His timeline got pushed when you let yourself into his office, near bouncing on your toes. 

“I’m going hunting,” you said before he could ask. 

Graves leaned back slowly, giving you a thorough once-over. “Need to borrow some gear?” he asked.

You rolled your eyes, clearly exasperated. “No. I’m going hunting.” You showed your teeth to emphasize your point. 

Ah. That kind of hunting. “Alright,” he agreed slowly. He knew you still had the tracking bracelet on, and he had to admit some curiosity to see how well it held up after you shifted. “I’ll make sure nobody shoots at you.”

“Again,” you drawled. 

Graves didn’t feel bad about that, because nobody had known about shifters at that point. Besides, it was hard to feel bad about the thing that had brought you to him. But he would make damn sure you weren’t injured under his watch. “You shifting here or out there?” 

“Here,” you answered after a moment. “Easier to not deal with clothes.” 

Graves nodded again, still watching you. “Good hunting, then, sweet pea.”

Your teeth flashed again as you grinned. “I’ll bring you back something good.” And you were gone, bouncing back out of his office before he had a chance to properly respond to your words. 

You’d promised to bring him something back.

This was something new, and Graves was going to find out what that was about. 

His boys didn’t take the news about you being a shifter quietly, but they took it. He could see they didn’t believe him yet, but they would.

And they all knew he was a man of his word. So they knew he was not exaggerating when he threatened to kill anyone who breathed a word of this to anyone else. 

But Graves trusted his boys. He trusted they wouldn’t betray him. Or you, by extension. 

The day was mostly gone by the time he heard the commotion. The call to open the gate came first, then a chorus of whistling and clapping. That was enough to pull him outside to see what the commotion was all about. 

A coyote was dragging a whole ass white tail deer into the compound, jaw clamped tight around its throat. Graves felt his eyebrows shoot up in surprise - the deer was considerably bigger than the coyote, but the coyote didn’t even slow down. 

Until you stopped in front of him, depositing your trophy and looking up at him. 

“Beautiful,” he murmured. Both the deer and you. “Dragged it back by yourself?”

You huffed at him, briefly showing your teeth.

“Course you did,” Graves chuckled, crouching in front of you. He debated for a moment before he held out one hand. It took only a moment before you shoved your head under his hand, and he stroked your fur, silently thrilled. His coyote. “Gonna let one of my guys fix it up?”

You stepped back and lifted your lip in a silent warning. 

Graves chuckled, holding his hands up in a pacifying manner. “Alright, sweet pea. You just let me know what you need, then, and I’ll let you handle it.”

Mollified, you grabbed the deer again and started dragging it away from the buildings, which he appreciated. He watched you maneuver your kill around without assistance, admiring your strength and determination. His men all kept out of the way, though he did hear a few compliment you on your kill. 

This was something he could get used to. 

–

You honestly hadn’t realized how much you missed shifting until you could, anywhere you wanted. The men got used to you quickly, opening the gate for you to come and go as you pleased. An unofficial new game had popped up - try to pet the coyote. You took great joy in evading their hands and occasional playful tackles. Honestly, it was fun. 

You didn’t expect to be approached by one of the men on his own while you were sitting outside. You blinked at him, head tipping to one side. 

“Do you have a moment?” He shuffled his feet a little, scent caught between shame and embarrassment. 

“Have a seat.” You turned a little to face him fully, on high alert now. 

He sat next to you, giving you a moment to find his name patch. Roberts. His sandy hair was nearly the same color as Graves’, though he was shorter and leaner. Roberts sighed softly before he looked at you, meeting your gaze. “I wanted to apologize.”

You blinked, caught totally by surprise. “For?”

“I shot you.” He made a vague motion towards your back. “I mean, I didn’t know it was you, I just shot at a coyote. But still.”

You shook your head with a little smile. “Don’t fuss over it,” you advised. “It’s long in the past now, and I healed.” 

He frowned at you, disapproving. “Anyway, a few of us were out last week, and, well…” He rolled up his sleeve to show off a still healing tattoo. A coyote in front of the Shadows symbol. 

He had simultaneously claimed you as pack, and put himself under you. And he’d sort of spoken for the rest of the Shadows, too. 

At least, your coyote brain was trying to convince you that you now had the biggest pack ever to protect and provide for. 

You grabbed him, pulling him into a hug and rubbing your cheek over the top of his head. He held himself stiff for a few long moments before he awkwardly patted your back, looking absolutely bewildered when you pulled back. 

