#jayce talis toast

[hryniewiecki]

hi, because I left instagram for good, here's almost all the shitpost I made with Jayce Talis Toast™ that was once in my story highlights keep reading at your own risk

the toast itslef I stole from pinterest and have no idea who the original creator is, but I want to thank them very much for changing my life, because over the course of two years I put it everywhere

translation for the last two pics: the same joke repeated 27 times levels of toast doneness(?) analysis (40 photos) average brightness average color saturation

[writingmysanity]

And more

Prompt: Family

Pairing: Viktor x reader

Word count: 734

A/N: sometimes family are those you've roped into loving you, blood be damned. whoever family is to you, I pray they're good to you, and if they aren't... I will take their kneecaps. <3

Life continues as the seasons change- your once vibrant garden painted brilliant shades of orange, red and purple. Lifeless piles of leaves being swept into the twirl of the wind, dancing around passer-byers as they huddle on, laughing, shoulder to shoulder. Humming happily, you huddle closer to the building walls to avoid the harshest of the wind pressing through the halls, rubbing your hands together trying to create more warmth before shoving them back into your jacket pockets for the remainder of your journey. 

Eyes ticking pass the various doors, you count to yourself, feeling the nerves settle in your system like fire searing through your veins. Your fingers curl into fists in your pockets as you can't help the smile that crosses your face as you settle before the deep burgundy door. A carbon copy of every other door lining the halls, lined with ivory trimmings, golden embossed numbers glossing off of the darkened surface.

298.

Taking a deep breath, you knock gently, wincing at how the hollow sound seems to echo back to you much more harshly with the sweep of the wind. There are only moments before the door creaks open, hazel eyes peering out at you before it swings open wide, Jayce’s infectious smile stretching your own as he pulls you in for a hug, very nearly lifting you from your feet.

“You made it,” he sings as he sets you down, tugging you in further. Laughing at his enthusiasm, you nod, shrugging off your jacket once you're met with the almost sweltering heat inside the apartment. 

“I had a choice?” you tease, earning a playful gasp as tries his best to act offended before melting into a fit of giggles, slinging his arm around your shoulders. 

“You’re right,” he grins, snickering a bit, lightly nudging you towards the hextech’s other half. “Viktor would have been miserable without you.” Rolling your eyes at him, you allow the stumble towards the quieter man, offering a smile and a small wave. He looks uncomfortable for a moment, you assume due to Jayce’s comment before he softens at your smile. 

“You’re late,” he chastises gently, motioning to the seat beside him. Fighting to keep your smile from growing, you plop down somewhat unceremoniously next to him, eyes sparkling in the low fairylights you are certain Mel strung up for ambiance. 

“Afraid I left you to fend for yourself with Talis?” he nods slowly, trying to remain the stoic, emotionally void man he shows the world, but you see the mischief dancing in his eyes.

“I was,” Jayce balks not far from you both where he is huddled up with Mel.

“I am a delight to have around,” his tone is enough to make you both break into a fit of laughter of your own. “I swear, I don't know why I try with you two.” he pouts. Mel is hiding her smile expertly behind her glass as she takes another sip. Giggles fade as you melt into conversation- shop talk cut off with pointed looks from you and Mel, reminding them gently that this is time away from work.

“Family time,” Jayce offers, looking rather fond. Despite your knowledge of how Viktor feels about Mel, you can't help the warmth that settles in your chest as you look at them all, a content smile crinkling your eyes when your eyes land on Viktor to find his eyes already glued to you. “To Family,” Jayce calls again. You aren't looking at him, but you're sure he's lifting his drink in a makeshift toast- already more than a few deep himself so he stumbles sloppily, Mel pressing deeper into his side with a shake of her head, mimicking his sentiment.

“To family,” she offers, softening when her eyes settle over you and viktor. “Not the family we were born with, but the family we've made.” You can't help the flush that colors the tips of your ears when Viktor’s fingers trace gingerly over the inside of your wrist, bronzed eyes flickering from your hand back up to yours as he traces his finger tips down the palm of your hand and over your fingers, a devilish crooked smirk wrinkling his nose a bit. 

“And more,” he whispers, a breath of hope lingering between you both leaving you breathless as you nod. His smile only grows when you whisper back, voice airy, barely there. “And more.”

____

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[lobster-tales]

Beat the Daylight

Sequel to Face the Noise, an Arcane Rock Band AU

Rating: M

Chapter 13: The Pub Part 3

Summary: Progress Day celebrates their victory in The Lanes || Lux and Jinx have their own celebration in Zaun

CW: Alcohol

This work is available here on AO3. Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12

True to his word, Vander had shooed away his regular clientele, hanging the rarely if ever used ‘Private Party’ sign on the wooden front door. The tables and chairs were stacked neatly, except for a few by the bar where their growing family could all fit. The TVs were off, though apparently the entire pub had been watching the contest rounds: when Progress Day won, they had all cheered and stomped their feet, making such a noise that Vander was afraid they’d break something.

Vi, Caitlyn, and Ekko were the first to arrive. Vander embraced them all, leaving Vi for last and holding her the longest. “I’m so proud of you,” he rumbled. “So proud.”

“Thanks, Dad.” When Vi pulled back, her eyes were damp.

“Where’s the rest of the band?” Vander asked. “I was looking forward to congratulating your lead guitarist. Quite the pipes on her.”

Vi exchanged glances with Caitlyn. “She uh… had something else to do tonight.”

Caitlyn added, “We’ll be sure to pass along your praise though.”

“And Jayce is on his way,” Ekko said, reading his phone messages. “I um… I also invited Zeri?” He gave Vander a hopeful look. “Is that okay?”

“Zeri? Ohh, from the opening band. Sure, I don’t see why not.”

They heard clanging sounds from the kitchen. Benzo, Vander explained, doing the dishes. Then he poured everyone a drink while they waited, asking questions about their band practices and methods.

The door opened, and in walked Senator Mel Medarda, with Jayce in tow.

As soon as they entered, Benzo’s voice resounded off the walls. “There she is!”

Ekko winced at the sound. “Dad, don’t-”

But he was powerless to stop Benzo as he barrelled towards Mel, sweeping her into an enormous hug.

The rest of the room held their breath as the senator was swung around. They were all shocked that Benzo would do such a thing, but even more shocked when Mel laughed. A real, genuine laugh, the way a child laughs when greeted by an overenthusiastic relative.

“Let go!” she giggled. “Set me down, you great thing.”

Caitlyn could tell from the polite wince on Mel’s face that Benzo already reeked of alcohol. He kept a large hand on her shoulders. “Come, let’s get you a drink.”

“Senator Mel Medarda.” Vander’s words were more of a muse than a greeting. “In the flesh. What can I get for you?”

“Ah, this must be the great Vander,” Mel said, ignoring his question. “I’ve heard much about you.”

“All bad, I hope.” He eyed her as she approached the bar. “Let me see… I know.” He moved to retrieve it. Though Vander was an extremely talented musician, his greatest skill was the ability to identify anyone’s favorite kind of drink just by looking at them. Tonight seemed to be no exception when he pulled out a mid-tier bottle of gin, holding it up to display for her.

Mel grinned. “Well done.”

He started pouring a drink for her, adding tonic water. “Welcome to The Last Drop, Senator.”

“Thank you.” She accepted the glass gracefully and toasted him. “And congratulations on the success of your daughters.” The air stilled. Mel immediately recognized her misstep, and said, “Th-that is-”

“It’s alright.” Vander raised his own glass. “Thank you. I’m very proud of them both.”

Clink. Ekko took a seat beside Mel at the bar. “Did you watch us?” he asked, eager.

“Of course, I always watch.” She put an affectionate hand on his shoulder. “Congratulations, Boy Savior.”

Jayce went to sit in the seat beside Mel, but Benzo beat him to it. He lingered at the edge of the group, and Caitlyn joined him there.

“Good job, Talis,” Caitlyn said wryly. “Didn’t think you could pull it off.”

He smiled and shook his head at her pestering. “Please, it was easy. I could drum in my sleep.”

“Well, maybe you should. You might be better at it.”

“Hey!” he laughed, jabbing her with an elbow.

The door opened again, and this time, Zeri entered. Her oversized coat nearly swallowed her, her sharp eyes darting around the room. Ekko contained his excitement, but barely, as he swaggered up to her, hands in his pockets, and gave a casual, “Sup. Glad you could make it.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Zeri said with a smirk.

Ekko breezed through introductions: Caitlyn and Jayce just gave a simple greeting and wave as Ekko nearly dragged her to the bar to meet the rest of the group. Soon, they were all lost in conversation, swapping band stories, while Caitlyn and Jayce chose to remain on the outside.

“I um,” Caitlyn wasn’t sure where to start. She hadn’t checked in with him for so long. “I meant to ask, how are you doing?”

His expression turned quizzical. “Uh… fine?”

She could tell, though, up close. She knew him for far too long to not know when he was putting on airs. But it hurt to see how good he was at it now, how long he’d been wearing that mask. And the fact that he would try wearing it around her. Of course, she didn’t want him to dissolve into tears tonight, not when he was supposed to be celebrating.

“We should catch up,” Caitlyn said, though it was more of a command than a suggestion. “Get coffee.”

“Sure.” Ekko passed Jayce’s drink to him from the bar: an old fashioned, per usual. Jayce sipped at it, smiling to himself. “You know, I’ve been to a couple different bars in Piltover. Viktor even took me to one or two on the outskirts of Zaun. But Vander’s old fashioneds are the best ones by far.”

Caitlyn was more of a wine drinker herself, but she understood the sentiment. At hearing Viktor’s name, she cocked an eyebrow. “Have you… spoken to him? Viktor?”

Jayce’s broad shoulders drooped, just ever so slightly. “Not really. I send him funny pictures sometimes, but he doesn’t really respond. Not that he ever responded before, but…” He lowered his voice. “You’ve spoken to him, right? For the investigation?”

The rest of the family was too engrossed in storytelling to overhear, so Caitlyn felt comfortable enough to say, “Yes. There’s been a few roadblocks, though. The band takes up a lot of his time.”

“Is he… okay? Like, is he happy?”

The mask had slipped, if not fallen off entirely. He was like a puppy with those big, brown eyes. Caitlyn felt a twinge of guilt on Mel’s behalf: she knew firsthand how emotional Jayce could be during a break up. Especially since she had been there for every other one.

She answered, “He is. He asked about you.” Technically, that was true, even if Viktor only ever asked once. Of course, he was much more offhand, and only offered a cool “Hmm. Good.” when Caitlyn told him. Though she had never been able to guess Viktor’s inner feelings. Jayce’s externality was so much easier to analyze.

He nodded, reassured, though the sadness was still there. Caitlyn decided that when they got coffee, she would walk him to the playground, let him open up there. But for now…

“Buck up, Talis,” she said with a wink. “You’re having fun tonight, whether you like it or not. Come on.” Caitlyn led him to the rest of the group, where Benzo was pointing at Vander.

“You know,” said Benzo. “Vander’s the one who taught them all.”

“That’s right,” Mel said. “I’ve heard you’re quite the musician, Vander.”

Zeri asked, “Really? Will you play for us?”

Vi and Ekko both gasped, then started pleading. “Yeah!”

He took some serious convincing, but eventually gave in. They relocated the party to the basement, where Vander removed his bass from storage. Jayce and Ekko made quick work of setting up Benzo’s drum set and the keyboard, piecing everything together while Vi tuned the electric guitar. Zeri, Mel, and Caitlyn took their seats at a nearby table, Jayce joining them once the band was ready.

Vander and Benzo definitely needed a few songs to warm up, but once they started going, they couldn’t stop. Vander’s voice was slightly hoarse from age, but he still hit all the high notes. They played classic rock, songs that most if not all of them knew.

Every now and then, Benzo would hand off the sticks to Jayce, or Vi and Vander would switch instruments. Even Zeri sang a few songs, hopped behind the keys with Ekko. They asked Caitlyn and Mel over and over again to sing on the mic, but neither wanted to, both self aware and secure enough to recognize their lack of skill.

Between songs, Vi sipped from her whiskey neat. Which is how she ended up much drunker than the rest of them, and eventually staggered to the mic and said, a little too loudly, “I wanna sing one!”

Vander nodded to Ekko, who got her a glass of water. “Which one, Vi?”

She drank deeply, then whispered it to the rest of the band. They exchanged sly grins as Vi returned to the mic, her attention directed at Caitlyn. “This song… is for my girl.”

The rest of the table giggled at the dramatics of it. Zeri was sitting in her chair backwards, straddling the seat. Jayce and Mel began the night sitting apart, but had slowly gravitated closer together. Now, Mel’s legs were resting across his lap, his hand on her thigh.

Vi shouted into the mic, “1, 2, 3, 4!”

Can't count the years on one hand That we've been together

Caitlyn, amused, called out over the noise, “You very much can.”

Vi kept going. Throughout the verse, she started sauntering towards Caitlyn.

I need the other one to hold you Make you feel, make you feel better It's not a walk in the park To love each other But when our fingers interlock Can't deny, can't deny you're worth it

Now Vi was standing right in front of her. She placed her fingers delicately under Caitlyn’s chin, voice sweet.

'Cause after all this time, I'm still into you

Caitlyn leaned up to kiss her, but Vi pulled away at the last second, smirking. She sang the chorus, jumping in time to the beat as Ekko sang backup vocals.

I should be over all the butterflies But I'm into you And baby even on our worst nights I'm into you Let 'em wonder how we got this far 'Cause I don't really need to wonder at all Yeah, after all this time, I'm still into you

When they finished the second chorus, Vi got close to Caitlyn again, swaying forward with each line of the bridge.

Well, some things just, some things just make sense And one of those is you and I Well, some things just, some things just make sense And even after all this time

Vi straddled her on the chair, pressing their foreheads together.

I'm into you Baby, not a day goes by

Her volume started raising, and Caitlyn’s grin morphed into a wince as Vi sang passionately to her face,

That I'm not into you

On the last chorus, Vi leapt on top of the table, dancing as she finished out the song. Her thick boots scraped against the wood. Mel and Jayce leaned back, nervous, but Zeri whooped and cheered her on, pulling out her wallet and tossing crumpled dollar bills on the table. Benzo and Ekko laughed, but Vander was clearly concerned. As the last notes faded out, Caitlyn stood and held out her hand to guide Vi to the floor.

But instead, Vi threw her arms around Caitlyn and practically fell on top of her, kissing her as she did so. Caitlyn barely kept her balance, laughing against Vi’s mouth. She tasted of salt and whisky, her face slick with sweat. And Caitlyn wouldn’t have her any other way.

“Alright then,” Vander called, and they broke apart. “Vi, I think you should sit this next one out.”

And she did, with the caveat that Caitlyn sit on her lap. While Vi sobered up, the rest of them kept drinking, and eventually, Vander announced the last song. “Gotta get this old man to bed,” he added, nodding at Benzo.

“Who you calling old man?” Benzo slurred, pretending to throw a drumstick at Vander.

Zeri grabbed Mel and Caitlyn, insisting they sing the last one together despite their protests.

“Really, Zeri,” Mel said. “I’m quite tone deaf, I assure you.”

“I don’t care!” Zeri sang the words. “We’re all singing.” She whispered the song title to Vander, who grinned. He plucked out the opening notes, practicing a few times before he nodded at Benzo.

As soon as Vander played the opening hook, they all leapt to their feet, crowding around the microphone.

Coming out of my cage And I've been doing just fine Gotta gotta be down Because I want it all It started out with a kiss How did it end up like this? It was only a kiss, it was only a kiss

Mel was, in fact, tone deaf, Caitlyn had her usual tinniness, and Jayce was less than impressive, but their voices were joined in by the others. Ekko harmonized as Vi and Zeri took the lead, and as the chorus began, they all began to jump and dance in time with the music.

Jealousy, turning saints into the sea Swimming through sick lullabies Choking on your alibis But it's just the price I pay Destiny is calling me Open up my eager eyes 'Cause I'm Mr. Brightside

Soon, the microphone was abandoned, all of them spreading around the makeshift stage as they sang the next verse and chorus. Jayce twirled Mel around to the beat, Vi’s hands locked on Caitlyn’s waist. Even Zeri and Ekko held hands as they danced together. And when the bridge came, they all screamed out the final words to the song.

I never I never I never! I never!

As the song faded out, Vi put her hands under Caitlyn’s thighs and lifted her up. Caitlyn wrapped her legs around her waist and kissed her again. The way she kissed her their first time, here in this very basement. Everything else faded out, the cheers of the group, their embraces. All that existed was Vi, her silver eyes, warmer than Caitlyn had seen them in years.

