#hurt javier

[lionlena]

Too many shadows behind you (JavierPeñaxf!reader) part 2: There are no shadows without light

Summary: You were born in Laredo, but you didn't meet Javier until he came back from Colombia. You quickly fell in love with him and became his wife. You were happy, but… Shadows of the past begin to haunt Javier, and you lose the fight for his love and look for it in the arms of someone else.

Generally, it's JavierxReader but Joel also appears. Feel warned.

Warnings: age gap, angst, hurt, PTSD, mentions about rape and murders, reader cheating her husband Javier, Yes you read that right, READER cheats on Javier, Javier is a faithful husband.

Sorry, I needed angst

When Javier returned to his hometown and retired, he did not expect anything positive. He had seen too much evil and suffering to count on happiness. He thought he would spend the rest of his life living with his father. He expected to grow more grouchy and lonely with each passing year. And yet, you came into his life. The first thing he noticed was your lemony perfume, and from then on he couldn't think of you other than you was his refreshing. You were like a cold lemonade to him on a hot day. You brought him back to life. Your youth and joy made him a little intimidated at first, but he knew enough about women to see that you were interested in him. But he was afraid you just wanted to have fun. Because why wouldn't you date younger men?

However, as he got to know you better, he realized that you were special and finally asked you out. But he didn't have sex with you after the first date, nor after the second or third date... It wasn't until after six that he took you to bed. You were too precious to him to treat you like a one-night stand, and he wanted you to know that.

Chucho also noticed this and started to pressure his son to settle down. He had some pretty reasonable arguments. Such a beautiful young girl can quickly find someone else. Javier knew it too. He'd seen the way other men looked at you and felt a pang of jealousy, as well as the anxiety of losing you. Even though you weren't interested in anyone else.

Finally, after half a year, he made a decision. He had many doubts, but all related to himself. He was afraid that his reputation would catch up with you. He was worried that he wouldn't give you the life you deserved. However, he took a risk and planned everything. He prepared a picnic and took you horseback riding. But just as he was about to propose to you, it started to rain. You hid under a tree, and since he wanted to be a gentleman to you and take care of you, he handed you his jacket so you wouldn't get cold. But he forgot that he had a ring box in his pocket. As you shoved your hands into pockets, he saw your eyes widen and realized he had ruined everything.

"Javi, is that?" you asked.

"Yes," he murmured. "I'm sorry, it wasn't supposed to look like this... I was supposed to kneel there." He pointed to where the blanket was. "This was supposed to be…"

You didn't let him finish his sentence as you stood on your toes, wrapped your arms around his neck, and kissed him.

"Yes," you whispered into his mouth and started laughing.

Javier had never felt so happy. What in his eyes was a failure, you turned into a success. He grabbed your hips and lifted you, turning around with you in his arms. He laughed with you and realized that you are his light.

Even your quiet wedding wasn't a problem for you. Javier has seen you accept his past and reputation. Right after you got married, he decided one thing: he would be the best husband in the world.

And you, in his eyes, were the sweetest, best wife he could ever dream of. When he came home tired, you were waiting for him with dinner. You rubbed his back and told him about your day. You never held anything against him. One day when he wanted to make you breakfast he burned the pancakes, and you turned it into a joke. You told him he couldn't be too perfect, otherwise, he wouldn't be real.

So he tried to be the best version of himself for you. He showered you with compliments and made sure you knew how much he loved you. He gave you little gifts and always made sure he brought you to several orgasms.

He even started smoking less because your dad died of lung cancer. And no, he wasn't worried about himself, but just about you. So he always made sure you were out of reach of cigarette smoke.

Being your loving husband became the meaning of his life.

But paradoxically, the more he loved you, the bigger the shadows behind him got. It all started with an innocent trip to a bar. You were going to meet some friends for a few drinks and you wanted him to go with you. Another thing that surprised him. You weren't ashamed to go to parties with him, on the contrary, you shined more with him.

However, Javier was not too enthusiastic. After all, he told you that he would join you later. However, he didn't feel like it so much that he thought about calling you with some excuse, but he made you a promise that he would come. He couldn't let you down. When he entered the bar, he immediately noticed you, his Sun. You were laughing with your friends and you were unaware of his presence. He didn't come to you right away. Sometimes he liked to watch you from a distance, and it was satisfying to see other men look at you. He loved their disappointed expressions when you tapped your wedding ring with your fingernail or when you snuggled into his side.

At one point he saw some guy staring at you and he didn't like it. It was no ordinary look of delight. There was something predatory about his gaze. Javier frowned and saw you heading towards the bathroom, the weird guy following you. So of course he followed you too. As you walked down the hall he shouted:

"Y/N, baby!"

You turned around with a big smile and ran towards him. You almost bumped into this shady dude on the way, but you didn't seem to notice him. Only your husband mattered to you.

You fell into his arms with a giggle.

"After all, you are Honey!!!"

He smiled and his finger tapped you on the nose. "How many drinks have you had already?"

"Only four... Maybe five and uh... I need to pee."

Javi shook his head and gently wrapped his arms around your waist. "Go, I'll wait here."

As you walked away, he noticed that the suspicious type had disappeared. It was as if he had vanished into thin air. Javier ignored it. Only you mattered.

Two days later you were hanging around the kitchen preparing breakfast. The radio was playing happy music as you rocked your hips. Javier licked his lips at the sight. He wasn't ready for round two after he finished in you that morning, but the sight was tempting. To occupy his mind with something else, he grabbed the newspaper and immediately opened the crime column, an old habit. But what he read made his heart almost leap out of his chest. A young woman was brutally raped and beaten next to the club where you spent the evening. There was a preliminary description of the rapist that matched the guy who followed you into the bathroom. Javier looked at you and swallowed. Everything was fit. Place, time, description… He imagined your naked, bruised body. Your broken like Helena's. If he hadn't come... If he'd called you with that stupid excuse.

Suddenly he felt your touch on his cheek and realized that you were asking him something.

"What?" he gasped.

"I asked if you're okay. You've turned pale, darling."

Javier nodded and pulled you onto his lap.

"I just want to hug you for a while."

You combed his hair and kissed his head. "Do what you want, baby."

Javier wrapped his arms around you tightly and sighed. Your closeness soothed him, but he kept thinking about it. What if it happened to you? Would it be his fault? What if the rapist beat you so badly that you died from injuries? It's all his fault. Because Javier Peña attracted evil.

And so your light made his shadows lengthen. First, he dreamed of Helena, raped and wounded, lying on a dirty mattress. Then the boy was killed by Carrillo. Sometimes Olivia's mother. Nightmares where he and Steve were late and Olivia died too. Javier thought about it more and more. About all the evil he has allowed. Every time when he was late and someone died. Then he started thinking you weren't safe with him.

Before he knew it, his shadows had swallowed him whole, and he couldn't fight them. It pained him to see you still trying. Even when he was broken, you didn't give up on him and that made him even more distant. He didn't think he deserved you and you shouldn't waste your life on someone like him.

And then he started noticing subtle changes in your behavior. You didn't wait for him with dinner anymore. You were coming back home late and kept close your phone. One night he came back very late. Normally he always slept on the couch then, but something drew him to you. He carefully laid down on the bed next to you and that's when he smell it. Another man's perfume. His heart squeezed painfully and he locked himself in the bathroom where he cried.

But that's what he wanted, you to leave. For a moment he even wanted to laugh at the irony of fate. Once he had abandoned the woman at the altar, and now he was about to be abandoned by his wife. He probably deserved it.

It didn't take long for him to discover who you were having an affair with. And that hurt him too. He expected you to take someone younger and then he could tell himself that his age was the problem. But no. You chose a man named Joel Miller. Javier used his connections with the police and checked him out, but found nothing alarming. No history of violence. Only a few speeding tickets.

So he accepted it and waited for you to tell him you were leaving. Every day he returned with a heavy heart. Every day he expected to see your suitcases or his. And it was like the torture you gave him. This made him more and more angry and bitter every day.

And then Joel was gone, but you stayed and tried to be his sweet wife again, and he wanted to scream in pain. He didn't understand why you doing it. Did you afraid of divorce and scandal?

But he made the decision to take the blame. He loved you too much to expose you to the wrath of your conservative mother and his father. It was easier that way. After all, this is him, Javier Peña, a regular visitor to a Colombian whorehouse. He knew, of course, that some people would mock you, but for most, you would be a victim.

The situation would be different if they knew you were the one who cheated him. Then everyone would look at you like you're a whore, and Javier wouldn't take it. That would be unfair.

Finally, during one of your arguments, the balloon popped and you let everything out. He saw you didn't say it consciously. And on the one hand, he felt relief, and on the other pain.

And of course, he decided to pretend he didn't know about your affair. He didn't want you to feel even more guilty. When you asked if he would fight for yours marriage, he wanted to scream 'YES'. But he no longer believed that you loved him and he wanted you to be free.

Leaving the house was the hardest thing he'd ever done. His heart broke into a million pieces.

Get these left handed lovers out of your way They look hopeful but you, you should not stay If you want me to break down and give you the keys I can do that but I can’t let you leave Oh, please don’t go I want you so I can’t let go For I lose control

*Barcelona - Please don't go

I cry ugly because Javier is so good husband… And I hurt him so much 🤧😭

Part 1

Part 3

[barghest-land]

ata tu corazón, mi amor, y arrástralo por la tierra

[almostfoxglove]

I'LL CARRY IT

written for my angst challenge

Rating: Explicit (18+)

Pairing: Javier x f!Reader

Word Count: 5.9k

you can read on ao3 too, if you like!

SUMMARY: Your childhood best friend returns to Laredo a celebrated hero. When he shows up at your bar shackled by grief, you drag him home for the night. CW: Heavy alcohol consumption and brief reference to the death of a parent. A fair bit of yearning.

Takes place somewhere in S3E1 after the wedding but before Javier returns to Colombia.

part II | series masterlist | masterlist

12:00 A.M.

At first you mistake it for a good thing. Last shift before your weekend, two hours to go, and the long-gone local hero back in his hometown smoking a cigarette at your bar. Your break over, you slink from the backroom into the riotous din of The Last Man Standing—one of Laredo’s many dives—to reclaim your post behind the bar. Place is a hellhole as often as it is crowded and tonight’s no different, and yet you’re halfway to a smirk. Pleased to see an old friend.

He hasn’t looked up, hasn’t seen you yet, so you busy yourself with the guy who flags you down to order the second he spots you. Fine by you, the guy tips well the later it gets and it’s already after midnight, and regardless, you don’t mind having an excuse to observe The Javier Peña, DEA agent extraordinaire, at a distance. Top button undone, cigarette vanishing in his hand, eyes glued to the ring-stained bartop as smoke shivers out between his lips. Quite the celebrity now. Been home three weeks if the rumors are true but you’ve yet to see him. You figured he’d call, but he didn’t—not that you’re surprised. 

Eight years feels like nothing now. Maybe he’s a hero to everyone else, but to you Javier looks exactly the same as he has his whole life—all that’s changed is the depth of his misery. How he doesn’t look up for anything or anyone, except to shrug off the occasional shoulder clap from some drunk stranger. 

When you’ve served the guy his drink and collected your tip—30%, thank you sir—you shake the nerves loose from your shoulders and slide up, glass in hand. 

“Well shit,” you say when you’re in front of him, and Javier slowly lifts his eyes. You smile, all rogue. No shake to your voice at all as you pour a whiskey blind. “This the part when I ask for an autograph?”

Javier’s dark brow dips in the middle and you might as well be twenty-eight again. Twenty-one. Eighteen. Eleven. All the ages you’ve been with him in all the years you’ve known him. Because this, right here—that little furrow that looks like a frown if you’re not looking close enough—is exactly how he’s always been. How he’s always looked at you after time spent away. 

Sure, there’s never been this much away . This much radio silence. The kind of parting that comes with getting older, getting further—something you once would’ve sworn only happens to everyone else. You’ve made your peace with it. Wished him well from the wrong side of the hemisphere. You’ve had lives of your own. 

Seems he can still cut a tiny hole in your chest when he withholds a smile. 

Javier spears smoke from the corner of his mouth as you slip his empty glass behind the bar and replace it with the fresh pour, watching as he nods in a tired, humorless way. “Not signing shit for you,” he gruffs, and snubs his filter into the crystal ashtray beside his glass. 

One-two-three-four-five others sit beside it, ashed in their grave. 

So he feels about as bad as he looks.

“Awful snappy for a man hoggin’ a barstool,” you reply.

The corner of his mouth flinches but doesn’t pull. He picks up his glass, eyes sagging away from you. “Nice to see you too,” Javier concedes.

1:00 A.M.

Friday means it’s crazy, means the rest of your shift slingshots by, and most of the night someone else is working Javier’s side of the bar so you lose track of his drinks. The windows of the bar have fogged, giving the world beyond a kind of eerie glow. 

You do your best to watch him, holding in your stomach a knot of newborn worry, but there’s always someone shouting for another drink. Now and then you catch some guy in a cap lumbering up to him to boast loudly of his pride, and though it’s microscopic—invisible maybe to everyone else—you see the way Javier shrinks in on himself. Folds.

The smoking, too, goes on. You sweep past him on your way to a booth in the corner, tray of shots balanced in hand, and accidentally inhale a sour cloud as he blows it out. You try to stifle your cough as you reach the table, doling out the silver glasses slick with tequila. On your way back to the bar, Javier catches your eye and snuffs the spent cigarette with an apologetic look. Pendant lights sway in his eyes like fireflies. You shake your head like he’s being silly, squeeze his shoulder briefly as you pass, and the roar of his body beneath your palm blazes like a campfire. The kind of heat that blackens everything to char. 

You think he’s had four drinks, maybe five, but not for sure.

2:00 A.M.

Only the drunks remain to kick out into the bog of late-summer, all that humidity that ruins your hair. You like most of ‘em. Most swagger out with a slurred night, sweetheart as you usher them safely into their cabs. Then all that’s left is your childhood sweetheart slumped over at the bar. Dated for two weeks in sixth grade—broke up over god knows what, probably him stealing your favorite gel pens—and were inseparable ever after. The second that kid sloped into your classroom, all gangly limbs attached loose as rubber bands and dark curls drifting vagrantly into his eyes, you just knew. Didn’t know how, didn’t know why—but you knew that boy would be home, and he was for years. 

Look at him now. Passed out drunk, lips parted, cheek squished flat beside his empty glass. His cigarette flares from his limp hand beside his face. You shoo off your coworker with a friendly gnight before slipping the cigarette from Javier’s fingers to crush in the crystal tray with its brothers. 

You go about cleaning up around him. He doesn’t wake for anything—not even when you have to count all the coins in the till for the night—which also, is new. Javier’s always slept like shit, even when you were kids and there wasn’t much to sweat over. Woke up if someone in the other room dared to breathe too deeply. 

Guess a bathtub’s worth of whiskey will take anybody out. 

When it’s time to go, you slip your hand up his spine to rest between his shoulder blades. “Alright, cariño,” you say softly. “Time to go home.”

Javier stirs, but only barely. A grunt, a shallow breath, a flutter in his lashes. You pat his back firmly, not harshly, but enough that he sniffs and grunts again, awake. 

“Blue’s still up there,” he mumbles with his eyes closed. 

Grinning, you lift your face to the ceiling fan overhead—one of two dozen in this place, none of which run and all of which droop with a rainbow of bras tossed into the rafters. Above you now sways the strap of a pale blue bra mildewed with dust. Would’ve been your twenty-first when you shot that up there, and it’s never fallen. 

“I’m a decent shot,” you say. 

Now he grins, just half his lips, but a real one all the same. “I remember.”

“Course you do, I was better than you.”

At your teasing, the grin snaps clean off his face and his real frown replaces it. “No’anymorre,” he slurs.

Your heart plummets. You can see, now, the bruised darkness beneath his closed eyes as you rub a small circle in the middle of his back. If you were already home you’d pull him into your arms, but he can’t rot on this stool all night. In your silence, Javier cracks one eye at you. “Can’t drive,” he groans.

“No shit,” you say, forcing a soft grin, and he mumbles some gibberish that sounds like it’s supposed to be Spanish. “Come on, work with me here.”

His eye shuts again as he grimaces, face still smushed against the bartop. His hair’s a mess so you comb it back, but the fucker still won’t budge. Rolling your eyes, you lift his arm and drape it over your shoulders to help him off the stool, his body warm and pliant. More solid than you remember him being before. Layers of slender muscle built up like the rings of a tree.

When he rises, gravity lurches and you stagger under his weight, catching yourself against the bar. 

“Careful now,” you warn him playfully. 

Javier turns his face towards yours, close enough in this awkward position that his nose presses against your cheek. He reeks of smoke and shitty whiskey. A little of sweat. You’d mock him for it if he were anywhere within a hundred miles of sober, but he’s a lost cause for now. Your arm fits snug around his waist. To his credit, he makes an effort to stay on his feet. Turns his head down to watch his boots as you walk him outside like he’s focusing intently on putting one foot in front of the other. You pinch his side and he hmphs at you. 

“Could’a just called, you know,” you say as you walk him to your car. The street is all empty parking spots and shuddered windows and packs of thirsty mosquitos, cicada song chirping densely in the air. Your car sleeps down the block alone, black as the sky and in need of a wash, green-strung beads hanging in a loop from the rearview mirror inside.

“Wanted t’ seeyou,” Javier says. 

You nudge your head against his cheek gently. “I missed you too,” you say.

As you drive, streetlamps stripe past the windows. Brick buildings sit squat and lightless, bodegas shackled for the night, and a wilful trash bag balloons with a passing breeze, blowing across the road with a quiet, swimming grace. In the passenger seat, Javier slumps against the door, temple pressed to the half-open window. You think he’s asleep until he licks his bottom lip. 

“Saw Lorraine,” he mumbles, those dark eyes closed away, like he can hardly keep himself awake.

You turn back to watch the empty road. Stop at the stop signs just for show. No one’s out here but you at this hour—Laredo is a ghost town.

“Heard Danny was gettin’ married,” you reply.

Javier exhales profoundly: slow, labored, loud. He’s always been a pouty drunk, but this is something else. “You weren’t there,” he says.

“Had to work.”

“Liar.”

You roll your eyes even though he isn’t looking at you to see. He’ll feel it. Always does. Drumming your fingertips against the steering wheel, you fight back a smirk. “Fucked one of the groomsmen last year,” you admit. “Didn’t feel like havin’ a reunion.”

When you glance at him again, Javier has opened his eyes a sliver to smirk at you, the corner of his mouth pulled into his dimpled cheek. “Julien?”

You frown at the road. “Mateo.”

“Shit,” mumbles Javier, still smirking.

“Somethin’ like that,” you agree.

At the next red light his eyes are closed again and despite the fact that he’s, what, thirty six now? Javier looks like a child to you. Spine hunched, torso sunken. Shoulders broader than ever but curled in on themselves, like if he only had the room he’d be small as a seed. Fetal and miserable. A thousand years older on the inside than anyone should ever have to be. 

“Starin’ a’me,” he scolds, his words slumping into each other.