“Thank you,” you murmured, breathing in deep. “That’s… it means more than you know.” 

He smiled tentatively and nodded. “Sure,” he mumbled. “So, not mad at me?”

You huffed a little laugh. “Not at all.” You shook your head, gaze drifting down to the tattoo again. “May I?”

He held his arm out for inspection, and you looked over the line work and the details of it. That was definitely a coyote, and definitely the insignia of the group. 

Well. Your pack had just grown. Quite a bit.

“I love it.” You sat back and smiled. 

He puffed up a little, clearly proud of himself. “Did the line art myself.”

“Good to know.” You smiled slowly. “I might ask you to do something for me at some point, then.”

“Would be my pleasure.” He puffed up even more, resembling a fluffy rooster. “Anyway. Just wanted to show you that.”

“Appreciated.” You nodded to him and watched him go, still puffed up with pride. You, on the other hand, were wrestling with your instincts to provide for your pack. 

Dammit. Fine. You’d make a couple loaves of bread, that would satisfy the itch for now. 

The bread was a huge success. As were the next four loaves. (Graves grumbled about sending a few men for supplies, because apparently the demand for fresh bread was quite high.) 

You didn’t expect to see more of the tattoos. But you did. 

Over the next two weeks, nearly a dozen of them approached you, usually individually, to show off their own tats. Most of them got the tat on a forearm, but one got his on his back, and one got it on his calf. You couldn’t help it - you hugged every one of them. 

You never would have predicted this would happen when you’d been shot those months ago. 

“You’re not tired of that damn thing yet?” Graves asked, clearly grumbling, after the most recent soldier had jogged off again. 

“The tat?” You grinned, looking back down at your bread dough. “Nah. I like it. Might get one for myself.” 

Graves grumbled wordlessly, coming up behind you to wrap his arms around your middle, teeth digging into the back of your shoulder through your shirt. “Won’t find one on me.”

“No?” Your breath hitched at the brief pain of his bite. This had become a habit between the two of you. “Too bad. I was thinking of offering an exchange.” 

“Exchange?” His head peeked up over your shoulder. “Of what?” 

You hid your smile, amused. “Marks,” you said blandly. “Thought you might like the idea of me wearing something of yours on my skin.” 

The quickly-stifled groan against the skin of your neck proved you right, and your smile turned victorious. “Not that,” he mumbled, lips moving against your skin, making you shiver. “Something unique.” 

You hummed softly, poking the dough one more time before tossing a towel over it to let it rise. “Well…” You trailed off, taunting, leaving the bait for him to take or ignore. 

He, of course, took the bait. “Well?” 

“Family tradition is a bite,” you mused, pushing your hips back into his. “But I don’t think that will work here. Don’t think you want a big scar.” You smirked teasingly back at him. 

“Could just get it tattooed,” he pointed out, hands settling on your hips, pulling you back into him. 

“Get a tattoo of your teeth marks?” You could feel the way he responded to that, an involuntary little jerk of his hips. “I could wear that, easy.” 

“Yeah? Wanna show off that you’re mine?” Graves tightened his grip on you, scraping his teeth lightly on the skin behind your ear. 

“More like have a permanent reminder,” you mumbled, tipping your head. “Pack already knows I’m yours, and you’re mine.” 

He bit down on the back of your neck with a groan, hands nearly fumbling as he rucked your clothes up and out of the way to get at your skin. 

It took only a few days to make the arrangements for your corresponding marks.

–

Graves normally didn't mind Shepherd. He was a demanding ass sometimes, but overall not bad.

Until right this very moment. 

"Didn't catch that, sir," Graves ground out, working hard to keep his temper. He didn't want to go flying off the handle, not now. 

"Don't play coy with me, son," Shepherd said, firm and a little condescending. "I know you've got a shifter there." 

"Don't know what you mean." Graves dug the nails on his free hand into his skin, the pain helping ground him and keep him from doing something monumentally stupid. 

"No? Then the coyote shifter isn't yours? She's a pretty thing, figured she's your type." The smirk in the general's voice was clear. 

Graves didn't respond, torn between demanding to know how Shepherd knew about her, and denying her existence. 

"I'll have a couple of my men there in a few days to bring her in."

"Bring her in?" Graves repeated, sharp and serious. 

"I'm taking her. She could be a valuable asset to me." 

Graves hit his limit. That? Was unacceptable. "No, sir."

Shepherd paused for a moment. "No?" 