As she was lowered to the floor, Caitlyn took a moment to step back, really take it all in. They were all so happy. Wonderfully, deliriously happy.

She wished the entire band was here. She hoped that Ezreal and Lux were at least okay, regardless of how the evening played out. And maybe it was her talks with Viktor, maybe it was her proximity to this family.

But she really, truly hoped that Jinx was happy.

                                                         ☆ ☆ ☆                                                  

That poor chauffeur. But after the first three clubs, Jinx was starting to get too tipsy to feel bad. At least Silco would pay him well, especially for taking care of his star by driving her around for hours. Or maybe Jinx would push it to days. Maybe the night would never end, and Lux would belong to her forever.

And what a belonging she was. What a bright, beautiful creature to have on her arm. Jinx never used to socialize at the clubs, much less with other celebrities, but she couldn’t resist showing her off. And Lux acclimated well: extremely well. She connected with everyone, asked questions, told stories. And just when people were getting too close to her, just when they began to show a real, intentioned interest, Jinx pulled her away. And Lux let her, gladly. Because Lux was hers tonight.

Jinx kept a hand on her at all times. Her waist, her hand, her shoulder. She claimed every inch that she could, fingers trailing down the shimmery fabric. On Jinx, the dress came down to just above her knee, and had always been too bright and attention-grabbing for her taste. But on Lux, the dress stopped neatly on her upper thigh, barely concealing everything. She did wear a pair of Jinx’s boy shorts underneath, though, since it made her more comfortable. Completed by the white fishnets that laced themselves up Lux’s long legs, the entire outfit made Jinx’s mouth water.

She kept herself under control, though. At each club, she spaced it out: take a shot, socialize, get a drink, dance. The dancing was the best part. And that’s when Jinx would almost lose control.

Jinx had always been graceful, her body moving like water. At first, Lux was stiff, awkward on the dancefloor. After a few drinks, after a few sloppy makeout sessions in the alley, she started figuring it out. She even studied the other dancers, copied the girls who pressed their asses against their partner’s hips.

And that’s what really drove Jinx wild. That’s what caused Jinx to drag her to the bathroom, to shove her up against the wall of the stall, not even bothering to lock the door as she kissed her roughly.

Lux matched her energy, tugging at Jinx’s own dress, pulling off her pinstripe blazer.

Jinx’s hands were everywhere: her back, her arms, her hips, her thighs. Her lips seized the skin around Lux’s neck, sucking each sensitive spot and leaving a mark. She palmed Lux’s chest, and Lux gasped softly. Her fingers went beneath the pad of her strapless bra, pressing against and around her nipples.

Out of the corner of her eye, Jinx saw the stall door slowly swing open towards them. She didn’t let up, just kept kissing Lux while her boot slammed against the plastic, holding it shut. She thought she saw a sparkly gasp and a flash of pink hair, but maybe she imagined it.

Lux started at the sound, and it seemed to rattle her back to reality. “W-wait, Jinx-”

Jinx didn’t want to stop. She knew she had to, but allowed herself one more smatter of small kisses before she pulled back, panting. “What?”

“We-we shouldn’t do this.”

A chill ran down Jinx’s spine. No, no. Was she having second thoughts? “We shouldn’t… do what?”

“Oh, I mean, we can do this,” Lux said, realizing how it may have sounded. “Trust me, I definitely want to do this, I just don’t want to do this… here.” She nodded towards the toilet, the names and swear words scrawled on the walls.

Yeah, it was definitely a less than sexy location. “Hotel?” she asked in a breath.

Lux nodded, stealing another kiss before they left.

They managed to control themselves in the car, though Jinx sat as close as possible, hand on her thigh.

When they entered Jinx’s bedroom, Lux shook out her hair, stretching. “Man, that was fun. I’ve never gone out dancing before. Such good exercise.” She surveyed the room, the wide windows overlooking Zaun, the large bed, the light spilling from the bathroom. The hotel’s housekeepers had been surprised at Jinx’s growing level of cleanliness over the last few weeks, compared to her usual mess. Nowadays, they actually dared to step foot in the room and tidy up, which Jinx had never been so grateful for. “Can I use your shower?” Lux asked. “I’m stinky.”

Jinx came up behind her and pressed her lips to a newly bloomed hickey on Lux’s shoulder. “What if I like the way you stink?”

“You know, you could join me.”

Jinx hadn’t bathed with anyone since she was a child. The idea seemed… vulnerable. Really fucking vulnerable. Way more vulnerable than just sex. At least if they were intertwined, Jinx could hide the ugly parts of her body, the parts she didn’t want her to see.

But as soon as Lux saw the big tub in Jinx’s bathroom, her mind was set on it. “Okay, nevermind. We’re taking a bath.”

Oh. This was worse. So much worse.

Lux undressed, grinning at Jinx as she slowly pulled the dress over her shoulders. She was still a little drunk: not sloppy, just tipsy. Jinx admired the clean lines of Lux’s back. She was so used to seeing tattoos.

“Come on,” Lux said, kicking off her heels. She took Jinx’s arm and guided her to the tub. “How do you turn it on?”

They figured it out together, and soon the water rose and steam filled the room. Jinx’s fingers toyed unsurely with her own clothes. Why was she so nervous?

Lux noticed her hesitation: she still wore her own undergarments, having just removed the white fishnets. “Do you want help?”

Jinx’s instinct was to bite, protect herself. “I don’t need help.”

But Lux was unfazed, just went to her, ran her hands down Jinx’s dress. “Mmm I think you do. Here.” She gently lifted the fabric, distracting Jinx with a kiss as she did so. She was careful to work around Jinx’s braids as she removed the dress, letting it pool on the floor. Then Lux focused on Jinx’s black fishnets, rolling the tights down her thighs. She trailed kisses down her skin as more of it was revealed. Soon, she was kneeling at Jinx’s feet, freeing them one at a time from the nylon.

Lux paused there, on her knees, as she came face to face with Jinx’s underwear. A blush spread across her cheeks, and Jinx thought it may have been because her boy shorts were covered in raccoons and had the words ‘trash panda’ all over them: she probably should have changed beforehand.

But Lux stood, slowly, and muttered, “S-sorry, I’ve never… Not with a… girl.”

Oh. Ohhhhh. “So that’s why you want to take a bath,” Jinx chuckled, entwining her fingers in Lux’s silky hair. “Wanna familiarize yourself with the territory first.”

Lux grinned shyly. “Yeah, survey the landscape.”

“Gotcha.” They kissed again, and this time, Jinx’s hands went to Lux’s bra. She unhooked it without looking, letting it fall to the floor. Lux shivered against the air, but Jinx covered her with warm hands. Her panties were soon to follow, and then Lux was naked. Fully naked. In Jinx’s bathroom.

Life was fucking amazing.

Jinx was so distracted by the sight of Lux’s body that she didn’t even realize she was also naked until the trash panda shorts flew across the room. Their hands wandered over each other’s bodies, exploring, until Lux murmured, “I think the bath is ready.”

As they submerged, facing each other, Jinx wondered why she had never thought to use the tub before. Showers just seemed more convenient. Not to mention dealing with her braids. Which were now drifting in the water. And now one was in Lux’s hands, and she was undoing it.

Knowing how monumental of a task it was, Jinx helped by undoing the other braid. Soon, her loose blue hair floated around them. Lux said, “Damn. You got a lot of hair.”

“Yeah.”

“Like, a LOT of hair.”

Jinx chuckled, “Yeah.”

They exchanged a few more kisses, hands searching for each other under the water. Lux pulled away and reached for a bar of soap and a loofah. “Here, turn around.”

Jinx obeyed. She managed to get most of her hair over one shoulder so Lux had room to scrub. The suds felt sinfully good against her skin. Lux said, “I love your tattoos.”

“Thanks.”

“Why clouds?”

To be honest, Jinx had never really thought about it before. Something about explosions, maybe. But she didn’t have a solid explanation, so she just shrugged. “You ever thought about getting tattoos, Starlight?”

“Mmm maybe. My mom hates the idea though.”

“What would you get? If you want them.”

The loofah disappeared as Lux considered. “Maybe stars. Or music notes. Or animals.”

“You could match your guitar.”

Lux giggled. “I could.” Then her hands were on Jinx’s shoulders, gentle but firm. Lux’s fingertips were calloused from years of guitar playing. Her thumbs pressed against the knot of muscle at the base of Jinx’s neck. They both gasped: Jinx in a pained pleasure, and Lux in surprise. “You’re so tense, Jinx.”

“I got a lot on my- ah. Mind.”

“Yeah… Can I ask you something?” She kept massaging Jinx’s shoulders as she spoke. It felt so good: Jinx wasn’t in a state to deny her anything.

“Sure.”

“What happened to your head?”

Fuck. In all the rapture, Jinx completely forgot about the wound on her temple. She was surprised Lux didn’t ask earlier: maybe she didn’t want to embarrass her. Maybe she was waiting for the right moment, when Jinx was totally and completely at her mercy. Like she was now.

When Jinx didn’t answer right away, Lux followed up with, “I-I mean, you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I didn’t remember you having it at the show.”

Jinx sighed. And she told her the entire story, how Finn lashed out, attacked both her and Viktor.

“He attacked you?” Lux asked, incredulous. “That’s awful. Are you going to press charges?” Jinx’s laugh echoed off the tile floor. It was enough of an answer for Lux, who then moved her hands from Jinx’s shoulders to her neck. “Are you okay?”

It was such an all encompassing question. There was no right answer. But Jinx reached back and kissed Lux’s knuckles, murmuring, “I’m better now.”

Lux’s fingers disappeared briefly, and when they came back, they were cold with shampoo. She massaged the soap into Jinx’s scalp. The sensation was heavenly.

They didn’t speak for a long moment, Jinx too lost in the pleasure to say anything coherent. No one had ever touched her like this, never put this amount of tenderness into her.

There were always thoughts skittering around Jinx’s mind. Even in her moments of greatest peace, they were still there, whispering. But now, her mind was empty. There was no more room for thought, only for feeling. And she felt incredible.

When Lux finished with the conditioner, she pulled back, lowering Jinx’s head back into her lap to wash out the product. Jinx gazed up at her from the water’s surface: she couldn’t stop smiling. She heard the gurgle of water, and realized Lux had unplugged the drain. “I didn’t take care of you, though,” Jinx protested.

“That’s alright,” Lux said, kissing her on the forehead. “You’ll get me next time.”

But Lux wasn’t done. She and Jinx toweled off, threw on matching black robes (provided by the hotel: both had a gold, embroidered eye on the back), then Lux sat her down at the tall, rarely used vanity, and combed out Jinx’s hair. Silco had specially ordered a chair tall enough so that Jinx’s braids were just above the floor, though she realized her hair must have grown since then, because now her locks rested solidly on the ground.

The combing was its own euphoria. Jinx had always just torn through her hair, not patient enough to deal with it. That was part of the appeal of braids: they were easy, and manageable. But Lux worked through every knot, every tangle.

When it was clear her hair was going to be a much larger and longer task, Lux started to sing. Softly, barely above a whisper.

Close your eyes and sleep Ignore all the burdens that you keep Come whatever may They could never harm you anyway

She vocalized in between the verses. The song was haunting and beautiful, the bathroom acoustics elevating the sound. Jinx closed her eyes, pretended she was a sailor and Lux was the siren pulling her in.

Waking from the dream Witnessing the smoke that's rolling in The end is what you fear The scent of embers lingers in the air

Lux finished with one braid, kissing Jinx’s non-wounded temple as she moved to start the next.

It's like a web There is no escape from It’s got you trapped And you long for freedom Every wish, every dream was granted Never knowing what they demanded

Lux stopped singing. Jinx sent her a questioning glance.

“S-sorry,” Lux said, sheepish. “I… forgot how intense that song gets.”

“I like it.”

Encouraged, Lux began to sing again. As the song came to a close, she finished the other braid.

Take your time but not too long Make it worth the time you own You woke a fire inside of me Fanned the flame and made it breathe You woke a fire inside of me Inside of me Inside of me...

Jinx stood and embraced Lux, holding her probably a little too tight. She wanted to thank her, truly and properly thank her for the amount of care she had shown her. Jinx had never felt so clean, so safe, so warm in her entire life. But words would fail. She could go on for hours and never fully express her gratitude.

So instead, she took Lux’s hands, kissing her calloused fingers. She felt a little guilty for roughing her up in the bathroom stall, now, especially after Lux had been so delicate and measured with her. “You know, we don’t… have to go all the way tonight.”

“No, I want to.” Lux rested her arms on Jinx’s shoulders, pressing the tips of their noses together. “I- I don’t know if we’ll get another one, so we should make it count.”

The words stung, even if they were true. Tomorrow was the last thing on Jinx’s mind, and she wanted it to stay that way. So she guided Lux to the massive bed, laying her down among the pillows, which now seemed like a ridiculous amount. To be fair, Jinx had rarely, if ever shared it with anyone.

In fact, the only affairs she had were quick, sloppy, usually fueled by a high. Jinx figured out quickly that those who ended up in her bed didn’t want to stay there. Mostly because she was a celebrity, and they just wanted the clout. Though, she did wonder if the myriad of bruises and bites she left all over them had something to do with it.

But with Lux, this wasn’t about that immediate satisfaction. They weren’t just having sex, they were… making love. Any other time, with any other person, Jinx would have been disgusted with the idea. But there was no other way to describe it.

She was gentle with Lux, since this was her first time. Sure, she sank in her teeth every now and then, unable to totally resist. But her fingers were light, working at her center. Lux let out the most delicious moans, at first shy about being heard, but forgetting all about it when she came the first time.

Lux trembled beneath Jinx’s touch, arching her back as she rode it out. There was not a drug on earth that was so immediately addicting to Jinx, as making Lux orgasm. And she hit that high again and again and again. Whether it was her hands or tongue that broke Lux open over and over, Jinx’s eyes were always glued to her face. The twist of her expression, the flush in her cheeks, her hands and legs shaking.

When Lux recovered each time, she would push against Jinx’s shoulders, insisting it was her turn to please her, but Jinx just held her down. She would hiss into Lux’s ear, fingernails scraping against Lux’s pinned wrists. “You’re mine tonight, Starlight. And I am going to make you cum as many times as I want.”

On orgasm…8? 9? Whatever. On one of her orgasms, Jinx was more intense, fingers working at a faster pace, teeth locked on Lux’s neck so that Lux’s gasps had a direct line into Jinx’s eager ear. Lux’s composure had been unwinding more and more with each climax, her words losing coherency and decency. The sounds that escaped from her now were a string of expletives.

“F-fuck, that feels- Ah! Damn, that feels so fucking good, Powder-”

Jinx jerked back, as if she had just been electrocuted. Lux, still breathless with pleasure, sat upright, horrified at herself. “Oh my god. Oh my god, I-I’m so sorry, Jinx, it was an accident, it just slipped out, I didn’t mean-”

She kept just saying words while Jinx processed it. She wasn’t… offended, just surprised. Sometimes, she forgot that Lux knew about that part of her life.

“It’s okay,” Jinx said, interrupting Lux’s strung out apology. “Really.” She crawled on top of her, trailing kisses down her neck. “It’s okay,” she murmured again, regaining her momentum.

This time when Lux wanted to switch, Jinx let her. If Lux hadn’t told her she had never been with a girl before, Jinx would never have believed it. Lux had her writhing with need in mere seconds, applying just the right amount of pressure. She liked dragging it out, delaying Jinx’s pleasure, seeing just how much begging she could elicit. Lux’s hands and tongue were precise and intentional. Jinx was a whimpering mess by the time she came.

After a few more rounds, the day's events began to wear on the two, and they ended up cuddling, entwined beneath the covers. Lux rested her head on Jinx’s shoulder, fingers tracing the cloud tattoos.

“Do you…” Jinx asked. “Do you want to call me that?”

“What?”

“Powder.”

Lux pulled back, trying to read her face. “Um… am I allowed to?”

Jinx shrugged. “Sure. As long as it’s just us, though.”

“... Okay.” Lux grinned, brushing her lips over Jinx’s skin. “Powder. Powder. I like that name more. Not-not that there’s anything wrong with ‘Jinx’, I mean that’s definitely a better stage name. But Powder is more normal, more… Well, not that ‘normal’ is better-”

She giggled: how could she not? “You’re good, Starlight, I know what you mean.”

A few moments passed. Jinx wondered what time it was. She couldn’t see daylight yet: maybe 4 AM? 5?

“Powder?” Lux asked. “Do you think… you’d ever go home?”

That was the million dollar question. Jinx answered as truthfully as she could. “I don’t know.”

