#kitchen hell 2022

[thunderheadfred]

so glad i spent a year renovating my entire kitchen so that my sons can have a clean bright place to do Even More Mischief

[m0e-ru]

(reading my own ao3) wow this bitch is so correct and on point i wish there was more . cmon guys look at this shit https://archiveofourown.org/series/2536405

[elgaberino-mcoc]

Jessica Jones has graduated from the Wishlist and the Balance Poll!

Spotlight: https://playcontestofchampions.com/news/jessica-jones/… 

Vote wishlist here: http://tinyurl.com/mcocwishlist 

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[darkfemininenergy]

LET’S PLAY THAT GAME ━ ethan landry

pairing: gf!ethan x fem!reader

warning: smut, ghostface phone call, dom!ethan, sub!reader, fingering, rough sex, choking, ropes, spit kink, fingers sucking, dirty talk, gloves kink.

author’s note: english is not my first language, and also my first time writing smut so i hope it’ll be good. if you have any request, let me know !

YOU’D COME HOME from the gym an hour ago, the only classes you had were this morning and you were grateful to have the whole afternoon off for once. you'd had lunch with mindy at noon and then decided to take her home, since the ghostface attacks had hit new york, following the 4 survivors of woodsboro, you didn't want the young meeks martin to go home alone, even in the middle of the day, who knows what might happen, especially when you knew who her uncle was.

now you were in your kitchen after a nice shower, in the background as sound of « how to get away with murder », one of your favorite tv shows, mindy found it quite ironic since you were in a law major.

you were cooking dinner quietly after a bit of studying, standing in front of the hob, dressed in a short, tight-fitting black top and gray shorts, your phone at your side as you wrote to the young meeks martin, who was confiding in you about her feelings for anika.

and that's when your phone began to vibrate, thinking it was mindy, a slight smile appeared on your lips before you grabbed your phone, but this smile slowly disappeared in your face due to what appeared on your screen: unkown caller.

a bad feeling began to take hold of you as, paranoid as you were, you looked around you at the knives just inches from you, spotting the largest of them.

you then answered the phone, adrenalin coursing through your body.

- hello ?

the sound of the oil against the frying pan camouflaged the sound of your series in the living room, as you added spices, waiting for an answer from your interlocutor, the wait was heavy.

- hello, y/n, replied the deep, gravelly, modulated voice.

ghostface.

a shiver ran down your spine, and your body froze, paralyzed as you realized the obvious: you were part of the group of friends of the survivors of the 2022 attacks.

you turned off the gas, stopped cooking. And clicked your tongue against the roof of your mouth.

- well, go ahead, i’m wainting for the “what's your favorite scary movie ?” part.

you tried not to show any signs of fear, but inside you were terrified, imagining yourself already dead on your kitchen floor, but you knew you didn't have time to think about it and passed your index finger between the various knives on the rack in front of you, leaning slightly over the worktop.

the only response you got was a little laugh of amusement, mixed with a hint of sadism, from the killer, and it made your blood run cold.

- you're a bold one, aren't you? now, i think that i'm really going to enjoy this.

- fuck you.

-but you're also a very pretty one... he said with a seductive tone, too bad that i have to correct that filthy mouth of yours, he finished with a voice full of brutality, as if your insult had made him angry.

his change of mood startled you, and you immediately straightened up, then nervously tapped the surface of your kitchen with your freshly manicured nails.

- what do you want ? you asked, trying not to show how scared your voice sounded.

he hums slowly, as if he's thinking, and you can feel the goosebumps on your skin.

- that's a good question... what do i want... ? i want to play a game.

your heart was starting to race, so without thinking any further, you grabbed the largest knife and suddenly turned around with dynamism, all your senses now activated.

- do you want to play a game, y/n ? the modulated voice asked you.

- go to hell, i’m not going to play any of your sick game, you replied brutally.

- you look cute with that knife, tell me, what are you going to do with it, sweetheart ? stab me ? he teased.

you could practically hear the smirk in his voice and it drived you insane as well as the pet name, your grip on your knife was starting to tighten.

- where are you, asshole ? you spat hatefully.

you started to look from left to right, if anyone else could see you through your window, they'd think you were crazy to get so agitated, you leaned over to look towards the right exit which led to the hallway of your apartment, before returning to the kitchen which overlooked your living room.

you put your phone on the worktop behind your hob not far from your fridge, and activated the speakerphone to leave the call and type in the police number before he even answered.

- oh i wouldn't try to call the police if i were you, y/n, it'd be a real shame for mindy and anika to pay the consequences of your stupid actions.

your fingers stopped typing on your screen, not only because of the threat, but also because a detail had caught your attention, how did he know i was going to call the police ?

- h-how.... you began before cutting yourself off, can you see me?

he was sniggering again, and you were really beginning to hate that horribly creepy sound. you swallowed that awful lump in your throat that prevented you from speaking properly and waited for an answer.

- of course i can see you. i must admit that you look good in those, a little bit short though, does your boyfriend know you carry around in your apartment like that, y/n ?

panic-stricken, you hung up, and what a grave mistake you'd made, dropping your phone onto the wooden surface, you clutched the edge of it as if your body were threatening to collapse and you were looking for something to lean on. but then you pulled yourself together and grabbed your phone, never letting go of the knife you'd armed yourself with.

you moved towards the large window in your living room and pulled back the curtain slightly to see if anyone was outside watching you, since your kitchen was connected to the living room and, above all, open, with no door separating them.

but you couldn't see anything suspicious, only the horrible traffic jams of the city that never sleeps and people minding their own business down your street. you weren't the least bit reassured, certainly not, you had no idea where he could see you and you were terrified of it.

then you let out a groan of surprise when your phone started vibrating in your hand again, except this time it wasn't a call but a notification from an unknown number, it was a video.

your hands began to shake as you huffed and puffed to regain your composure, naively hoping to regain an ounce of control over the situation. once you'd opened your phone and clicked on the video, you saw mindy and anika on it, kissing on a sofa, the video had been taken from outside through your window and you pursed your lower lip, anxious, but starting to get angry that ghostface wasn't just threatening you, but also your friends, after everything mindy already endured because of that stupid mask.

and then, another call, again. you stared at your screen for a few seconds, looked around your living room and swallowed, grabbed your tv remote to turn it off, a silence falling over every room in the apartment when you finally accepted the call as you peered into every corner of the room, your stomach burning with fear.