You huff quietly, caught. “Shut up,” you say. “Just remindin’ myself what you look like. Think you got uglier.”

He growls darkly, unamused.

As you turn at the next light, the green-beaded rosary sways from the rearview mirror. If he had his eyes open Javier would recognize it. His mother’s—passed to you before she died. You aren’t one for praying but you’ll die with it in your hands, you think. That’s the kind of person she was to you. Eternal.

Beside you, Javier mutters something unintelligible, his breath fogging the window. 

“Hm?”

“Seein’ anyone yet?” he repeats, and shifts to loll his head back against the seatrest. 

You gasp softly, feigning offense. “Yet? Ouch, baby,” you tease.

“Didn’t mean it like that,” he grumbles.

“I know,” you say, as you turn into the suburbs. Quiet starter homes lurk in the dark, kids’ bicycles lying like skeletons in their yellowing lawns. “I’m being mean.” 

“I like y’mean,” Javier replies, and finally opens his eyes as if he can sense you’re getting close to home, even though he’s never seen this place. He stares through the windshield glazed and distant, and you try not to stare like you’re concerned. He looks destroyed, you think. Obliterated. Sure, you’ve kept up with the news. Devoured everything you could about the quest to tackle Escobar, terrified Javier’s name would appear in the black ink that stained your fingers, reporting he was dead. That he’d be another casualty, and you’d not have said goodbye.

You know you’ve got no clue what really happened down there. That you never will. But you can see it choking him, hanging from his neck like a noose that’s just biding its time before it pulls.

“Nah, it’s just me,” you say, dragging your eyes off him again. “Think the two weeks we dated was about the closest I ever came to love.”

You’re joking, all foxish grin, but Javier doesn’t laugh. He just stares into the middle distance looking like a ghost. “Sixteen,” he mumbles.

“What?” you say.

He sighs. “Was sixteen days,” he annunciates, and your heart sputters.

Then his face folds in on itself suddenly; he pales, then greens. “Gonna b’sick,” he says.

3:00 A.M.

“Christ, you got heavy,” you groan, hobbling slanted up your porch steps. Though more alert, Javier is no less useless in walking, and though he mumbles shame-riddled sorrys he can’t much help you here. You hold him tightly to you, fingers pinching into his hip as he leans, hot as a furnace against your side in the worst of summer. You don’t care.

It doesn’t matter that it’s been eight years. It could be forty, and if Javier showed up on your doorstep ready to fall, your response would only ever be give it to me. I’ll carry it.

He grunts as you prop him against the side of your house to fish out your keys. “All muscle,” he teases, voice deep and coarse.

“Glad you haven’t shed your ego,” you snark.

You give the door a shove as the lock turns. Javier tips his face up to look at the sliver of moon left out to wink from the sky as if he’s saying a prayer. He reeks of sick—his shirt stained in one spot on his chest where he failed to aim away from himself—and while he stares up at the dark rash of night you work open the buttons of his shirt to take it off. Despite puking in your car, he’s still too lost to the world to notice your hands until you’re halfway down. Maybe in another life you’d be staring at his chest as you uncover it. The broad slopes of muscle, his stomach, the dark path of hair trailing towards his jeans. But in this life, you aren’t that to each other. You don’t get to be. 

“Cariño,” Javier says, and one of his hands covers yours as you pinch the last button. Looking down at you now, concerned through hazy eyes. Summer hangs wetly in the air; his curls lay damp against his skin, licking his temples, the nape of his neck.

You shrug his hand off yours, offering a small grin. “Gotta get this in the wash, Javi,” you tell him. “Not allowed to get in my bed smelling like puke.”

Cicadas sing from their trees. Your house, small as it may be, is a welcoming place. All red bricks and white shutters. The swing on the porch sways behind Javier, giving the occasional squeak. You shuck his button-up off his shoulders and ball it in your hands before catching his eye. “Can I trust you to stay upright while I put this in the wash?” you ask, one eyebrow arched.

He scowls, all pouty bottom lip—trying to make you laugh, even now. You huff as if exhausted, sarcastic and a little pleased. He’s in there, the person you’ve loved. Somewhere buried.

When the laundry is running you find him on your porch swing, horizontal. One bare arm dangling off the seat, his eyes closed again. Skin that’s usually golden washed silver by moonlight. In this heat there’s no reason for you to cover him but still you feel the nagging urge. Even with you here with him, you hate the thought of anyone coming out onto their porches or lawns to see him like this—out of control. You rouse him just enough to lift his head so you can sit at the end of the swing, then lay his head in your lap. He hums. A low, gravelly sound of pleasure. Glad to feel you beneath him in this small way. 

“M’sorry, baby,” Javier murmurs groggily, nuzzling his cheek against your leg as you stroke the hair away from his face again. He’s flushed, damp and sweaty, and even with the shirt gone could use a shower but you’d never say so. At this point, you’ve seen him in every state—sunny and terrible and everything in between—and don’t fear any of them. Don’t hate any of them. Never could, because all of them are him, so how could you.

“Cleaned up your puke before,” you reply. “Nothin’ I haven’t seen.”

He sighs, and with no small effort rolls himself onto his back with a grunt—the swing sways with the movement, rocking you both. Then once more, this time to his other side to face you. You chuckle softly as he settles, one of his arms reaching behind you to wrap around your hips, and for a while you drift back and forth with the porch light off and the moon’s claw cutting through the dark.

It’d be something close to heaven if it weren’t for his pain.

“Wanted to call you,” Javier sighs, after a long while of cricketing quiet. “After—”

Nothing.

You wait.

The rest of whatever he was going to say dissolves, never follows. Never becomes something for you to hold, to know, to carry. He keeps all the weight.

“Could’ve,” you say, hand in his hair again, how he always used to like. Even when you were kids he always wanted to be touched. His head in your lap, your hand in his hair to scare off his bad dreams. You could never tell a soul without destroying him—and you never wanted to. The way you were for each other was just that: for each other. Everyone knew you were close, inseparable at school. But the depth of that bond was a secret no one had to know. How his body needed to be close to yours to settle, to breathe, sometimes to sleep.

Javier’s nose scrunches as he fights off some stabbing thought. You stroke your thumb across his temple, trying to get him to look at you, but he won’t. 

“Tell me,” you whisper. 

Two words you never say. A question you never ask. He’s so far past drunk he’s practically a child—maybe it’s wrong to ask him like this—but you’d do anything to relieve even one ounce of this suffering.

Eventually, he exhales deeply, breath warm against your hip. Behind you, you feel his hand stroke your back, slipping beneath the hem of your shirt. “Thought you’d hate me,” he mumbles.

Your heart splinters. Every cell in your body wants to pull him against you, pull him into you, swallow the ache. “Should know better than that by now,” you say. 

The shoulder he isn’t laying on bobs with what must be a shrug. “Been a while.”

“Been a long time,” you agree. Not angry, not bitter, not blaming—it’s been a long time. It’s nothing to you now but a fact. Seeing him again has erased the nag of your neglected longing.

With a gruff, Javier’s arm tightens around your back and he pulls himself closer, his forehead nuzzling your hip bone. “Feels like a’undred years,” he says, his voice hoarse and broken.

There isn’t anything you can do but card your fingers through his hair, scratching his scalp with featherlight nails. You let your head fall back against the brick of your house. Exhausted, but you won’t sleep. You’ll stay awake with him all night if he needs it, if he asks you. Even if he doesn’t. 

4:00 A.M.

“No more water,” he begs. “Please.”

In your kitchen, just the stove light on, he’s sobering. Not sober —but he can stand up on his own. Leaning back against your counter, both hands outstretched to rest upon the laminate. Cool light splits his face in half—one bright and weary, one lost to shadow. You roll your eyes and hold one hand out to accept his water glass which he passes you with a grateful sigh.

You listen to the harsh rush of water draining into the kitchen sink—a stark disruption to the eerie quiet of the middle of the night in which it feels like you and Javier are the only people left on earth. 

Behind you, Javier groans, watching the glass fill again.

“It’s for the nightstand, baby,” you assure him as you pass it back. 

He pouts at it, arms drooping at his sides. Trying again. Digging for your laugh. With expectant eyes you pick up his hand and cup it around the glass, and when you let go and he doesn’t drop it you let a smile creep slowly across your face. Satisfied, he straightens a little, swaying slightly, and nods. He looks down at the floor, his bare feet, and his face blues. Darkens like he’s remembering.

You lay the palm of your hand over the center of his chest and beneath it Javier’s heart throbs steadily. His lungs expand. His blood moves. Alive—whether he feels it or not—and a comfort to you. 

Though you’ve lived in this house only three years and Javier’s never once seen or stepped foot in it, he trails through the narrow halls to your bedroom like he knows it well. Sloppy footsteps, yes, and always with you behind him braced to catch any sudden fall, but he makes it in the end. Water sloshes over the lip of his glass as he sets it down. Then—still in his jeans, which hug his thighs so tightly you’re surprised he doesn’t try to peel them off—he crawls into your bed, on top of the duvet. In the doorway you pause to watch him and get a vision of another life in which he does this every night, at ease in your home because it’s his home too.

It is a terrible thought, weak and troubling. It’ll burrow if you let it, so you kick it away. While you strip free of your work clothes, you watch him in the small mirror above your dresser; his head flops into your pillows, cheek smushed, eyes sliding closed. Those dark lashes, those parted lips. Always exactly the same. He doesn’t even glance in your direction—he doesn’t need to peek at your body. He’s seen you before. You him.

“Was Mateo worse than me,” he asks from the bed, like he’s read your mind. No surprise. For years, you would’ve sworn he could.

You blush, though he’s not looking. “Javi,” you say softly.

“Sorry,” he sighs.

In a t-shirt, you pad around the other side of the bed to crawl over the covers and curl onto your side to face him, one hand beneath your cheek. “Sex in college is supposed to be bad,” you tell him, grinning.

His brows pinch together, bracketing his forehead. “Shouldn’t've been with you,” he mumbles.

Yes, he’s how you remember. Ever chasing some rabbit hole to plummet down to avoid the cavern to which he’ll give no name. He’s got one hand buried under his pillow—how easy it is to think of your things as his—and the other lies between you, limp. You take it in your own, pull it to your lips, and press them to his knuckles. “We were kids,” you say, sure to smile against the back of his hand so he’ll feel it.

He huffs. “Drunk.”

“That too.”

“Better now, I swear.”

You laugh. Can’t help it. Silver light from the moon puddles over you, illuminating half his face, the curve of his shoulder, the slope of his arm. Even miserable, probably in a blackout, one foot hanging sadly off the edge of the mattress, Javier is someone who draws laughter out of you with ease, same as when you were kids. You kiss the back of his hand again, still grinning, and watch the frown dissolve from his face. He’s always been beautiful in a way that never seemed fair, but you think it might be getting worse with age. No one should look so good in this state, but there he is.

“Sure hope so, baby,” you tease.

Now he cracks one dark eye to squint at you, the corner of his mouth loosening, curling into his cheek. Then there’s that dimple. Your heart patters. You’ve missed him. “Could show you,” Javier smirks.

You roll your eyes. “You aren’t showin’ me shit right now.”

His bottom pink pops again, pouting as he broods, yanking another chuckle from you while he murmurs something you miss. Something that ends with good though.

“Hm?” you say.

“You smell good though,” Javier murmurs, and though soft you hear it this time. That almost whine.

“Well, when you put it that way,” you tease, and like magic, he laughs. Smile lines crinkle beside his eyes, nose scrunching. Beautiful. It is, you think, the best of him—how he looks when he actually laughs. It takes over his face. 

As you both settle, he scooches closer on the bed, squeaking the mattress. You feel the warm plume of his breath whisper over your face as he sighs. He has, it seems, only a match of levity at a time. It sparkles, flares, and smokes out too quickly. 

It isn’t a frown that replaces it, but despair. “Gonna feel like shit tomorrow,” he mutters, no louder than a whisper. No need to speak any louder when you’re lying this close. Your lips press to his knuckles again and this time he squeezes your hand, the muscles in his forearm briefly tensing. Freckles dot his bicep like stars.

“You feel like shit right now,” you whisper in reply.

Javier nods, face folding like he wants to cry. But he almost never does, not even in front of you.

5:00 A.M. 

You drift into brief tides of sleep with the warmth of him around you, his face in the crook of your neck. For most of your life, you’ve chalked up the ease with which you touch each other to an echo of your childhoods—a time in which touch is given often and without judgment. There has never been hesitation between you, not in this way. Even now, eight years since the last time you saw him, Javier slots against you in a way that just feels right—new, broader shoulders and all. 

His slow, deep breaths warm your neck, your collarbone. You couldn’t wiggle out of his arms if you tried, and though it’s warm even with the window open, even with both of you on top of the covers, you don’t want to. Eight years is a long time to go without this.

When he stirs with a tortured groan, you nudge your lips against his forehead. “S’okay,” you mumble, and the whine that snakes out of him rattles your chest and slices clean through your heart. Wrapping a hand around the back of his head, fingers threading through curls, you pull him closer, and his arms tighten around your waist.

Maybe it should feel wrong when Javier nuzzles into your neck to kiss you softly beneath the jaw, but it doesn’t. 

“Baby—” he croaks, and you hush him, petting his hair.

You don’t want him to say it. You never say it. If he says it now, it’ll ruin you.

“I know, Javi,” you whisper, squeezing your eyes closed so tight you see a rain of stars. “I know.”

“Y’ never let me say it,” he mumbles against your throat, his breath fogging your skin.

“You don’t need to,” you say.

“Wanted to, you know,” he replies, his voice so gentle you feel it pass from his chest to yours in a shallow tremor.

You chuckle softly from the darkness behind your eyes, like opening them will break the spell. “Oh yeah? When?”

He shrugs, his body loose and boneless. The heat of him is making you sweat. 

“The whole time,” Javier mumbles, and you wish suddenly that he weren’t so close because he must hear the sudden racing of your heart. “Pensé que me casaría contigo.”

If he didn’t hear its racing, you think, there’s no way he misses when it stops. Your Spanish is mediocre at best but you catch fragments, piece it together. I thought I’d marry you.

Your forehead wrinkles as a sudden urge to cry slams into you, shattering your bones. At least you manage to pat his back teasingly, feigning coolness, steadiness. Pretending he hasn’t toppled you. 

“Think you’re confusing me and Lorraine, cariño,” you tease quietly, hopeful that the wetness in your eyes doesn’t taint your voice.

Silence stretches like an elastic threatening a snap, a sting, a burn. But Javier exhales in a way that feels like he’s asleep again, like all of this is just nonsense cooked up in some drunken dream. Soon sleep is dragging at you sweetly, loosening your limbs again. You grow heavy, face slack, your limbs indistinguishable from his. When he whispers again you hardly hear it and the words don’t stick. You’ll forget them when you next wake for real. But he says them all the same.

“Not confusin’ you with anybody.”

Then you’re gone, sucked away. Asleep.

6:00 A.M.

The yellow morning leaks through your bedroom. You wake to a glint in your eyes: sunlight reflecting off a picture frame on your dresser. You and Javier twenty years ago dressed for junior prom, hidden now by the blinding. Squinting, you groan a soft mph sound as you wake, desperate to bury yourself in sleep again. 

In your brief slumber the two of you have remained braided—two strands of clinging ivy. Against you, Javier groans, humming tiredly against your throat, and you feel his hand slip up the hem of your shirt again, his palm flat over your spine. 

Half asleep, you let him. 

Half asleep, you let yourself remember.

You’re twenty five again. Just a few years out of college, both of you home for the summer. Out in the long grass in Chucho’s yard, you stretch yourselves out to sunbathe in the Texas summer, watching bumblebees laze drowsily between blooming thistles. Beside you, Javier lies on his back with both hands cradled beneath his head while you read, those yellow aviators over his eyes.

“Could get a place together,” he says. So casual, so simply.

Looking up from your book, you see the pink collar of sunburn around his neck and grin to yourself. “We’d get sick of each other,” you lie.

Javier only shrugs, unaware, you think, that you spent all of college in love with him. In freshman year, you’d stumbled home together after a party and he’d kissed you against your front door, waking you from what you realized then had been a lifetime of slumber. You’d never considered kissing him before, but all of a sudden it was obvious. You thought this is what your lips should have been doing all this time.

But it never happened again. The sex was awkward, clumsy—you’d only done it once before—and you told yourself that’s why he never tried again. You never tried either. Now it’s a joke you tell each other, trying to make the other person blush. 

The thought of sharing an apartment with him sends a river of panic through your veins. It would kill you to watch him bring girls home. To watch him date someone else. It was bad enough watching Lorraine, and he left her.

“If you say so,” he says, looking not one bit disappointed.

Half asleep, you let yourself dream you said yes.

7:00 A.M.

You don’t know who leans in—if you tilt your head down or if Javier tilts his up, if it starts in your sleep—only that when you next stir the morning is darkening to gold and orange. Panels of windowed sunlight crawl slowly across your legs, and you are kissing.

Javier’s lips melt against yours. It’s nothing like when you were kids. Eighteen and nervous wrecks, your teeth always getting in the way.

It’s different now. You know how to kiss each other like you’ve had the practice, like it hasn’t been almost two decades since last you tried. Pliant and sleepy, his tongue licking gently into your mouth. His mustache scratches sweetly against your skin. When a breathy sound whimpers from you, he cups your jaw, his other arm locking snug around your waist. There’s no rush to it, no progression. You don’t strip down and fuck—both of you content with only this: the soft murmurs you breathe into each other. The lifetime of wanting in every kiss. 

Because you have wanted him, you realize. Not just in college, but before then and every day since. Maybe from the first day he walked into your sixth grade class and felt like home. Even these last eight years when you’d accepted that he was gone from your life for good, your friendship having reached the end of its life, you wanted him.

He grunts when you nibble gently at his bottom lip, and you smile. Then he moans. And it’s perfect, somehow, like he’s dug around in the cabinets of your mind to know exactly how you want to be kissed. Deeply, patiently. All tongue and breath and yielding lips, your hands in his hair, the fire of him enveloping you.

You say nothing; you talk with your touch.

He stripes his tongue along your bottom lip: I’m sorry.

You tug at his curls: I’m sorry.

He kisses the corners of your mouth: I’m sorry.

You lick the hinge of his jaw: I’m sorry.

His thumb strokes the apple of your cheek: I’m sorry. I’m falling asleep.

You tilt your head to better taste him: I don’t want to fall asleep.

But you do. The tide drags you out, your body molten, exhausted, hypnotized. Your lips still touching as you fall into a dream.

8:00 A.M.

When next you open your eyes, you’ve rolled towards the window and the weight and warmth of his arms is gone. You don’t bother turning over. Don’t bother reaching for him. 

You know the bed will be empty on his side, cold. 