“... They really miss you. And I’m not saying that to make you feel guilty or anything, because, you know, you’re an adult and your choices are valid and all that. But they miss you. I can tell they miss you, because when they talk about you… Well, obviously they didn’t talk about you until after I found out. And it took a while, but eventually Vi and Ekko opened up more.

“And then on girl’s night, when they were both pretty drunk, they told us all kinds of stories. Stories about growing up together, how you and Vi used to pretend you were monsters when you were really little. Ekko told us about all the graffiti you guys would do around town, though Caitlyn covered her ears during that part because she didn’t want to be an accomplice,” Lux giggled before continuing. “And they talked about the band you had, The Firelights. I actually listened to some of your songs the next day. I knew you were a drummer, but I didn’t realize how good you were.”

Jinx scoffed out a chuckle. “Way better than Talis.”

“Way better,” Lux agreed. And then she stopped. The room sounded so empty without the hum of her voice. “Why… Why haven’t you gone home?”

She knew the answer to that one. “Just like you said: they miss me. Except, they don’t miss ‘me’, they miss Powder. They want Powder back, just the way she was. But I’ve changed, Lux. I changed a lot. And if Jinx came home instead of Powder… I don’t know. I don’t know how they’d take it.”

Outside the window, Zaun’s neon lights thrummed. They could hear cars going by every now and then, the distant pulse of music.

Lux finally murmured, “I think… I’m gonna sleep.”

“Me too.” They snuggled in closer together. “Goodnight, Lux.”

Even as she said the words, she drifted off. “Goodnight… Powder…”

Lux was out. She was soon to follow.

And Powder slept.

[nonbinary-kaz]

mel and viktor are morosexual

[bexbaxx]

Viktor x Reader: Pride & Prejudice (2)

(Finally here's the next chapter! The previous one can be found here. Hope you enjoy!)

You and Mel enjoyed a hearty breakfast the next morning, various dishes and juices laid out on the table for your pleasure. The previous night's events had ended slowly, with most of the guests taking their leave in the later hours of the night.

You had felt a strong sense of relief when it was time to leave, for while Mel had ultimately enjoyed her night and the company of one Mr. Talis, you were eager to put some distance between yourself and his friend, Viktor.

The man had definitely wounded your ego with his comment, and his overall behaviour throughout the night brought a scowl to your face as you took another bite of toast.

You assumed Viktor was from an insanely wealthy family, possibly more-so than Mr. Talis himself, considering his disinterest in the entire event, though you hadn't asked anyone about it.

No, you thought, asking about it would indicate a level of interest you certainly didn't possess.

"He's exactly what a young man should be." Mel started absentmindedly, playing with some of the food on her plate. "Sensible, good humored..."

You quickly interrupted her with a knowing smile. "Handsome, conveniently rich."

Mel laughed and turned to you, her face looking slightly warm. "You know perfectly well I don't believe marriage should be driven by a lot of money."

You grin widened, and you reached for your glass of juice. "I agree entirely! Only the deepest love would persuade me to marry, which is why I'll end up an old maid."

It was quiet for a moment as you continued eating. Though you hadn't drunk much last night, you felt an emptiness in your stomach and a tension in your head.

Mel spoke again, this time more quietly. "Do you really think he liked me?"

You scoffed, almost spilling the glass in your hand. "Mel, he danced with you most of the night, and stared at you for the rest of it."

Though your friend attempted to hide it, you caught a small smile spread across her face. You were a bit surprised by her infatuation with the man, for you had never known your friend to be so taken with another before.

Though, you supposed Jayce Talis was quite unlike most other Piltover highborn. He seemed quite grounded in the conversations you had shared last night.

"I still can't believe what Viktor said about you."

Viktor, however, was still an enigma you had yet to unravel, more specifically you wondered how exactly a man such as him had befriended Mr. Talis in the first place.

You thought for a moment, before replying. "It doesn't matter. I doubt we will ever speak again."

The conversation was cut short by one of the household servants approaching the table, a scroll in their grasp. They promptly stopped beside Mel, gesturing for her to take it, which she did so hesitantly.

She briefly looked at you before she undid the seal, and for a moment she silently read the contents of the scroll. You paid it no mind until a sudden gasp made you drop your spoon.

"I've been asked to dine with the Talis' tonight!"

Now, later in the evening, you found the rest of your day had been reasonably quiet. After you and Mel had, at great lengths, discussed how she would approach dinner at the Talis household, she left promptly after for her office.

Very rarely did she have any days off, and it seemed that recently the work of a Council member had kept her even busier.

You on the other hand spent most of the day enjoying a book and some rest.

Dinner was a modest event, your Mother still nursing a sickness most likely associated with her drinking the previous night, and your Father silently enjoying his meal.

You sipped your water, paying little mind to your Mother's rambling across the table. The two of you got along, though you found at times it was simply too difficult to keep up with the quickness of her speech when something had caught her interest.

Your Father, who by comparison was much more reserved, seemed to be listening intently as he ate. You had always wondered how two very different people like them seemed to be quite happy in marriage, especially considering it was not arranged for them.

A servant quickly walked into the dining hall with a scroll in her hand. You were a bit surprised when she wordlessly handed it to you, as it was not often you received letters from anyone.

Your Mother cleared her throat, before speaking up. "Ooh, another admirer?"

Your rolled your eyes and took the scroll into your hand. "I doubt that very much."

When you opened the scroll, you immediately recognized the handwriting. You wondered why Mel was writing to you now when she had seen you only a couple of hours beforehand.

"I've come down with a terrible illness during dinner. The Talis' have been kind enough to allow me to stay in a guest room, and a Doctor has already come to check on me. Apparently I've caught a cold.

Don't worry too much about me, I should be better by the morning."

Your head shot up. "Mother, can I take the carriage in the morning to see Mel?"

This time it was your Father who answered. "One of the wheels is currently being repaired, I'm afraid. You might have to go out on foot."

The next morning you woke early, and promptly searched for any correspondence from your friend. When you ultimately found nothing, you quickly left for the Talis residency.

You could use the walk, you thought, though you didn't own shoes that were good for it, and you eyed the mild breeze outside suspiciously.

You knew she would be slightly unhappy with your arrival, already probably embarrassed, but you couldn't help but worry for her. It was unlike Mel to ever really get ill, and if it had been bad enough to force her into bed rest, you needed to know she was making a swift recovery.

Upon arrival at the Talis home, you couldn't help but marvel at how grand it appeared. It was quite large, two stories, freshly coated in a white paint that almost sparkled in the sun. You noticed the accent of gold present throughout the residency, on the doors, windows and gates, and wondered if that was yet another similarity Jayce shared with your friend.

As you neared the front gate of the home, a servant of the family approached you. He greeted you formally, and guided you inside. His brief look towards your hair made you quickly run your hands through to smooth it down, though you realised it wouldn't do much good now.

Inside was even grander, and you slightly marvelled at the various paintings that hung off the white corridor walls.

"Missus Talis is currently in the drawing room." The servant informed you, and he guided you furthest down the hall until you entered a large, well lit room, filled with various chairs and two canapé sat facing each other.

As you moved further into the room, you saw a round wooden table, and two people sat. You recognized Ximena Talis holding a teacup in her hand as she conversed with the person sat beside her.

Viktor.

Your heart fell slightly, and you had to stop yourself from gaping outwardly at the situation. His appearance was slightly more humble today, he wore black dress pants and a dark maroon shirt, and over it a white waistcoat and tie.

As you moved to stand in the center of the room, modestly holding your hands in front of you, the servant formally introduced you to the pair before taking his leave promptly.

Viktor's head shot up, his striking eyes almost looking right through you with his intensity. Appearing slightly stunned himself, he swiftly stood from his seat.

His sudden action startled you, and you hesitantly looked away once Ximena spoke up with a warm smile. "Goodness my dear, did you walk here?"

You stopped yourself from attempting to smooth your hair again, though your hands found their way to your dress instead. Your reply was bashful. "I did."

There was a slight pause in the conversation and your eyes flickered towards Viktor once again, who continued to stand still by the table, and watched you with an interest that you assumed meant he had something to say.

When he said nothing, your gaze hesitantly fell to Ximena again. "I'm so sorry, how is Mel?"

Before the woman could even blink, Viktor finally spoke up. "She's upstairs."

His expression was absolutely sincere, which startled you out of words once again. This predicament was highly unexpected, you believed you would never see the man again, and yet here he stood with an expression of great interest towards you.

It was certainly strikingly different to the disinterested attitude he had towards you during the previous night's events.

Ximena spoke up again, cutting through the sudden tension of the room. "I'll have someone show you to her upstairs, dear. She's recovering slowly."

You nodded, and as the woman turned to speak to one of the servants stood beside the table, you curiously looked toward Viktor once again, a bit taken aback that his focus remained on you.

You would begrudgingly admit to yourself that he was handsome, and you took note of the way his hair looked slightly unkept, almost as if he had woken up not too long ago. His appearance, too, was strikingly different compared to the previous night.

"Thank you." You replied, eyes still focused on his.

You had never seen Mel so ill in your life. She was still bedridden, congested and rundown, however you had been told by the accompanying servant that she had improved considerably since the previous night.

You moved to sit on the bed beside her form, and she spoke with her eyes closed, in a strained voice. "You didn't have to come see me, you know."

You huffed out a laugh, reaching for her shoulder to comfort her. "You look positively awful."

She groaned, moving her hands towards her face sluggishly. "I feel so terrible for the imposition. They're being so kind to me."

"I must admit the timing of this is ingenious." You replied, still smiling as you caressed her arm softly. She was warm to the touch. "Mr. Talis must be most pleased to have you spending the night."

Mel opened an eye to glare at you, though in her condition it came off softer than usual. Almost as if summoned, Jayce entered the room after a brisk knock, a look of concern on his features.

You quickly spoke up, offering him a warm smile. "Thank you for tending to her so diligently."

He returned with a small smile, moving further into the room. "It's a pleasure."

He paused for a moment, before quickly fumbling to correct himself. "I mean, it's... Sorry. It's not a pleasure that she's ill, of course not. It's a pleasure that she's here..."

He paused again, looking embarrassed, and your kind smile formed into one of amusement as he lamely finished. "...Being ill."

You hadn't seen the man looking so nervous before, you could only assume it was Mel's form beside you that was causing it. She would no longer be able to deny his attraction to her, you thought to yourself, it had become almost painfully obvious.

Jayce cleared his throat, before speaking again. "You're more than welcome to spend the evening with us. Viktor arrived not too long ago to show me some project plans, I could ask the kitchen to bring us something?"

You paused to think for a moment, looking down towards your friend. It would be rude to say no to such an offer, and the longer you could remain close to Mel the better you would feel about her condition.

"I would love to." You replied warmly, though in the back of your mind you couldn't help but worry about spending another evening in the same room as his friend, Viktor.

(@londonbrandcandy, @shrektiledysfunction, @madamerebloger, @veloceraptors, @supershunini, @telleroftime, @langaslefthairstrand, @famousalmondloverangel, @sweetcakuuuu, @ranfithegood and @glasstyrs and @abstracteddreality asked to be tagged!)

[squishy0823]

•Made in Glory | Viktor x Fem!Reader

Part 3

Part 1 | Part 2

Summary: You and Viktor make up about the broken promise

Warnings: Little fluffy, nothing too detailed though

Pairing: Viktor x fem!reader

Word Count: 1559

A/N: The chapters keep getting shorter, and that's not on purpose. Anyways, enjoy!!

—————

Just like that, Hextech got approved by the council. You knew it would happen, it was bound to become the new future of Piltover, but it worried you. Arcane magic was something people were afraid of, and now it would be intergraded into society.

A few days after Hextech got approved, the council desired to show off their new face of promise. Show potential investors and other scientists the face of Jayce and Viktor. It was all so sudden and new and you didn’t know how to feel about it all. But there you were, getting dressed all fancy for a banquet you didn’t want to attend. You hadn’t seen, nor spoken to Viktor since the night he got Hextech to work with Jayce. They became busy with meetings and plans for a new era of magic. You smoothed out your dress, feeling it hug you uncomfortably. Glancing in the mirror, you shook your head and debated on ripping your hair down, dress off and washing the makeup from your face and not go.

You were still mad at Viktor. But you were more upset. A promise had been broken, one which he knew made you uncomfortable, but still broke it. Pushing your personal feelings aside, you represented the Academy, you needed to go. You just had to butter up a few elderly men, who always thought they were superior to the women in their field, maybe a few drinks for courage, then leave. That was all you had to do.

The cool night air nipped your shoulders as you stepped into the garden. The moonlight brought the colour out with the flowers that lined the stone path. Your hands brushed the bushes as you walked towards the group of people. You were a little late, but you made it in time to see Jayce standing on the small stage, making a toast to the future of Hextech. You had to admit, he was a natural public speaker, not afraid to put himself out there. His charming smile and tall composure were an easy give to his confident nature. Next to him, drawn further back, was Viktor. He hated public speaking, avoided it as much as he could. He wore a vest with a deep blue button-up. His hair doing what it did best, laid perfectly back from his face. He leaned on his cane, his grip tight as he tried not to focus on the crowd before him, afraid of their eyes on him.

“To Hextech!” Jayce pulled his glass to the night sky, the crowd joining in with a cheer.

Your eyes caught Viktor as he and Jayce walked off the stage. Jayce smiling and shaking hands of those around him, Viktor giving a stiff smile to them as he moved closer to you. You lowered your shoulders and turned away from him, searching for a glass of courage to ease your worries.

“Y/n,” Viktor spoke from behind you. You shut your eyes and then quickly turned back to him. His eyes scanning your face.

“Viktor.” You nodded coldly.

“Y/n, please listen,” Viktor stepped forward, licking his lips. “I apologize for my behaviour. You know I never meant to break the promise I made.”

“But you did.” You said clenching your fists.

“But I-“

“Viktor!” Jayce laughed as he placed his arm around his shoulders, earning a glare from Viktor. His bubbly smile was a clear show that he had been drinking. His eyes were on you, taking you in as you stood uncomfortably in front of them both. “Viktor, you know it’s rude to not introduce me to your lovely friend.” Jayce moved away from Viktor and took your hand, placing a soft kiss on your knuckles. “Jayce Talis.”

“I know who you are.” You said unimpressed like his name would make you swoon.

“Jayce, this is Y/n Y/ln.” Viktor rolled his eyes at Jayce and motioned towards you. “She’s one of the biology lab assistants.”

“It’s a pleasure,” Jayce smirked. You pulled your hand from his grasp.

“Likewise.” You bit the inside of your cheek.

“Y/n-”

“I should be going.” You cut Viktor off, taking in a sharp breath.

“But, you just got here.” Jayce chuckled looking to Viktor who gave him a look. You quickly turned away and started off back the way you came, Viktor calling your name from behind.

Once back inside the doors of the academy, no longer cold in the night, you leaned your head back on the wall as you heard the soft clank of Viktor’s cane. “My dear, please listen to me,” Viktor spoke softly, now standing next to you. You picked up your body and turned to him, feeling defeated.

“You hurt my feelings Viktor.” You told him, crossing your arms across your chest. “I asked you not too and you promised. But you broke that promise.”

“I know.” Viktor hung his head low, stepping closer to you. “I am a fool. I hurt you and I feel horrible for what I did.”

You looked down to your feet. “I guess it’s too late for you to back out of Hextech now.” You chuckled trying to get rid of the awkward silence.

Viktor looked up and chuckled. “Yes, unfortunately.”

“Looks like you're stuck with him for the long run.” You looked back out towards the garden, Jayce laughing and rubbing shoulders with people around him.

“Jayce is, uh, tolerable.” Viktor shrugged. “He’s smart, I’ll give him that. But he is full of himself.”

You smiled and nodded. “You should get back out there.” Looking to Viktor, “The people will be missing the future of Hextech.”

Viktor looked back to you, taking a breath. He grabbed your hand from being folded across your chest. “I’d much rather be here with you if you don’t mind.”

You shook your head in response, heat rising in your cheeks as Viktor took his other hand, bringing it to your cheek. You were stiff under his touch. His eyes sparkled in the moonlight, his thumb moving across your cheek. Viktor cupped your jawline, leaning towards you. You could feel his breath on your lips, bringing himself closer as your eyes darted to his lips, eyes fluttering closed. His lips connected with yours and your legs wobbled as he kissed you. His other hand came to the other side of your jaw as your lips moved together. Butterflies erupted from within, your senses clouded with nothing but Viktor.

You felt bright, like all the colours of the rainbow had exploded from within, feeling his touch on your hips, his hand on your jawline. Your soul opened up, and poured out, filling Viktor as well. You couldn’t put the kiss into words, you just felt like you were floating, levitating in your love for Viktor. After a moment, you both drew away, foreheads touching as you breathed each other in, like a cool inhalation of oxygen to warm the soul.