- hang up again and i'll rip their heads off and send them in a box at your door ! shouted the killer menacingly and violently.

the violence of his threat burned your eyes, but you were able to swallow back your tears. you were sure he could feel your panic through the phone.

- not them, don't hurt them, s-stop it, i’ll do anything, i-i promise, you cried, afraid that something might happen to your friends.

- good girl, you see how easy things are going when you start obeying ? his voice softened, but you could still hear the amusement in it that told you he loved what was happening, that he loved scaring you.

despite the fear, the nickname he'd used triggered a reaction you'd never have suspected: a wave of heat spread through your body, even between your legs, and you suddenly felt ashamed.

- now, let's play that game. have you ever heard of hot and cold ?

you simply nodded, tucking a lock of hair behind your ears, knife still sharp in hand.

- words, pretty girl.

another heat wave.

- y-yeah, yes, i have.

- perfect. you want to know where i am, right ? then come and find me. go on.

you frowned, apprehensive about the objective behind this game, especially apprehensive about the moment when you were going to meet him.

- and then, if i find you, what will happen ?

- find me and you'll see, answered mischievously ghostface.

a new silence, neither of you speaking, the silence was heavy for you. you took two steps forward, and turned to look behind you again, the fact of not knowing where he was disturbed you and increased your degree of fear.

- are you scared, sweet thing ? he continued to mock, knowing he had the upper hand.

- shut the fuck up motherfucker, you're gonna pay for all of this, you grumbled in between.

- oh, really? i’m waiting then, he sneered, and you were willing to bet he was smiling.

his words only provoked you and you walked out of the living room, realizing that he couldn't be there, you were surprised to realize that you actually started looking for him, now angry at the way he was openly mocking you. you opened the bathroom door, peering in after turning on the light.

- cold.

you immediately left the room, closed the door and stepped into the corridor, which this time led to your bedroom. but before you got close to it, your steps slowed down, as you became more reluctant to head towards this part of the apartment, what if he was inside ?

- why are you slowing down ? maybe I'm inside.

- fuck it, you muttered.

you continued to hold your knife, getting ready to use it, when you arrived at the door to your room and opened it, you went in, and looked all around, near your desk, in the nooks and crannies, then your gaze fell back on your wardrobe, which was closed.

- are you in there ? you asked, your breath catching.

you heard his breathing through the phone become more erratic, and that's all you could hear as you held it to your ear.

- open it.

without further hesitation, you grabbed both wrists of your wardrobe and suddenly opened them, brandishing your knife in your face the next second.

but surprisingly, he wasn't there, so you straightened up and let your arm fall back down your body, then brought the phone up to your ear to hear your interlocutor, who seemed to love playing with your mind and emotions. he started laughing again, and the more he did it, the more it annoyed you than it frightened you now.

- no, i'm not there sweetheart, i was just messing with you.

- asshole, wanting to play a game without even knowing how to play it, you laughed bittersweetly.

you could sense that he wasn't happy with your answer, maybe even angry, but in any case, he didn't show it and decided to restart the game.

- you're getting colder, keep looking.

since you'd gone in the opposite direction and weren't getting any closer, you decided to return to the area you'd been in when you received the bloody call, retracing your steps, finding yourself in the hallway where your bathroom was once again.

- you're still cold.

you sighed in annoyance, but kept on walking, and when you passed the bathroom door you'd already looked in.

- warm, he warned you, and his husky voice sent shivers down your spine.

the further you went, the more your heart pounded to the point where that was all you could hear now. now you were back in your living room, you couldn't make any sense of the situation, you must have misunderstood his directions, he couldn't be there.

- you're getting warmer, good, very good sweetheart, you're almost there.

and yet, the praise almost made you blush again, you felt butterflies in your stomach and snapped inwardly as you remembered who you were on the phone with.

slightly frustrated by the flirtatious tone, you began to hold your knife out in front of you, preparing yourself better in case you found him.

as well as being frustrated, you were in total bewilderment, you had no idea where he could be, he kept messing with your head and he was very good at it.

he definitely wasn't in the kitchen, nor in the living room, not even towards the entrance, since you'd glanced around.

- keep looking, y/n, it'd be a shame if i find you first, wouldn't it ? tormented ghostface.

you held back from insulting him once more, avoided the living room areas you'd already looked at, and moved towards the only corridor on the opposite side of the apartment where you hadn't glanced.

and to do this, you had to pass through the corridor to your left leading to the front door, when you passed this door, and moved into the unlit corridor where in one of the doors lay your washing machine and other belongings, he spoke again.

- you don't want to turn colder again, don't you ? now, turn around.

paranoid, you thought he was right behind you, so you quickly turned around and took a big step back, the knife right in front of you, your arm raised, and you let out an expletive when you couldn't see anyone again. He was definitely playing with your mind and you'd had enough. You could feel the frustration heating your blood.

you made the choice not to pay any more attention to your footsteps, beginning to believe that he had lied to you and wasn't even near you, that this was just to scare you.

- warm.

but then you stopped, and that's how you noticed you were near the entrance hall. no, it couldn't be.

you headed in that direction, advancing slowly, cold sweat beginning to take refuge on your forehead.

- warmer.

shit. shit. shit.

you noticed the cupboard embedded in the wall a metre from the landing, and realized he was probably here. I'd have heard him, the kitchen's right next door. you had no idea what was going on.

- very very warm, he whispered.

your trembling hand came to rest on the wrist of the hall cupboard, hesitantly, you didn't open it immediately, feeling your breathing quicken.

in a split second, you brought your other hand to the cabinet and jerked it open. but nothing, absolutely nothing.