[lloydfrontera]

'lloyd is very weak now and needs to marry so he'll have someone to protect him'- lloyd has the only grandmaster on the world following him around like a puppy. he has the most terrifying motherfucker on the world wrapped around his little finger. he has the one person in the world who can hit an absolute in the head and get away with it swearing in his heart to protect him no matter the cost over and over again.

lloyd made javier watch him die twice right in front of him just to keep him alive. there is no power on existence that could make javier allow anyone or anything to even think about harming lloyd again.

lloyd is fine

[lokischocolatefountain]

Separation

Series Masterlist

Fandom: Narcos

Pairing: Javier Peña x Reader

Rating: 18+ (*slaps the roof of this fic* This bad boy can fit so much smut, angst and fluff in it)

Word count: 8.4k words wtf

Summary: The last time Javier Peña saw his wife was almost three weeks ago in Steve Murphy’s apartment. He’d finally done it. He’d fucked up the only good thing in his life, driven her away with his neglect.

A/N: Why is it that whenever I write Javi, there’s angst? What is it about this beautiful pathetic man with big brown eyes (and big strong arms) that makes me want to hurt and comfort him? Also, if any of you want to be tagged the next time I post Javi (or just husband Javi) lmk and I’ll make a tag list.

The last time Javier Peña saw his wife was in Steve Murphy’s apartment, holding a sleeping baby Olivia Murphy on her lap as she consoled an anxious Connie Murphy. That night, he’d finally brought his partner home to his wife and child. Relieved, he went home only to find a note from his wife by his bedside informing him that she would be staying with a friend for a while. No explanations, no phone calls. Just a note.

That was almost three weeks ago.

Her side of the bed stayed untouched. Her bedside table was unusually empty without her novel of the week on it. When he reached out for her in his sleep, his heart craving the familiar comfort of her touch, he found it cold and empty. He’d wake up with a start, unaccustomed to an empty bed even though he’d spent all his bachelor life before her sleeping by himself. It was as though married life had been a cruel fantasy he was awoken from to be forced back into the reality of his lonely existence.

No matter how many times he longed to call her friend’s landline, he couldn’t bring himself to dial the number. She’d been by his side ever since he asked her to move in with him. Undying loyalty, a shoulder to lean on, a body to hold when he awoke from nightmares. She deserved a break from him.

The refrigerator sometimes had boxes of meals for him, his whiskey glass was chilled, her laundry done and dried for him to fold up. Dishes left in the sink for him to wash. He had a wife and she did come by the apartment but never when he was there too. She’d been like a ghost, slipping in and out and probably through walls without his notice.

Their anniversary came and went. Still no sign of her.

It wasn’t their wedding anniversary. It was the anniversary of their first date. That was not something they celebrated like they did their wedding anniversary but her absence made him remember and it fucking stung.

He’d finally done it. He’d fucked up the only good thing in his life, driven her away with his neglect. She gave him everything and asked for nothing. Not even the bare minimum. Her parents had begged her for a proper wedding and he couldn’t even give her that. She married him at the embassy and went home alone in the short white dress she bought herself from a regular store as he went off on some fucking raid that ended up failing anyway. She watched as her friends had weddings and baby showers and children while he kept her stuck in the same place in life.

And she was finally gone. After putting up with everything, she’d slowly disappeared from his life without him even noticing it.

Javi found himself outside her classroom. He’d walked into the English Literature department, opened her drawer and checked her schedule, ignoring the questioning staff with the same practiced authority he had as DEA agent.

For the first time, he took in the force that was Professor Peña in action. He knew she was a fucking genius. But to see her command the classroom’s attention was something else.

On one of their first nights together, he’d put his head on her lap and closed his eyes as she played with her hair and asked her unashamedly to read her book out loud to him. He had a reputation of being an asshole, of sleeping around a lot. There was an image of him being a callus man who hopped from one bed to the next. It couldn’t be further from the truth. He gave bits and pieces of his heart to every woman he slept with, he asked personal questions, kissed foreheads and comforted them over their troubles. He lied on the lap of the woman he would one day marry and asked her to read him a bedtime story of how Anna Karenina fell out of love with Alexei and in love with Vronsky. Javier may have been an asshole in others’ eyes, but on her lap, he was the man who kept his parents’ easy intimacy in the back of his head as he looked up at her and wondered if he could have something like that with her.

As she engaged the classroom in a discussion about Frankenstein’s creation, he witnessed everyone around him fall for her just as he did. He watched as she pulled them into discussions and got them involved in passionate debates amongst themselves about the nature of the creature. She was the perfect leader, knowing just how to steer the large group, get the stubborn young people to question their world views and lead them to answers to questions they didn’t even know they had.

She was a wonder.

If this was all he could have of her, he would take it. If she wouldn’t come home to him anymore, he would show up to her classes and sit in the back seat just to hear her voice and see her eyes twinkle with passion.

She didn’t notice him, her attention reserved for the students who asked questions and argued their points passionately. He had to wait until they’d all submitted their papers to her and had a little conversation to continue their discussions. He’d never seen students so reluctant to leave a classroom. He couldn’t blame them; he didn’t want to leave either. Only when most of her class had shuffled out did he have the courage to approach her desk.

He stood there, making no sounds, just fidgeting with his right hand as he tried to find the courage in him to speak to the professor who was counting the number of essays that had been submitted to her.

“Sorry, I have to get home now. Office hours are before class on Monday,” she said, not even looking up at him.

“Sure, if that’s the only way I’ll get to see you.”

She stilled mid-count, letting go of the papers as she looked up at him. She opened and closed her mouth, as though swallowing everything she thought to say.

“What are you doing here?” She asked, finally.

He shrugged and managed a half-smile. “Had to catch you somehow.”

When she said nothing, he continued, “Where do you go when you tell your students you’re going home? Because you don’t come to ours.”

He carried her papers, her handbag and her lunch bag to the jeep. As though he had to confiscate all her belongings to make sure she’d actually come home with him. As though he was afraid she’d slip through his fingers like the sicarios he chased.

Her hand didn’t cross the physical space between them. Her head rested against the glass of the window and her eyes were closed. She didn’t reach over to switch the radio on, didn’t ask him about his day, didn’t reach over to pinch his cheek or steal his aviators.

“Talk to me,” he said, his voice shaking as he realized he didn’t want to hear whatever it was she had to say. He wasn’t prepared for the harsh truths. All he wanted was to take her to bed and kiss her all over and hold her tight so that she would never leave. He wanted to cry like a little boy begging his dad to not leave for work because he would miss him too much during the day. He wanted to overwhelm her with his love, manipulate her mind into taking him back though he couldn’t admit to himself that at some point she apparently stopped wanting to keep him.

His hand was on her knee as he sat at her feet and looked up at her face expectantly for her to speak. It wouldn’t have taken him more than a second to get on his knees. He was no religious man. That stopped the day he buried his Ma. But he would get on his knees again and pray to her to stay, to be his benevolent goddess and forgive his sins for the nth time.

“I don’t know what I did, I really don’t,” his voice cracked as he confessed. “But it must’ve been something terrible for you to stop coming home.” It shamed him to discover that he had become the man he promised himself he would never be. One of those inattentive men who’d grown so comfortable in the kindnesses of their wife that they’re shocked when she decides she has had enough. Neglect killed love. And he had been neglecting her, leaving her alone most days and most nights as he traveled back and forth between Bogotá and Medellin.

She stared at him, her expressions indiscernible. She accepted his hands when he placed them on hers, the small action giving him hopes. “Whatever it is, I’ll fix it,” he begged, holding on tight. He needed her to believe him.

She shook her head and looked down at her lap. “It’s not— you didn’t do anything wrong.”

After relief came surprise. He hadn’t done something wrong this time? The relief was quickly replaced by worry. If he was the cause of her running away from him, he could handle that. He could change himself, fix whatever within was wrong to make her come home again. But it was something else, someone else…

“What is it, then?” He asked, cupping her cheek and gently directing her to look at him instead of her lap or the walls. “Is it work? Are your parents doing well back home?”

“Nothing, it’s nothing.”

He inhaled and rubbed his eyes. “It can’t be nothing. You left me. You packed up your bags and left. I think I deserve an explanation.”

She let out a sigh. “I’ll come back then.”

His hand curled into a fist and his jaw clenched. So that was it? All he had to do was ask? Her easy compliance made him want to throw something at the wall.

He got off the ground where he was knelt at her feet and began pacing across the room.

He expected some resistance when he barged into her workplace uninvited and demanded that she come with him. He expected— no, hoped for a fight for it would give him answers for her sudden disappearance. But she just walked with him to the parking lot, no questions asked. And now she just agreed to move back in. All because he demanded answers.

“Fucking tell me!” He yelled, his hand fidgeting at his side.

“I don’t want to fight,” she said, her voice too calm for the gravity of the situation. Like this didn’t fucking matter.

Oh, you don’t wanna fight? You don’t wanna fucking fight? You fucking ran off and you don’t want to—

“I don’t either, but you’re making it very hard to not do that.”

He heard her take in a deep breath before he heard the unmistakable whispers of sniffling. Great. Fucking amazing. Now, he’d gone and made her cry.

Her sounds of despair were enough for his rage to evaporate off him. He rushed back to her side and pulled her to his chest, forcing comfort upon her in the hope that it would serve as a salve to whatever wounds he’d ripped open. To his relief, she didn’t push him away. But she didn’t pull him close like she always did when he embraced her. Things had changed and he hadn’t even noticed it happening. All he could do now was hope that whatever this rift was between them, he could patch it back together.

—————————

Even in the blistering heat of Bogotá, Javier chose to keep his wife pressed to his chest when he slept. She was disgusted by their sweat combining and their clothes sticking to their bodies, but she indulged his need for closeness. She knew he loved with his body and she accepted his love, in all its sweaty sticky mess.

So he had no choice but to interpret the chasm between them on their marital bed as her rejection of his love.

As soon as he brought her back home, he had to leave for Medellin. Any hopes for setting things right had been crushed when he had to leave from work straight to the other city. He’d called home before he left, informing he would be gone for a long time once again. She didn’t say much, just hemmed and hawed before asking him to be safe out there. No exaggerated smooching sounds to make him laugh, no promises of what would be awaiting him when he came back home to her, no I love you before she said goodbye.

Over ten days after the call, he was back but without any of the feelings of satisfaction he usually had when coming home to her. Instead, there was just dread. She met him at the door as usual and wrapped her arms around him, but she separated without a kiss. The cracks in the foundations of their marriage ran deeper than he’d feared.

“Hey,” he whispered awkwardly when she finally opened her eyes. She stilled, her head jerking up as though surprised he was there.

“Hey,” she replied, her voice groggy from sleep as she shuffled under her blanket.

“I missed you so much, mi amor…” he said carefully, afraid that anything he might say would snap the last thread that held them together. His hand slowly crept into the space between them, an offering to share the littlest bit of marital comforts.

“Missed you too, Javi,” she conceded, not taking his hand but settling for playing with his fingers. He allowed her to lead, giving what little contact she took from him and taking back only as much, afraid to cross any lines.

Her nails were uncharacteristically unkempt. The woman he knew did not tolerate chipped nail polish, wiping all her nails with acetone when the paint began chipping off. Almost all her nails except her pinky had chipped paint now. Her thumbnail was bare.

“May I paint your nails?” He asked, hopeful. She nodded and he left their bed in search of the box in which she kept all her manicure tools and paints.

When they sat together on bed as he took the pink off her nails, they were closer. He handled her hands with care, refusing to scrub too harshly even when the pieces of glitter clung to her as stubbornly as he did. Manicures were something she got done from salons, but she painted her own nails just as often. She said it calmed her.

He then brought the glass file to her nails, reducing them to a shorter oval shape the way she liked them. Any longer and she found it hard to use her typewriter. He made sure to file the edges in the same direction, recalling that she’d told him filing in opposite directions was not good for nail health. He repositioned her hand in his, turning it left and right as he evaluated his work. Satisfied with the shape, he brought his lips to the finger, his eyes remaining on hers the entire time to check for any signs of rejection. He pressed little kisses from her fingertip to her wrist, relishing in the shy smiles she rewarded him with.

He repeated his work with the other nails and then used the little wooden stick she had to push her cuticles back in preparation for the paint. The shower would wash it off soon, but he still slathered some moisturizer on her hands, using it as an excuse to massage her hands. He pushed the excess cream beyond her wrists and up her arms.

He kissed the back of her hand and looked up at her, her eyes clouded with sleep and something else, her plush lips parting as his own traveled up her arm. “You feel so good, baby, so soft,” he praised, making her shudder. When he reached the sleeve of his t-shirt that she liked wearing to bed, he pulled it down, exposing her shoulder. As he neared her neck, she cradled his head in her hand, guiding him by his hair to place kisses where she wanted them. His lips went willingly, loving her up in every spot she took him to. She was all sweat, citrus shampoo and the jasmine of the lotion he’d rubbed on her. He breathed her in, her scent being his choice of drug.

She pulled him back from her neck, gazing at his lips before closing her eyes and leaning forward. He brushed the tip of his nose against hers, making her giggle. He smiled before leaning in again but kissing her chin.

“Javi,” she whined as he kissed along her jaw and the corners of her lips and even her nose, refusing to press his lips to hers.

“Yeah, baby?” He asked, feigning innocence. But she knew him too well to believe the act.

“Jodón.”

“Tell me what you want.” He demanded, craving the feeling of being wanted. He needed to know that she needed him just like he needed her, that she wasn’t just capitulating to his desires, that she desired him.

“Kiss me.”

He found himself grinning as he took her face in his hands and tilted his head, unhurried in how he grazed her lips with his. She took initiative, pressing her lips to his. She consumed him, not like a starving woman but like one ready to savor each second of her meal. He let one hand wander down her back, caressing her through the thin fabric but not daring to slip it under her t-shirt. He needed her to take this at her pace, unaffected by his greed and desperation to have all of her. It was fantastic how just a kiss from her could make him feel his heart beating for her.

He’d kissed other women before her and he enjoyed all those times. But with her, it was different. It wasn’t the first step in fucking, wasn’t a means to an end. When he kissed her, he wasn’t a lonely man trying to imitate a deeper intimacy he’d never had merely to quell his yearning for connection. In her lips, he found not just the thrill of desire, but the safety of home.

The first time he kissed her, every other kiss ceased to exist and she’d become the only one. Everyone he kissed after that first kiss left him unsatisfied. None of them tasted like her, didn’t send jolts of electricity through him, didn’t make his heart leap out of his chest.

She mewled into the kiss as his tongue danced with hers, giving in to her exploration of his mouth as she pulled him closer to herself. Taking her sounds as encouragement, he tangled his hands into her hair. He poured a month’s worth of longing into the kiss, asking with each sigh and moan ‘Can you feel how I yearn for you? Can you not feel how you broke me when you left and put me back together with just this kiss?’

She pulled back first and he found himself panting, taking in the air he didn’t know he was depriving himself of. He pounced back, needing her more than he needed oxygen. He took her lips between his, pushing her head into the headboard as he pulled her into a heated kiss. One hand roamed his shoulder and then his arms, up and down and driving him mad as the other rested over his heart. He brought a hand to hers, trapping hers over his heart. He felt lightheaded as she staved him of air, but he happily drowned in her. He needed her to feel him, feel how his heart beat to her tune, how it missed having her head rest on it as they slept in each other’s arms.

“Please, Javi. Need you…” she broke off to whisper. He placed one last kiss to her lips before he slid down the bed, pulling her to the edge before pulling her shorts off her. He dove in and licked her through her panties, savoring the taste of her wetness on the cotton. Her hand found his hair and tugged gently.

“You have no fucking idea how much I’ve missed having you, querida…” he said, placing a kiss between her legs.

“I miss you so much, Javi…”

“No, you don’t know,” he insisted, angered that she would claim to have missed him after she left him. If you missed me so much, why didn’t you come back? He pressed his thumb on her clit, pressed a bit harder than she liked and she whined.

“I’m sorry!”

“You left. You walked out on me, didn’t tell me shit and I was fucking miserable,” he confessed, passing on the hurt right back to her. She mumbled a few more apologies, but nothing would be enough until he got to take her again.

“Gonna let me show you how much I missed you, baby?” He asked, placing kisses on her belly. “Gonna let me make love to you?”

“Yes, yes, please. Need youuu—” she cried as he pushed the cotton of her panty aside to lick her.

“You need me?” He asked, licking her again. God, how he missed his favorite taste. “Did you miss my cock like I missed this pussy, baby?”

She nodded, but that wasn’t enough for him. He needed to know from her lips, needed her to scream for the entire city to know how she missed his touch. He pushed her legs back together and pulled her panties off before setting it aside. He wrapped his lips around her and sucked on her clit, exacting the sweetest little sounds from her.

“I need to hear you.”

“Missed you, Javi. Missed your cock,” she confessed, tightening around his finger as she did. He wished he had his cock inside her as he made her tell him how much she missed it. He would pull more confessions out of her with a promise of an orgasm and he knew she would say anything he wanted.

“You have ruined me, mi amor. Can’t make myself cum just as good anymore without this pussy. Hate my own fucking hand.” He praised before he lapped and laved at her core, licking her up as he made her wetter and wetter for him.

“I sneaked your panties out of the laundry hamper, took it with me to Medellin like a fucking creep,” he confessed, unsure if her cry of his name was the work of his fingers or the confession of his depravity. “The pink one with the stripes, covered in you from when you touched yourself, when you kept this cunt to yourself and kept me away. I needed to smell it when I wrapped my fist around my cock and imagined I was fucking you.”

She clenched around his finger and that sent a rush through him. “That make you feel good, Cariño? Knowing you’ve turned me into a fucking pervert?”

“Javi, baby please…” she cried as he busied his lips once again with her cunt. He would’ve left her pussy lips for the lips that cried his name so prettily but she kept him down with her hand on his hair. She fucked herself on his fingers, gasping when he added a third one to stretch her out further.

His idle hand traveled up her body, its every nerve ending enjoying having her tremble beneath him once again. He took his time, roaming everywhere, feeling every inch of skin that he would soon trap under him as he fucked her for the first in a long time. This was the longest they’d gone without each other ever since they decided to pursue what they had for real. Even with his job being the way it was, he managed to come to Bogota every now and then to have her.

She wrapped her legs around him, trapping his head with her thighs as she dug the heel of her foot into his back. He growled into her cunt as she thrust up into him, fucking his mouth and his fingers at the same time. She still wanted him in between her legs if nowhere else and if he had to, he would fuck her into staying with him forever.

A few more minutes of licking and sucking and she was pulsating around his fingers, her thighs setting enough pressure on him to make him fear that she might crush him. With a cry of his name, she came for him, coating him in her juices. He drank up all of her, not showing any restraint.

She pulled him up by his hair and he obeyed, kissing her lips to bless her with her deliciousness. He dipped his tongue into her mouth, meeting her tongue as she moaned with her own taste. He placed his hand over her collarbones, smearing her all over the place before he crept up and held her neck as he relished in the vibrations of her moans.

He gasped into the kiss as she wrapped her hand around him through his boxers. He grabbed her wrist and held her in place, keeping her from stroking his cock. It’d been too long since he had her and he wasn’t going to waste this morning by coming in his fucking underwear.

“Let me have you, baby,” he begged, dipping down to her neck to lick up her cum that he had smeared over her. He wasn’t going to let any of her go to waste.