“My love,” Viktor whispered, “these feelings cannot be described, nor has there get been any part of speech or figure of speech invented to describe it.” His eyes opened, looking at you. “You are an aphrodisiac, mixed with a Pandoras' box effect.” You opened your eyes to look into his. “The fireworks glowing inside me from the touch of your lips to mine.”

You were breathless at his words. Nothing you could say could compare to the words he just spoke out to you. You drew your hands up and pushed your face back into his, taking him by surprise and kissing him all over again. His hands dipped lower on your hip as your tugged at his tie under his vest. You heard footsteps come closer, causing Viktor to pull away, clearing his throat.

“There you are,” Jayce said with a smirk. “Are you two going to come back or hideaway?” Jayce chuckled looking back to the party.

Your face was flush, but the night hid it well enough. Viktor blinked, still a little dazed. “I was just, discussing some work with y/n.” Viktor spoke quickly. “I would like to consult her with some ideas instead of joining your party.”

Jayce looked between you two, a smug look on his face. “Alright.” He drew out, turning away. “Don’t do anything too stupid.” With that, Jayce walked off, chuckling to himself.

You pursed your lips, “He totally knows.” You mumbled.

“And I will never hear the end of it.” Viktor shook his head turning back to you, trying to shake Jayce from his mind. “Maybe we should go somewhere private,” you turned to him, blushing again, he did as well. “to continue where we left off?”

Your heart leaped in your throat. You nodded and kissed his cheek. Both of you walked back into the halls and towards Viktor’s room. Once the door closed, your back was slammed into the closed door, his lips on your again. Your skin was on fire, peppering you with kisses, trailing down your neck as he mumbled sweet nothings into your skin. His accent thick, words from his native tongue giving your hot body chills.

He was all you ever wanted, all you ever needed. Viktor knew that, and you let him touch you in ways you never thought anyone could. He made you feel a way that no other person has.

[undercityviktor]

Excitiiiing, i love your stuff! If any of these interest you: jayvik at some kind of informal party, like a club or houseparty - can be modern au, yknow, the classic americal college alcohol fest at some rich kid's house. Like, standoff-ish viktor, jayce very poorly hiding his interest in this handsome stranger, tipsy flirting, caitvi cameo, you get it. OR! Roomates! Wherever and however you like them, arcane universe, modern AU, academy classmates AU....post divorce....(the classic we-hate-each-other-but-the-lease-still-has-three-months-to-go...) No pressure if not! Just throwing some ideas hehe

So many good ideas, Anon! My brain saw “party” and “post divorce” and ignored all the rest for now though, and 1.9k words of pining and fluff was born. I hope you like it!

Content: very brief racism against Viktor being from another country with a perceived language barrier, pining, so much pining and lack of communication, Caitlyn’s somehow supportive zero-tolerance of Jayce’s pining bullshit, and a couple of olive branches exchanged between two idiots clearly still in love. Oh, and a modern no-hextech au feel/setting.

AO3  | Tumblr writing masterlist

___

“Jayce, don’t,” Caitlyn growled, grabbing him by the shirt sleeve and yanking him bodily back into an alcove. It shouldn't have been possible for someone of her stature to man-handle someone of Jayce’s size, but he moved willingly enough under her hands like a wooden puppet on fraying strings.

Across the room, Cait’s wife raised an eyebrow in amusement and was answered with a roll of searing, sky-blue eyes and a shake of the head. “You’re a pathetic, pining drunk, Jayce Talis. What are you?”

“A pathetic, pining drunk,” Jayce mumbled, flopping down onto the flimsy antique chair behind him and groaning. “I’m not even drunk, Cait,” he said. “Almost wish I was. I’ve only had the champagne from the toast earlier. Fuck, he’s so beautiful.”

“Jayce,” she warned, smacking him none-too-gently up the back side of his head with the flat of her hand, and he nodded and waved a vague hand in her direction.

“I know, I know. ‘Beautiful ex-husband is off-limits during fundraisers’. Gods, why did he have to be here though?”

“Because he’s Head of Engineering at the Institute of Technology?” she said. “Duh.” She’d picked up more than a few mannerisms from Vi, including That Face.

“I know, but…” Jayce cut himself off, knowing full well how pathetic he sounded. He dropped his head into his hand, and Caitlyn gently removed his empty champagne flute from the other to set it lightly onto a passing waiter’s tray.

Jayce sat up and tried desperately to look anywhere that wasn’t Viktor, but as ever, his ex-husband drew his attention like an open flame to a doomed moth. Just then, as if he could feel the weight of Jayce’s gaze on him, Viktor looked up sharply. What Jayce hadn’t expected was the oddly soft look in his face that lingered there for just a moment before he schooled his features into a mask and focused his attention away from Jayce and back to the small knot of investors around him.

“I’m fucked,” Jayce mumbled. “I need some air.”

This time, Caitlyn didn’t stop him.

In the hallway beyond, he heard the name ‘Ivanovich’, and halted. Jayce immediately recognised the retreating mop of white hair belonging to Professor Heimerdinger as he vanished around the corner, having evidently just departed from a conversation with three smartly-dressed academic types. They gave each other the side-eye while Heimerdinger trotted off, and then one of them smirked. “Please, the only reason Professor Ivanovich had any standing here at all was because he was married to Dr. Talis,” one of them said.

“I heard he had to leave because his visa expired after the divorce, and the university wouldn’t sponsor him any more. After that he could only get ZIT to sponsor him!” They all broke off into a bout of cruel, guffawing laughter at the nasty acronym the Zaun Institute of Technology had garnered over the years.

“He doesn’t even speak English properly, so I can’t see how he even contributed to any of —”

Jayce saw red.

It didn't matter that they were no longer together. This was Viktor they were insulting. “Do you have any idea how brilliant he is?” Jayce roared, charging up the corridor and grabbing one of the unsuspecting academics by his ugly tweed collar and shoving him roughly against the plasterwork panel behind him. “How lucky the Institute is to have him? How lucky those students are to benefit from everything Viktor has to offer? He’s a fucking genius, you snivelling piece of shit, and you couldn’t even dream about half the stuff his mind can grasp!”

The other two goggled at Jayce in shock while he glared down at one offending little shit-stain, chest heaving with emotions he didn’t know he still had.

A voice in the corridor behind him drew his attention and he found Caitlyn glaring at him, arms folded.

With a final shove, Jayce released the stranger and stalked off down the staircase to barrel out into the courtyard.

“Fuck,” he hissed, trying to still his thundering heartbeat. When simply breathing didn't work, he drew out the little brass cog that he still kept on a cord around his neck. Over the years it had tarnished to a dull brown against the natural acids in his skin, but the edges bore a perpetual shine where they rubbed on his clothing or, more commonly, he ran his fingertips over them. He traced his thumb over the engraved date on the flat of the little cog and his vision blurred as tears formed and his chest tightened.

With watery eyes and a heart as heavy as the earth itself, he stared up at the night sky and wondered how it had all gone so wrong. Three years after the divorce had been finalised, and he still missed Viktor acutely every day. Every single day. It was like there was a hole in his chest that had been blasted out with a shotgun, leaving tiny pieces of his former self scattered to the wind, irrevocable and irretrievable.

Did Viktor ever feel the same way? He looked as good as he ever had; lean, ethereal, unobtainable. Had the divorce even fazed him? Did he even care? Did he think about Jayce when he made his morning sweetmilk or did he just make it and get on with his day? Was he truly as heartless as everyone said he was? He was beautiful, so it was only natural that people had tried to seduce him after their separation — romantically as well as academically — but he had garnered something of a reputation for politely but ruthlessly shutting anyone down who even attempted it.

“Jayce?”

Jayce yipped in surprise and spun to find the very object of his musings standing in the doorway behind him. Viktor leaned his weight elegantly on his cane, his hips listing ever so slightly sideways as always. Or maybe that was Jayce. It was hard to tell which way was up and which was down when he felt so lightheaded around Viktor.

“Uh, yeah?” he said for the second time that evening.

Fuck me standing, he thought. In the soft lamplight of the courtyard and the moonlight gleaming down from the night sky above, Viktor didn’t even look real. Did Viktor’s eyes drift down to Jayce's open collar where the gear dangled in plain sight?

“That was gracious of you,” Viktor smirked. He adjusted his hold on the grip of his cane with a subtle wave of his fingers, and Jayce found it suddenly impossible to look away.

“Huh?” Somehow, despite having two PhDs and numerous other qualifications, patents, papers and inventions under his belt, Jayce always managed to feel dumbstruck and stupid around Viktor.

“Coming to my defence like that…” Viktor purred. “Most chivalrous of you.”

“Well, they were rude,” he shrugged.

Something soft and almost fond played once more around Viktor’s golden eyes, and Jayce’s heart cracked right down the middle. Unable to keep looking at him, he turned his face away and bit back something that was half-sob and half-grimace.

“Jayce?”

“What, Viktor?” he snapped over his shoulder. “What do you want? What more do you want of me?”

Viktor blinked. “I don’t want anything from you, Jayce. I never did.”

“Right,” he breathed. “Of course. Well, I’m going home now. Enjoy the rest of your evening. I can’t… I can’t do this, Vik.” It hurt too much.

And with that, he stalked off, scrubbing a hand over the stubble that had built up over the day. Viktor had used to love the feel of that stubble on his soft inner thighs, the scrape of it on trembling muscle when — no. “Not going there, Jayce,” he snarled, kicking half-heartedly at a pebble as he left the courtyard and headed out into the city beyond.

He walked for hours with his hands in his pockets, barely paying attention to the beautiful city around him. Everything had lost its sparkle in the last few years. He still strove for perfection in his academic work, but without Viktor working beside him in the lab, there was no point to anything. Viktor had been everything, and suddenly it had all fallen apart. Jayce had had sponsorships and private tech and aeronautical companies outbidding each other for the rights to his inventions, and all Viktor had wanted was to heal what society had left broken for far too long.

And Jayce had lost sight of all that. It had been what had brought them together after all.

He was still thumbing the gear pendant around his neck when he drifted back to his miserable little apartment. He trudged up the stairs, working finger and thumb over the notches of the cog, twisting it round and round like a fidget toy, when he ground to a halt at the top of the staircase. There, outside his door, leaning his weight on the wall behind with arms folded and cane resting idly against his hip, was Viktor.

He looked simultaneously like the twenty-something year-old that Jayce had fallen head over heels for within a five minutes of meeting him, and the just-shy-of-forty year-old he currently was, and the overlap between the two made Jayce’s vision blur. “Viktor?” he hissed when Viktor looked up and met his eyes.

“I think…” he began in his musical tenor, “I think we may have made a mistake, Jayce.”

“Oh? And what brought you to that conclusion?” he asked, nearly tripping up the final step and joining him on the landing.

“We are both miserable,” Viktor stated. “And…” he softened and sighed. “And your light has gone out.”

Jayce scowled, his eyes tracking up to the perfectly-functioning light bulb in the hall ceiling above them. “What —”

“Not that light, you literal —” Viktor cut himself off with a huff of breath. “Your light. Piltover’s Golden Boy is… no longer shining.”

“I’m tired, Vik. Just say what you mean for once.”

“I would like for us to be friends again,” Viktor said. “Maybe more.”

“Friends?” He shook his head. “I can’t do that Vik.”

Hurt flashed across Viktor’s face and he pushed himself off the wall. His shoulders took on a defensive tension and his eyes hardened from honey to hammered bronze. “Very well. Though after seeing that you still wear yours, I had hoped we were past the pettiness, but —”

“—Wait, let me finish,” Jayce interjected gently. “And ‘wear my what’?”

“Your gear,” Viktor said, digging into his collar and drawing out a small gold chain, at the end of which dangled a delicate brass cog, engraved with the date of their first success.

Jayce teared up and stepped towards him. “You still…? I thought…?”

“I was rash,” Viktor said, letting go of the necklace and allowing his hand to fall limply to his side. “I wanted to change the world overnight, and I didn’t stop to think what I might leave behind. I sacrificed patience for progress. Understanding for achievement.”

“You didn’t lose me, Viktor,” Jayce hissed. “And it’s always been hard to keep up with you.” After a long pause he said, “I could have tried harder to understand. I didn’t. I thought I knew everything, but… I obviously didn’t.”

Finally, blessedly, Viktor laughed. Just the faintest little chuckle, but it had been years since Jayce had heard it, and his body flushed with undiluted joy at the sound of it. “You… You want to come in for a drink?” he asked, as though it was the most unremarkable thing in the world to ask his ex-husband into his apartment for a drink as though it were the end of their first date. In a way, he supposed, it was a first date, after a fashion. “Think I’ve even got some sweetmilk.”

“Yes,” Viktor smiled. “I think I would like that very much.”

___

Thanks for the prompt! One more on the way at some point soon :)

AO3  | Tumblr writing masterlist

[perfectlywingedsilco]

An Invitation: Part Three (Silco x Mel drabble)

Part One Part Two AO3 Link

She saw him next at a gala held in one of the mansions on the hill.

It was an unexpected surprise. The statesman didn’t seem to be one to waste an evening among the hollow splendours of the sumptuously dressed crowds milling through the palatial halls. And yet there he was, dressed in his usual colours of black and maroon with a touch of gold, and Mel found herself slowly gravitating to him across the sea of heads.

Silco, she realised, was taking his time noticing her, his good eye surveying his surroundings with languid disinterest. And he seemed to feign that same mild indifference even when she caught his gaze and raised her glass in his direction.

He only tipped his head a fraction in acknowledgement. And Mel was surprised to find that she felt a little ... offended by his cool response. Their meetings had alluded to there being an understanding - a closeness, even. And it seemed strange and jarring to have him regard her as little more than a passing acquaintance.

She turned away to entertain herself with merrier conversations. A well-placed laugh at the Demacian diplomat’s jokes. A pleasant word of agreement for the Noxian aristocrat. And all the while, she was aware of those mismatched eyes coolly regarding her from a distance.

‘Statesman Silco,’ she greeted him eventually as she found him within the scope of the circle she was tracing around the crowd. ‘I had not expected to see you here.’

‘Councillor,’ he greeted her back with a stiffness to his nod. ‘I was told an appearance was expected of me.’

‘And who issued such an order?’ she asked him, a little teasingly. ‘Surely there is none here who could impose their influence on you?’

He looked at her then as though he was seeing her for the first time that evening. And Mel couldn’t help feel a slight bloom of pleasure at seeing the outline of his crooked smile.

‘There’s only your influence, Councillor. And I must admit I was expecting it to be your letterhead that summoned me here tonight.’

‘Expecting or hoping, Statesman?’ she asked, and he only smiled coyly at her in response.

‘Your Jayce Talis suggested I present myself,’ he said instead to avoid spoiling her fun with an answer. ‘He seems to think the Council needed a full complement of its people to impress the Shuriman delegation.’

‘Ah, Jayce ... You must not mind his enthusiasm for doing things to their fullest extent. It is well-meaning, even if it is not always convenient.’

Silco just tilted his head slightly in vague agreement.

‘Would you like me to give you an introduction to the delegation?’ she offered to him, only to be surprised by the slightly surly undertone of his response.

‘Not particularly.’

‘Well, then ...’ Mel began as she tried to think what else might appeal to his interests. ‘Perhaps a drink? I see your hands are empty.’

And she looked down at those hands now, with their slim, well-turned fingers and the thoughtfully square cut of his nails. Agile and hardworking, she thought. Clever more than strong. But that only seemed to suit him more.

‘A drink ... I suppose I could afford it.���

‘It is on the house,’ she joked, and he smiled thinly in response.

It didn’t take long to flag down a waiter threading their way through the throng with a tray of drinks held aloft. And Mel took the opportunity to step a little closer to the statesman so that she could clink her glass lightly against his.

‘To our mutual success,’ she suggested as a toast, and he agreed by raising his glass back at her.

But the air of awkwardness never quite left them. And Mel was left wondering what was happening behind that teal blue eye that saw so much yet revealed so little.

‘They have a Vinscher here in the east wing,’ she said after a moment’s silence. ‘A true masterpiece. I was hoping to pay it a visit. Perhaps you would accompany me? We can discuss your problem of sea freight rates along the way.’

The offer of talking business seemed to help relax his tightly drawn features, and Mel was pleased to find him so willing to let her lead him away from the crowds.