- fucking bastard, you growled.

you sighed, and slammed the wardrobe doors shut, the sound echoing throughout the apartment after this act of anger and you could hear him laughing in your ear.

pissed off, you returned to the kitchen to the very same spot where you had decided to call the police, still holding your weapon in your hand which was now on the kitchen counter facing the living room.

- now you're boiling.

you held your phone so tightly in your hand that you could have crushed it. you didn't know whether your hands were shaking with fear or anger, or both.

- i’m done with that shit, you growled again, if you want me, come and get me.

- want you in which way, darling ? don't get me wrong, both involve ropes, but it's an important distinction to make before we proceed.

- w-what ?

and just then, you saw a shadow with a very tall figure forming right in front of you.

you immediately dropped your phone from your hands, about to turn and brandish your knife to stab him, but a large gloved hand pressed against your mouth and an imposing body slammed you against the surface.

your scream was then muffled by the hand over your mouth, and your knife was snatched from your other hand, panic instantly seizing you after your weapon was snatched from you, you tried to fight back by reaching behind him with your hands, but his free hand had no trouble grabbing both your wrists and pinning them behind your back.

- i told you it'd be a shame if i find you first, he said mockingly.

the tears in your eyes blurred your vision, you kept squirming in all directions and your screams kept choking against your attacker's glove. then you felt them, your hands bound by ropes.

ropes that burned your wrists, he had to take his hand away from his mouth to bind your hands, and you couldn't control the rhythm of your breathing.

- no no no no no, you protested, naively trying to free yourself from the ropes.

just then, you felt his hips push you against the counter again and his hand slid down your back to force you against the surface, bended you over, he towered over you.

- p-please, please let me go, you tried not to let the tears roll down your cheeks, but your voice betrayed your fear.

- where's that attitude you were giving me earlier, hm ?

- i-i’m sorry, you let your forehead hit the cold surface of the counter, your eyes closed.

- you look so good like that, he murmured under his breath, bended over, begging for me, better than i have imagined.

a new complaint came from the back of your throat, and you started to struggle again, unconsciously moving your hips to push him away. then you felt something against you, something hard, then you heard him growl.

your mouth fell open in astonishment, you must surely have heard wrong, you thought. then you continued to rub your hips against him, your two bodies pressed together, and suddenly his left hand grabbed your hip to immobilize you.

an amused smile spread across your lips, contradicting the tears in your eyes.

- does this turn you on ? do i'm turning you on mr. ghostface ? you said in a playful tone.

- shut up, i'm gonna fuck that attitude out of you, spat the killer.

a groan threatened to leave your mouth but you managed to control it, feeling all wet after rubbing yourself against him and his modulated voice making you feel things you shouldn't feel.

a moan threatened to leave your mouth but you managed to control it, you felt all wet after rubbing yourself against him and his modulated voice made you feel things you shouldn't feel.

quickly, he removed your shorts followed by your underwear, leaving you almost naked apart from your black top, your wet intimacy exposed to the cool apartment air sending a shiver down your spine and forcing you to squeeze your thighs together.

- uh uh, none of that, open those legs for me, he said, slapping one of your thighs.

aware of the extent of your desire between your legs, you spread them slowly and slightly, enough for him to slip his hand in.

his fingers began to tease your crotch, you were about to open your mouth to express your desire, but closed it when his fingers moved to brush over her clit. you breathed deeply and closed your eyes as you felt his fingers gently beginning to knead at your clit and press against your entrance.

you took a shaky breath, clenching down around the finger gently as it was pushed in up to the second knuckle.

you moaned happily, your hips pressing forward. your hips swayed further as he began to move his fingers slowly. his fingers moved in and out of her slowly. then he gently curled them as he moved them, smiling at the cry he drew from you. his thumb gently massaged your clit, and you arched your back silently asking for more.

- you like that, huh ?

you nodded positively, moaning softly, your lip still between your teeth.

- come on, what did i told you earlier, sweetheart ?

words.

- f-fuck, y-yes.

- yes what ? while curling his fingers inside of you.

- yes, yes i-i like that.

he was starting to pick up his pace, you could hear his breathing jerking in turn, getting harder and harder by the pretty sounds you were making and the way you were moving your hips against him. although he'd been using a fairly gentle rhythm, now he was thrusting his fingers into you harder and harder, going even deeper.

causing moans that you could no longer control, especially when he added another finger, unconsciously, you closed your legs once more against the sensation that invaded you, but his other hand forced you to keep them spread for him.

even if you wanted to deny him access to your legs by closing them, you couldn't, his grip was too strong for you to move, it would probably leave a mark later.

when his fingers reached that spot inside you, you tilted your head back, eyes closed. he took advantage of your position to lean towards you, so that his fingers were deep inside you, and your belly was completely pressed into the countertop surface, as were your hips.

he grabbed your jaw to force you to open your eyes and tilt your head back even further, causing you to arch your back even more to the point of slight pain, and with your hands tied behind your back, it wasn't easy, so when you did, you fell into the big, intimidating black eyes of his mask.

but the idea of him fucking you in his ghostface costume, mask and gloves made you wetter, it was so wrong.

you gave him those doe eyes, and he swore he could have cum right now just from the look you were giving him. you half-opened your mouth as if to let out another moan, but nothing came out.

his thumb moved to your lower lip, his hand still gripping your jaw. his other hand continued to penetrate you roughly, but you still wanted more. he could read the desire on your face, in your eyes.

- what's the matter, pretty girl ? do you want my cock instead ?

you nod eagerly.

- please, i w-want it so bad.

the position you were in meant you couldn't breathe properly, your back arched, your head back as you stared into the big black eyes of the ghost mask.

his thumb pressed your clitoris just right, in a delicious way that brought back that exquisite sensation in your lower belly. but suddenly he withdrew his hand, feeling you suddenly empty, you let out a whine.

but he quickly silenced you by pushing the two fingers inside you into your mouth, his other hand controlling your movements through your jaw and forcing you to take his fingers covered in your juices.