“Yes, fuck!” She reached into his boxers and took him out, painfully hard and already leaking precum. He licked and sucked the skin until it was marred from his attention.

“Wanna be on top, please,” she begged and he rolled them around, acquiescing to her. She sat up on him, her knees planted on either side of him before taking her t-shirt off to reveal her pretty tits. Before he could reach up for her himself, she took command in taking his hand and placing it on her breast.

“Missed this so much, Javi,” she said as she stroked his cock. He kneaded her breast in his hand, enjoying having the ample flesh in his hands.

“Need to be inside you, please,” he breathed, trying as much as he could to clear his thoughts for if he focused on her hand around his cock and how gorgeous she looked on him, he would burst in an instant.

She obliged, adjusting herself over him before living him up with herself. She let him inside her wet heat, just the tip, before pulling back up. He groaned at the loss of contact, biting down on his lip as she repeated the motion, giving him just a bit of her pussy before pulling away once again.

He grabbed her hand and squeezed. “Don’t fucking tease. I haven’t had you in the longest time, darling. I need—ssss” he hissed as she took him in once more.

“I’m not teasing,” she gasped silently as she allowed a little more of him inside her. “So big, Javi. Haven’t stretched me out like this in s-so long,” she praised as she swallowed him bit by bit. “So fucking thick, gonna ruin me.”

“That’s right, baby… You love this cock, don’t you? Can’t go for anyone else ever again. I’ve made you mine,” he said, moving his other hand to her clit, moaning when she rewarded his touch by gripping him tighter.

“Mmmm love your cock,” she moaned as she struggled to take more of him even though he’d gotten her nice and wet with his fingers and mouth. Poor thing needed time to get used to his girth again after having gone such a long time without him.

“You are so beautiful like this… Look so fucking sinful trying so hard to take all of me, sitting on top of me like that and letting me touch your tits,” he praised as he played with her nipples, pinching and tugging and rolling between his fingers to make her tighten around him. She might have been on top, taking the reins, but he still had control. He knew her body like he knew the communas where he chased men, knew every shortcut, memorized every path, knew where to go to corner and capture them. He could elicit every desired response from her by touching her in the right places and saying the right words. She belonged to him, body and soul, and he enjoyed using every inch of her body to remind her to whom she belonged.

He let her set a slow torturous pace as she adjusted to him, groaning as she finally swallowed him to the hilt. It was pure bliss to be surrounded whole by her, to feel all of her wet, velvety heat. He felt her all over, from the tips of his toes to the top of his head and it was everything. She was everything.

It was sweet torment to be exposed to the cold air of the fan only to be swallowed back up by her hot cunt. He needed her so fucking bad, needed her not just for the carnal pleasures that sex brought but the feeling of home when he found himself buried in her— he needed her to devour him whole and keep him right there, inside her, all hers and nothing else. Only the Javier that belonged to her was worth existing. Everything else he’d become in over three decades of life was insignificant.

Inside the walls of their home, on their marital bed, there was no world outside. She brought him the delusions of safety and he luxuriated in it, allowing himself to forget everything that wasn’t her. The world was just her tight cunt, her tits under his hands and the filthy sounds from her lips as she slowly went from a woman in control to a writhing, moaning mess. He met her halfway with his thrusts when she struggled to keep up on top of him. He sat himself up and pulled her to his chest, giving in as she stole his lips. It was hurried and sloppy as they explored familiar territory, still as excited as the first time they kissed each other. Practiced lovers, savoring the familiar comfort of each other’s lips yet excited to find something new each time.

“Don’t ever leave me,” he begged, holding her face in his hand and making her look at him in the hopes that she would see just how much he meant it. “I can’t, without you… I— I c-can’t, mi amor— Please…”

“I w-won’t,” she managed to stutter out as she grew breathless.

“Promise me,” he demanded even though what he wanted to do was beg.

She opened and closed her mouth, unable to form words as he set a relentless pace, taking over as he thrust into her and thumbed her clit.

“Fucking promise me!” He growled, forcing himself into her in hard, merciless thrusts.

“Aaaah! Ja—”

“You’re mine. You’re fucking mine, get it? This isn’t— We aren’t just da-dating. I’m your husband. You can’t just leave like that.” He forced himself deep and inadvertently hit her cervix. She jolted in his arms and let out a pained cry, letting him know his mistake and he pressed a kiss to her cheek in a silent apology.

“Sorr— hnnng! ‘m sorry Jav—”

A tear slipped down her cheek and he kissed it, tasting her. He breathed her name the way a dying man would call for his god in desperation. He prayed her name, each syllable a request of Save me, never leave me, breathe life into this wretched man.

She pulsated around him, collapsing on his chest and relying on him to hold her up as she reached her peak. She was deadweight in his arms and he held her tight as he reamed into her, her back arching and her hair cascading down her back, shaking from his hard thrusts. She took him along with her, erasing his world and making herself his everything. She had dragged him to the peak of the world and now she was pulling him down and he went with her willingly, taking everything she gave him, getting lost in her body. She was like a breath of air after drowning for eternity, she gave him life, gave him meaning even though she’d been the one to rob him of it.

He wiped her tears and kissed her all over, showering her with all the love he had for her. But it wasn’t enough. No matter how much he poured out, he couldn’t show her the depth of his feelings for her. No words compared, no kisses came close to the place she had in his life. No matter how many times he told her he loved her, she would never know just how much.

“Te amo, Javi,” she broke off from their kiss to whisper. He collapsed on the bed and brought her down with him. He pecked her lips once and then twice before setting his gaze on her eyes.

“Si me amas…” he paused to take a breath. “¿por qué me dejaste? ¿Por qué?”

She looked down at her lap and fidgeted with her rings as she spoke, “Y-yo no quiero perderte.”

He shook his head as he said, “No me perderás. Yo soy tuyo.” He took her hand and placed it on his chest over his heart. “Tuyo.”

She scoffed, her hand curling over his chest. “More Escobar’s than mine at this point.”

“What?”

She shook her head and looked away, avoiding his eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to— I shouldn’t complain.”

“No. No, you talk to me. What is this about?”

“We’ll fight if we talk about it. Like Steve and Connie.”

“Do you…? Do you want to leave…? Like Connie did?” He asked, unable to steady his shaking voice. Three weeks with her gone was hell enough. If she wanted to take off permanently, he didn’t know what he would do with himself. Hunting the hijo de puta had become his purpose in life over the past few years. But he now had another important purpose, a woman he’d made promises to. Promises he was insistent on keeping.

She shook her head.

He sighed as he tucked her hair behind her ear, needing to see her without anything in the way. It was fucking frustrating, not knowing what worried her so much that she couldn’t even talk to him about it, that she chose instead to run away from him. But he had to be kind if he wanted her to open up.

He began by caressing her cheek with the back of his hand. Gently, like soothing a wounded child. “Baby… If you don’t tell me what this is about, how am I going to fix it? Hmm?”

“It can’t be fixed,” she said, same as that day.

It took him a moment to know how to answer her.

“When I asked you to marry me, you asked that I give you all of me. Have I not kept that promise?” He asked, knowing that he had so far. No matter how ugly, no matter how broken, he brought home all of himself. To her credit, she accepted him just as he was.

She nodded and said, “you have.”

“Now I’m asking. I want everything, too. Whatever you’re hiding from me that has you worried will make us fight. Is it about my job?”

“I’m sorry,” she said as she nodded, head hung low as tears spilled out.

“No, no, nothing to be sorry about. Just talk to me. What about my job?”

“S-scared.” His chest tightened at the trembling of her voice. Relationships were not something he was comfortable with after he left Lorraine and it was alright for his dangerous new lifestyle as an agent in Colombia. There was no one else he was putting in danger because of his line of work. But then he had to go and fall in love.

It was one of the reasons he proposed to her as soon as he could. Being his wife offered her more legal protection than did being his girlfriend. And knowing that she was it for him, he saw no point in waiting. But she was still afraid for her safety.

He reached out quickly to reassure her.

“I’m here, okay? Our home is safe. Those bastards won’t dare touch you here, won’t dare touch a US federal agent’s wife. I got you,” he whispered into her ear and rubbed her back, hoping to help her relax in his arms. She didn’t. She just tensed.

“‘m not worried about m-myself,” she said softly. “Ever since Steve got kidnapped, I—”

He took in a deep breath and pulled her in closer even though there was no gap between them. What was he supposed to do? Tell her he was safe? Lying wasn’t something he was ready to do in their marriage. Even if he did, she wouldn’t believe him after she had to comfort a panicking Connie. He had the same job as Steve, faced the same dangers. It could be him next. And he might not be lucky enough to come home.

The CNP guys were in much greater danger than he was as an American. Call it gringo privilege. But he couldn’t make promises. He couldn’t promise that a jump from the roof wouldn’t end up terribly. He couldn’t promise that he would never catch a stray bullet. He couldn’t promise that a crazy motherfucker wouldn’t target him for the bragging rights over nabbing a US agent.

Small town sheriff Javier Peña hadn’t thought of all this when he signed up for this job in his mid twenties. There was just an opportunity to run away from a town that hated him— a town he hated more for how it smothered him from all sides as he grew and grew yet it remained small, insignificant. It was his chance to do something great, to be the good guy fighting big bag guys and he took it. He hadn’t been warned that he’d one day be sat holding his sobbing wife, speechless because he couldn’t make the most basic promise— to fucking stay alive.

“I’m sorry,” she whimpered, the tremble in her voice tugging at his heartstrings.

“No, no. I’m sorry.” Sorry I can’t give you more. Sorry I made you cry. He pulled her into his arms and sat on the couch, cradling her in his lap more for his comfort than hers.

“I shouldn’t complain. I know I married a man with a dangerous job. I signed up for all this, but… ‘m so scared, Javi. I can’t sleep at night. I wake up from nightmares and I lose you every single time. I get scared when I get a call because what if—” she stopped, breaking down into sobs.

There was nothing he could do to fix this, she was correct. The thing that was causing her all this agony was his whole life.

“Do you want me to quit my job?” He asked, regretting it the minute the question left his lips. What if she said yes? What if that was the only way to fix their marriage? He would quit. There was no question about that. But that would mean that almost a decade of his life’s work would be worth nothing. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself. Resentment would break anything they had left between them.

Please don’t ask that of me.

She shook her head and he had to keep himself from letting out a huge sigh of relief.

“Do you know I have students who— I shouldn’t tell you. I’m not on the field like you and I don’t know all the things you know, but I see everyday how he’s fucking ruined lives. I want you to catch that motherfucker. You’re in this fight and I’m not letting you leave it without crushing his blood empire. I just don’t want us to be collateral damage. I can’t bear losing you whether it is to divorce or a bullet. I can’t—” she brought her hand to her lips, biting on her newly shaped nails.

He swallowed, tugging her hand away from her mouth and giving it a kiss. “I can’t make promises about the latter,” he said softly, unable to look her in the eyes as he said it. He didn’t want to know what he did to her with those words. “You know I can’t. But when I die, whether it’s tomorrow or 40 years from now, I’ll die your husband. I don’t do divorce. You might think it’s not a big deal for me, the guy who left his first fiancé at the altar. But trust me, you’re a catch and there’s no way I’m letting you escape”

She laughed and nuzzled into his neck. He rested his head on hers and pressed a kiss to her hair. “I’m not joking. You should be very scared, baby. As far as I’m concerned, I’m it for you. Won’t let you leave no matter what you do.”

“Yeah?” She laughed, her eyes glinting with tears but also something new. Her lips quirked up in a mischievous smile. “What if I slept with a bunch of guys?”

He raised an eyebrow, reeling the unhinged jealous little man in his heart to join her in whatever this was that made her smile through her tears. “Good for them. Best pussy they’ll ever have. I mean, I will beat them to death for touching you. But you’re still my wife. Not divorcing you.”

“What if I fucked Steve?” She challenged, raising an eyebrow.

He knew what she was doing. She was making it personal, putting a face to the act and making said face a very familiar one. But he wouldn’t give her the satisfaction.

“Last thing he’ll ever do in his life. I’ll kill him and Connie will help me hide his body.”

“Mhmm? What if…..?” She trailed, looking into the distance as she stroked her invisible beard. “What if I let someone else knock me up?”

“You bitch!”

She gasped and shoved at his chest. “How dare you call me a bitch!?”

“How dare you even think of letting another man do that?”

“I won’t actually do that!” She defended, folding her arms over her chest. “I’m just trying to get a raise out of you.”

“And you did,” he supplied, making her scoff.

“How about…? Okay! What if I fucked Escobar?”

“Shit, I would tell everyone!” He laughed. “My wife? Getting that close to that piece of shit and living to tell the story? Yeah, I’d be on the rooftops with a megaphone. Oh and I’ll kill him. Of course. Goes without saying.”

“Well, you were gonna kill him anyway. What will you do to him for touching your wife?” She asked, twirling his overgrown hair around her finger.

Was this…? Noooo! He was just joking, but she seems to like the idea of him killing men for wanting her.

“Baby, what’s wrong with you?” He asked, laughing. She surprised him every goddamn day.

“I don’t know, you tell me,” she licked her lips and drew shaped on his chest with her index finger. “There should be an explanation for why I signed up for all this.”

“You like this, don’t you?” He asked, lowering the register of his voice the way she liked as he took her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “You want me to possess you, to hurt anyone who would want you that way I have you. You like that I can be a dangerous man.”

She shivered, but quickly stabilised herself, looking very blasé as she spoke, “Huh, that answers my question. I always wondered what kind of idiot would be with Escobar. I guess women just like to fuck a powerful man. And money. She’d gotta be in it for the money.”

“She married him before he got rich, actually. And it’s not just women who are attracted to powerful men,” he added, letting her know just how much he liked when she was in a position of power.

“Men too? You’re gonna tell me you want to fuck Escobar?” She asked, making him laugh. He pinched her bum, making her squeal and attempt to get off him. He pulled her back in immediately, not ready to lose contact.

“When I came to your class, I sat in the back the entire time. I enjoyed seeing you in your element, leading the discussion, getting a big room full of people to listen to you. And your ass in a pencil skirt. If I was your student, I would wank off every day thinking of you” he groaned, his cock twitching inside her at the mental image.

“Oh my god!” She exclaimed before hitting him playfully.

“Whaaat? I feel bad for those fuckers in your class, having to talk about Frankenstein’s monster to impress their hot little literature professor.”

“Don’t sexualise my job!” She looked positively scandalised. Like he’d suggested that she let him fuck her on the streets.

“Uh huh? Now you know how it feels? What was that you asked me for your birthday?” He teased. “On yds, the little interrogation fantasy. You’ve been begging me to tie you up and interrogate you.”

She hid her smile from him, covering her face with her hands, but he pried them off to see her looking so sweetly shy at being reminded of the depraved things she wanted him to do to her. “You don’t have to do it,” she said, shy and quiet and she played with her rings.

“Mmm thank you baby, but I’m gonna make your dreams come true. Just be happy I’m not CIA. Cause CIA has some terrible interrogation methods. They’ll fucking waterboard you.”

“Oh my god! Okay this isn’t fun anymore,” she said, getting off him, but he pulled her right back onto his cock, laughing as he caught her expression.

“Let me go!”

“No, no sorry. I shouldn’t talk about the CIA in bed, they’re such a turn off.”

“You think that’s why I’m trying to escape?? Javi, women don’t like talking about waterboarding with a dick inside them.”

“Okay, okay, I know. Just stay in bed. I have today off and I need to be inside you,” he said, rubbing her back in an attempt to coax her into foregoing her household responsibilities for a lazy day in bed with him.

“I have work to do. Papers to grade and clothes to wash. Oh and some pervert,” she said, poking his chest a few times. “has been stealing my panties so I have to go wash them before he gets to them.”

“Oh please, it was just one pair,” he lied, looking away quickly but it wasn’t enough for him to get away with it.

She squinted her eyes at him and he relented. “Fine. It was three. Pink one with the stripes, blue lace ones and a white cotton panty.”

“Pervert!”

“Or I’m just really in love with my wife. You should see the sweet side of it. You don’t know how other guys act on the field. It’s like as soon as they’re in Medellin, they aren’t married.”

“Uh huh?” She said as she tilted her head, her tone suggesting that she wasn’t convinced by his words. “And I’m supposed to be grateful that you aren’t sleeping around? Pendejo!” She punctuated her curse with a slap to his chest.

“That’s not what I meant!” He defended, taking her slapping hand and giving it a kiss.

“Sure, Cabrón.”

He laughed, amused at how adorable she was when angry. He pulled her down to lie down with him, her head on his chest and his hand in her hair. Mornings like these had become so rare. Even without their period of separation, they didn’t have quality time together. Work always called, always overwhelmed and left him with very little to give as a husband. Being too tired to do anything else, he couldn’t even take her out anywhere for dinner. But that would change tonight.

“I made dinner reservations for us. Are you free tonight?”

He’d booked it a while back, but he didn’t know if she would want to go with him after she left. And he didn’t want to promise her a date night before he knew for sure that he would have the day off from work. She did not take it terribly when he had to calculate on her for work, but something told him it wasn’t good for a marriage to keep breaking promises.

“Hmm, I don’t know. This pendejo said he’ll paint my nails and did a half assed job. I might have to book a nail appointment for the night,” she teased, making him laugh. He’d completely forgotten that their activities were preceded by his request to paint her nails.

“I’ll finish the job now,” he said, getting up, but she pushed him back down and trapped him in a loving hug.

“Later. I just wanna stay like this a little longer. Feels good…”

“I like when you hold me like this, mi amor,” he confessed, his voice softening as he opened himself up to allow himself to bask in the euphoria that holding her to his chest brought him.

“I- it calms me down. I need to hear your heart beating. I wake up from bad dreams sometimes and I can’t fall back asleep if I don’t lie down like this.”

He froze. He had no idea she had nightmares. “You never told me.”

“Didn’t want to worry you.”

He said her name softly, making her look up at him from his chest.

“You have to tell me these things,” he said, moving her hair out of the way so he could have an unobstructed view of her. Her features were soft, her eyes open, vulnerable.

“You have a lot on your plate already… I don’t want to be one of your problems.”

“Jesus,” he swore before sighing. “You’re not- I’ll never think of you as a problem. I understand why you worry. It’s not unwarranted. I would never ask you to hide your feelings for me. I thought we talked about these things. You’re the one who’s always telling me that we should communicate about difficult things. What happened to that?”

“Do you remember when I made you choose? Either date me for real or stop coming over for anything other than sex?”

He hummed in response, encouraging her to continue. They'd been fooling around for around two months back then and one night when he was dressing himself to leave, she forced him to confront how he’d been treating her— he’d been giving her mixed signals, pulling her in and pushing her away. He’d act like her boyfriend one minute but get distant the next and she was understandably annoyed.