"No. She stays here." Graves knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that if he handed you over to Shepherd, you’d never be seen again. The general was a merciless man. He’d break you, or dissect you. Or possibly both. And that was something Graves found he couldn’t live with. 

Shepherd let the silence grow between them before he snorted softly. "You sure you wanna do this?" He asked, soft and threatening. 

“I am.” Graves clenched his jaw. He was willing to let a lot of shit slide, hell, he’d done a lot of shit himself. But this? No. He’d never admit it aloud, but he was too attached to you. 

He’d never hand you over to anyone. But especially not Shepherd. 

“This won’t end well for you,” Shepherd promised. And hung up, not giving Graves a chance to respond.

Graves breathed out slowly, putting his phone down. He knew Shepherd, knew the general wouldn’t give up so easily. 

This would come down to a fight. One he was determined not to lose. 

Graves started planning. 

–

When Graves first insisted you learn how to use a gun, you rolled your eyes. Why did you need a gun? You had teeth. But he didn’t let up, going so far as to ask while balls deep inside of you, holding you still under his weight and refusing to move until you gave in. That earned him a few days of nasty looks.

But you did learn.

The worst part about it for you was the noise. Even with the headset to muffle the sound, it was jarring and took some getting used to. 

You noticed the changes on base slowly. The guards seemed more alert, constantly watching the horizon. One of the Shadows was always nearby, though they always made it seem coincidental. Graves held you tighter at night (he’d moved you into his room shortly after you both got tattooed). 

But any time you tried to ask, Graves evaded. Stricter training. Upcoming op. Refreshing their skills. All were excuses he tried. 

You didn’t quite believe any of them. 

But he clearly didn’t want you to know, so you didn’t push. You just grew restless, often walking the perimeter of base. 

He was keeping something from you and you wanted to know what. 

None of the Shadows would tell you. Apparently Graves had given them orders not to, because when you cornered one younger man he outright panicked, gaze darting all over the place, hands shaking. You left him with a snarl of discontent, stalking away. 

Not that you had to wait long, after all. 

A shout went up from one of the guards that night, well after dark. You could hear radios going off around base too, just caught a few words: vehicles, armed, Shepherd. 

You had very little idea what it meant, but the way the rec room emptied hinted that it was nothing good. 

“Come with me,” Graves demanded, hand fastening around your wrist. 

“What–?” You didn’t get a chance to finish your question as he pulled you along with him. He got a vest on you first, then handed you the rifle you’d been practicing with and ammo. 

“Stay with me, sweet pea,” he ordered. And it was very clearly an order. “Okay?” 

“Okay,” you agreed, confused but rapidly realizing how serious this was. 

Graves got his own gear on with practiced motions, clicking his comm. “How far out?” he asked briskly. You could just hear the voice on the other end, but not the words. “Copy.” Graves started moving, and you stuck close to him. 

Outside the building was nearly unrecognizable. Shadows were running around prepping, putting up barriers and hides. Graves strode through the organized chaos, right up to the gate. 

You could see vehicles approaching, four of them. The rumble of engines grew steadily louder, though the gates remained closed. 

The vehicles stopped, people piling out of them, guns down for the moment. You didn’t recognize any of them. Not that that was truly a surprise - you knew few humans. 

“Graves,” one of them called in the kind of tone of one used to being obeyed. “Last chance to hand her over.” 

Graves clenched his jaw and didn’t look back at you, though you realized with sudden startling clarity that this was all about you. Because somehow that man out there knew you were a shifter. 

And Graves had apparently refused to hand you over.

It was an interesting feeling, warmth suffusing you from Graves’s actions while dread tried to remind you of how very bad this could be. 

“Not a chance, Shepherd,” Graves called back. He nudged you back just a little, hands gripping his gun securely. 

“I’m sorry it came to this. If you hadn’t been such a fool…” Shepherd trailed off. 

You only had a moment to wonder what he meant before the shooting started. You ducked back behind cover, Graves right behind you. 

“I want them all dead,” Graves said into his comm, eyes utterly cold. You realized with a start you hadn’t seen him like this since the very beginning of your stay here. “Let’s get it done.” 

You were not ashamed to admit that you were not much help. You didn’t have the experience of these men, and this was not a fun game of paintballs. Besides, your movements were restricted to keeping with Graves. 

But you did surprise yourself when you spotted one attempting to flank around the barriers, and you shot him. He fell silently. 

For a bare moment, you wondered if you should feel bad. Not that you did - you’d killed your fair share of prey before. But prey had never been human before.

Then again, humans had never attempted to infiltrate your territory nor threatened your pack before. Not like this. 