- that's it, taste yourself, take those fingers right down your throat, whispered ghostface.

you felt your taste on his two fingers deposited on your tongue, you closed your mouth to suck greedily on his fingers that he pushed deep into your throat, creating new tears in the corner of your eyes and causing you a gag that seemed to satisfy him.

his fingers were so deep in your throat that your saliva was starting to drip down the corner of your mouth.

His hand that held your jaw withdrew from it, you felt the trace of the fabric of his gloves burn your jaw in the absence of his hand, then just after, you heard the sound of a belt unbuckling just behind you.

claiming only his fingers or his cock inside of you again, you moved your hips back, and felt the brutal material of his jeans, and then, from his underwear, you could especially feel his erection that was right against your ass.

you tried to speak, but with his fingers in your throat and the taste of your wetness on your tongue, those sounds were muffled, but you knew he'd heard you because he pushed his fingers even deeper into your mouth, making you feel a little dizzy.

as he let out a muffled moan against the movement of your hips against him, he in turn thrust against you, feeling your clitoris swell with excitement.

then, a few seconds later, unexpectedly, without any warning from him, you felt his tip right in front of your entrance and quickly, he penetrated you brutally, knocking the wind out of your lungs, causing you to scream due to the impact.

- did i go in too fast ? he laughed, tilting his head to one side, his voice still modified by the modulator.

he started to thrust in and out of you at a pace that made you see stars. his fingers left your throat, and you took a deep breath of air, you were suffocating, and yet his index finger remained between your mouth and your teeth, understanding what he wanted you to do, you bit the material of his glove, allowing him to slide his hand out, removing his glove for him, letting go of the glove in your mouth, you could then observe his hand.

large and covered with veins. You could almost recognize his hand. Your pussy was throbbing and the harsh thrusts didn't help.

suddenly, his hand grabbed the back of your neck and tilted you forward, pushing your chest against the surface where you rested your cheek. it felt so good, you could hear him growling behind you and your whole body wanted to submit to him. his thrusts pushed your belly against the counter, his hips slammed into your buttocks.

for support, he grabbed the ropes he'd tightened around your hands, still holding your neck to make sure you didn't move, you were his to fuck.

you tried to straighten up, but his grip prevented you, so you tried to look over your shoulder, and just seeing him fucking you could make you cum on the spot, his tall figure, the mask, him dominating you.

the erotic sound of his cock thrusting into you filled the room and mingled with your moans and grunts.

- harder, please fuck me harder, you begged, letting your forehead fall back against the counter, eyes closed.

- you want me to fuck you harder ? he said playfully, fine then, i’ll fuck you harder.

he did as you asked, but first by slowing down his thrusts, you then let out some moans as you arched your back, but then he thrust more brutally, deeper into you, all the while being fast. you opened your mouth in pleasure, before going back to biting your lip.

his bare hand grabs your waist and uses it as leverage to thrust into you, leaving you little or no time to adjust as he drives deep into you.

he pulls you back, using his grip on your wrists as your pussy tightens around his cock under his thrusts.

after a few more strokes that made you feel disoriented to the point where it was hard to keep your eyes open. a small noise near you caught your attention, you reopened your eyes breathing hard, and noticed the ghostface mask right next to you, he'd just pulled it off. your eyes widened in astonishment.

- taking it so well, hm whore ? he said in a taunting tone, the modulator was off, god, you feel amazing, he moaned.

and you recognized that voice.

- e-ethan ?

you couldn't see him, but he was smiling and pounding into you, his curly hair falling back on his forehead with a little sweat on his temples.

without you expecting it, his hand on the back of your neck slid down your throat to pull you back to his torso, your hands tied behind your back making the position slightly uncomfortable, but when you let your head fall below his shoulder to look up at him, you forgot the discomfort.

you couldn't believe it, ethan, the shy, dorky guy you were so close to.

- hi baby, surprised ? he smirked devilishly.

- i- you tried to speak, but another of his blows triggered a soft moan.

he laughed again, his eyes never leaving your face, watching as your eyebrows furrowed and your mouth opened in pleasure. he tightened his hand around your neck enough to reduce the air passing through to your lungs, and again he felt you tighten around him.

- look at you, what a little slut. you look so pretty with my hand around your throat.

wanting to look at him, you opened your eyes again, your eyes met and you noticed how dark his gaze was as I'd never seen it before. his hand on your hip began to rub your clit deliciously while he was thrusting in you.

he leaned over and placed his lips against yours to kiss you passionately, not giving you a chance to breathe, you kissed him back without hesitation, which made him smile.

when the kiss ended and you parted, you looked up at him again, his hand still around your neck. you let out at surprised gasp when he forced you to bend over once more, removing his hand from your throat to move it into your hair, which he grabbed to pull you back.

you found yourself in the same position as before, your back curved and your head tilted back. you could see him, but instead of the ghostface mask, you saw ethan's angelic face, who wasn't actually so angelic.

his grip on your hair made you groan, and you'd never have suspected this dominance from mindy's number one suspect.

- open your mouth.

damn.

you opened your mouth as he asked, tongue out, with a doe eyed gaze that made him growl. he leaned closer and spat into your mouth.

- swallow it.

and you did. you swallowed without replying under his eager gaze. you stuck out your tongue to prove it, god, you were sure you looked so dirty like that. his gloveless hand found its way to your cheek, and he patted it before caressing it with a delicacy that contradicted the brutality of his strokes that made you stammer.

- that’s it. you’re being very good baby.

the praise pushed you to give him a fucked up smile. the more time passed, the more you felt that knock in your lower belly. you were close,and ethan could feel it too by the way you tightened around him.

- s-shit, e-ethan, i’m close.

- i know, baby, cum for me.

with his hand pulling your hair tighter so he could get a better view of your face to see you cum, before long, you were cumming and felt your legs trembling under the intensity, and when you came, you let out the prettiest sound without worrying whether your neighbors heard you or not.

he let go of your hair, and both his hands bestially gripped your hips, he was close too, you felt overstimulated but you knew he was going to cum soon so you

let him use you. he muttered "fuck" under his breath, and cummed as he sank deep inside you, stopping his thrusts to stay deep inside you. he tilted his head back, his adam's apple perfectly visible and you didn't have to look at him to know he must be incredibly beautiful like that.