[silverdragonoid]

‘Satisfied’ - JayVik - Lyrics

okay I’m even more sorry but I had to do this: the lyrics of Hamilton’s ‘Satisfied’ but slightly edited so it’s Viktor being dramatic at Jayce’s and Mel’s wedding. I think this is rather canon lore compliant because they actually met at a gala/ball for the first time. I also like to think that if Viktor has told Mel of his feelings towards Jayce early, she would have become his wingwoman because I don’t see her straight-up stealing Jayce even when she developed feelings later, too. Enough talking-

Viktor=Angelica (refers to Jayce as brother because that’s how Jayce calls him)

Jayce=Hamilton

Mel=Eliza

[VIKTOR] A toast to the groom! To the bride! From your brother Who is always by your side To your union (To the union! To the evolution!) And the progress you provide May you always (Always) Be satisfied (Rewind) [Recorded Samples] Rewind, Rewind Helpless, sky's, sky's Drownin' in em Drownin', rewind I remember that night, I just might (rewind) I remember that night, I just might (rewind) I remember that night, I remember that— [VIKTOR] I remember that night, I just might Regret that night for the rest of my days I remember those fancy men Tripping over themselves to win our praise I remember that dreamlike candlelight Like a dream that you can’t quite place But Mr. Talis, I’ll never forget the first Time I saw your face I have never been the same Intelligent eyes in a suntanned frame And when you said “Hi,” I forgot my dang name Set my heart aflame, ev’ry part aflame [COMPANY] This is not a game [JAYCE] You strike me as a man who has never been satisfied [VIKTOR] I’m sure I don’t know what you mean. You forget yourself [JAYCE] You’re like me. I’m never satisfied [VIKTOR] Is that right? [JAYCE] I have never been satisfied My name is Jayce Talis

[VIKTOR] It’s Viktor [JAYCE] Where’s your fam’ly from? [VIKTOR] Unimportant.

[BOTH TOGETHER] There’s a million things I haven’t done but Just you wait, just you wait [VIKTOR] So so so— So this is what it feels like to match wits With someone at your level! What the hell is the catch? It’s The feeling of freedom, of seein’ the light It’s Heimerdinger with a key and a kite! You see it, right? The conversation lasted two minutes, maybe three minutes Ev’rything we said in total agreement, it’s A dream and it’s a bit of a dance A bit of a posture, it’s a bit of a stance. He’s a Bit of a flirt, but I’m ‘a give it a chance He asked about my fam’ly, did he see my answer? My hands started fidgeting, I looked askance I’m from the Undercity, but I’m here to advance Handsome, boy, does he know it! Peach fuzz, and he can’t even grow it! I wanna take him far away from this place Then I turn and see Medarda’s face and she is… [MEL] Helpless… [VIKTOR] And I know she is… [MEL] Helpless… [VIKTOR] And her eyes are just… [MEL] Helpless… [VIKTOR] And I realize Three fundamental truths at the exact same time [JAYCE] Where are you taking me? [VIKTOR] I’m about to change your life [JAYCE] Then by all means, lead the way [COMPANY] Number one! [VIKTOR] I’m a guy in a world in which My only job is to become rich My city has no voice so I’m the one Who has to social climb for one So I’m the brightest and the wittiest and the gossip in Piltover is insidious And Jayce can be tactless Ha! That doesn’t mean I want him any less [MEL to Jayce] Councilor Medarda. It’s a pleasure to meet you [JAYCE to Viktor] Councilor? [VIKTOR] My friend [COMPANY] Number two! [VIKTOR] He’s after me ‘cause I succeed Which elevates his status, I’d Have to be naive to set that aside Maybe that is why I introduce him to Mel Now that’s his bride Nice going, Viktor, he was right You will never be satisfied [MEL to Jayce] Thank you for all your service [JAYCE] If it takes fighting a war for us to meet, it will have been worth it [Mel looks uncomfortable at that]

[VIKTOR] I’ll leave you to it [COMPANY] Number three! [VIKTOR] I know my partner like I know my own mind You will never find anyone so brilliant yet so blind If I tell Mel that I love him she’d be silently resigned He’d be mine She would say, “I’m fine” [COMPANY] She’d be lying [VIKTOR] But when I fantasize at night It’s Jayce’s eyes As I romanticize what might Have been if I hadn’t sized him Up so quickly At least now he has a good wife; At least I keep his eyes in my life To the groom! To the bride! From your brother Who is always by your side To your union (To the union! To the evolution!) And the progress you provide May you always (Always) Be satisfied And I know She'll be happy as his bride And I know He will never be satisfied I will never be satisfied

[weltraum-vaquero]

You could have it all (my empire of dirt)

1. this town ain’t big enough for the both of us (but this bed is)

[Chapter 1] ↠ [Chapter 2] ↠ [Chapter 3] ↠ [Chapter 4] ↠ [Chapter 5] (coming soon)

[AO3 link]

Western AU

18+

Jayce Talis x GN AFAB Reader

Word count: 12.5k+

Synopsis: Bounty hunter Jayce Talis should know better than to fall for his target. Unfortunately, he doesn’t.

Tags/warnings: western AU, face sitting, praise, degradation, restraints, nipple play, blowjobs, coming untouched, multiple orgasms, overtsimulation, come eating, slight dacryphilia, Jayce being a desperate little cowboy, reader taking advantage of said desperation, Caitlyn being an annoying little sister (affectionate)

Notes: Happy birthday to beloved @glass-instrument . This one's for you, for hyping this fic up to no end, discussing the outline with me even when it was just the equivalent of a fucked up little tangled ball of yarn bouncing around inside my head, and for being as insane about cowboy Jayce as I am. Love you Marcel, and I hope you have a lovely, lovely birthday :3

Many many MANY thanks to Skade and Bri for reading this bad boy even in its unpolished stages and screaming to me about it. You have no idea how much you guys helped

Jayce Talis takes pride in his steely resolve.

Where lesser men would have given up, would have let outlaws continue their wretched ways, he has persisted. Has caught criminal after criminal, served justice where it had been desperately needed.

Sure, Mayoress Kiramman’s generous sponsorship has certainly played a part in Jayce’s efficacy as a bounty hunter through the years, but he likes to think himself responsible for most of his success in the profession.

His father — a talented, humble gunsmith, and the designer of the famed Talis rifle — had started it all. 

The rifle had been something revolutionary for its time. Forty-nine inches in length, maximum firing range a glorious fifteen hundred yards, boasting a previously unachieved accuracy. 

At just six years old, Jayce remembers his father putting it in his hands for the first time, laying out multiple empty beer bottles a short distance away, and covering Jayce’s ears, encouraging him to take his first shot. Jayce remembers falling on his ass from the recoil, all while also falling madly in love with marksmanship.

At nineteen, Jayce remembers steering his family’s carriage down the road leading out of Piltover, remembers the constant clatter of cans and jars at any harsh bump under the creaky wheels.

He remembers a gunshot. Just one, then too many to count.

He remembers three masked, armed men ambushing the two Kiramman stagecoach guards, remembers how quickly it had been over. In less than thirty seconds time, only one outlaw was left standing, and both guards had been killed — one shot clean through the forehead, the other still gurgling on his own blood. He remembers the stagecoach coming to a sudden halt, remembers the warning shot fired up into the clear afternoon sky, remembers Mayoress Kiramman stumbling out of the carriage, little Caitlyn’s hand clasped tightly in hers.

He remembers how clammy his palms were as he slid the Talis rifle off his shoulder. He remembers trembling while lining up his shot.

He doesn’t remember anything after that.

A blur of shoulder-pats and champagne toasts at parties he had never thought a cow wrangler could get invited to, more money than he’d ever seen being pressed into his hands, and getting hired by the Kirammans to protect their daughter. 

From there, it had been a slippery slope from just simply guarding her (frankly, Caitlyn had grown into a young woman more than capable of handling a weapon now — no need for Jayce anymore), to being sent out on increasingly difficult manhunts after Sheriff Grayson had passed and left a gaping hole where justice had once reigned. 

With Piltover’s growing prosperity in the past decade, many had set their sights on the riches of its citizens — the Kiramman family’s even more so. Outlaws that dared approaching their beloved town needed to be weeded out, and fast. 

You’re just another name on that list.

(Y/n) (l/n), wanted in three different states, charged with an egregious amount of horse and cattle thieving, and, if he is to believe the rumors, you’d pulled off three train robberies in Demacia, all by yourself.

He’s no fool, though. Or at least not enough of one to buy that. Demacian lawmen are reputable for their numbers and tenacity; unlikely, truly, that you’d pulled off even one train robbery and had lived to see another day.

He’ll give you some credit, though — you’re tough as shit to track down, probably his most elusive bounty to date. Either that, or the Kirammans’ paranoia has reached new bounds, to send him after someone that’s long left Piltover.

After well over a week of camping out in the wilderness and scrupulously scouting out the entirety of Piltover’s untamed periphery, Jayce decides it’s time for a moment of reprieve. A saloon nearby seems fit for the job. He’ll have a drink, take a bath, and finally get to sleep in a real bed.

Yeah, that sounds good.

And it is. The bath is heavenly, and the beer, straight out of the cellar and delightfully cold, soothes the soul. 

The saloon is comfortably half-full, too; not bustling enough to be suffocating, not empty enough to creep out whatever soul dares pushing past the wooden doors. A comfortable lull paces all conversations, mellows them down enough for them to blur into a background hum.

Until a stranger catches his eye.

In a far corner of the saloon at a small table, you swirl some whiskey in your glass, dejectedly staring at it. There’s something familiar about you, something Jayce can’t put his finger on.

Your face — the most alluring he has seen in all his years — comes into clear view as you raise your chin, meet his gaze.

And he’d consider it a challenge in normal circumstances, for someone to look him dead in the eye from across the room, would consider them someone looking for a brawl. Someone worth avoiding.

The way you look him down — slow, deliberate in your path down his sturdy frame — then back up, lingering this time, before you finally look at his face again…

He’s not avoiding you, if he can help it.

Not just because you look at him like you’re going to squeeze every last drop of pleasure out of his willing body, but because you’re drawn on the neatly folded bounty poster in his satchel.

Well, maybe not you. The drawing certainly hasn’t gotten your lips (or your nose, for that matter) quite right. Jayce has stared at it long enough for it to be burned into his memory, and you, in the flesh, do not compare to it.

No, you’re far better.

Far easier on the eyes.

Maybe they just have an unfortunate face, Jayce deludes himself, maybe it’s not even them that’s (l/n). 

That would make wanting you, would make the heat stirring in his stomach, in his chest, would make the need to touch you far more bearable.

He aches to give you the benefit of the doubt a little more than he wants to find out if it’s really you. 

As he goes to stare at your lips again — just to confirm that they do, in fact, not resemble the ones on the bounty poster at all — he finds them already quirked up in a smirk.

Your eyes rest on him so intensely that he wonders if his bar stool is on fire right below him.

Fuck. You’ve caught him staring.

Jayce hurries to glance down at the near empty beer bottle in his hand instead, as if that’s going to keep your chair from creaking as you get up, or your spurs from jingling with every step you take closer.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Another beer for the pretty boy.”

Coins rattle as they hit the table, Jayce jumps in his seat enough for his wide brimmed leather hat to tip backwards. Thankfully not off his head entirely, but definitely enough to reveal his face to you, fully.

You seem delighted by the sight. And he’d be lying if he claimed some voyeuristic part of him didn’t enjoy being exposed to you — he catches himself wanting to bare even more of himself, just to see in what way you’d wreck it. Wreck him.

Jayce draws in a steadying breath.

Time to end his dilemma before it grows.

“What’s your name?” The words nearly refuse to come out. Not because his mouth is so dry they stick to his tongue, or because his heart‘s beating so fast his throat won’t open. Those aren’t helping, but he’s long mastered the art of pushing past his anxiety. His reticence is the result of something entirely new.

He just really doesn’t want to know. It’s his sense of duty asking the question; if it were up to him, he’d forget both his and your names, just to have you.

Jayce hopes you’ll lie.

You laugh.

It’s not menacing by any means, but clearly amused no less. 

“You really have no idea how this works,” you tell him. The bartender sets down the beer you’d ordered in front of Jayce, scoops up the coins. He wonders if you can see right through him, into his depraved thoughts, and how much they worsen when you tap your leather gloved fingers against the sticky counter. “I paid for your drink, I ask the questions.”

If you had any fucking idea how his insides coil at your commanding tone. 

“Your name, first. Or will I have to call you pretty boy for the rest of the night?”

Oh?

He’s not opposed to that. But he’d rather not give you that sort of ammunition against him. Not yet.

“W-well, uh…” Feeling very much like he’s making a deal with the devil or signing his will, Jayce still takes the beer, brings it to his lips. There’s a tremor to his hands, and he hates it. You, quite the opposite. “Jayce works, too.”

As he drinks his beer, you drink him in, too.

And more than that, you look like you’re just about ready to devour him, boots and all, as you take your gloves off and fold them into your satchel.

“Jayce,” you repeat, like it tastes sweet, and like you can’t wait to sink your teeth so deep into his flesh that you’ll burn your gums on the heat within. Ravenous.

He thinks he manages to conceal the shiver that crawls down his spine — until your smile says otherwise. More daring now, you eye the generous expanse of his tanned chest revealed by his loosely buttoned shirt, the muscle on his forearms, the gun belt hanging off his hips. 

“Quite the set you’ve got on you,” you lilt, eyes fixed on his chest, while your hand, tantalizing, walks two fingers up his thigh, coming to rest at the pistol on his hip. Jayce realizes you meant his guns. Of course you had. 

Your touch sears — into his skin, his memory, his soul, and he craves more. Craves to know the taste of your skin until it’s stuck between his molars, craves to have the scent of you lingering in his sinuses. He wants you in every crevice of his being.

Heavens above, he’s fucked.

You ease two fingers under the leather strap securing the holster to his thigh, squeeze the meat below indulgently.

He can’t help the way he melts, can’t help the involuntary parting of his thighs, can’t help the way his face and pit of his stomach catch fire when you hum, pleased.

Grinning with mischief, you let go, and Jayce only has half the mind to stifle a whimper. His body chases your touch, lifting his thigh to press into your hand, but you’re quick. Quicker than he’d like, pulling away, fingers hooked under the thin leather strap, before you let it snap back into place, and revel in the surprised hitch of his breath.

Damn your name, his responsibilities, damn everything. 

Jayce doesn’t think he’s ever wanted and, in turn, felt this wanted, and you’ve barely dedicated your attention to him for less than a minute. He’s either getting desperate — which isn’t far-fetched, considering the last night he’d spent with someone has been years ago — or you’ve got him under a spell. A terrible one, if the way you bite back a smile on your bottom lip is anything to go by. 

You lean in until your hair tickles his exposed collarbone. He prays to everything above that his body hasn’t yet reacted to you, because there would be little room to hide it under the taut, coarse material of his blue jeans.

“Never seen one of these before,” you say. Swallowing, he straightens up as you wrap your fingers around the carved wooden grip of his pistol, pulling it from its holster slowly.

“Modified,” Jayce clarifies. 

It really shouldn’t feel so intimate to watch you flip it in your hands, to watch nimble fingers as they trace the muzzle, sliding down the engraved barrel, thumbing at the hammer. 

His depraved mind pictures them around the girth of his cock instead, thumbing at his leaking slit, and that alone is enough to have his dick twitching with interest.

“Only a pair of talented hands could have done such a mighty fine job,” you comment, expertly spinning the weapon in your hand before you holster it back. Your touch lingers at the leather – a gathering of courage, or perhaps granting him reprieve – before it comes to grasp at his hip through his jeans, thumb brushing the crest of it.

He wonders how much longer he can keep his growing arousal from you.

“I did,” Jayce replies, shivering.

“Oh?” Your head tilts as you look at him, surprised and enticed all at once. Your touch is unrelenting, strokes at his hipbone more boldly. “Makes me wonder what else those hands of yours can do.”

Jayce is not quick to rush to conclusions, but the tone of your voice has his entire body revolting against the brush of his own clothes, against the cold bottle resting at his lips instead of your warm, soft mouth. You want him, little to no doubt about it. 

And he needs you;  he’s in far above his head to pretend otherwise.

“Anything you’d want,” Jayce finds himself blurting out. “Anywhere–” his voice cuts off when you squeeze at his hip, drawing him a little further off the stool as you move to stand. His hard-on presses into the meat of your thigh shamelessly, mind swirling with arousal when you flex it against him. Jayce looks away, whimpering under his breath at the blissful contact. Finishing a sentence has never been this difficult, but through sheer willpower alone, he manages. “A-anywhere you’d let me.”

You simply hum, obviously pleased with his suggestion as you draw your hand up his side, over his strong shoulder, letting it rest easily below his chin. Your fingertips are firm below his jaw, easing his face – and his gaze – upwards, to you.