“And you said you wanted to date me but you warned me that your job was dangerous and that attachments were a weakness. I didn’t want to be your weakness, I still—”

He shook her head, interrupting her mid-sentence, “I was talking out of my ass, I was just scared. And it’s different now. We’re—”

“Yeah but when I think of you strapping a gun and badge on yourself to go out and get shot at by those malparidos, I want to stop you,” she choked on her words, getting up off his chest and hugging her knees to her chest. “I told you I could handle it. That day and the day you asked me to marry you. But, I can’t. I can’t handle it. Ever since Steve was kidnapped- and I know you said he wasn’t in any real danger, but fuck! It was terrifying to see Connie like that and I couldn’t help but worry and put myself in her place. And I couldn’t stop thinking about every terrible thing that could happen to you and I just wanted to lock you up at home. So I left- because I don’t want to be your weakness. But I can’t be brave, I can’t be strong.”

It broke his heart to know that behind the scenes, behind her easy smiles and her strong shoulders he leaned on everyday, there was so much fear. So much insecurity. There was shame too. Had he been more attentive, he would’ve known without her having to tell him, without her having to run away.

He sat up, pulled her close and placed a kiss on her head. “You are brave and you’ve been so strong, putting up with more of my shit than you need to… Sometimes I think I won’t get through this with my soul intact if it weren’t for you. So never think that you’re my weakness.”

She listened, her eyebrows furrowed and eyes never leaving him. She bit down on her lip, pulling at the skin with her teeth, something she did when anxious. He reached over and thumbed her lip, not wanting to wait until she started bleeding.

“I… I’ve put you in a difficult position, but I would never ask you to hide your fears for my comfort. And you leaving definitely did not make me stronger. Just scared the hell out of me. I thought I’d done something so shit that you’d left for good.”

“Sorry I left… I just—”

“I’m sorry you couldn’t talk to me. Not like that would’ve solved anything,” he scoffed, rubbing his eyes. “Nothing short of stopping that bastard is going to solve this.”

“I know, I know…” she sighed.

“I’ll get him,” he affirmed, taking her hands in his. All the things he’d done since he landed in Colombia, all the things he’d lost because of that man… To think he might lose her too… It was chilling. He’d lost friends, made enemies, became the guy everyone called an asshole for not cutting corners, for not putting up with anything that wasn’t right. He’d lost so much, but she wasn’t going to be one of them. He wouldn’t allow it.

Javier Peña wouldn’t rest until Escobar was history.

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Series Masterlist

[chaotic-iguana]

Sleep

Summary: Reader suffers from lack of sleep, caused by a recent event. As she continues to overwork herself, she reaches her breaking point with near disastrous results. Starring concerned!steve murphy, chaotic idiot!steve murphy and clueless!reader. javi has my fucking heart though.

Pairing: Javier Peña x reader (no use of y/n though)

Rating: M

Wordcount: 2.2k 

Warnings: fluff, mild angst, sort of a panic attack, mild MILD allusions to someone being creepy (not javi though), mild flirting, humour, lots of swearing sorry

this is my first fic - let me know your thoughts! check me out on ao3

masterlist.

“I swear to fucking god Murphy, if you don’t stop bouncing your leg against the table, I’m slamming your head right into it” is the gospel that flows out of your mouth at 7 am on a Monday morning. Feels like it’s gonna be a great week.

“The hell did I do? You’d think Connie’s cookies would be enough to get you animals off my back, but no, first sign of any damn fire an’ the first person you’d throw in?” Steve huffs. “Murphy”, he repeats mockingly. You scoff and roll your eyes at him, clenching and unclenching your fists in an attempt to talk yourself down from strangling the idiot situated two feet to your left before turning back to the paperwork in front of you. The one-foot-tall, monster stack of paperwork. Right. In. Front. Of. You. And would the golden boys ever do it themselves? If they ever got a moment’s relief from jacking each other off during missions (or however the hell they manage to fumble practically every single little op), maybe. But most of the time, you were stuck with it. Because god forbid the two princesses you were partnered with ever had to so much as lift a pen themselves. Hell would freeze over.

And it isn’t like you mind. At all, really. Half your job is the paperwork, and you’re happy to get it in order - if only to avoid Noonan’s wrath. Besides, what good is an agent if they can’t do their fucking job? In its entirety; not the half-assed shit most of the men did around the embassy. But a single glimpse of yourself in the mirror while rushing to leave the house revealed that these past few weeks of skipping lunch breaks, going home late, and taking files home to work on have been catching up with you - sunken, bloodshot eyes, cracked lips, and bruises smudged under your eyes now, perpetually, since the nightmares had started. Anything to keep you busy, right?

Another aggravating side effect of the amount of work you had taken on apart from the usual? The constant irritation. Marlene’s new nails, Katie’s suspicious last lay, the stupid fucking demon alarm clock that never quite managed to wake you up, the busted tire, the broken coffee machine, Dave from accounting’s downright idiotic whistling, your pen running out of ink, and finally - Murphy’s bouncing knee banging the table every fucking millisecond, practically in tune with the pounding ache beginning to form between your brows. If you were a better person, you’d let these things go. Such is life, right? But since the lack of sleep, the increased workload and general mishappenings had already created this beautiful trifecta of shit just to screw you over, better people could go fuck themselves. As could Murphy. “Don’t use your wife’s cooking as an excuse. I’m telling you, make another sound and die.” you spit out, whirling in your chair because the incessant fucking banging still hasn’t stopped - just in time to catch Peña sauntering in, already smirking.

“Already nailing Murphy’s balls, cariño? Careful, I’ll fall in love, baby.” You can hear the laughter in his crooning voice as he throws it over his shoulder - but you don’t care - can’t care, beyond the spots that seem to be forming at the edges of your vision. Were your fingers always a bit tingly? Or is that a new development, like your tongue suddenly feeling thick and heavy in your mouth, like you’re choking on it? But even though your thoughts feel slow and weighed down by molasses, rage sparks brighter in your mind as Peña’s flirty nicknames and bullshit teasing registers. You push away from your desk, and shoot up from the chair, striding towards the door to get some air - or you try to - because before you know it, your vision is blinded by white and you’re breathing quick, shallow breaths as you lay on the ground trying to figure out what the fuck is happening. Distantly, you can hear someone calling your name but it sounds so far away you barely even register it. Hands wrap around your wrist, your head, attempting to stabilize you, to ground you, as you flail wildly in a panic. A low hum begins to fill your senses, forming words that sound to fuzzy to understand or care about right now, but you lean into it, something in your being telling you it’s safe.

When your sight clears, you’re curled up on the on the floor trembling. Shaking, like a scared fucking child, while Peña kneels to hold you to his chest, repeating the same few phrases over and over: “You’re okay, it’s okay hermosa. You’re safe. Safe. No ones gonna hurt you, it’s over now, okay?” as Murphy stands next to him, watching with panic and a hint of sympathy in his gaze. You scramble away from them both, panting, nearly slipping in your effort to get to your feet. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s okay, pretty. You’re okay” Peña repeats his assurances with his hands held out, palms facing you, as you stand on wobbling knees, wiping at your face.

“‘M fine” is all you whisper to them hoarsely before ducking your head and rushing out of the pathetically cramped room you three work in. You can hear footsteps behind you, but can’t find it in you to turn around - not even at the panicked sounds of your name being called by a familiar voice. You’re making a scene, you know it, but you don’t care. It’s all too much, and you’re too far gone. Reaching the parking lot, you struggle to unlock your car as your trembling fingers drop the keys twice. Swearing, you resolve and pick them up again, pressing them and reaching for the door. But just before your fingers find the handle another hand - much, much larger than yours - splays out on the window to stop you, just as Peña’s signature bedhead comes into view. He looks at you with wide, concerned eyes, his mouth tucked low at the corners, like he’s disappointed. You want to melt, you do, because the melting pot of emotions you have for him make you preen at his worry - but your usual defense mechanisms humble you. And so you sharpen your claws, flash your fangs, and the hackles raise again, leaving a “What, Peña?” to come tumbling out in a tone so sharp it makes you flinch. HIs frown just deepens as his gaze rakes over your form frantically, as if checking for injury. He says nothing, pursing his lips further before snatching your wrist and tugging you behind him as he stalks to his car, opening the side door. You raise a brow at him, and he counters by jerking his head towards the car, scowling slightly. You get in, slightly confused, and wait for him to walk around and get into the drivers seat. “What the fuck, Peña? I just fainted, I’m not senile. And I don’t give a shit how mad you are, you can’t just-just drag me to your car and f-force me to get in. The fuck are you playing at?” you begin to ramble, fury somehow still rising at a dizzying speed. Peña doesn’t respond, just starts driving while looking straight ahead while you continue fumbling over a panicked rant so pathetic it sounds nonsensical to your own ears. “…And what? You just enjoy calling me s-stupid nicknames? You think it’s cute to flirt with me while I’m- while I pass out?” This one makes his nostrils flare, eyes darkening a bit while his jaw tightens just for a second before letting go. You pause for a second, getting your breath while your hands still shake in your lap. “I’m fine, it’s fine. Can I just go home please? I’ve already done the month’s paperwork for all the ops we have planned, and you can just give me the rest post-op. I’m just a bit under the weather, I just need to lie down for a bit.” you start trying to reason, but the stubborn ass just keeps driving, and alarm starts bubbling in your chest again. You look down to your lap while you fiddle with your thumbs, willing to control the irrational fear yelling at you that something’s wrong every second Peña chooses to stay silent.

“Think I was flirting with you while you passed out? Y’think I don’t see it, you working yourself to the fucking bone? Think I can’t see how you’ve stopped eating, honey? Stopped laughing like you used to? Think I don’t know how late you’ve starting going home? As ‘f I’ll ever stop waitin’ for ya to clock out first so I know you’re home okay, baby. You gotta tell me what’s wrong - this is eatin’ you up.“

Peña’s tone softens, but his harsh whisper makes you turn your head to look at him. He sounds so…tortured, as if he’s the one suffering. He glances your way, locking eyes with you for a second before turning his head back to the road. You sit there and practically gape at him, your jaw slack as your head whirls. Peña knows? No, wait, he waits? For you to go home so you’re safe? He cares? What the fuck? Confused, all that comes out of your mouth is a mighty elegant open-mouthed “huh?” before you blink at him, waiting for him to continue.

“You gotta know by now, sweetheart. Gotta see how I’ve been lookin’ at you. You’re the smartest fuckin’ agent I’ve seen, with the balls to take down men I’d sweat to be ‘n the same room with. You swear like a sailor, an’ make me laugh till I’m chokin’ on my own damn cigarette. Tell me what’s hurtin’ you, honey. I can’t promise I’ll fix it, but I can swear to you I’ll damn well try my best.” He responds, turning to hold your gaze as his own eyes widen, and his brows turn down. Puppy eyes, you think. 

Your brain has gone from hazy to too fucking clear in a matter of five minutes, and now it feels like your thoughts are gonna come ripping out of your head. So you just blink at him, again, before reaching an unsteady hand out to cup his cheek. “I’m okay, I swear. Just-you remember that deal I had to cut last month? With the sicario? For intel on that lab?” Peña nods, and you continue. “Fucker led me to a dead end. Ambushed me. O-only got out ‘cause his gun jammed, and his child-soldier ran away. I just-this is so fucking dumb I’ve been in worse but- I can’t get it out of my head. The shit he said to me, the way he looked at me, t-touched me. I should be dead or worse, Peña. And I nearly was.“ you look down again, ashamed of the truth that’s spilling out of your mouth. It’s so small, so weak, you just want to fold into yourself and never come out. Your voice wobbles towards the end, tears filling your eyes as you turn your head away from the man you’ve wanted for so long to save whatever dignity you still have left. “‘N I can’t sleep anymore. Just see- or feel him every time. So thought I’d work for a bit. Clearly didn’t fucking work out, though.” small hiccups have started to punctuate your words, testament to the tears now flowing down your cheeks. Peña pulls up to an unfamiliar building and turns to you.

“‘S Javi, honey. Look at me, pretty baby.” He cradles your chin between his thumb and his forefinger to turn your head towards him. “None of that was stupid, okay? Come lie down at my place. I’ll sit in a damn chair next to you and fight him away if he comes in your dreams, sweetheart, okay? Nothin’ to be ‘fraid of. Never letting any fuckers near you again.” Javi leans in to brush a kiss to your forehead before stepping out of the car and hooking his index and middle finger to beckon you too. You step out of the truck and towards him, smiling while swiping at your face. “Didn’t know this was what the girls meant every time they bragged about sleeping with you” you snark softly, with a teasing grin on your face as you reach him. Javi rolls his eyes playfully before unlocking the door.

“Ain’t gotta do no sleepin’ you don’t want to, honey. You’re here to get some rest. Be a good girl and sleep f’me, and I’ll keep you up for as long as you like after,” he  throws over his shoulder with a matching grin and a wink.

[ellies-enrichment]

[stylesispunk]

"Nothing's gonna hurt you, baby"

Detective!Javier peña x f!reader

Prologue | next chapter | series masterlist

summary: You were kidnapped one winter night, but you have no memories of the incident or the person who took you. A year later, a homicide leads Javier Peña to your door, seeking help. He soon learns that he must protect the woman he loves.

chapter warnings: mentions of kidnapping, death, angst. The story doesn't follow the plot from narcos, but the use of Javier as the main lead in this story. No proofread

w.c: 4,5k

a/n: the first chapter of this fic is here! I really want to be careful with this one in the process of writing and stuff because I'm trying not to feel pressured. Reblogs and comments are always appreciated, please let me know what you think!! Remember if you want to be taglisted, you can tell me <3.

masterlist

dividers by @/saradika

Thump.

Chest raising slowly, in short breaths that made your heart ram against your ribcage.

Thump.

The blood pounded in your ears. Your hands shook. Your legs tingled. Your vision blurred, casting shadows of gray colors around your head, threatening to hurt.

Thump.

Breathe, breathe, breathe.

You closed your eyes tight, taking a long, slow, deep breath, then lifted your gaze, meeting the eyes of the detective sitting in front of you, looking around your house as if you would be able to find some answers tied to that unfortunate event that had happened to you a year ago.

Poor woman, he must have thought as he looked at your poor, weak woman.

You studied him—the way his nose crunched as he lost deep in thought, writing down things in his journal or whatever the hell he brought with him. His moustache over his lip, the creases of his soft-toned skin, and his dark brown eyes that had just met your gaze again.

Javier’s heart stopped beating for a second, feeling a strange feeling against his ribcage, stealing the air from his lungs. It must be sympathy; the turmoil was evident in your eyes. He had seen that same look from horror countless times before, but yours was different.

To him.

"What does it have to do with me?” You asked, avoiding his intense stare. Just the mere name of what he had told you made your hands tremble.

“I just told you. “He answered with a calmness that made your blood boil. As if it were just a routine question of your day.

“No,” you spat. “I’m just trying to heal from that, and you came here asking me things I’m not able to remember and I don’t want to." Your voice got cut by a small sob.

It was a deep scar, something you were too afraid to remember, something that had made you lose an entire year of life, stealing memories from your story you would never meet.

“He left a note for you; that means he knows you’re in this city and that you may be in danger.”

Javier's expression softened as he watched your emotional outburst, his heart aching with empathy for the pain you were experiencing. He knew that he had touched a raw nerve, dredging up memories and emotions that you had fought so hard to bury.

“I can’t go through all that again,” you whispered, closing your palms with so much pressure that you could feel the skin getting ripped by your nails.

The warm touch of Javier’s palms over your hands stopped you in short as you lifted your gaze again to look at him again. His own hands reached out instinctively to grasp yours, preventing you from inflicting further harm on yourself. He could feel the tension in your fingers, the pressure building as you struggled to contain the emotions raging within you.

"I understand," he said gently, his voice a soothing presence in the midst of your turmoil. "I know that this must be incredibly difficult for you, but as a detective, I’m asking you to let me protect you.”

Did he just say, “Let me protect you”?

“What if I don’t want to?” You asked carefully.

Javier's gaze softened as he listened to your question, his heart heavy with the weight of your pain and uncertainty. He had spoken the words without hesitation, driven by a deep-seated instinct to shield you from harm, but he understood that his offer of protection might not be what you wanted or needed.

"If you don't want me to protect you, I won't force you," he replied gently, his voice tinged with understanding.

Your hands were burning under his gentle touch, and his eyes were diesel to your own gaze. You both could feel the intensity of the electricity running through your veins as you connected somehow.

Despite the pain and uncertainty that still lingered within you, there was a flicker of hope igniting in your heart, ignited by his dark pools looking at you.

Both of you were awfully quiet, maybe so lost in the intensity of your touch over each other's skin that you didn't hear the door closing off. Your best friend, Alice, had just arrived from her running session.

Her eyes widened in surprise as she took in the sight of Javier holding your hands, his gaze locked with yours in a moment of quiet connection. There was a furrow of concern between her brows as she glanced between the two of you, silently urging you to explain the unexpected presence of the detective in your living room.

You could feel the weight of her scrutiny as you struggled to find the right words to explain the situation. Javier, too, seemed to sense the tension in the air, his grip on your hands tightening slightly as he prepared himself to face the questions that were sure to come.

Taking a deep breath, you turned to Alice, your voice faltering slightly as you began to speak. "Alice, this is Detective Javier," you said, your words coming out in a rush. "He's here to help me with...”

Your explanation hung in the air, as you didn’t know how to keep explaining the presence of Javier, but Alice's expression softened with understanding as she nodded, her eyes flickering with concern as she glanced back and forth between you and Javier.

“I’m Alice Wilson; I’m her best friend, by the way,” she introduced herself to Javier.

“Javier Peña,” he said, shaking hands with the girl.

There was a brief pause after the greetings, but Javier cut it off in a second. “Could I talk to you for a second?” he asked Alice, not without looking at you as if asking for permission.

You nodded, walking out of the living room towards the kitchen. You placed the palm of your hands over the kitchen counter, and you gripped the borders with strong force, trying to stop the hammer from beating your brain. You had tried; you had tried so hard to make an effort and remember what had happened that night and the whole year that came after, but you simply couldn’t; you were waiting for it to go away to a dark sea of monsters where your nightmares rest.

But what if the death of that woman was your fault?

You didn’t want your life to be tainted by the ghost of your worst fears, from your captor.

Your heart started beating so loudly against your ribcage that you felt Alice and Javier would be able to hear it.

"Hey,” a voice banished the monster lurking in your thoughts away. His voice did.

You turned around, timidly facing him. You couldn’t take your eyes away from his figure once you did. There was something about him that you weren’t able to decipher yet.

“I’m heading out,” he informed.

"Okay," you replied, your voice barely above a whisper.

He nodded, pursing his lips as he contemplated what he was about to say: “If... If you change your mind about it, please call me. I let my number with your friend.”

You nodded, and Javier graced a small smile on his lips. "Please, take care," he said, praying that that person wouldn’t find you.

As he made his way towards the door, you couldn't help but feel a pang of sadness at the thought of him leaving. Despite your initial reluctance to accept his help, you had come to rely on his brief presence, as if something invisible were pulling you towards him.

“Handsome, isn’t he?” Alice broke your bubble of thoughts.

"Are you thinking about calling him?" You asked, jealously flickering at the thought of him with your friend.

“Me?" She chuckled. "If someone stole his heart, it was you."