[bunnyluvs-blog]

txt reactions: bf!txt when you wear their shirt (smut)

tags ! Suggestive/smut ,, Somnophila ,, thigh riding ,, blindfoldeds ,, degrading ,, semi public sex ,, eating out (will make a full smut on one member if requested)

Soobin: You always wait for soobin to come home from work. No matter what. However this time, you spent all day hard at work you could barely keep your eyes open on the drive home. You took a quick shower and just threw on whatever you grabbed firsts. Snuggle into the bed, hell it wasn't even your side of the bed. You fell asleep hoping soobin would understand. Well once soobin came home and saw you in his shirt, he was done for. Slowly lifting up his shirt on you, he left small marks and hickeys all over your chest. He knew you had a thing for Somnophilia. And it was one of his major turn ons so why not test it out on his pretty little bunny <3

Yeonjun: While he was in the kitchen making coffee for you guys. You were getting ready for the day. You decided to wear one of your many shirts that you stole from your boyfriend. This one he wore to the ama 2022 award show however. it was too long to be worn as a normal shirt. So you threw on some small shorts and a belt to make it a semi-dress. Without the shorts- if ur raised ur arms ur ass and everything else could be seen. You made your way to your boyfriend, wrapping your arms around him. A soft "hi baby" leaves his mouth as he turns around to face you. Only to see the opening of ur chest pushed up against him. You're ass peaking out since you were on ur tippy toes ? Did he forget to mention how pretty you look in his shirt with your cum running down his leg ? He will just have to show you then.

Beomgyu: God fuck how were you this perfect? Blind fold covering your face as he fucked you in his shirt. The soft fabric didn't even cover much since well- he unbuttoned the whole thing after he got you where you are now. You're moans filling the room as the shirt sleeves slide off of you. "Aww look at you, you're so small my shirt can't even stay on you" he said in a mocking tone as he fucked you harder. He was always one to talk down on you when you were just so submissive too him. He didn't even have to fight u to get the blindfold on. You just listened to him like the dumb pup you are.

Taehyun: "What are you some kinda fucking whore?" God was he pissed off. You looked so damn good while you guys went to the park for your date. A short skirt, Knee socks, and his damn shirt unbuttoned almost to where you could see your chest. Well now the shirt is well off of you. The Starbucks restroom door locked as teahyun bends you over the skin. "Showing over everything damn thing you have, and in your own boyfriends shirt." He hasn't even touched you where u need him most. Hes just been hitting ur ass over and over and over again, you're sure your screams can be heard from the people outside. He pulled your head back by ur hair. "You. Car. Now. You're gonna sit and not whine or beg until we're home. And if you do I'm not gonna let you fucking cum at all." Oh boy did your plan work

Huening kai: you were snuggled up on the couch with hyuka just watching a movie. You've felt as if your plan to make him fuck you failed. And you were just so fed up. You wore his shirt after hearing what your friends bf did to her after she wore his. And damnit you wanted that treatment too. Little did you know hyuka wasn't doing any better then you were. Every 2 minutes you had to pull the shirt back up from falling off. Your damn chest being flashed to him so much. This last time tho, he couldn't take it. Flipping you onto ur back and pulling your panties down to your ankle. Hyuka was done with waiting. "Huen ? What are you doing..?" You ask as if you had no clue. "Im gonna take you let me eat you please..pleaseee you look so good in my shirt I can't hold back" You didn't even get s chance to answer when he licked your clit slowly <3

Reminder !! If a story is requested from one of these I'll probably do it !!

[penwieldingdreamer]

Love Confessions and other truths

Whoa, this one got out of hand I guess.

Thank you everyone for the likes, comments and reblogs. This fandom has given me so much joy and inspiration and he's definitely hard to resist not to write for.

As you know, I tried to keep the appearance and description of the reader as vauge as possible, you guys will be able to come up with your own picture for the reader, only thing I pictured: female reader, living in London with her british mother and american father, single mother of two girls Lottie (5) and Millie (3), and two years older than Austin.

Summary: Austin confesses his feelings for you, but you keep the truths about your feelings under wraps, until friends come up with good intentions and meddle in your relationship.

Words: 5.6k

Warnings: fluff, some swear words, maybe a few tippos - if so, please let me know

Happy reading and enjoy. And please let me know what you think, if you want to be tagged or taken off the taglist for this.

Dividers @cafekitsune

Tagging: @sqrlgrl22 @buckysteveloki-me @rlinda6 @imusicaddict @fortheloveoffanfic @unicoreads

Dec. 2022

With a groan you pulled yourself up on the couch, your leg propped up on a mass of pillows. 

“You doing okay, baby?” 

Were you okay? You didn't really know. A few days ago you injured yourself walking home from the store down the road from your flat. Winter had taken hold of the city and the streets were very slippery. Of course you thought your running shoes were enough to last that short walk. 

Well, your bandaged knee and ankle spoke for themselves. The ice patch had you out of commission for the time being, thankfully you only twisted your ankle and partially tore your ACL. It was dumb and unnecessary, but a few weeks and you'd be good as new. 

“Hurts like hell, but it's better than yesterday.”

Your mother leaned over and laid a kiss on your hair. She had been helping you with the girls, keeping them occupied and stopped them from running up the wall. “It's only a few more days. Doctor Burnes said you'll be able to walk better by next week, just keep it elevated for now and take your pain meds.”

“Hm, yeah, by next year I'll be a normally functioning human again.” It was a joke but also a semblance of truth. 

Only a few more days and you'd ring in 2023. Hopefully a better one than the last. With Trevor finally paying on time, Lottie still having fun at school and Millie enjoying her time at Kindergarten.

“How's Austin? I haven't heard from him in a while.” She asked, busying herself in the kitchen.