“Desperate to please, ain’tcha?” you smile, press the back of your ring and pinky at his bobbing Adam’s apple. “Under all that, though, I reckon you just yearn to be taken care of.”

He nearly chokes on his own spit, simply looks up at you with a kind of flabbergasted surprise that tells you your guess was right.

“How’d you–” He stops in his tracks when you simply raise your brow at him, and he remembers he’s not the one asking the questions tonight. If he has to play by that rule just to have your hands on him by the end of the night, he’ll do it. “I mean– Jesus, yes. Please. If– if you’re willing.”

Your smile grows, you let go of his arm to lean in.

“Darlin’, I’ll soothe aches you had no idea you even had.”

You inch your fingertips up the bottom of his canvas shirt, grinning when you find what you’re looking for. You don’t venture far enough for it to be more than a flirtatious touch, an insinuation of how you’d treat him. Dichotomous, you’re gentle and salacious all at once as you run your thumb against the grains of hair on his lower stomach. It takes a great deal of effort not to curl against you and unbutton his pants right then and there. Even remembering to breathe comes as its own challenge; his lungs ache with the first fill of air after a punched out sigh that lasted far too long for his own good.

Your fingertips stop in their path when you stumble across a soft, sensitive, hairless patch of skin, trace it slowly. Jayce can almost feel the gears turning in your head, wondering if you can pinpoint the carved scar across his abdomen for what it resulted from: a shallow slash of a knife.

“What do you do for a living, Jayce?” you prod, tone suddenly shifting, curious.

“Uhm, cows,” he clarifies, quite stupidly. “I mean, n-not–! I don’t… I’m a cow wrangler.”

Technically not a lie. He was a cow wrangler, before he ended up having to hunt the likes of you for a living.

You don’t quite seem to buy it, burning touch still nudging at his scar, intimate and invasive in your exploration. Against better judgement, he leans into it. “Seems you had to deal with a quite rowdy bunch of ‘em.” 

“Y-yeah,” he rushes to assure, wonders if, and (more importantly) what you’re suspecting. Wonders, for the first time in his life, how far his name has made it among outlaws. “I’m– I’m good at handling… anything rowdy.”

Seemingly put at ease by his reply, you chuckle, bracing yourself against his hips as you lean in, lips brushing the shell of his ear with your words. Jayce shivers so hard he fears his spurs are going to start jingling.

“Are you, now?” Your words, half a challenge and half a taunt, have heat prickling at the back of his neck. “I’d like to see you prove that.”

Denying you – or himself – would be a crime. And he’s not the kind of person to commit one.

“Yes, I— yes. Now?”

“Now.”

You give the bottom of his chin a meaningful little tap that urges him to stand; he eagerly follows, feeling very much like a dog being taught a new trick. He can’t decide if he loves it or hates it.

“Can I…” Jayce swallows, aware he’s going against the rule you’d established, but he needs to have this, at least. Needs to know if he’s going through with the worst possible idea he’s ever had and fucking his target, or, by some miracle, having the luckiest night of his life, and taking the world’s most attractive stranger to bed. “Before I do, can I know your name? Please?”

Your grin sends a rattling shiver up his spine. “You don’t need to beg,” you say, your voice falling into a playful, decadent lilt. “Not for my name.”

“So, what do I have to do?” He hates how helpless he sounds, hates how he can feel his guts shrink with shame when you laugh, mockingly almost.

But the sourness doesn’t last long — not when you squeeze his bicep and flash him a smile.

“You can just pay for the room we’ll be sharing tonight.”

Jayce has never shoved his hand into his satchel this enthusiastically. Jittery from excitement alone, he slaps the bills onto the bar counter, barely gets out the words “room for two, please”, snatches the room key from the barkeep the moment it’s within reach.

It’s only once he’s handed you the key and watches your ass while you lead the way that he realizes he’s stopped caring if you’re really his target. He should count himself lucky, really, that out of everyone in that wretched saloon, you’ve handpicked him when you could’ve easily had anyone. What does it matter who you are, who he is, if you both want each-other? What does it matter how fucked up tomorrow’ll be, if he can have you tonight?

A full body shiver shakes him when you slot the key in and twist the lock open. 

“I’m (y/n),” you say suddenly, peeking at him over your shoulder. “I can’t leave you without a name to call out for the rest of the night, can I?”

His stomach has never sunk so hard, his heart has never soared this high.

Fuck.

It’s you. No doubt about it.

As your hand finds his wrist and you tug him into the room, his gut twists with both heat and an impending sense of doom; he shouldn’t. 

Every fiber in his brain protests against every fiber in his body, he really shouldn't.

Shouldn’t let you kick the door shut behind yourself and walk him to the nearest wall. Shouldn’t cling to your leather coat. Shouldn’t let you nose your way under his jaw. Shouldn’t tilt his head to accommodate you. Shouldn’t choke on a whine so high that it stings in his throat.

But he does.

He’s always been a terrible liar, and now is no different. He can’t even lie to himself, much less to you, about how he aches for you. 

And maybe that’s all that matters. Maybe there’s no need to think about anything other than the bruising pinch of your teeth at his neck, or the nudge of your thigh between his legs, maybe he’s allowed to have something good for once and not give a shit about the consequences. His shoulders have been heavy with responsibility since the moment he’d first raised his rifle to protect the Kirammans. Although he suspects doing this is only going to make it so much heavier, your tongue and kisses still soothe, albeit momentarily. He lets himself have it.

Jayce’s last shred of resolve crumbles when your hands find his hips, and tug them forward to rock his erection against your thigh once more. He can’t help but sigh – it’s a relief, to be guided like this, to know he’s doing exactly what you want him to.

“You’ll tell me,” you say, “If I do something you don’t like. Won’t you?”

“Yes,” he says, although the list of things he wouldn’t refuse is embarrassingly short. Possibly non-existent.

“There’s a good boy,” you reply, and this time his knees do give out. Jayce finds himself lucky to be sandwiched between your frame and the wall. He clings to your waist with a broken whimper, can’t be bothered to focus on anything but the press of fabric against his swelling cock and your laugh brushing the shell of his ear. “I did have a burning suspicion calling you that’d make you weak in the knees, but not like this.” Although your tone is taunting, the kisses you suck to the spot behind his ear say otherwise. “Let’s get you to the bed while you can still stand, hm?”

He’d really like to have some retort of his own; normally does. But with you, for you, he can only nod dumbly, and lean against the wall in a pathetic attempt to catch his breath while you make your way to the bed. Can only watch as you toss your hat, gun belt and satchel on the floor, then let your coat slide off your shoulders with surprising grace.

Everything you’ve touched both burns and yearns for more, empty and cold and desperate, he needs to feel you again.

“Well?” The edge of the mattress creaks and dips below your seated weight, you’re smiling as you part your knees. “C’mere, pretty boy.”

He takes what’s offered. Stumbles your way, overzealous, and only stops half a step away, suddenly hit with the realization of what he’s about to do.

Not that he gets to ponder what tomorrow might bring, what sort of risks he might be taking by doing this. Not for long, not when you hook your fingers under his gun belt and use it to reel him in. He’s kissing his rationale goodbye, once and for all, when you simply start plucking his shirt open, smiling up at him with a hungry sort of reverence he’s not encountered anywhere else.

He’s been wanted before, of course he has.

But not like this. Strangers have approached him with a drink, a flirtatious touch, but never more; he’d always been expected to take control. You’ve peeked deeper into his soul than any of those strangers — more than anyone — ever has. You’ve spotted the part of him that yearns to let go and be taken care of, a part he’d never thought the world would accept, much less understand. And you didn’t even need to take more than one good, thorough look at him to figure him out.

That alone is incentive enough to lean into your warm caress, hands now spreading his shirt open, scratching at the hair on his chest and stomach, halting at his belt once more.

The sunset filters through the curtains, makes the smooth skin of his slash wound scar glisten in a warm gold. He’s never had his imperfections on vulnerable display like this not for the sake of having them marveled at. You’re watching the carved scar intently, frowning for less than a heartbeat – conflicted, in a way – before your eyes flicker up at him.

He’d worry what’s on your mind, if you weren’t holding his gaze as you leaned in and traced the scar’s smooth edge with your tongue.

“Wait, wait, what are you–”

There’s no need for an answer when your actions speak volumes. Pressing your parted lips to his tummy until your nose is buried deep in the soft curls of his happy trail, you kiss the spot with an open mouth. His first instinct is to squirm, away, into your touch, he can’t decide, only knows it’s too much, too soon, too intimate – he’d expected you to push him onto the bed and have your way with him.

Not this. Not tenderness. 

“You’re gorgeous,” you rasp, lips curling into a smile above his scar. “But then again, I reckon you’ve been told so plenty of times already.”

Not nearly enough, he wants to say, but decides against it. His heart is melting at the echo of the word in his own head; he’s been called handsome before, but never gorgeous. It’s unfamiliar and genuine. 

You’re calling him gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous and you mean it and it’s too much. He tilts his head to the ceiling to swallow the forming knot in his throat, focuses on counting the imperfections – not so different from what you’re doing to him, but significantly more personal.

You take your time with his body, with the array of scars that litter his front, appreciate each and every single one like it means something. For a moment, Jayce wants to set his hands on your head — not to push you, if anything, he needs to touch you to acknowledge this is even real — but when he raises them and realizes they’re shaking, he lets them hang at his sides loosely once more.

Much to his delighted surprise, you take one in yours, lace your fingers, and bring the other to his hip to steady him. As heavenly as it is to be held, be reassured like this, it doesn’t last. It never does.

All interest in his scars is lost as you perk up and peer at his hip.

“I suppose you know how to use this, cowboy?” 

He glances down at you with a gulp, realizes you’ve snatched the rope hanging off his gun belt.

Oh. 

Oh, fuck.

“U-uhm, yes,” he stutters out. Your smile is enigmatic, unreadable, as you trail the rope between your hands, then give a tug to test its sturdiness, obviously satisfied. He’s not one to cheap out on his gear. “I mean, someone’s gotta know how to catch a cow when it decides to stray.”

“Hm.” Your grin is nearly a bearing of fangs in its intensity. “Ever use it on a person before?”

At least once a week, maybe more, would be the truth. 

“Well, I–” Heat rising in his face, all the way up to his ears, Jayce resorts to nervously clearing his throat. “No. Never.”

“I’ll show you, if you’ll let me.”

His cock twitches at the mere thought of being tied up, at your mercy wholly. His brain, however, is not sold on the idea. 

Are you suggesting this solely because you want to tie him up and do as you please with him, or is this some sort of trick he’s too worked up to see through? Have you figured out who he is?

Sensing his reluctance, you give a reassuring smile, kiss the spit-slick skin of his scar. 

“Don’t worry, pretty boy. Once I’m done with you, I’ll let you tie me down, and let you use your mouth on me until I’ve had my fill of you. How’s that sound for a compromise?”

His presence of mind is nothing short of a miracle with your lips nibbling at the skin on his tummy, but, against all odds, he manages an epiphany. Maybe there is a way to get both what he wants – which is you – and stay true to his duty. And it’s obvious that you wouldn’t have suggested him tying you down in return, if you’d known who he is. You wouldn’t have suggested putting yourself in a vulnerable position, if you knew he was out to get you. And you wouldn’t have suggested it unless you cared for him.

He briefly wonders if the stories about you are even true. How could someone like you – warm hands, warm voice, warm kisses – have done even half the cold, ruthless things he’d heard?

It shouldn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. This is his job, and he’s never failed before, never disappointed before. He’s not going to start now. 

Even though he dislikes the fact that he’s going to use your kindness to his advantage, dislikes the fact that as soon as the rope will be around your wrists, he’ll be hauling you to his horse, and then promptly to the Sheriff’s, he’ll do what he must outside of this shabby saloon room. Within, he’ll take what he needs.

“Yes,” he agrees. “That– yes. Good. Sounds good.”

“Take your shirt off for me.”

He follows your command with newfound certainty, now that he knows that doing this with you is nothing more than a detour he’s taking to catch you. He just needs to keep a clear head, not lose sight of the goal behind all of this. Easy.

Until your palms trail up the generous expanse of his chest, coming to a halt below the meat of his pecs, and squeeze. 

“Nervous?” you lilt in a playful tone that has him bracing himself against your shoulders and pushing his chest into your hands. You chuckle, then give a gentle tug at his nipples that has him biting his lip to keep from moaning. 

So much for keeping a clear head.

“N-no.”

Your touch lingers on his chest, even as you move to stand, then duck your head to lick at his puffy areolas. The tip of your tongue barely touches enough to get them wet, before you huff out a delighted laugh against the slick skin. 

Jayce is reminded of that one time Mrs Kiramman had forced him into attending dance lessons, although this – letting you guide him to turn around until he’s the one whose calves are nudging the bed’s edge and you’re pressing in further, further, until he stumbles onto the bed – is somehow significantly more natural than any dance.

You crawl up to him between his parted thighs, rest one knee between them as you latch onto his neck and press him into the sheets until he’s flat on his back, open and vulnerable. Jayce can’t do much but shiver and grind his hardon into your thigh.

“So needy,” you tease, sliding one hand between your bodies to cup his hard cock and give a firm squeeze. Jayce jolts into it with a surprised squeak, uncharacteristically high. You only laugh, not mockingly, but with genuine enamorment. The squeeze softens, as does your gaze, and you massage at the outline of his cock with surprising gentleness. “‘s been a while for you, hasn’t it?”

His mind blanks at your inquiry. It has been too long, but he’d been hoping it wouldn’t be so obvious. 

Jayce’s voice comes out strained when he speaks, defensive, nearly hissed out through gritted teeth, as you keep rubbing his cock through his pants. “Why, do you do this often?” 

Jealousy is not a part of his question. It shouldn’t be. It’s not his fault that there’s still a rancid taste of it in his tone, he should know better. He does know better.

You laugh again, pressing your palm against the outline of his erection one final time, before you sit back on your knees. “Only when I find someone I particularly like,” you reply, fiddling with the rope, and Jayce tries not to read into it too much. 

But you said you like him, particularly so, and he can’t help the warmth in his chest. For a moment, Jayce truly feels special, even if he’s just another name on the list, there’s no place he’d rather be than your list. Part of him wants to pry deeper, prod for whatever confirmation he can find that he’s something more than just a one way ticket to pleasure in your eyes, but you’ve already untangled the rope and look at him with a cocked brow. “Give me your hands, wrists pressed together.”

Surrendering feels right. He brings his hands together in between the two of you, on the receiving end of the rope’s knot for the first time, and finds that the tremor in his hands is a product of excitement alone. Although he’d like to worry about the consequences of relinquishing control to you, his body has little regard for it.

He just wants to please.

You tie his wrists with surprising efficiency; not the clumsy kind of knot he’d used in his early days as a bounty hunter. No, you know your trade, winding the rope around his forearms, securing them with a firm knot that does not hurt, but immobilizes him all the way down to his elbows. 

He’s never felt more exposed than when you tug his wrists above his head and tie them to the bedpost. You hum, appeased, as your palms brush down his raised arms, down his chest, settling at his sternum. 

It has his hair raising — every touch, no matter how gentle, comes with a new, dangerous subtext that has him squirming. 

You’re in full control.

He hadn’t expected to love it this much. The realization that he has no way to fight what you want from him, that he can only be yours, be good, and hope you’ll reward him accordingly. It’s all in someone else’s hands – autonomy, responsibility, pleasure – and he’s never felt happier about giving it up.

You watch him for a moment, enraptured by the rise and fall of his chest under your hands, or perhaps his explosive heartbeat, the unmatched reverence with which he watches you loom over him and dip your nose between his neck and bicep to nip at his jaw.

It’s overwhelming to be doing nothing more than simply letting you bend and push and arrange him whatever way you like, and earn such high rewards for it.

Your affections come easily, willingly. If Jayce didn’t know who you were, what you do outside of this room, he’d be fooled into thinking you genuinely cared for him enjoying tonight. Maybe you do, some part of him hopes, but it doesn’t matter.

It shouldn’t matter.

You’re just a criminal. And in some weird, roundabout way, he’s just doing his job by letting you do with him as you please. That’s all there is to this — although he grasps for any hint of it being more intimate — you’re just a stranger. 

In spite of what he’s just told himself, he serves himself up to you on a vulnerable silver platter, twists in whatever way he can to let you have as much of him as you want, to sink your teeth into whatever spot you deem fit.

His hips jump when you bite, unrestrained and ravenous, into the tendon of his neck. 

Jayce would be content to come like this. Tied up, at your mercy, taking his pleasure in how you hum at his tender, raw kissed neck when he raises his thigh just right to let you rub against it. Hardly even needs to have anything — or anyone — touching him. His cock pulses just at the mere thought of granting you your release. 