"I don't know about that," you replied, trying to sound nonchalant as you turned away from the door. "He's just doing his job, after all."

Alice raised an eyebrow, a knowing smile playing on her lips. "Maybe," she said, her tone teasing. "But I saw the way he looked at you. There was something there, whether you want to admit it or not."

You felt it too, but you didn’t feel ready to admit it.

As Javier was walking towards his car, his phone started ringing.

Murphy.

With a sigh, he looked behind him towards your house, then answered his phone.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice tinged with concern as he braced himself for whatever news Murphy had to deliver.

On the other end of the line, Murphy's voice crackled with urgency. "A girl," he said quickly. "Around twenty-five, she missed her friend’s party; she found herself unlived in the morning.”

Javier's heart skipped a beat at the news, cursing at the sky or whoever was allowing this to happen.

"Where?" he asked, his voice firm with determination. "Give me the details, and I'll be there as soon as possible."

Javier ended the call and hurried towards his car, gazing at your house for the last time, and as soon as he drove towards the scene of the crime, his thoughts kept drifting back to you, hoping against hope that he could bring an end to the nightmare that had plagued your life for far too long.

He couldn’t bear the thought of you being in danger.

"Denisse Around twenty-five, she missed her friend’s party; she found her friend like this in the morning,” Steve explained.

Javier couldn’t take his eyes off the victim, who was lying still on her bed, dressed in a white gown with flowers on her lap. She seemed to be at peace, resting, as if her life would have been taken by a crazy bastard who wanted to reach you.

You were the only thought in his mind.

This girl, again, looked like you—the features on her face, the hair.

“Javier”

He came back from his own thoughts, lifting his gaze at Lauren, who was wearing a worried expression on her face.

“What?” he asked simply.

“I asked, What had happened to you? You seemed lost.”

“I met the girl. The one from Boston.” His voice felt heavy. "It's just... too much of a coincidence."

Lauren's expression softened with understanding as she placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. "I know," she said softly. "But we'll figure this out, Javier. We'll find the truth, no matter what."

“No, you don’t understand; he is trying to capture her image on these girls.”

“And what did she say?” Steve asked, confused at his partner's demeanor.

“She doesn’t remember.”

“It's a shame; I'm sure that if she could remember. It would help us close his case and stop the crimes.” Steve said

“No shit" Javier said, angry. He was furious at everyone and at himself, so he walked away from the scene of the crime.

As Javier stormed away from the scene of the crime, Lauren hurried after him, her concern evident in every step she took. She caught up to him just as he reached his car, her brow furrowed with worry.

"Javier, wait," she called out, her voice soft but urgent. "What's wrong? Why did you speak to Steve like that?"

Javier paused, his hands gripping the material of his shirt. He struggled to contain his emotions. He knew that he had lashed out unfairly at his partner, but the frustration and anger boiling within him were too overwhelming to ignore.

"I'm sorry, Lauren," he said, his voice strained with emotion. "I just... I can't shake the feeling that we're missing something crucial here. These girls—they're not just random victims. He's targeting them for a reason, and I can't help but feel like it's all connected to her."

Lauren nodded understandingly, her eyes filled with empathy as she placed a gentle hand on Javier's arm. “I know”

Matthew gazed at his partner, trying to find reassurance in her words and in her presence, as he had always felt since he had met her, but his thoughts and worst nightmares were drifting to you.

He didn’t confess, but his biggest fear was that you would be the next victim on the list.

“You aren’t hungry." Alice, who was sitting next to her, had not eaten anything either; being too scared that something bad could possibly happen to her friend was too much to bear.

You shook your head slightly. “I can’t stop thinking.”

"No,” Alice said, touching your arm.

“There is another girl who has died.” You tried to explain, “It’s my

“Don’t even say that,” Alice interrupted. “I know it’s not easy for you to try to erase what has happened.” She held her gaze on yours for a moment.

“Alice”

“Why don’t you lie down and try to rest?” She suggested that worry was creeping up on her.

“I can’t sleep,” you replied, sad at the thought that you would never be happy again.

“I’ll give you a pill, but please rest,” she said, delicately brushing her fingertips on your naked arms.

She helped her up: “Come on, you’re going to take a warm shower, and then you’re going to go to bed, and I’ll bring you the pill, and you’ll try to sleep.”

You nodded without protesting, allowing your friend to look after you, at least for today.

But then the doorbell stopped the both of you from taking another step. Your body tensed up, and Alice, noticing the movements, walked towards the door, peeking through the peephole before opening it.

Who could it be at this time?

“It's Javier,” she announced before opening the door.

There he was, Javier Peña, standing next to the door with a wide smile on his face. “Excuse me for showing up at this hour, but I need to talk to you,” he said, looking at you, who had not taken your eyes off him since Alice had opened the door. The light illuminating the porch and the shine emanating from his brown eyes made you feel like you were naked under his stare.

His hair was messy, and some curls fell over his forehead. Your eyes traveled down over his jawline towards his neck. A little further down, a bit of dark, curly hair peeked through the white shirt he was wearing.

The trance that Isabella seemed to have fallen into faded when she heard her friend's voice. “Come in, detective.”

“Thank you.”

Isabella continued without saying a word, just a couple of steps away from him.

“Well, I’ll be in the kitchen,” she said, turning around and disappearing from the room while her lips curled into a mischievous smile.

“Do you want to have a coffee?” You asked, getting nervous; your hands were starting to sweat.

“No, thank you,” he said, trying to ignore the butterflies in his stomach at seeing you again.

“Take a seat,” you indicated.

Javier looked at you as you sat on the edge of the couch. He didn’t know what to do or say, so finally he ended up sitting next to you. He followed his instincts.

No one spoke, and the silence became increasingly heated and tense. Javier stretched his arm over the back of the couch, and his finger almost touched your hair. He wondered what it would feel like to feel the softness of the hair under his fingertips.

On the other hand, your bare knee brushed against the rough fabric of his jeans. Your soft friction caused a wave of intense sensations in you that rose to your throat. Then you looked at him, and Javier could barely contain the urgency to cup your face and kiss all the fears away.

He must concentrate on his work while thinking about protecting you.

“I wanted to see how you were doing; I guess you already know.”

You nodded; however, you tried to process what his words meant. She knew that, perhaps, it was just part of her job as a detective. After all, it was one of her duties to look after the well-being of the people, but the way he looked at her while she was complaining about her made her think otherwise. He was worried about her and her safety, worried about what might happen to her, and he had come to her house in the middle of the night to check on her.

“I can’t stop thinking everything is my fault. I’m destroyed; the crimes, my kidnapping, that person, you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you want things from me, and I don't know if I can give them to you. You came into my life, telling me you need my help to stop a murder and asking me to remember things I can’t and would rather not.”

“I'm sorry; I've never wanted to pressure you.”

“I know you're sorry, and you're just trying to do your job.”

“Believe me, I would never have wanted you to be involved in all this, but unfortunately, there is someone else out there who wants just the opposite.” He was dying to hug you and taste those lips that moved restlessly from side to side while you listened to him. Try the taste of your mouth and get drunk with it until he loses his mind.

You could feel it too—the magnetic pull between the two of you. You needed to move away from him and put a little distance between you. You could feel the stare of his intense brown eyes on your back. You ran your hand over your neck, and your pulse accelerated. What Javier caused was something new, a feeling you had never experienced before, clouding all your senses. You could feel it in your trembling legs.

“It’s late.” You spoke.

“I know; I don’t know why I came here,” he responded, smiling.

“I'll walk you to the door.” He walked past you, and, for a second, you thought he would stop you and kiss you passionately. But it wasn't like that. You went out with him to the porch and tried to appear as calm as possible. "See you."

As Javier walked towards his car, you felt a sudden surge of desperation wash over you. The magnetic pull between the two of you was undeniable, and you found yourself longing for his presence, craving the comfort that he seemed to offer despite the chaos surrounding your life.

"Javier," you called out, your voice barely above a whisper.

He turned back towards you, his gaze searching yours for a moment before he spoke. "Yes?"

You hesitated for a moment, unsure if you should voice the sudden impulse that had taken hold of you. But then, with a deep breath, you found the courage to speak.

"Could you... take me to a bar?" You asked, the words tumbling out before you could stop them. "Just to relax, you know?"

Javier's expression softened at your request, a faint smile playing at the corners of his lips. But deep down, he knew this wasn’t correct. “Of course," he replied, his voice gentle. "I'd be happy to, but you must tell Alice first; I don’t want her to worry about you.”

You put a smile on your lips and nodded.

The bar was dimly lit, with a low hum of conversation filling the air. Javier found a quiet corner booth for the two of you, away from the hustle and bustle of the crowded bar, in disguise as if he were your protector, and he was doing his job somehow. As you settled into your seats, you couldn't help but feel a sense of relaxation wash over you. You were grateful for the chance to escape the chaos in your mind for a second.

"What can I get you?" Javier asked, gesturing towards the menu on the table.

You glanced over the options, and the weight of your recent experiences was still heavy on your mind. "Just a glass of wine, please," you replied softly.

Javier nodded, signaling to the bartender as he ordered your drinks. As you waited for them to arrive, you couldn't help but steal glances at Javier, his presence comforting and reassuring in the dimly lit bar.

"Thank you for bringing me here," you said, breaking the comfortable silence between you. "I needed this."

Javier smiled, his gaze warm as he met yours. He could feel his heart beating faster at the sight of you under the lights, looking so ethereal. He didn’t know if love felt like this, but the feeling was like this; it terrified him. It terrified him to think about what he would do for you.

The bartender returned with your drinks, setting them down on the table with a soft clink of glass. You took a sip of your wine, the rich taste soothing against your parched throat. As you savored the moment, you couldn't shake the feeling of Javier's eyes on you.

"I'm sorry if I've been too forward," Javier said suddenly, his voice tinged with uncertainty. "I just... I want to help in any way I can."

I care about you.

You shook your head, reaching out to place a reassuring hand on his arm. "I want to help you with the case.”

Javier's eyes widened in surprise at your words, a flicker of hope dancing in their depths. "You do?" he asked, his voice laced with a mixture of astonishment and gratitude. "Are you sure?"

You nodded, a determined expression settling on your features. "Yes," you replied firmly. "I want to remember. I want to help put an end to all of this."

A sense of relief washed over Javier at your words, a weight lifting from his shoulders at the thought of your cooperation in the investigation. "Thank you," he said sincerely, his voice filled with gratitude. "I'll do everything I can to help you remember."

As you continued to talk, Javier mentioned the idea of finding a hypnotist who could help you unlock your memories. "There's a hypnotist, I know," he said, his voice hopeful. "He's helped other people in similar situations before. Maybe he can help you too."

You considered his suggestion for a moment; the prospect of uncovering the truth was both daunting and enticing. But deep down, you knew it was the right decision. "Let's do it," you said finally, a sense of determination coursing through your veins. "I'm ready to face whatever memories may come, but please be patient with me.”

"Of course," he replied gently, his voice filled with reassurance. "I'll be right there beside you every step of the way, supporting you through it all."

Back at your house, on the porch, with his jacket around your shoulders, your body felt heavier, as if it were tightening your throat, hurting from the words dancing around waiting to come out.

One day, his presence became a drug you wanted to try.

One day, your presence was bathing in sunlight on his skin.

But you were a victim, and he was a detective playing with becoming a hero; he clearly wasn't. It was all for you, all for the desire to be your

Was he becoming obsessed with the idea of you just as the person following your track, threatening to snatch the wings of an angel from your back?

Javier couldn't stop thinking if you could perceive him as a pervert, as the thoughts of your ethereal company made him think about, or the words he would whisper in your ear for only you to hear.

Would you see him as your protector?

"Javier," you broke the silence with your voice and soothing melody, which he could listen to for the rest of his life. You tried to take his jacket off your shoulder, but he stopped you.

“Keep it. This isn't the last time you'll see me.”

You graced a smile at him, and Javier felt he could be used to face the death, and he had come to peace with it, but you? He wasn't ready for what he was becoming because of you; he wasn't ready for the possibility of you slipping away from his fingers and losing you to a monster. He didn't know how to love someone or how to take care of someone who wasn't him, yet you seemed to have turned his world upside down.

He was scared of changing, scared of your hold over him, and scared of your captor because you feared him.

“See you,” you said.

“See you,” he also said, leaning to press a kiss on your cheek. “Take care.” 

The small kiss lingered like a gentle caress, leaving a warm path and spreading through your entire being.

You kept quiet, completely still, while looking at how Javier walked toward his car. You leaned against the door, looking up at the sky, before going back inside the house again.

A silhouette mingled among the shadows that the same moon capriciously drew that night. No one perceived it, and no one heard the name that silhouette whispered.

daisy, daisy, daisy.

The next day at the office, everything felt smooth; there wasn’t another victim to cry for, but still, there was no information or indication they could use to find the murderer, and that was an issue. He was becoming obsessed with a case he needed to solve for his own sake.

“Did you sleep badly?" Lauren asked while looking through some details of the case.

Javier massaged his neck with smooth movements, but nothing was able to calm the pain that pricked insistently in his muscles. After seeing you last night, he couldn’t find a way to go back to sleep.

“This pain is killing me a bit.”

"You should relax a bit," Lauren said, sitting down. She tucked her hair behind her ears.

As if it were easy, he thought.

“News?” he asked, but his expectations were killed once he looked at his partner, wearing a resigned expression on her face. “Nothing important; there are no footprints found; we have no evidence, nor am I a suspect.”

“What about cameras?” Javier asked, exasperated.

"No,” but her partner didn’t seem happy with the answer. “Come on, Javi. Don’t let this case take the best of you.”

“I know, when we solve this case, I’ll go to Italy or something, but now just let’s focus on it, please.”

Lauren nodded, walking back to her office and continuing to work. Once in a while, she lifted her gaze, and he looked focused on the screen on his laptop with sad eyes adorning his features.

She was about to get up from her seat, go over to him, and caress his shoulders to show him her support and to show him she was there, but at that moment the door opened violently, and you entered his office as if you were running from some danger.

Javier jumped out of his chair. He was perplexed to see you in such a state.

"Javi,” you said, throwing yourself desperately into his arms.

Javier's heart skipped a beat at the way you whispered "javi", at the urgency in your voice and the way you had thrown yourself into his arms. Concern flooded his expression as he held you close, instinctively wanting to protect you from whatever danger had caused you to seek refuge in his office.

“Javier, he was at my house." You took a moment to catch your breath, the fear still evident in your gaze as you recounted the events that had led you here. "He was at my house," you repeated, your voice trembling with emotion.

It was all happening again.

tags: @christinamadsen @romanarose (if you want to be removed, you can tell me 🥺)

[tempesttamers]

Imagine how awful it must have been for Javi to not know what was going on with his friends, calling out over the radio but never receiving a reply. How long was it before he learned he lost three of his best friends??

[softpascalito]

Peluda - Javier Peña x Reader

Summary: A snowstorm hits Bogotá and you bring back a surprise visitor. Javi is not amused. But, it leads to a realization about himself- and about you.

Relationships: Javier Peña x F!Reader WC: 1700 Tags/Warnings: Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Emotional, Nicknames, Soft Javier Peña (Narcos), Sweet Javier Peña (Narcos), Healthy Relationships, Fights (blink and youll miss it), Snow, Blizzards & Snowstorms, This kitten is DEA Read on AO3 full advent calendar (updated daily)

notes: okay listen i am AWARE that bogotá does not get snow like this but this is my fanfiction and what i say is law so there is snow now.

❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️

Thick snowflakes swirl around you, the ice crunching under your feet as your gaze flies over the windows of the building down the street. As you get closer, you can see it clearly, light spilling out from the right window on the ground floor. He's home.

You slip twice before you reach the house, hurrying past the parked cars and up the small flight of stairs that is also glazed over with ice, keeping your head down and your coat wrapped tightly around your body. When you reach the front door, you fumble with your keys for a moment, your hands shaking from both the cold and the adrenaline.

A curse escapes your lips as the bundle of keys falls down and you lean forward to grab it before settling for the doorbell instead of giving it another try. It's mere seconds until the door buzzes open and you push yourself into the dimly lit hallway of the apartment building. The wind howls around you, even after the large door has fallen shut, seemingly finding a way through the cracks around it.

“Hermosa?”

His door is slightly ajar, brown hair and a pink shirt poking out at the side of it. You practically storm towards him and you can tell by the way he flexes his arm that he's holding his gun, carefully checking who is showing up on his doorstep this late at night.

“It's me, calm down,” you brush him off as you reach the door and all but push yourself inside. Javier steps back, staring at you for a moment. His voice is a little lower than usual, which in your experience means one of two things. He's horny or he's mad. Occasionally a bit of both.

“Are you crazy, going out in this weather? I was worried sick.”

Mad it is.

You barely look at him as you shake your head, “I just wanted to get some more bread, we were out again and I didn’t know if the stores might close-” His gaze is on your face for a moment, resting on your slightly reddened cheeks, the slowly melting snowflakes that decorate both your hair and your coat. 

But that is what he stumbles over- the coat. Your arms are wrapped around yourself and the thick fabric is drawn over a lump that definitely does not belong to your body.

“What did you get?” Javier tucks the front of the coat down just as you turn away, sending a glare into his direction, “Don't scare it.”

“It?” Javi asks and you can practically see his brain going haywire as he tries to figure out what you’re talking about. The agent is so goddamn smart when it comes to tracking down informants and exposing cartel members but the most normal conclusions sometimes seem like a mystery to him.

His furrowed brows relax slightly when you peel the coat off yourself carefully and he is left staring at a trembling ball of fur in your arms. Very dirty, brown fur.

“Oh hermosa-” He starts but you shake your head before he even has the chance to complain. Bogotá has more than a few stray cats and dogs but so far, he has managed to keep you from taking any of them home.

“She was all alone, Javi, in the snow. She would’ve frozen to death,” you mumble. As if to confirm your story, the kitten gives a small, strangled noise and you hum quietly. Javier follows you into the bathroom, watching with crossed arms as you place the animal in the bathtub and begin to run the water, adjusting the temperature with one hand. The cat trashes around slightly, clearly uncomfortable with the cold porcelain below her and the attention of not one but two humans. Her claws strike your hand, making you curse as a thin trail of blood runs down your fingers.

“What are you doing?” Javier asks in a low voice, clearly exasperated. But you're not exactly calm either, your own hands still cold from the snow and now stinging slightly from where the cat has struck you. 

“I’m taking a bath,” you say with a roll of your eyes, voice dripping with irony. “I’m cleaning the fucking cat, Javi, what does it look like?!”

You don't need to see his face to know you're not the only one in the bathroom who looks like they've been struck. There's a small shuffle next to you as Javi closes the door behind himself and then kneels down beside you with a low groan, “Okay, how do we do this?”

A weak smile spreads over your face as you bring both hands back to the cat that has by now joined in on the conversation, audibly meowing up at both of you as you gently stroke its back, “I'll hold her, you run the water and get some soap.”

He does as told, filling the tub up just a bit so that the small animal can still stand. To your surprise, she doesn't seem to mind the water as much as a cat should. In fact, she almost seems to enjoy the warmth of it around her small paws. 