Last you heard he had told you that he was busy with pre awards parties and dinners and planned to go on a trip with Kaia during the holidays. “Don't know, you probably should ask the girls, they've been keeping tabs on him. I just provide the source to let them talk with him.”

Chuckling, your mother shook her head. “They really love him, huh? He's great with the girls.”

“They do. If he's not calling every third day, Lottie takes my phone and calls him herself.”

Your mother had listened to the excited squeals of your daughters when they had their evening calls with the actor. Once she had asked you about your feelings towards him, treading dangerously but you shut her down really quick. He was in a relationship, younger than you and you definitely didn't want to jump into another relationship, even if your last had been years ago.

Was this really what you wanted? 

Every time you talked to Austin, you felt your insides flutter like millions of butterflies. 

No, he's happy with Kaia, with his career. He doesn't need you to distract from all this.

“Mummy, mummy, mummy! Look it's Austin!” Lottie ran towards you, jumping onto the couch and hitting a painful spot on your knee. Her eyes widened as she heard your gasp and shrank back from you. “Careful baby, your mum isn't in the best shape right now.” Your mother reprimanded gently and you saw your daughter’s lips tremble slightly, the phone in her hand to show Austin watching attentively over the FaceTime app.

 “I'm sorry mummy, I didn't mean to hurt you.”

You pulled her back against your side, sitting up on the couch so you were propped upright again instead of laying down. Kissing her hair and breathing in her scent, that still reminded you of the time she was a baby, you brushed your hand along her back. “I'll be okay, baby, now what's this about Austin calling?”

“Hey darlin’, you doin’ okay all the way over there on that island?” 

You knew he was trying to keep in all the questions he had when he heard your mother and Lottie talk, but even as good as an actor he was, he couldn't keep the concern shining in his ocean blue eyes.

“I'll be fine, Aus, nothing a few days rest and a hearty meal won't fix.”

Squinting, he shook his dark blonde locks, giving you a disapproving look. “Lottie said you fell, hurt your knee and ankle.”

“Don't worry about it. My mum is helping out for the time being, keeping the girls entertained and me off my feet.” You sent him a reassuring smile, playing with Lottie's locks. “How are you? Are you taking care of yourself?”

“Hmm, yeah. It's warm, the sun’s shining and I'm relaxing at the beach.”

Your daughter giggled at his playful retort, her body jumping so hard, you had to hold onto her so she wouldn't fall off the couch and hit her head. “Austin! You're so funny. He's so funny mummy, right!”

Humming, you nodded your head, but you saw dark shadows under his eyes, not from lack of sleep but from his anxiety and his brain turning in a million directions as he once told you. “Why don't you help granny while I talk to Austin for a minute. You can come back and show him what decorations Millie and you made for Christmas. How's that sound sweetheart?”

With a deep sigh she nodded her head and skipped into the kitchen, telling your mother that you sent her away to have a grown up talk with Austin.

“She's getting quite sassy for her age.” The actor commented, sitting back on the lounge chair in the cabana, the blue shirt he wore pulled down at the neck to reveal a sliver of his chest making you swallow against the dryness of your throat.

“She is. Seems to be your influence because she never acted like that before she met you.” You accused with a smile before turning serious again. “Now what's this about? Shouldn't you be enjoying your mini getaway with your lovely girlfriend before the award marathon?”

Nodding his head, he put his arm behind his head, leaning his phone against his propped up leg. His free hand scratched along his chin and you knew with whatever in his mind right now, Austin wasn't enjoying his time with Kaia. 

“I've got a lot on my mind, I guess.”

“Want to talk about it? You know, I've got time before dinner.”

A mixture between a groan and a sigh left his lips as he stared into your eyes, making your insides twist with something you hadn't felt in so long, something warm and soothing. “I think I'm stuck in a kind of predicament.”

“Okay, something with your next project? Or the upcoming awards?”

“No,” Austin shook his head. “It's you.”

Wide eyes stared at him as you tried to comprehend what the actor just told you. “M-me? I mean, why?”

“I've been thinking about you and I can't stop it. I should be happy with Kaia, but all I'm thinking about is if I'd have a chance with you, if you'd be my girl and I'd get to call the girls and you my family.”

You shook your head in denial. His confession was making your head spin. You were friends, nothing more. “Austin, you, you've got Kaia, it's not fair to her. I, this can't happen, I'm sorry.”

His hand tightened in his sandy blond locks, trying desperately to keep his composure and you knew his anxiety was ready to make itself known. “I know. I tried so fucking hard. But God forbid, I want you… so much.”

“This…Austin, it’s…I can’t, I’m really sorry. I can only be your friend,” You felt the burn behind your eyes, the tears building up and threatening to make you blind. Yet you refused to let them fall. The crestfallen look on his face made your heart ache but you knew there was no way a relationship would work at the moment. “You need to focus on your career on all those amazing projects you’ll be able to make and we can’t distract you.”

Shaking his head, Austin sat up again, his phone now close to his face and you saw the tears building in his own eyes. He was an amazing actor and yet he could be read so easily. “I can focus on my career with you. I want you, I want the girls, I want everything!”

With each word his voice got louder, until he nearly screamed it for everyone to hear. You could make out a shadowy figure at his side and swallowed thickly. Probably not the best topic to talk about when his girlfriend was just a few feet away and they should be happily engaged in other activities during their couples time.

“I can be friend, Austin, nothing more. You want to talk to the girls? They made Christmas decorations with Elvis on their stars.” He nodded his head, brushing his long fingers under his eyes and you could feel the dredd pool deep in your stomach. Keeping the sniffles to yourself until you were safely tucked away in the bathroom, you called Lottie and Millie and with some grunting and heaving, you managed to get off the couch.

Your mother's eyes followed you before you pushed out your daughters’ excited squeals and Austin’s playful responses. 

Your heart ached and you felt your stomach clench, thinking back on his words. 

What had you gotten yourself into?

He was an amazing guy but you feared you weren't the right one for him. 

Putting your hand over your mouth, you tried to muffle your sniffles, the tears wetting your cheeks on the way down as you felt your heart shattering.