He’s good, he’s useful, he’s the reason you’re panting against his sensitive skin and tilting your hips to meet the friction he provides. It’s all him.

All his life, he has known nothing but to make himself serviceable in a desperate cry for another’s attention, and now that you stop to work at his belt, said ingrained reflex comes into play. Whatever thought he had of the things you might do to him falls flat in comparison to servicing you. 

He wants to be what you want. What you need.

“Use me,” Jayce gasps out in a fit of mindlessness. “However you want to, it— it doesn’t matter. Please.”

You hesitate for a moment, but he feels your smile grow against his neck, now even more exposed as he's trying to hide his face in the groove of his bicep.

“You want that?” You punctuate your sentence with a series of delicate kisses. Jayce understands that in their slowness, they’re a moment of reprieve, a chance to change his mind. The first is at his jaw, then at the hollow of his cheek, and finally, at the corner of his lips. Answerless, you grasp his face between your thumb and palm, nudge him out of his hiding spot until he’s looking right at you. The sight of your lips has him chasing them, raising his face against your hold as you chuckle, cruel, and lean away. Jayce can only whine, and it seems to both amuse and satisfy you. “Want me to take whatever I want from you until I’ve had my fill, until you can’t take it anymore?”

He arches off the mattress at your question alone, tugs at his restraints desperately. He wishes he could hold you, squeeze you closer. 

“Please, yes, please,” he grits out. Lashes flutter tentatively as he looks at you, licks his lips hungrily before he speaks. “Whatever part of me you want, it’s yours, a-all yours.”

His words hit their mark. In an instant, your hands are gone, working at your belt, all the while you’re grinding yourself against him with new fervor. 

His mind buzzes, hands trembling in his restraints with nerve wracking excitement – he’s being useful.

“Your mouth,” you growl, “I want to use your filthy mouth, ride your gorgeous face, fuck myself on your tongue until I’m satisfied.”

Jayce can only muster up the clarity to nod, sob out a slurred ‘yesyesyesyes’ as your belt clinks and your thick, worn jeans rustle as you kick them off.

Your slick smears on his lower stomach once you’re finally bare. You grind yourself against the softness of him, and Jayce’s mouth floods at the prospect of getting to taste you. 

He’s never needed someone more than he needs you now.

“If you need to stop,” you say, climbing up his frame, “snap your fingers.”

“I won’t,” Jayce replies. He briefly worries if he’s overestimated himself — until your bare cunt hovers above his face and your hand is in his hair and he’s getting drunk off your scent alone and he’s raising his head off the mattress in a way that hurts and it doesn’t matter, none of it does, because he gets to taste you.

You’re soft, warm and gushingly wet, unfamiliar but alluring tang of you heavy and dizzying in his senses. His lips click with how wet they are when he opens them, mouth watering from the scent of you, tongue dripping before he’s even laid the first lick against your slit. 

Delicate is the first thing that comes to mind when he finally does; the give of your flesh against his lips, into the fleeting kiss he presses to your folds before he dips his tongue into the gushing space between is reminiscent of ripened fruit. Jayce closes his eyes to indulge in the sensation, circles the tip of his tongue at your dripping hole, then drags forward, until he’s nosing at your pubic mound.

“You taste… s-so good.” A sigh slips from him as his lips cushion your swollen clit into a soft kiss. “More,” he gasps against it, “more, please.” You have to brace yourself against the headboard to avoid tipping over from the sensation, and his heart is full with joy from that alone.

“Good boy,” you coo, fingers scratching adoringly at his sideburns. “You’ll get more.” He cracks his heavy eyes open to peer at you: watching him with utter delight as your gentle touch spurs him on, tugs him a little closer.

That’s not going to be enough, Jayce realizes. With a sloppy, wet sound, he unlatches his lips from your cunt, licks them clean and tries to catch his breath and tell you what he needs.

“Sit,” he pants against your dripping sex. “Sit on my face. Please.”

You’re still hovering above him, hesitant for a heartbeat, before you do, and it’s heaven. Jayce realizes he cares very little for air when he has you invading his senses, when he can bury his tongue into your pink, soft cunt until you’re fucking yourself on it and keening for more, more, more.

“Yes,” he chokes out under the featherlight weight of your cunt against his tumescent lips. “Mmh— fuck, yes.”

He could easily spend the rest of his life right here, between your thighs, brain buzzing with a painful lack of oxygen, bridge of his nose pressing into your clit, lapping and sucking at your heat like it’s his sole purpose.

“You’re so— so good,” you groan, rocking yourself against his waiting tongue with abandon. “So desperate for me.” He flattens it out eagerly when you grind your clit against it, plunges it into you with a full-body moan when your hole is within reach, suckles on your bundle of nerves when your thighs quiver so hard that they nearly give out below you. He chases the roughness of your pull at his roots, the height of your moans like it’s a reward. “With a mouth like that, you— a-ah, you belong in the whorehouse just down the road, don’t you?”

His mind blanks at the double edged praise. Jayce can only sob, eyes rolling into the back of his skull at the confirmation that he’s doing well, so well; wishes he could untie his arms just to force your thighs apart and sink himself into you until there’s not a thought left in his head.

When he opens his eyes, you move to hover above his face, shivering at his frigid, racing breath hitting your drenched pussy. A stretchy string of spit-slick stretches between his swollen lips and your entrance, breaks and lands on his chin when he gasps for breath. It has Jayce’s cock jerking out another droplet of precum below his navel.

He’s lucky you pull away when you do. Judging by the ringing of his ears, the tears clinging to his lashes and clouding his vision, or how his lungs hurt, he’d needed it.

“Look at you,” you whisper, cupping his cheek and thumbing at his parted, slick lips. Still driven by mindlessness alone, he envelops it in his mouth, breathlessly hums when you chuckle and press in, press down on his tongue, press until you’re nearly inside his throat. He swallows around it with a punched out little mewl, sucks it although the webbing of your thumb is already stretched taut against his lower lip. “Desperate for anything you can get, ain’t you?”

Arguing with that would be futile — it’s true. He is desperate, for pleasure, for contact, for tenderness, for you, and it’s wrongly right to have it acknowledged and accepted and indulged. 

Jayce can’t tell if the hot tear pearling down his cheek and into his sideburns is a result of choking on your thumb or relief, but it’s not even relevant. You’re wiping at its trail and smiling down at him like he’s the only thing that matters.

He’s ached for it; to be the center of someone’s attention and affections, yet now, he finds himself overwhelmed with it; wishes he hadn’t agreed to you tying him down. He could’ve pulled you back onto his mouth instead of whining around your thumb and closing his eyes to ignore his own whines and choked-up, slick sounds as he laves his tongue against your heavy thumbprint. You pull it from his mouth with a pop, smiling down at him.

“Such a good mouth, such a pretty face,” you whisper, tone tender in spite of your following words. “It’s like you were made for this. Made for being used until you break.”

“Please.” The weight of your thumb rubs his lip raw. “Please, I— nh-need to feel you cum on my tongue.”

“Go on, earn it,” you encourage, and Jayce moans — truly, actually moans — when the mattress shifts and he can feel his nose and lips brush your cunt. 

You’re clenching and he can tell without even having nudged your hole, just from how your clit pulses against the flat of his tongue. Your hand, once gentle, now grabs at his hair and yanks — and he’s moaning in encouragement again just for that. Muffles his voice into a very agreeing mmmh against your clit before he’s wrapping his lips around it and sucking. 

You take the hint, hold him against yourself and part your cunt open with your other hand to thrust yourself against the suction of his lips, well and truly using him now. His cock jerks in response, uncharacteristically hard for how little it’s been touched. His hips follow the movement, shooting off the bed in search for something, anything, pathetically settling back down when he’s greeted with nothing.

You notice, of course you do. But you don’t let up in your grinding, only give a tug at his hair while you peek over your shoulder and laugh.

“You look like you could come just from this,” you say, before you glance down at him. His eyes shamefully fall shut, before he finally, finally gives a reluctant nod. He’s not even sure himself — but growing surer of it by the minute still. 

You huff out a laugh again, but this time it’s less sadistic and more surprised, before you’re angling yourself to let his tongue sink into your hole. The rest comes naturally to him. Hinge his jaw open, stiffen his tongue, thrust it deep, thorough, prod until he finds the spot at the front of your cunt that makes you see stars.

The fact that your hips twitch and you start to furiously rub at your clit is confirmation enough that he’s doing well.

Jayce whines, loud and unabashed, lower half thrashing against the sheets desperately. He’s close, so close, can feel his cock ache and twitch with near-release pressure. And he hasn’t even been touched.

“You poor thing, you are gonna cum like this.” A moan interrupts your observation, and Jayce is thankful for it. If you’d pointed out how he’s pathetically rutting up against thin air, he might’ve come then and there. He dares opening his eyes to look up at you through his damp lashes, whimpers against your slick, pulsing clit, a plea to take what you need. It earns an amused scoff from you, before you’re tilting your head back and fucking his mouth. “God,” you gasp, “s-so fucking depraved, aren’t you?”

Jayce has always considered himself more responsive to praise, but there is something vastly different about your insult. It hardly feels like one, and he finds reassurance in it – a vulnerable, unfamiliar kind – you know what he is at his core, and you’re saying it to his face, but none of it hurts, because you still want him. Not in spite of his desperation, but for it.

Right now, he can be his depraved, pathetic self without a care in the world. Can kick his feet at the sheets, can pull and writhe against his restraints, can lap up your juices like they sustain him, can moan out his pitiful pleasure into your core.

You lean back, brace yourself against his chest, thighs quivering and flexing at his sides.

“Open up… good, that’s exactly it.” Jayce complies, choking on a sob while his dick aches at your praise. If only his hands were untied, if he could touch himself before his cock feels like it’s gonna explode, if he could wrap his arms around your hips and press you onto his face until– “Oh, f-fuck, yes. Tongue out, pretty boy. I’m gonna cum in your whore mouth.”

He’s not sure what exactly makes his eyes roll into the back of his skull, his back arch, what makes his cock convulse in pleasure so potent it hurts. He can only squirm below you and wail a vibrating groan into your drenched, throbbing cunt while his hips cant up against nothing and nothing is touching his dick and there’s nothing, his orgasm is nothing – vehement and overwhelming and not fucking enough and he’s coming all over himself, over your back. You’re still chasing your pleasure on his lips, his tongue, and you’re there, but not where he needs you, not how he needs you.

It’s too much. It’s not enough.

He whimpers again when the ringing in his ears lets up barely enough to register your voice. You’ve lifted your cunt off his mouth, puffy clit still twitching with the aftermath of a powerful orgasm from where it peeks out from between your slick, swollen folds. His back and (judging by the way the wood creaks) the headboard strain under how he pulls at his restraints, raising his chin to suck a delicate kiss to the bundle of nerves. It makes your hips twitch, rolling against his mouth one last, complacent time before you settle on his collarbone. 

Once the throb of his unsatisfying orgasm subsides, Jayce looks up at your wrecked, heaving form through damp lashes (when had he even started crying?). You meet his gaze, looking significantly more placid now – more sated – and reach to brush the hair from his forehead. 

“Such a good boy,” you whisper, huffing when his eyes drift shut and he leans into your palm. “Letting me make such good use of your filthy little mouth.”

Jayce isn’t sure what to reply, but realizes it’s unneeded when you descend, easily settling your knees on either side of his hips. He might’ve stopped to think about the allure of your sopping hole hovering above his cock, but that’s long forgotten when you brace yourself on his ribs and lean in to lick the trickle of your own juices off his chin. 

“God,” you whisper against his skin, voice so low and smug it sends a steady trickle of hot arousal down his spine, “you’ve made me cum with all the skill of a slut.” 

Your tongue pushes in-between his friction-raw lips for a heartbreakingly brief moment, before you move on, kissing down his chest. There, you find the first spurt of his cum, splattered neatly across his sternum, and lap it up with a pleased hum. “And you got off on it too, look at you.”

His body rebels against his previous orgasm, obeys you instead, cock pulsing with another wave of arousal where it’s tucked snugly between your bodies. You feel it, of course you do – Jayce is not subtle in any way, shape or form – and it earns him a wicked little smirk from you.

“You need more already?” you taunt, nuzzling at his sternum. “You’re insatiable.”

He can’t tell if you’re chastising or genuinely enticed with his overzealousness; out of habit alone, an apology already scratches at the back of his teeth. Your mouth, dripping with a mixture of his cum and your spit, seals around his nipple to suck, while your hand comes up to cradle his other pec, and that alone is enough to shut him up before he can get out past the o in “sorry”.

“I know,” you soothe. “I’ll take care of you. Let me take care of you.”

He can’t do much but arch into your touch and moan for more, which you happily provide, circling his nipple with your tongue, gently thumbing and squeezing at the other one. Teeth scrape and fingers pull at the sensitive little pebbles, pleasure-pain buzzing at his ruddy nipples, shooting straight down his spine to his neglected cock. It throbs in time with his heartbeat, already heavier. Harder.

“You’ve made such a mess of yourself,” you comment breathlessly, cruelly abandoning his sore tits in your pursuit of his spend, further down his abdomen. Your lips linger there, greedily lapping up the final few drops of his own cum before you part his legs with your knees, settling in-between them.

Gingerly, your palm wraps around his cock, giving a few gentle but terribly dry, overstimulating pumps. The sensitivity burns, has Jayce keening and pulling at the rope.

Too much.

“Please, I’m—mmh!” Biting his lip so hard he draws blood is the only thing that can keep his desperate moan at bay. Your grip around him tightens enough to hurt, until you lean over his cock and spit on its red, sensitized tip. “A-ah, nnh, fuck—!”

His hips shoot up into your grip with the first contact between your cold saliva and his scorching skin, then fall into a faltering, broken back and forth when you rub your palm against the slick tip. 

It’s still mind-numbingly overwhelming, but in spite of it, his cock is jerking into fullness slowly.

“Shh, there you go,” you coo, the slick sounds of you stroking him echoing your words. Jayce’s entire body floods with goosebumps from your words alone. His first impulse is to lean into you, curl against you, desperate for contact that soothes rather than overwhelms. There’s none to be found. From where you’re kneeling between his thighs and watching him thrash under your touch, he can’t do much but choke out an incoherent sob and let you do with him as you please. “Already hard again, and you came just a minute ago. You needed this so bad, didn’t you?”

“Y-yes, yes, I just– wait, ‘s too much–”

In an instant, your hand is gone, both your palms settling against his inner thighs instead. As much as the contact had set his nerves alight, with its sudden lack, Jayce finds himself aching for it, and regretting his words. 

“Spread,” you say, nudging his knees apart, delving forward the instant he complies. His inquiries about what exactly you’re planning on doing are long, long gone the moment you flatten your tongue against his balls, careful as you ease one into your mouth just enough to suckle on gently.

Jayce hears something in the bed’s structure break with how he shoots up. Still, whatever pins his hands above his head remains intact, keeps him unmoving, vulnerable.

“Oh, fuck,” he gasps, gritting his teeth when you settle your hands under his knees, pushing up. “That’s– What are you–”

“Relax,” you reply, tone so saccharine he can’t help but let himself be pliant, let you push his knees up to his chest. If he thought he’d been exposed before, now it’s gotten significantly worse, with his cock drooling against his stomach and his asshole twitching, every part of him on full display. All for you to scrutinize.

Through a teary blur, his gaze still finds yours, and you give a smile that’s both mischievous and gentle. “I just wanna make you feel good, Jayce. So if I do anything that doesn’t, you just give me the word, ‘n I’ll stop, yeah?”

“Mm-hmm,” he all but squeaks when you take his answer and run with it. The moment his approval is given, you lean back in, nosing at his balls, while your lips brush at his perineum, latching onto it firmly before you suck.

Nerves zing with delight and pressure, the sensation somehow tingling all the way inside his stomach.

“O-oh, that’s— ah, s-so good…”

He hadn’t even thought about touching himself there – much less considered someone else would. It’s good, more than good, has his body singing with a novel, unfamiliar pleasure, hips canting up to meet your lips. His heart races at the thought of what else you might tease out of him, and as your tongue laves at his taint and your hand comes up to grasp his hardening cock, he realizes he’ll take everything you’re willing to give him.

When he glances your way, he finds you already watching his face, your smirk evident in just how your eyes smile from your cheeks. Slowly, you work your way upwards, kissing and licking at the curve of his balls before you close your eyes and moan as if you’re indulging yourself, rather than him. 

The vibrations of your voice permeate his flesh, heat prickling at his spine, a rush of pleasure that has his stomach flipping.