“Good shot, sweet pea,” Graves said, speaking up over the din around you. 

You had just enough time to see his faint grin before the world exploded around you. 

You blinked at the dirt under you, ears ringing, head aching. Hands grabbed you and you growled, disoriented, at least until you heard the familiar sounds of your pack shouting. Pulling you back, away from danger. Presumably. Your hearing was still fucked, and you couldn’t smell anything through the gunpowder and smoke. 

One of them fell with a shout, something you just barely heard. You stumbled as his support vanished, falling to your knees. The other Shadow tried to haul you to your feet before he was shoved away, much harsher hands grabbing you. You yelped, the sound too canine to come from a human throat, still disoriented enough that you couldn’t properly resist. 

You almost got your feet under you, except a harsh yank from one of the two pulling you along sent you right back off-balance. You swore, clumsily grabbing for something to hold on to. Your hearing was coming back, slower than you liked but enough. 

They were dragging you off base. To Shepherd. 

If they got you that far, Graves wouldn’t be able to get you back. 

You twisted hard, managing to get a hand on one of them. He tried to yank you off balance, muttering curses. 

But you took advantage of the bare skin of his wrist that you could see and lunged, jaw locking and teeth clamping into his skin. The hot taste of blood filled your mouth but you refused to let go, even as one of them hit you in the back, hard. 

It wasn’t until you heard two gunshots, closer than expected, followed by the dead weight of the soldier dragging both of you down that you released your grip. You spat blood out of your mouth, swaying a little. 

“Sweet pea!” Graves hit the ground next to you, one hand immediately going to your cheek. Blood matted down his hair on his right side, and he seemed to be favoring that side in general, right arm kept tight to his side. Shadows surrounded the two of you, keeping Shepherd’s forces back. 

“I’m okay,” you managed, still a little dizzy. But you latched on to Graves’s vest, because he was right there and comforting. 

Graves let out a relieved sigh, giving you a quick visual once-over. His thumb smeared the blood on your chin. 

“Not mine,” you reminded him, paying no mind to the two bodies around you now. 

He nodded, tugging you closer. “Marry me.”

“What?” You blinked at him rapidly, sure you’d misheard him.

But he grinned, bright and a little mischievous, totally disregarding the active battlefield you were on. “Marry me.”

“Let’s finish this first,” you pointed out, lips twitching in response to his humor. “Kill Shepherd first. And then I expect a proper proposal.”

“Anything you want.” He pressed a hard kiss to your lips, uncaring of the blood, before he got to his feet. You followed him, swaying only for a moment before you caught your balance. 

Shepherd’s force had been decimated, only four remaining, huddled behind the protection of the armored vehicles. One tried to put down his weapon and back away from the fight, only for Shepherd to turn on him and shoot him. 

“You can end this,” Graves yelled to Shepherd in open mockery of Shepherd’s earlier offer. “Nobody else has to die.”

Shepherd didn’t respond, gaze flitting between the Shadows and Graves and you. “You really think you can get away with this?” he asked, voice absolutely venomous. “I’m a general!”

“Shouldn’t have tried to take my coyote, then.” Graves backed up, gently pushing you back as well. You were confused for a moment, trying to figure out what the plan was. There was no way he was just letting Shepherd live, was he? 

The Shadows all swarmed back behind cover, still keeping you surrounded. Something rolled under the vehicle Shepherd hid behind, and the whole thing blew up. You ducked a little, reflexively, before popping back up with wide eyes to watch. The other vehicles were also quickly destroyed. 

You followed Graves over to check the bodies. All dead. You tipped your head, looking down at Shepherd, silently wondering if he’d really been willing to die to get his hands on you. 

“Let’s clean up this mess,” Graves ordered, and Shadows immediately jumped to obey. But grief hid in his eyes as he looked at his base. You leaned into him, silently offering support. You’d help count the losses. 

“You still owe me a proper answer,” Graves murmured, his hand settling low on your back. 

“You still owe me a proper proposal.” You smiled, leaning harder into him. “Even though you’re already mine.”

He huffed. “Bold of you,” he mumbled, head dipping closer to yours. “I like it.”

“You always have.” You smirked, tipping your head enough to bare your teeth at him and watch as his pupils dilated. 

“Trouble.” But Graves just grinned at you. 

–

The base was a mess. Graves helped as much as he could, contacted families and next of kin as necessary. 

The general was disposed of quietly, their trail covered. His Shadows wouldn’t face the fallout of this. 