“So, she said No?”

Before he called you, Austin had finally sat down with Kaia and discussed what had been plaguing him the last few months.

He knew it wasn't fair to be with her and think about the what ifs of you being there.

Of course she wasn't happy, their relationship lasting not even a year, but the model had already seen a change in him. She was sad and cried when they talked but knew neither of them would be happy if they continued like they did.

So they agreed to end it there on their mini getaway, agreeing to be better off as friends, still supporting the other on their dreams.

Kaia sat on the end of the lounge right at his feet. She leaned on his knee, watching Austin closely. He always wears his heart on his sleeve and she could see the defeated look all over his face.

“I'm sorry.” Pushing the heels of his hands against his eyes, he tried to keep.the tears at bay, being the sensitive man he was. “She told him she could be my friend, but nothing more.”

“She's lying.” She finally mused, thinking back on what she heard you say during the call. “She was ready to break down and admit it, Aus.”

Pursing his lips the actor watched his girlfriend, well ex closely. “But she said”

“It's not what she said, it's what she didn't say. The way she behaved.” Kaia sent him a smile. “She's just as in love with you as you are with her. No woman in her right mind wouldn't be in love with you. I mean look at me, we had a great time together.”

Awkwardly scratching his fingers along his chin, the actor breathed out a sigh. He was loath to admit that it had been an amazing time with her but life was throwing him curve balls left and right it seemed. “I'm thankful for our time together and I'm sorry for the way this played out, but I”

“We're staying friends, Aus, I'm not letting you off that easily. I'll be helping you get your girl, besides maybe that way mom will be distracted the next time I FaceTime her and the girls to ask me when I'll be deciding to grace the world with little Crawford models.”

“Oh god.” He chuckled, throwing his head back with a laugh. “Please don't. Enjoy what you're doing right now. You'll know when you find the right guy.”

Kaia hummed, drawing an invisible pattern on his propped up knee. “I thought that was you, but you know the last few months we've both been so focused on our career and things we both clearly have different thoughts about, that it hasn't felt like in the beginning. And I guess ending this while we can is the best decision for us.”

“I'll have to talk to Kate, make sure there's no dumb rumors circling and we get a joint statement out there to keep it as low as possible.” His free hand gently brushed along her shoulder, before settling on her back and drawing Kaia into a tight hug. “You don't know how much this means to me. The last time, with Nessa, being friendly wouldn't have been possible.”

The model reached her hand up, brushing a stray tear away that had slowly made its way down his cheek. “Have you been able to talk to her at all? Clear it up after all that time?”

He shook his head. “Honestly, I don't know what I would tell her, she didn't want to listen the first time and I guess she's happy now. Why wake sleeping dogs when you can keep the peace?”

“Well, that is a good reason…for now.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Let's focus on your darlin’ and how to get her to admit she is head over heels for you.” Winking, Kaia got up and moved inside the villa they had rented for the week, determined to get her mission, to shove you into his arms, started.

If there was one woman she was going to step aside for it was you. She had known you had feelings for Austin for a while but you never acted on them and she had to give it to you: for her you were more sister and close friend than some of her friends in LA.

Feb. 2023

“Hey, Ash. How's everyone? How's my favorite niece?”

The corners of his mouth raised up at the light chuckles coming from his phone. Austin was back in London for another night of awards. He still couldn't believe he had won all those awards like the People's Choice or Golden Globe and gotten nominations for Elvis alone. Hell, he was nominated for the BAFTA and the Oscar. This was beyond anything he ever thought and yet, looking out over Hyde Park he felt his gut churning. He wished he could talk to his mom, to Lisa-Marie who had given him so much strength before he lost her suddenly a few weeks ago. She had the same calming energy as his mom and after getting to know her he was drawn to her, happy for every moment he shared with Elvis’ only child. 

You still hadn't stopped seeing him as just a friend, calling him and congratulating on his win, listening to him when he got the news of Lisa's passing. He didn't think it possible but he fell even more and Austin wasn't sure he'd be able to recover easily.

“She's your only niece for now but Juju is doing great, really everyone is.” Ashley told him with a grin. “How're you Mr. Golden Globe winner? Heard your in the run for a BAFTA and Oscar.”

“It's unbelievable, I…phew, still can't believe it. I called Nessa, I wanted to talk to her and…thank her, you know, for what she did back then. Didn't want her to just read it in the press. I-I wished mom could be here. And Lisa.” 

His eyes watered. Austin had so many moments he was taking on alone again. Kaia was back in LA filming while juggling the runway as well but she loved it and every time they talked he could hear the lightness in her voice. 

“I'm sorry Aus, you know they're hella proud of you. Your mom is always there, Juju was in the garden a few days ago and this huge butterfly just plopped down on her nose and I knew Lori was there looking after her. And I bet Lisa will shine down on you as well. You made something really special.” She pulled him out of his dark thoughts, the small smile returning to his plumb lips. “And I'm sorry about Kaia, I know you guys were super happy. But you're still friends right? Are you going to be okay, want to talk about it?”

“Hm, yeah, I think so. Right now I wished I wasn't going alone tonight.” 

Humming, the actress sent him a smile. “You're not alone, babe. Baz is there and Kate, she'll make sure everything goes smoothly.”

Running his hand through his hair, Austin sat down on the plush settee in front of the bed. “I know, it's not them, it's…I'm grateful for them but there's, I wished she was there with me.”

“Oh!” Ashley's eyes widened with a grin spreading on her lips. “You still haven't gotten further with her?”

“No,” he sighed. “I even sent her love songs, ones I sang myself, tried to talk to her again when I called the girls, but she's insistent.”

“Don't worry, she'll come around.” The actress winked and Austin racked his brain about what she was going on about. He hoped she wasn't doing something he might regret in the end.

“Good morning my little poppets, I come bearing breakfast.” Your father called in his fake british accent from the front door of your flat. Your daughters squeals erupted with shouts of grandpa and you watched them run around, laughing softly at their antics. Your mother helped you in the kitchen, preparing the cake for Millies's birthday the next day.