He’s not going to last like this.

“Keep your legs up for me,” you say, to which he lets them fall flush against his heaving chest. You kiss the base of his cock with an open mouth, tell him exactly what he’s aching to hear, lips brushing a bulging vein with every syllable. “Such a good little slut, open and needy for me.”

His entire being quivers from just your praise, and his next moan is shaky, strangled, stuck somewhere in a knot in his throat. His dick leaks out a fat bead of precum that pearls down his underside, and finally, into the willing kisses you press at the root of him. Picking up on the salty taste, your lashes flutter as you look up at him, salacious.

“Close already?” You lilt, but rather than taunting, your tone sounds pleased. Jayce nods, desperate and quick. In an instant, your lips are around his tip, while your free hand comes up to cup his balls and fondle them, eager to earn his release. 

Your touch is an overwhelming, coordinated assault on his sensitive nerves, has his hips thrashing between the tight, moist heat of your mouth at his pulsing tip, and the careful, circling press of your thumb between his balls. Under your touch, they draw up tight against his perineum, all the while his dick gives a needy jerk against your tongue. He knows you feel it, too, because you hum and your lips tighten around him in a smile before you pull away.

The gossamer string of spit and cum stretching between your lower lip and his cockhead is mesmerizing, even more so when your tongue laps at it to break it. “Good,” you rasp, wrapping your other hand around the base of his cock to angle it up, ducking to lick and suck at the spot below his red, swollen tip that makes him mewl. “Let me taste you.”

The moment you suck him into your mouth again, lips barely past the ridge of his glans, Jayce is done for. If your tongue writhing against the fullness of his cockhead hadn’t been enough, your encouragement is. He arches off the bed with pleasure so intense and wrecking it seems unending, ruining; screams out his rapture to the shabby saloon room walls and pumps his heavy, thick load into your waiting mouth. 

You ease him through it, surprisingly gentle compared to how eager you’d been to overstimulate him seconds ago. Your tongue twirls at the underside of his dick, thirsty for the taste of his release that wrecks him from overheating core to numb limbs. You drink it up, with quick, shallow little swallows of his come, and one final, thick one the moment he finally settles into the mattress; spent, dry and heaving.

Once the last wave of pleasure barely tugs at the ridges of his being and Jayce remembers how to breathe, you’re climbing up his frame, grinning like the cat that got the cream.

He supposes that’s sort of what you are, anyway.

Jayce doesn’t manage more than a punched out wheeze, and a surprised hum when you earnestly kiss him for the first time. The contact between his lips and yours nearly hurts in its force, your tongue pushes into his mouth greedily, laves against his own.

He tastes his own salty bitterness on you, even as you pull back and smile ever so sweetly.

And just like that, he’d be content to let you go, free of charge for any and all crimes you may have committed, just for this alone.

Panting, grinning, Jayce watches you climb off him, more at ease than he has been in years. Sleep is going to come blissfully easy tonight, with how you’ve wrecked him already. His eyes drift shut and he listens to the calming thud of your bare feet against the wooden floor. For the first time tonight, he registers the ache in his arms, his shoulders, even the set ribs that sit right below his arms.

To believe he’d even considered turning you in. Absurd.

“Can you, uh—“ he swallows, realizes his throat is also parched. “Shit. Can you untie me? My arms hurt.”

“I’m afraid not,” you reply plainly, and your reply doesn’t particularly alarm him — not until he hears the clink of a belt.

Already half-dressed, you’re padding around the room, collecting your clothes, and putting them on worryingly fast.

What?

“What are you—“

His voice dies in his throat when you fasten your belt, shirt already buttoned up, then snatch his satchel off the floor.

“Hey, hey, hey, that’s mine!”

“I’m aware,” you reply plainly, easily tugging it open, scoffing at what you find inside. Laughing now, well and truly laughing, you pull the sheet of paper out, unfold it— oh. Oh, fuck. “Ha, I knew it.”

Your bounty poster.

“A friendly tip for next time,” you lilt, dropping it before you push your hand into his satchel and retrieve a thick wad of dollar bills Mrs Kiramman had given him for new rifle parts, “maybe don’t bring posters with you on your hunts. And get better at lying. No cattle rancher needs that many finely crafted firearms. Or has that many knife wound scars.”

Wordless, Jayce watches in utter horror as you pocket it, and then take whatever other valuables you find in his satchel. Mr Kirraman’s broken golden watch, which he was going to take to the jeweller tomorrow, and fuck, he can’t believe this is happening.

“Untie me,” he tries, in his meanest big boy voice. You laugh again, and it makes his stomach flip the exact opposite way from how you’d made it turn a minute ago.

“Or what, Talis?”

Hearing his last name has never stung this hard. He’s never particularly liked being addressed with it, had felt it too daunting because it reminds him of the legacy he’s to carry on his shoulders, but now it’s a bitter testament of his naïveté. You know who he is. 

And you had used him. For his body, for his willingness, but ultimately, for his profession. He wonders, briefly, if you ever even wanted him, or if you just handpicked him because you knew he was out to get you. 

He pushes that thought down, mainly because sulking about it won’t solve the predicament he’s in right now, but his hurt bubbles up in a sad rendition of anger.

“I will get out of these ropes once someone finds me,” He threatens. The sheer thought of someone seeing him like this makes him physically recoil, but he pushes onward regardless. The fact that you’ve fucked him because he’s a bounty hunter stings, but it’s also his only leverage against you right now. “And trust me, you’re not getting away with this, or anything else you’ve committed, once I do.”

“Right.” You half scoff, half laugh. “I would very much like to see you try.”

So much for what little leverage he had. He knew it was a long shot to intimidate you with his profession, sure, but hadn’t expected it to fall quite so flat. Then again, you did fuck the soul out of him with such little regard for who he is that he should’ve known better than to even try.

Disinterested, you let his satchel drop now that you’ve squeezed it for all its worth, and turn to the door.

It’s difficult to decide what’s more embarrassing: the fact that you not only saw through his plan, or that you used it against him and he’d walked right into it.

And now that his grave is dug and he’s fallen right into it, you’re walking away without a care in the world, whistling to yourself.

At a loss for any other arguments, Jayce does what he does best. Plead.

“Wait, wait, wait!”

To his surprise, you do, in fact, wait, turning to look at him, hand hovering above the doorknob.

He didn’t think he’d get this far. But if threatening you didn’t work, perhaps earning your sympathy will.

“Please… “ he starts, mouth cottony as he tries to come up with something, anything to say, “don’t do this. You can’t— you can’t leave me like this! I’m naked!”

“Oh, I do envy the lucky bastard that’ll be getting an eyeful of you tomorrow morning,” you lilt, mischievous gaze softening ever so subtly as it lingers on its way down his ruined body. Based on how your eyes twinkle, you get an idea — a terrible one. “But I s’pose I could let you keep one shred of the dignity you’ve so willingly given up for me, can’t I?” Humming, you simply snatch his hat off his head, grinning as you place it just enough to cover his softening cock.

Jayce hates that it makes him whine.

“There you go. And—“ you retrieve the money you’d taken, tucking a laughable amount under the hat’s rim, right above the hipbone you’d stroked so reverently minutes ago, “here. For your troubles. That oughtta be enough to convince the staff not to tell everyone in town about what they’ll find in this room tomorrow morning, hm?”

With that, you leave, still chuckling to yourself. 

Jayce can’t believe this is happening.

—

“I can’t believe this happened,” Cassandra repeats herself for the fourth time tonight, staring into her tea, swirling it in her cup, before she glances back to Jayce. “Horrid! For someone to be able to rob you blind in your sleep like that — with all your experience — they must be incredibly skilled.” 

“They, ah, got lucky, too,” Jayce adds, swallowing thickly. He hates the accidental double entendre, and hates that it’s right. “I hadn’t managed to sleep well the night before — with, uh, y’know, coyotes howling out in the prairie, and I, uh, I… I slept heavier than usual.”

Caitlyn scoffs from beside the fireplace, botched embroidery her mother had forced her into practicing discarded on her lap. A desperate attempt at forcing her into something more befitting of her station after she’d brazenly told them about her plans to work under Sheriff Marcus as an enforcer once she turns eighteen. 

Mrs Kirraman is not coming to terms with it, but considering Caitlyn’s stubbornness (and impressive marksmanship and smarts), Cassandra is playing a losing game. Not that Jayce minds. He’s taken Caitlyn with him an abundance of times, especially on low risk jobs, and has promised her tutorage, shall she ever need it.

It comes to bite him in the ass in ways he hadn’t thought possible.

“The first time you took me with you to Shurima you slept through the cicadas and the coyotes,” she comments. “I could tell because you were snoring the whole time.”

Jayce wishes the look he gives her could be classed as murderous, but in truth, it’s anxious. And it has Caitlyn grinning as she picks up on the fact that Jayce is obviously hiding something.

He hates when she does this.

“Prairie coyotes and desert coyotes have distinctively different howls,” Jayce replies, fully aware of his lie. Cassandra won’t pick up on it, Tobias even less so, but Cait–

“Sure.” She snorts into her tea, then straightens up with an apathetic roll of her shoulders under her mother’s scolding gaze.

“Regardless,” Cassandra interrupts, “I will talk to Marcus about this. His men are still far more incompetent than you, but perhaps it would aid you to have more people in on this, Jayce.”

He hates how his stomach flips at the thought of enforcers’ hands on you – not because he cares about you, he tells himself, but because it’s not fair. You’ve taken him for a fool, and made him one, too. He’s spent his entire night waiting, writhing, and pulling at his restraints, has spent his morning trying not to die of embarrassment when one of the cleaning maids had found him stark naked and tied to the bed, had spent his entire day riding back to the Kiramman estate. He wants a night to lick his wounds, and then, he wants his justice. Needs it — needs to put you where he should’ve put you the moment he laid eyes on you: in prison.

“No,” he says, “I, uh– I’ve got this. I do. I just… I need to think about how I’m gonna go about this. Come up– come up with a plan.” As he settles in his chair and stares down at his cold tea, mere porcelain seemingly heavy in his leaden hands, he realizes that he isn’t just ashamed, but utterly spent after today’s events. And after what he did with you, too. 

He tries to stifle a yawn, but miserably fails.

Tobias claps an encouraging hand on his shoulder. “Go ahead and get some rest.”

“He’s slept through someone robbing him,” Caitlyn argues. “How is he even—“

“Be a dear and take the teacups to the kitchen, Caitlyn,” her mother cuts her off. Jayce’s shoulders sink with relief from being saved, albeit momentarily, from Cait’s stubborn curiosity. He suspects this won’t be the end of it, and has it confirmed the moment he hands over his teacup and finds her gaze lingering on his wrists, peeking out from below the cuffs of his sleeves.

She raises a brow, but Jayce knows better than to stick around for follow-up questions. Especially in front of her parents.

Standing up so fast the chair scrapes against the freshly polished floor with a squeak, he fights against the drag of his feet and makes his way out of the room in the least awkward way possible, climbing up the stairs to his room two at a time.

In all his years working for the Kirammans, he’d practically become a part of their family – and after his mother had passed from tuberculosis four years ago, the change had been cemented. He’d been allocated a permanent room at the estate. The door leading to it, equipped with its very own lock, becomes a light at the end of the tunnel, with the tunnel being Caitlyn and her curiosity.

He does not reach said light. Luck has never been on his side, and that isn’t changing now.

After a good few years of living with them, he knows how each of them – and even some of the staff – climb the stairs. The quick, light steps ringing out right now foretell bad news.

Before he’s made it to his room, Cait has already caught up, sprinting behind him and, much to his surprise, grabbing a hold of his wrist.

“Hey–!”

“Did the coyotes do this, too?” She jokes, although her tone is mercifully low, almost a whisper. With a victorious smirk, she’s rubbing at the tender skin of his wrists. Growling under his breath, Jayce rips them from her grip, brings his hands closer to his chest.

“No, this is, uh–” Jayce’s brain blanks in his attempt to come up with an excuse. Realistically, there’s nothing that could’ve caused the rope marks on his wrists except for another human, and that’s the last thing he wants to talk about right now. “This is none of your business, actually,” is the best he can come up with.

She pauses for a bit.

“They tied you up.” She concludes, crosses her arms in front of her chest. The cogs in her head turn visibly, and, judging by the horror that grips her, she jumped to a very wrong conclusion. “Oh, god, did— did they torture you?”

“No,” he replies. Quite the opposite, actually. But Caitlyn doesn’t need to know that. “No, they didn’t. I’m fine. Everything is fine.”

“Well, since everything is fine,” Caitlyn mocks, “why don’t you tell me what really happened?”

She’s told him about a few innocent crushes here and there, and fine, maybe he’s confessed to a few as well, but this is off the table. He’d rather sink into the ground before he admits he knowingly fucked his target and was moronic enough to let them tie him up without much more than a single second thought.

“It’s none of your business.”

“It is my business if they hurt you.”

Her voice, serious and very much protective in a way that’s clearly emulated from whenever it was him that had to step in as her protector has his defenses crumbling.

“Fine.” Jayce relents. “They, uh, tied me up.”

“I gathered as much. How’d they manage that?”

Right. He’s not going to say anything about that.

“In, in my sleep.”

“In your sleep?”

“Yes.”

“Alright, I’ll take your word for it,” she says, and much to Jayce’s surprise, accepts his terrible lie and changes the subject. Her eyes drift lower, focus on his neck. “Your bandana looks dirty, I can take it to the washing room, if you’d like. As an apology for pestering you.”

He’s not about to turn down a truce.

“Uh…” Jayce tries, to his credit, to figure out where her change of heart came from. But the tone of her voice holds nothing but genuine care, so he finds himself going to untie the knot at the back of his neck. “Sure. Thanks,” he mumbles, handing it over, watching her eyes widen for a moment, lingering at his collar. “What?”

“Oh. Oh my god.” Caitlyn draws in a surprised breath, can’t stop staring at his neck. What— oh. Oh, no, the marks you’d left on his neck, neither small in number nor subtle. Fuck. “Don’t tell me you fu—“

Out of instinct alone, Jayce stumbles forward, claps a hand over Caitlyn’s mouth, and drags her into his room, kicking the door shut behind himself.

“Shut up,” he grits out, watches how her gaze goes from surprised to devious at an alarming rate. “Please. If you tell your parents about this—“

Annoyed, she bites into the meat of his palm, which is incentive enough to pull back with a hiss. Caitlyn scoffs, wipes her mouth while Jayce wipes his hand on his jeans, and ignores the pulsing where her canines had sunk into his skin.

“The fact that you even think I’d tell them is insulting.”

His shoulders slump with relief at her words, and with that, his fatigue hits him all over again. Subconsciously, heavy feet drag against his carpet, barely making it to his bed, plopping down on its edge within seconds. Caitlyn still stands right where he left her, back against the door, arms crossed, staring at the floor.

Her silence is thoughtful, heavy.

 “What are you going to do now?” she asks.

Jayce sighs, buries his face in his hands. “I dunno. Catch them, turn them in, I guess?”

This is the first time Jayce has ever heard her laugh with pity — and he hates it.

“Right. Sounds like a breeze, especially after you slept with them.”

“That was an accident.”

“An accident?” She scoffs. “What, you tripped, and your pants just happened to fall—“

“It’s not that simple, Cait!”

She sighs, shakes her head. “Listen, Jayce. I’m not here to judge you—“

He shoots her a look. “And yet…”

“Right, well,” Cait rolls her eyes, turns to rest her hand on the doorknob, “I’m just saying; if you do want to catch them, you might want to be quick about it. Mother already sent out word to Marcus to provide reinforcements.”

How this day just keeps getting worse is beyond him.

“Thanks for the tip,” Jayce says, ignoring the worry churning in his gut, “but I’ve got this. Trust me.”

“Okay.” Caitlyn gives an encouraging smile. “Just— try not to be stupid about this.”

“Yeah,” Jayce replies, knowing full well he already has been irreparably, inexcusably stupid about this.

And that he’s about to do much, much worse when he sets out to find you again in the dead of night, not more than seven hours after Caitlyn’s advice.

[hryniewiecki]

🍞

yes (ain't got much left, but it's honest work)

the first one was for an actual 3D class assignment, don't worry about it (I passed)

[hryniewiecki]

forgot to include this

hi, because I left instagram for good, here's almost all the shitpost I made with Jayce Talis Toast™ that was once in my story highlights keep reading at your own risk

the toast itslef I stole from pinterest and have no idea who the original creator is, but I want to thank them very much for changing my life, because over the course of two years I put it everywhere

translation for the last two pics: the same joke repeated 27 times levels of toast doneness(?) analysis (40 photos) average brightness average color saturation