Javier seems to pick up on it too, “I thought cats don't like baths.”

“I guess not all of them?” You offer as he hands you the bar of soap and you begin to gently run it over the matted fur below your hands.

“Are we sure it's a cat?”

His voice is so serious that you can't help but laugh as you elbow his side, “Javi-”

“I'm just saying, hermosa. It could be a- an oddly shaped, brown raccoon.”

It does not turn out to be an oddly shaped raccoon. As the dirt comes off, layer after layer, staining the once white tub a gentle brown, it doesn't even turn out to be a brown cat.

The orange fur is dripping wet, making the small thing look even more pitiful than it had when you had spotted it hiding from the snow below a bench. At least the attempts to further scratch you have died down, the cat seemingly content to be warmed up and cared for.

“Hold on, I'll get a bigger towel,” you mumble and head to the small cabinet in the hallway. As you grab a well-worn one and pull it out, you hear a low voice coming from the bathroom, one that makes your head turn and hold still as you peek past the door frame.

“You're still shaking, peluda,” Javi whispers, crouched over the tub to gently brush his fingers through the dripping fur, no doubt not realizing you can hear him, “We’ll get you nice and warm, don't you worry.” A tiny meow comes as reply and he tuts softly, “Todavía no estoy seguro si eres un gato. You may fool her but not me. I'm an agent, you know? I can see right-” He punctuates his words with a soft, gentle pat on the cat's head, “- through - you.”

Your heart feels like it's about to jump out of your chest. You've never heard Javi talk to anyone so gently, anyone except yourself. And even then, it's usually reserved for when you're alone, tucked away in bed in the dark, tracing the skin of the person beside you.

A few minutes later you're seated in the living room, the tiny cat wrapped in a big towel on your lap as Javier hands you a baby bottle filled with some milk - both borrowed from the Murphy’s upstairs, who had both been equally confused when Javi had shown up on their doorstep to ask for both.

“Come on, peluda,” you reassure the kitten gently, repeating the nickname Javi used for her earlier, and very carefully, she begins to drink. The taste of the lukewarm milk seems to agree with her because after a few moments, the small sucks on the bottle becomes more eager and silence falls over the apartment, only interrupted by the small noises of the furball on your lap.

Javier is still standing in the open kitchen, watching as you feed the animal, occasionally reassuring her with a gentle pat or a different angle of the bottle.

He swallows, trying to get the realization that his head is producing back down into his stomach, the scenarios running in front of his eyes away from the surface. But there is no un-knowing the things he knows, no way to get rid of them.

He wants children.

It's not a possibility, not in Colombia, not with the cartel so close. Maybe it won't be one for a few years to come, until things are more quiet, until he has fixed everything he needs to fix. Including himself.

But as he watches you, the ever-growing wish settles in his throat, placing itself dangerously close to his mouth. Javi swallows again. He doesn't want it to slip out. Not yet, anyway.

He stands there, content to just watch as the cat eagerly takes one sip after another until the bottle is empty and the ball of orange fur purrs gently as it settles onto your knees, eyes already drooping.

Your voice is quiet as you urge him to come closer and with a small sigh, Javi settles down next to you, his arm automatically wrapping around your shoulder. He doesn't realize how close the picture of the three of you is to what he might have in a few years, minus a round stomach or a non-furry little companion on your lap. It's okay. He can wait.

“Can she stay?” You almost beg, your eyes finally leaving the kitten in front of you to wander to Javi instead. He sighs softly, both of you looking at each other. Then, his gaze leaves your face.

Brown puppy eyes meet green kitten eyes. They look at each other for a moment. Then Javi nods, “Yeah. She can stay.”

notes: shoutout to the person on my discord who said "funny, normally javi is happy to see a pussy" (i love you) also: do not give kittens cow milk (unless theyre starving and theres a snowstorm i guess?) idk this is no vetinary advice, google that shit if you ever bring home a kitten to your dea agent husband.

[sunflowercider]

Once Javier Asrahan becomes a grandmaster, there are only two times he is ever harmed by a blade.

This first time is one of his most painful memories. A chaotic battle in the pits of Hell itself. He desperately attempts to defend his master, and only briefly succeeds. The throbbing pain of his shoulder is no comparison to the shattering of his heart as he watches the man closest to him sacrifice himself to save everyone they love.

(He does not allow this man to suffer alone.)

The second and last time he is injured by a blade is a quiet evening not long after. The master of his heart is resting in the bed before him. The entire household is appalled at the state of his health and has ensured he remains rested and well-fed. Javier is no exception, and has brought an apple for a bedtime snack. The man watches him as he quietly quarters it and hands a slice over, making sure to pick any seeds out. As he cuts into the next slice, there's a long sigh beside him followed by a quiet "I love you". Javier whips up to gape at the man. There's a faint stinging in his palm. It's a wonder he can hear his master's yelp of shock over the ringing in his ears. The man tugs at the hand holding the apple, babbling about something, but all Javier can do is tug him closer and ask him to repeat himself. Through gritted teeth and pink cheeks, he does, and Javier is reminded of his most treasured memory every time he sees the nick on his palm.

[ying-doodles]

in some other timeline...

[barghest-land]

if u wanna know if i Actually cried drawing him cutting off his hair, yes i did

[penvisions]

from grief to grace {javi g x reader drabble}

Pairing: Javi Gutierrez x Reader

Word Count: 1.2k

Summary: Determined to work through your heartbreak, you end up spacing out until your boss comes to check on you.

Warnings: hurt and comfort, break up, heartbreak, asshole boyfriend, negative language, degrading language, disrespect, um idk if there's anything else?

A/N: written for @iamasaddie as part of their writing challenge 2.0! decided to go literal with the prompt of 'javi's blue jacket' and pick javi g since i've never written for him before. the genre i was given was hurt/comfort and the prompt was 'will you tell me about it?' i had so much fun with this even if i took an angstier route (apparently that's my thing lol)

drabble masterlist || main masterlist || ko-fi

You were trying to concentrate on threading the needle, but your hands were trembling, and tears were brimming. Sighing, you set the needle’s pointed end back into the pin cushion atop the desk, beside the jacket you had been attempting to fix.

Footsteps echoed down the hall, and you quickly picked up the notebook you had scribbled Javi’s measurements on, double checking them against the thin white lines you had drawn onto the fabric as you heard him enter the room.

“Okay, my apologies, that meeting ran a little longer. It was unexpected.” He clapped his hands together, seemingly done with that part of the day and more than willing to move onto the nest.

“Th-that’s okay, senior.” You tried to sound normal, but your heart sank when you realized it hadn’t been convincing enough.

“Is everything okay, you do not seem like yourself.” Javi’s cheerful tone had dampened, worry creeping into him as you could feel his eyes look you over completely as you sat frozen at your desk. No doubt taking in the way the jacket that was supposed to be ready for him to try on was sitting in front of you in pieces.

“I know, I’m sorry. I’ve been too slow on this jacket, senior, please accept my apologies.”

“I am not worried about the jacket, I am worried about you. You’re crying, querida.” He intoned softly.

Quickly raising a hand to wipe at your cheeks, you were startled to discover that you were crying. The tears having fallen to the fabric you were supposed to be working on. Damp spots decorating the bright fabric. It was a mustard yellow, the color deeper where you tears had landed. You frantically tried to rub the wet spots off, patting at them with a tissue from the box near the edge of your desk.

“Oh shoot! No, no, no, I will fix it, I swear.”

“No need,” Javi strode further into the room, kneeling beside you to take your hands in his. They looked so small in his, the freckled tan of his feeling warm. “I worry for you, tell me what’s wrong?”

You shook your head, aware of a few errant tears flying away at the motion. You wanted to keep it inside, to not ruin the day or be the cry baby that vented to their sweet, understanding employer.

“I’m okay, I swear.” You wouldn’t look directly at him, knowing his wide brown eyes that glittered in the sunlight would make you spill the news far too quickly if you were to gaze into them. You always had a soft spot for him, for the way he was endlessly kind and wore his heart on his sleeve. Something that had been a thing to tease you over, from both your friends and your – well now ex – boyfriend.

“Will you tell me about it, querida, please? I will do my best to make it better, whatever it is.” He beseeched in that deep baritone he had, his hands squeezing yours reassuringly.

“My-my boyfriend, h-he broke up with me. He said he was embarrassed to tell his friends I was a seamstress.” You sputtered, the ache in your heart making the words flow from you to your boss. He was always so kind, so thoughtful. You hadn’t wanted to tamp down on his sunny and excitable demeanor today of all days. He was preparing to host a viewing festival, indie film makers from all over the world would be there and he had requested you to work overtime if you wanted to. You had taken him up on it, even in the wake of the breakup. You needed to save as much as you could to cover the down payment for a new place, your ex not too prideful to kick you out of the one in your name that he had moved into. “He ki-kicked me out of our apartment, I have nowhere to go.”

You felt a tug on your arms and you leaned into it, your bottom thudding on a plush pillow Javi had pulled from the nearby couch. He took you into his arms carefully, on the watch for any signs that this was not the way to go about this. But you went willingly, your arms going around his neck and your cheek going to his chest. You breathed in deeply, one of his hands rubbing up and down your back soothingly.

“I’m so sorry, mi amor. Why don’t you let me cook for you or take you out to a lovely dinner, mi amor. To help get your mind off of things. You can stay here in the meantime, there are countless rooms here for you to have.” His voice vibrated through you, comforting in how it caressing your ears at the same time. You could only nod, not trusting your voice to be more than a warble of nonsensible words. You tightened your on hold on him, feeling safe for the first time all week.

-

The next morning you woke naturally, the sunlight filtering in through the sheer curtains over the windows. You had opted to stay in, too nervous to be out in public lest you run into your ex. Javi had understood completely, whisking you toward the kitchen after he had dried you tears. Glasses of wine were shared over the course of making dinner and during. Two led to three led to four and you found yourself slow dancing with the graceful man in the kitchen once you had finished. The soft sounds of the distant ocean paired with the oldies flowing low from the radio too tempting. He whispered how he would never treat you in such a bad way, how he would always take care of you, make sure you were happy and healthy.

When he offered you a room again, you had been emboldened by the wine and casual touches. It urged you to lean up close to him, hands still around his neck from dancing to ask if his room was available. He had answered you with a deep kiss, his hands wide on your back as he licked into your mouth. He had assured you he was a man of honor before offering you a pair of pajamas and settled into his plush bed beside you. He hadn’t done anything more than tangle his fingers with your underneath the covers before you both drifted off to sleep.

Smiling to yourself, you stretched out. A moan bubbling up as you felt a few kinks work themselves out in your back. You felt heat rush to your cheeks, the sound so dirty in the warm bedroom. But when you looked over to the other side, you were the only one in the bed. Your eyes flashed to the pop of neon color on the bedside table.  

There was a post it note atop the alarm clock, blocking the display of numbers from view. Javi’s script penned in ink, a message for you.

‘Mi amor, I had to leave early but did not want to wake you.

Please join me for the festival if you’re feeling up to it. Just ask my assistant for a VIP pass.

I will bring home something for dinner. I hope you got some rest last night, please take it easy today.

Yours, Javi’

You liked the sound of that. Home.

[lloydfrontera]

It hurt. Every time that man put up a blatantly false front and tried to bear the burdens all alone, it shook and broke Javier's heart.

god. javier not just,, being upset about lloyd trying to deal with everything on his own but honest to god being heartbroken about it. ok that's. that's fine.

Why would you want to bear the burdens all by yourself? Just why? [...] Why can't you just tell me that you're having a tough time? Why can't you admit that you're afraid?

javier,,, wanting lloyd to tell him when he's overwhelmed, when he's afraid, when he needs help because he wants to help him, more than anything, he just wants lloyd to trust him so he can be of help,,, that's. that's soooo fine.

What an idiot. Javier's clenching became tighter as he strengthened his resolve on one side to protect his idiotic friend, regardless of the adversity that came their way. The grandmaster was determined to keep his pretentious, cowardly buddy safe. So stop being a crybaby about your own death. You're not going to die, and I'm going to ensure it. Even it really comes our way, I will die in your place instead. I am willing to.

javier. deciding that he'll protect lloyd no matter what, that he will keep him safe from anything that may happen so he should stop being afraid because javier won't allow anything to happen to him. he shouldn't be afraid of dying because even if death came their way, javier would die for him first. this is so so so sooo fineeee.

Javier breathed a small sigh again, as the fraudster's subtle crying noise still reached his ears. The grandmaster's heart broke as he hear the sound that leaked out through Lloyd's palms or the blanket, whichever he was covering his face with. Jeez. It was a long night. Javier wished for the darkness to go away as he lifted his chin and stared at the ceiling. The night was perhaps too long.

THIS IS FINE. SO SOOO SO SO SO SOO FINE I SWEAR

[lokischocolatefountain]

Say No to Me

Series Masterlist

Fandom: Narcos

Pairing: Javier Peña x Reader

Rating: 18+ (Mostly smut with a garnish of fluff)

Word count: 5.7k

Summary: It hadn’t been a good day at work for Javier Peña— what was new? She knew she could make him bury his frustrations in her, but it was taking a much more convincing than he usually needed. It didn’t matter. She liked a challenge.

A/N: He’s a hot asshole and all but I think he’s husband material with those soft eyes and pretty hair. Warning: bad Spanish.

The dinner went cold on the kitchen counter as she sat at her desk, reading through the stack of essays she had to finish grading by the end of the week. He always told her not to wait up, scolded her for staying up waiting for him in the living room even when she had to wake up early for work.

She continued to not follow his request. She was tired most nights she waited desperately for the lock to turn to let her husband in. But it didn’t feel very wifely to go to bed before feeding her husband. He didn’t expect such things of her; neither of them were traditional that way. He didn’t expect much of her really and she didn’t expect much of him. He didn’t expect her to cook and clean, she didn’t expect him to come home on time. But she still cooked when she could and he hurried home whenever he could. It was why their marriage worked.

A smile curled her lips upward when she heard the door open. “Jav—” she gasped, standing up from her chair and rushing to him. Even in their dimly lit living room, she could see the splotches of red on his shirt.

He took her hands in his before she could take his shirt off to assess his injuries. She knew his job was dangerous, but never imagined she’d see him come home covered in blood.

“It’s not mine,” he insisted, dropping her hands to hold her face with both of his. His brown eyes looked into hers, pleading with her to just believe him. It was an ‘I know I always lie about work, but I’m not lying this time’.

He pulled her close to his chest, whether desiring affection or to distract her from the blood on his shirt, she didn’t know. She knew it was just her imagination, but she could feel the blood on his shirt stain her white top. Like he was transferring his sins on to her, giving her everything he had as he said he would in their marriage vows. She imagined him leaving red on her forehead as he kissed her, red in her hair as she imaged his metaphorically bloodstained hands combing through.

To her surprise, none of it fazed her. She loved him, brown eyes, bloody hands, guilty heart and all. She should be ashamed, really, that these things only made her want him more.

“Need you to say no, mi amor,” he said, grabbing her ass over her silk pajamas. If he actually wanted her to deny him, he was doing a poor job of convincing her to do so. They did not have a traditional marriage, but just this one part could be considered a bit too traditional. They would fit right in with the old expectations for women to put out whenever their husbands desired although none of them did it as part of their rather unusual lifestyle.

He’d given her a ring to wear over her wedding ring for when she wished to give him permission to do whatever he liked with her. It was with the expectation that it would go on and come off. She never took it off, giving him explicit permission to do with her what he wished forever. That didn’t stop her from asking, begging even to say no to him. She very rarely gave in.

“Stop touching me so good then.”

On second thought, they would not fit well with those old expectations. Purely because of how good he fucked her. Why would she ever say no when he always took great care of her? Why reject touches that lit her on fire and reminded her for days to come what she’d let him do to her.

“Just grabbing your ass, baby. Not doing much,” he said, pushing her into their door and holding her there with a strong hand on her lower back.

“It’s doing things for me,” she pressed her cheek into the cold door, her eyes struggling to keep him in her line of vision as he played with her body. He pulled the silk drawers down her legs, the fabric tickling her thighs before pooling around her feet.

“Oh? You missed me that much?” He asked, casually slipping a finger inside her cunt. She whimpered as she felt him force his way in, his finger exploring her as she imagined what he had planned for her, the ways in which he’d make her scream his name.

She nodded and said, “Sí, papi.”

She heard his breath hitch at that one. Good to know he liked that…

“Say no to me, cariño…” he begged, kissing and nibbling at the skin on her neck. He stepped closer to her and reached under her top to find her breasts. Usually, his touches were gentle but now, he grabbed, groped and pinched like a greedy man who wanted to take everything for himself until there was nothing left of her. Yet he was begging to be stopped.

“Whyyyy,” she whined, fucking herself on his finger, desperate to use any part of his body she could get to make herself feel good.

“I had the worst fucking day,” he said, bending down to whisper into her ear. The gruffness of his voice drove her mad, made her want to get on her knees and beg to be used for his selfish pleasures. “You let me have you now and I’ll fuck you up, baby. I’ll fucking ruin you,” he grunted into her ear and wrapped his hand around her throat. She felt the bulge of his cock through his pants as he rubbed himself against her ass like a desperate animal.

“Ruin me then,” she whimpered, making him tighten around her throat.

“Don’t wanna hurt you.”

“Please Javi, hurt me… Want you to—” ruin me

She didn’t get to complete her sentence. All of a sudden, the man who was begging her to say no to him twirled her around to face him, his hands meeting at the middle of her top and ripping it apart.

“Javi! You fucking animal! Why did you do that?”

“Quit whining,” he growled, grabbing her face in his hand and forcing her to look up at him, at his fiery eyes. She would be able to cook up a smile if not for the iron grip on her cheeks. “I bought it for you and I’ll do whatever I want with it. Just like these,” he paused to grab her tits with the other hand. “—are mine to do with as I like. ¿Eso se entiende?”

“Sí Papi,” she gasped out with the little air she could have.

“Buena chica,” he smiled, letting go of her throat and caressing her cheek. She panted, letting air back into her body after being deprived of it for a little while. Losing air for just a little while was something she enjoyed, but only if he was the one robbing her of her breaths. There was just something so sexy yet comforting about letting the man she trusted play with her breath like that. Something about putting her life in his hands and asking him to play around with it knowing that he would keep her safe.

“Don’t know what I should have first…” he trailed, his eyes roaming her body. He traced the outline of her lips with his thumb as he continued, “This pretty little mouth that knows to put me in my place when we argue but begs to be hurt when we fuck.”

“Or…” he grabbed her between her legs, laughing when she gasped at the humiliating position she was in. “This pretty little pussy that creams at the prospect of pain.”

“Whatever you want, Sir… Please, just use me. Please…” She’d rather him fuck her pussy. It had been too long since they’d been energetic enough to fuck at the end of the day. It had been too long since he made her writhe and cry in his arms as she came down from an orgasm. But she wanted him to have a choice after the rotten day he’d had, didn’t want to deny him anything. If what he wanted was to hold her head in place and fuck her face, she’d let him. It was easy making that choice knowing he’d always repay her with his head between her legs.