You held up better than Graves had expected, supporting his men when needed, doing whatever you could to help with cleanup and disposal. Honestly, he was impressed. 

He also hadn’t forgotten his promise to you. 

Once he was sure the danger had passed, he made some arrangements. Flight plans, necessary permits, a few phone calls. Everything was set and arranged exactly how he wanted. 

He had basically everything. The last thing was something he needed to pick up himself. He snuck out while you were hunting, knowing you’d more than likely pout but he’d be back soon. 

“How do you feel about goin’ on a little trip, sweet pea?” He asked a few days later, so as not to arouse suspicion. 

You shrugged from your place in his lap, idly watching a few of the younger Shadows playing a video game. “Never done much of it,” you admitted easily. “Never had a chance.”

He hummed, one hand squeezing your hip gently. “You interested?” 

“Sure, if you want.” You shot him a little smile over your shoulder, relaxed still. That told Graves everything he needed to know.

He didn’t quite pick out your clothes for you, but he did insist on a few things. Like something nice to wear. (And if he snuck in a brand new set of lingerie for you, well, he liked seeing you in pretty things.) 

You didn’t like the plane trip, that much was obvious. Tension pulled your shoulders tight, and it took you a long time to get comfortable and settle down. Graves kept one hand on you to help where he could, and was finally rewarded when you fell asleep against his shoulder. 

Watching your awe looking around somewhere new warmed him in unexpected ways. (Maybe he shouldn’t be so surprised. He did ask you to marry him, after all.) 

He gave the two of you three days to adjust to the timezone change and do some touristy things. Not that he much cared - he’d been all over the world by now. People were people everywhere. But giving you this experience? So much better. 

You eyed the Eiffel tower with distrust when he led you to it, and he couldn’t help but smirk. 

“Don’t worry, sweet pea,” he drawled, extra sweet. “You’ll be fine.”

You immediately scowled at him (just as he’d hoped) and stalked up to the lifts. He followed a little more leisurely, knowing everything was taken care of. 

He caught your expression as the sun set, the wind whipping against the two of you, the city sounds all but gone. You looked awed again, hands gripping the railing as you looked over the city. Graves smiled, pleased with his timing, and settled next to you for a minute, just letting you look your fill. The softer light on your skin filled him with a kind of warmth he’d never thought he’d experience. 

“Hey, sweet pea. Got a question for you.” 

You turned to him and blinked, totally unsuspecting. Graves took a knee in front of you, pulling the ring box out of his pocket, and your eyes went wide, one hand flying up to your mouth. 

“I promised I’d do this proper,” he murmured, looking up at you, blind to everything else. (There were at least two of his Shadows in the crowd, you were safe, that’s all he cared about.) “Never thought I’d be here, but you’ve been a surprise from the beginning. I want you to keep surprising me, sweet pea. Will you marry me?”

You nodded and then huffed a soft almost-laugh. “Yes,” you managed, hands settling on his cheeks before you kissed him. The crowd around the two of you clapped, a few whistles coming from his boys. Graves grinned at you, honestly ridiculously happy, and slid the ring on your finger. 

Standing there with you in his arms, the stars slowly emerging even as his boys put on a hell of a fireworks show for the two of them, Graves knew one thing for certain. 

He’d gentled his coyote, but you’d gentled him every bit as much. And he was just fine with that. 

[parkakeet]

yeah yeah yeah, utah, the mormon state. we've all heard it. 'never go there, the mormons!' etc etc

but have you ever watched the sun set behind the towering walls of a sandstone canyon, oranges and reds against the bright blue sky until the sunlight bursts across the top and makes the rocks glow?

have you ever stood on top of a mountain and looked out into the deep wide of the uintah range, and felt like they could swallow you whole?

have you ever driven your car out onto the salt flats and sat on the hood and felt your skin burn and burn, but the endless bright white stretches out like a lake in the desert, and you can't look away?

have you ever looked up at the bright slice of the sky from the bottom of a slot canyon and watched a bird flit over it, and you are so small and so deep and the walls are boxing you in so tight that you can scrape your arms against the sides?

have you ever heard the coyotes out in the open desert at night or looked up at the stars in escalante?

have you picked out the avalanche trails that trace down the mountains in the snow, or stepped outside in the winter to squint against the bright white of the world?

have you ever heard the water in the canyon and listened to the rustle of the leaves, and felt the early morning chill on your arms? and the paintbrush flowers and the teasel and the forget me nots.

it's so open and so wide and so deep, and I could drown in it. do you understand?