“Fuck, baby! Who would’ve thought, huh? Can’t believe I once thought you were just a sweet little thing, a nice respectable professor. Didn’t think I was fucking a shameless fucking whore.”

She attempted a laugh, but all she could do was let out a breath. “Wish I could say the same about you, but you have shameless fucking whore written on your forehead.”

He let out a dry laugh and tucked her hair behind her ear. She closed her eyes as he leaned in, hoping that he would kiss her. Instead, she felt the tip of his nose in between her eyebrows. She heard him breathe her in and moan as though just her scent turned him on. He traced the tip of his nose down her nose, stopping at the tip and nudging playfully.

Bloodstains forgotten, she placed her hands on him, letting herself feel his broad shoulders, strong arms and the little belly she was growing fond of despite his constant complaining about getting old. “Gonna quit this job right-fucking-now, Cariño. Gonna take you back home and fuck you all day and all night. I’ll never leave this cunt, I swear.”

“Oh? And then what?” She asked, curious about what kind of future he fantasized about for them even if it was an unrealistic product of his hard dick.

“Finally knock you up,” he said, his eyes glinting as he pushed his fingers in and out of her cunt. “Todo el mundo debería saber que eres mi esposa. Our families want us to have a wedding, but I think this will be more effective.”

“I don’t know, Papi…” she teased, playing with the buttons of his shirt. It had been a longtime wish of theirs, to settle down and have kids. But his job didn’t have seem to have an end and their plans remained something to fantasise about when they fucked or sat cuddled up on rare Sunday mornings. “I don’t want to lose my figure. Don’t want you to lose interest in me and go back to being a manwhore.”

“It’s alright, Cariño. You’ve had this figure for a while, it might be time for a change. I might just end up loving you swelling up with my baby so much that I decide to keep you pregnant.”

“That’s financially very very—” she gasped silently as he hit a sensitive spot inside her. “It’s ir- irresponsible.”

“That’s okay, we’ll handle it. I’ll keep this fucking job, climb the ladder and make us some money. As long as I get to keep you fucked out and filled with my cum. Breed you, mark you the way men have been marking their women before rings and marriage licenses. Think about that, querida…”

She clenched around him, letting him know immediately that she was imagining this scenario and liked what she saw in her head. She imagined being only his, no responsibilities in life except to please him. Oh to be nothing but his plaything, to be used for him to get off, held down and bred over and over and—

“You thinking about that, hmm?”

She nodded, grabbing the arm that was between her legs and encouraged him to go faster.

“You can’t say much anymore, can you, slut?” He taunted, pushing her hand away from his before continuing his torture. “Fuckin’ love that mouth of yours, Querida. That sharp tongue, too. I think that’s why I dragged you to the embassy and made you my wife.”

She moaned, attempting to cry his name but failing. Whatever sound she made sounded nothing like his name, sounded nothing like a human woman. She loved his mouth too, even though her obsession was with his eyes and his nose. She loved that mouth that could make her cunt cream and her heart melt at the same time.

“But I keep you 'cause I love to shut you up. Love to stick my cock in your mouth, love to fuck you stupid with just my fingers like I’m fucking you now. Only I can fuck you stupid, my smart girl. Only me. All mine, aren’t you?” He asked, taking her lips between his before she could scream that she was indeed all his. He tasted of cigarettes and whiskey, something she couldn’t stand when she was his girlfriend but craved as his wife. It was a taste she’d gotten used to, grown to love. Perhaps because it was so masculine or because she’d identified the taste as something that belonged to her, just like the man himself.

She tightened around him and he noticed, smirking at how he could play her like an instrument. She clung to his shoulders for support as he prepared to yank her world from beneath her feet. When everything was unstable, when she couldn’t trust her own two feet, he was there, holding her up and making her feel so fucking good.

“Javi…” she cried, the kinky names she had for him disappearing as all she could remember in the thrall of her pleasure was his name.

“Sí, mi amor. Estoy aquí. Mi amor, mi corazón, mi vida, mi esposa. Estoy—” he continued whispering his sweet, sweet words. As wonderful as they were to hear, she drifted away from his voice, drifted away from him. The world had turned into nothing and she was suddenly shot up into the sky, but also floating down to the earth like a feather.

His arms wrapped around her and she felt herself be carried before her back hit the soft bed.

“Was that it?” She asked, panting.

“Do you want that to be it? You tired, Querida?”

“No way,” she said, still breathless. “You promised to ruin me. I’m not letting you get off until you keep your promise. I’ll keep you up all night…all fucking night if I have to.”

He hovered over her, his gaze piercing her as he watched her tits rise and fall in her attempt to catch her breath.

“I picked a wanton whore to marry, huh?” He teased, but she was in no mood to listen to his words. She’d let him talk later as much as he wanted but not now.

“Get to work, Peña,” she said, grabbing him by his hair and leading him between her legs.

“Oh, so I’m just Peña now?” He managed to quip before being shoved closer to her cunt. “Yes Ma’am,” he grunted before licking a stripe up her dripping pussy. He pushed her thighs further apart, putting her on display for his eyes. She looked away for a second before turning her focus right back to him, shy about being exposed to him but unable to keep her gaze away from his beauty for too long.

“Taste so good, Cariño,” he said, coming up for a breath. “I could live off of eating you, three meals a day for the rest of my life.”

“Would be a short life then, seeing that there’s no nutritional value to pussy,” she quipped, earning a slap to her pussy. Her legs closed by instinct, but he spread her open again. Before the sting of his slap could fade, he slapped her again.

“Disobedient little cunt,” he spat, slapping her again. She kicked her legs around, but there wasn’t much she could do to escape his grasp as he held her in place with those strong hands of his. She felt like she could be one of the people he chased. He would be so elentless, catch and pin her down, hold her in place with his strong arms and fuck! She whined at the next slap.

He brought his hand down again and her eyes squeezed shut in preparation for the impact. It never came. Instead she felt his thumb circling her clit. She looked down at him and pushed his hair behind to find his eyes. He smiled arrogantly from between her legs, his eyes mischievous and determined to cause her a lot of pain. He provided her a few seconds of mercy as his thumb left her. She noticed her slick on his mustache, whimpering at how much more handsome he looked with her all over his face. He slapped her again and she kicked her legs, almost getting him in the process.

“Please, please Papi! I can’t—” she shrieked as he landed another one.

“You either take what I give you or we stop everything. Do you want to stop everything?” He asked and she shook her head in disagreement immediately. She didn’t want him to stop no matter how hard it got, no matter how torturous his touches became. She wanted the ruination in his arms that he promised. She wanted to be crying, to be numb when he was done using her.

He alternated between touching her clit oh so gently and slapping her when she least expected it, the pleasure and pain merging into one until she craved the pain as much as she did the pleasure. At some point, her legs stopped fighting back, resigned to her torture. Her eyes glazed over and her Javi was but a blurry image. When she came again, she may have said his name. Or not. She wasn’t sure. Her thighs shook under the pleasure and she felt him pull her into his comforting embrace where she relaxed with her eyes closed.

“—can stop if you want to. Don’t worry about me, mi amor.”

“Still not ruined. Ruin me,” she replied, dazed. She wanted to know how far he could go. She needed to feel the full extent of his power over her, to know where the limits of his power were. For her sake, she hoped there were no limits. She hoped to find out she was all his even when he fucked her thoughts out of her head and she was nothing but a pretty body.

“You missed me that much, Cariño? I made you come only twice and you’re already so fucked out?” He peppered little kisses along her jaw before moving to her neck.

“Missed you so much, Javi,” she managed to say when she once again felt stable, as stable as she could be as his puppet.

He had been away too long for her liking, leaving his side of the bed cold and empty. They were by no means the kind of couple that clung to each other, but god she missed him. She missed him between her legs, on her lap as she read to him, at the dinner table appreciating her cooking, in their kitchen washing the dishes… She missed him so much.

“I missed you, too,” he said softly, laying her back down on the bed. She refused to part with him, holding on to his hand and interlacing their fingers to keep him from getting too far away from her. Understanding her need to be close to him, he gave up on separating from her and caressed the back of her hand with his thumb.

“Ready for another round?” He asked, throwing her legs over his shoulders before diving in.

Two orgasms turned to three and three to four and so on. She’d lost count at some point, but he hadn’t lost his enthusiasm. Her body was on fire and he was the only one with the water to put it out. He had to be a cruel man for he did the exact opposite, lighting her on fire over and over and promising to put her out if she’d come for him “just one more time, Cariño”.

She felt a tear trickle down the side of her face, but his hands and mouth continued relentlessly, consuming every bit of her, body and soul. In her state of intoxication, she thought his hands were in too many places at the same time. She laid helplessly, unable to do anything but take what he gave as he forced her to surrender to him over and over and over and—

“Qúe Bonita,” he cooed, wiping the tears off her face as she sobbed. She didn’t even have enough in her to tell him to stop, to have mercy, to free her from his painful pleasures. But even if she could, she didn’t know if she would.

“Want your hole just one more time. Just once, okay? Open up,” he said, tapping her cheek with the back of his hand. She opened her mouth, grateful that he’d spared her pussy at last. She whined as he touched her again, too sensitive even for his now gentle hand. He collected the slick between her legs and smeared her all over his cock.

“Taste yourself on me, Querida. Taste what I can do to you,” he said before pushing the tip in. He placed his hand on her hair, petting her like she was a wild animal he’d tamed. He was getting her wetness all over her hair, but she couldn’t tell if it was something to be annoyed about. She couldn’t tell anything except the blissful pain in her cunt and his cock stretching her out.

He was so tender in feeding her his cock, so attuned to her responses. She didn’t even have to tell him to back away when it got too much for her. He read her so well that he knew just when to give her a breath. He knew her body better than she did, knew how to make it sing and how to make it beg, how to get it to surrender to his control.

“You look so good with my cock in your mouth. Fuck! Feel so good, baby,” he praised, the hand in her hair pushing and pulling her around his cock. Her jaw was beginning to hurt from the recent lack of practice, but she was sure he’d get her back to her prime over the week. The man had an obsession with shutting her up.

“Gonna fuck that smart brain outta that head,” he said, his quickening breaths combining with her moans and the lewd wet sounds of her mouth getting used. “Look at yourself,” he commanded, directing her to look at the mirror attached to their closet door. She caught herself, limp and useless but for her mouth. Her lips were swollen and her eyes were red. Her cheeks glistened under the light from the tears she’d shed. Her hair was all tangled up from his manhandling and her thighs had several marks the shape of his teeth. “Think your students will recognize you like this, Professor Peña? You think they know what a slut their whip smart professor is at home?”

“You think they wonder why you wear three rings? Bet none of them know that the third is just a license for me to use you up.”

She moaned around his cock as he pushed in and out of her throat, making him cry her name at the sensation. She wanted to grab a camera and take a picture of this moment to remember how thoroughly he used her.

“What a perfect fucking mouth!” He exclaimed, wrapping his other hand around her throat to feel how he stretched her out. “‘S like you were measured to fit around me, made to be my perfect little cocksucking whore.”

She clenched her throat tighter around his cock, letting her teeth graze him ever so slightly in the way that drove him nuts. Confident in how he held her up, she moved her hand from the bed and touched his balls, careful to not hurt him with her recently done nails. He twitched in her mouth and hissed at the sensation, making her smile victorious around his cock. He might think he had all the control with the way he was fucking her mouth, but it was always good to remind him that she could wipe his thoughts off his mind with just one touch.

“Gonna be fast now. Can you handle that, baby?”

She nodded, giving him all the permission he needed to forget he was fucking his wife. His thrusts were harder than they usually were, burning her throat. Her scalp stung with how mercilessly he pulled her hair. His other hand found her tits and dug in, leaving his marks on her flesh and making her cry in pain. Her jaw was sore and she knew her throat would be sore when she woke up the next morning.

She was fully out of control, having handed him the reins to her body and mind. She’d never done that with any other man before, just him. It was so easy to trust him, so easy to be content in being used as his toy knowing that he would still keep her safe. He would still respect her as his partner no matter the names he called her to get them off and the bruises he left behind on her body.

He went from coherent screams of her name to strained moans and groans. His grip on her hair slackened but he still kept going, pushing in and out of her mouth. She helped him along with her gentle touches of his balls and her sharp nails digging into the ample flesh of his ass. In no time, he was coating the insides of her throat with his cum. He pulled out too quickly, his cum now spurting out on her tear-stained face. She wished she hadn’t taken her makeup off, she would’ve made an even messier image for him with smudged lipstick and mascara running down her cheeks.

He didn’t seem to mind, looking more than just content with the sight before him. He laid her out on the bed and collapsed on top of her, placing quick kisses on her lips and her cheeks and her forehead. “Mi hermosa,” he whispered, traveling down to her shoulders and placing a kiss on her between each term of endearment. “Mi esposa, mi cielo, mi vida…Where would I be without you?”

“Doctor’s office, probably,” she chuckled. “Getting treated for STIs from sleeping around.”

He laughed and kissed her cheek, unbothered about the mess he made on her face. “Love this fucking mouth,” he smiled, giving her a quick peck.

A smug smile crept upon her lips as she said, “And you love fucking this mouth.”

“That I do, baby. Missed your mouth so much.” He bent down to kiss her lips as though proving just how much he missed it.

“Just my mouth?” She asked innocently, looking at him like a kicked puppy.

“You know it’s not just your mouth. Quit fishing for compliments.”

She slapped his chest playfully and tugged on his ear, making him shriek dramatically. “I shouldn’t have to be fishing, Javier. You should be complimenting me all the time.”

“You’re right, mi amor,” he said, taking the hand that slapped him. He brought it to his lips, kissing each finger and then her palm. He stopped at her ring finger with the three rings— a thick gold band with his name engraved on it, a thin one with a modest diamond, and nestled between them, a thinner silver that she wore to signal that he could use her as he liked. He paid the finger special attention, placing little kisses down to the tip.

He held her hand in the most gentlemanly way as he admired her newly manicured nails. “So lovely…”

“Mhmm? You like the color?” She asked, knowing very well that he did. The few times he got to accompany her to nail appointments, he always chose this shade of sparkly purple.

“You know I do. Did you remember to take money out of my drawer before the appointment?”

The man had something of an obsession with her nails, asking to see them and paint them for her. He took her to the nail salon when he could and insisted on paying. When he couldn’t accompany her, he made sure to slip some cash into her purse to pay for it.

“No, I’m sorry honey. It was a spontaneous thing with Carla.”

He tsked and dropped her hand like a petulant child who didn’t get what he wanted. She laughed and caressed his cheek with her thumb. “Are you really mad at me for this, Javi?”

“You know the rules. I pay for these nails.”

“I’m not going to argue about silly things now. I’m hungry. Go reheat the dinner and fix us a plate,” she said, shoving at his chest.

“You haven’t eaten yet?” He asked, eyebrows furrowed.

She shook her head and said, “I was waiting for you to come home. It’s been a while since we ate together.”

His eyes softened and he swallowed audibly. “I’ve been making you wait a lot, haven’t I?”

They had no expectations of each other, but he placed a lot on himself. He made promises she didn’t ask for and broke his own heart when he couldn’t keep them immediately. She wished he could be as patient with himself as she was with him. Tried as she might, she couldn’t do much to ease his worries. There was only so much a good fuck could do.

“Out of all the things you’re worrying about, our marriage shouldn’t be one. Okay?”

He looked away and nodded, but his eyes told a different story. She gently pushed his chest, getting her off of her so that she could sit up. She cupped his cheek and forced him to look at her. God, he looked so sweet, so vulnerable…

“I understand that things are terrible at work. I can see you’re worried about every goddamn thing. Work isn’t going great for me either. Our department isn’t being funded and my ass is being grilled for every— it doesn’t matter. Our home is all we have. I don’t want you to put a time on dinner and feel guilty about me waiting for you to come home. I don’t want you stressing over me not letting you pay for my nails. It’s a sweet thing you do for me, but it’s not like our marriage will be over without it.”

“Isn’t our marriage made of several small things? We do things for each other… I pay for your nails and you buy my shirts. You cook, I clean. You forgo a proper wedding and I…” he paused to sigh. “We got married at the fucking embassy and I got pulled for a raid and sent you home alone... We still can’t have kids because I’m so tied to work. We haven’t even eaten together in weeks. I’m not doing my part and I’m afraid that one day I’ll come home and you won’t be here.”

He wasn’t one to speak at length about what he felt. She could tell his feelings, see the burdens he carried just by looking into his eyes. But she didn’t know the specifics. She didn’t know he regretted not having a regular wedding. She didn’t know he was scared she would leave.

“I’m not going anywhere. And I never wanted a wedding for the sake of a wedding. You asked to be my husband and now you are. That is what you promised and that is what I wanted. I don’t care how we got there.”

“I left a woman at the altar.” He said, seemingly out of nowhere. His shoulders dropped as soon as he said it as though he’d been holding that information in for years.

“I know.”

“I never told you.”

“Laredo is a small town and your neighbors felt gossipy when I visited. I still don’t see what that has to do with this.” Once upon a time, that bit of information scared her. His ring still on her finger, she was afraid he’d stand her up too. But the woman he was supposed to marry, Lorraine, was quick to explain it away to her. If his ex was willing to clear him, she saw no point in being worried.

“I failed a marriage even before there was a marriage and now I’m failing you.”

Oh, you precious fool.

“You were young and stupid. That has nothing to do with us.”

“Now I’m older and still stupid.”

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to say. If you insist on believing that you’re failing in our marriage just because of some silly little things, there isn’t much I can do to make you see reality. I’m happy with you. I just waited a couple hours to eat with you. I didn’t fucking starve in that short time. We do these things in a marriage, Javi. You can’t take each little thing as a personal failing. You came to the campus to pick me up one evening and I was stuck in a meeting for more than an hour. Imagine if I thought I was a shit wife for that. I need you to let things go and enjoy yourself at least at home. Because all you’re doing right now is being miserable and ruining my great night with your sad little face.”

“Thank you…” he said softly, kissing her hand once again. “And my face is not little,” he mumbled.

“Oh my god!” She exclaimed, picking up her book from the side table and hitting him with it. “Go get me dinner. Pendejo.”

“So disobedient,” he teased.

“Cabrón.”

“Wow.”

“Viejo. Now go get me dinner.”

“Viejo? You’re older, Viejita.”

“By just a few months!” She huffed, crossing her arms over her chest. Realizing he was very much enjoying seeing her push her tits out, he dropped her arms and pulled their blanket up to block his view. “And I still look younger. You look so old people are going to ask if you’re my uncle.”

“Are they now?”

“Yeah. It’s all those worry lines. Idiota.”

“Rude.”

Before she could call him another name, he got up from the bed and walked away. She sat back comfortably and whistled as she got a good view of his bare ass and his broad back. She caught him laughing softly as he walked to their kitchen, his eyes still on her as he heated their dinner. His insecurities weren’t going to go away anytime soon. Her body would only become less prepared for motherhood as time passed. But, she had him and he had her and that was all the safety they needed to go on to the next day.

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