“She's so excited for tomorrow.” Your mother laughed, mixing the cake batter and winking at you.

“That she is. She can't wait to be four, kept asking me when it was time for bed so her birthday would come sooner.” Chuckling, the two of you glanced back at the doorway waiting for your rugrats and your father.

“Mommy! Look what grandpa brought me!” Lottie called running over to you, holding up an Elvis coloring book. Your father followed closely with your youngest propped up on his hip. Somehow you had a feeling her obsession with the King of Rock'n'Roll was only fueled by Austin and your father. 

“Found it in that web shop and she wouldn't shut up about this Austin being Elvis in that new movie, so I thought I'd do ya a favor. That way she'll keep quiet for some time as well.” He ruffled her hair and grinned down at his oldest granddaughter.

Shaking your head, you were just about to retort when your phone chimed with a new message. You guessed it was Austin, telling you he had arrived safely at his hotel and was preparing to surprise Millie tomorrow with a visit.

Meet me at the Four Seasons. It's important. K

Kaia? Why was she…You hoped Austin was okay. You hoped she was okay. Of course you had read the news on their break-up, feeling guilty about it all and you knew Austin’s decision on that but you wanted to talk to her, explaining that you never intended, never encouraged him to start feeling anything for you. 

Swallowing the lump that had formed in your throat, you casually replied and asked her when she wanted to meet you. The reply was immediate and you felt that gut wrenching anxiety.

Was she going to blame you for the break-up? Oh god, this wasn’t going to end well.

Get here as soon as you can. K

And you did. You had asked your parents to watch the girls, not knowing how long the talk with Austin’s ex would take and what she really wanted. Anything was possible. Kaia had always been super nice to you and the girls, but there was no way of knowing if her thoughts about you had changed now after the end of their relationship.

So, you made your way inside the hotel, hands clammy and knees chittery from the dark thoughts swirling inside your head. The front desk loomed over you and you raked your brain on how to approach this, they probably wouldn’t just let anybody know information on

“Hey, Y/N.”  

Turning around with a soft gasp, you saw Kaia sitting together with two women watching expectantly. Taking a deep breath you clutched your bag tightly, a lifeline if you will and suddenly you felt stupid for being overly dramatic but you couldn’t help it. “H-Hey, Kaia. I’m sorry, I came as fast as I could and well, honestly I don’t know why I’m here, but I’m really sorry and I never meant”

She giggled softly, stopping your rambling and put her arm around your shoulder to pull you over, sitting with her and the women. “God, you’re such a sweetheart. I’m not mad. I was bummed, sure, but I guess we wanted different things in life so it’s all good.”

“But you, you said it was important and I thought you were going to hate me and I’m rambling again, sorry, I’m just nervous.”

Chuckling, one of the women got up and offered her hand. “I’m Sandra and this lovely lady is Sofia. Kaia asked us to get you ready for your date with Austin.”

Wide eyes turned to the model, your hand tightly gripping the offered appendage. “M-My date? I don’t…I think you’re mistaken. There was never any word about a date, besides we’re not even a couple.”

“Yet and yes, you’ll be going on an awards date. Aus has been moping the last two and a half months and to be honest, I want cheery, cheeky Austin back as my friend. So, we’re going to doll you up and I definitely know you’re going to blow him away.” She smirked at you, grabbing your arm and pulling you along to the elevators. 

“But” Your protests were cut short as the doors closed and the four of you made your way to Kaia’s hotel room. With it still being morning, Sandra told you there was enough time to get ready without any kind of stressing out - at least time wise, inside your brain was another story. You kind of felt like the girl from that Disney movie Inside Out. So many feelings at once.

“Right, so Austin is still up in his room, Tom and Jamie are going to join him later, we’ll be down here and get you ready. If you want you can take a shower first, relax a little and calm down.” The model suggested grabbing the champagne bottle from the large table inside her room - well more like a suite, if you were asked.

“I-I need to call my mum, she’s taking care of the girls right now. I thought I’d not be longer than an hour if you let me live.” You shrugged, anxiously biting off the skin on your finger.

Sofia grabbed your hand and pulled it away from your mouth. “Stop that, you don’t have anything to worry about.”

“So you say. You guys are gorgeous looking with killer bodies. Those dresses belong on you, not little ol’ me.” Your shoulders slumped. “The last time I remotely dressed up was for a date a year ago and the only positive thing he said to me was that my eyes were looking a bit tired and I should make sure to get enough sleep. I haven’t seen the inside of a gym for over three and a half years when I tried to train off all that baby weight and then just gave up. My ass is too big, my boobs are saggy and”

“And you have two wonderful kids that you love to bits. You look gorgeous with the right tool, believe me. Me looking like that is the combination of good genes and hard work.” Kaia pointed to herself. “There’s days I’m super happy to just sit down, doing nothing and enjoying the greasiest food I can get. But then I remember I have to get back to the Fashion shows.”

Taking a deep breath you nodded your head. “I still need to call my parents.”

“I’ll do that, you take a shower and drink that glass of champagne, believe me, it works wonders.” Kaia suggested, pushing you towards the en-suite and taking your bag. “Now, chop chop, we haven’t got all day.”

After your shower, Jamie, Austin’s hairstylist sat you down in front of the large vanity, all tools and makeup stashed on the table. You couldn't remember if you ever dreamed of something like this - your wedding maybe, but on a day like today, definitely not.

“What do you think about this one?” Sandra held up a gorgeous tulle dress, long sleeved and rhinestones all over. It was perfect, just not for you.

Shaking your head, you forgot Jamie was still fighting with your hair. She had been adamant that the last time a female sat in her chair had been back when she was training. The pull on your temples as she combed it was enough of a reprimand to sit still.

“It's the fourth dress you said no to. What is wrong with this one?” The stylist sighed and turned to Kaia who was shrugging her shoulders, obviously giving up on reasoning right now. “The first”

“My boobs are to big for that one.”

“Why do you think I've got Boob-Tape? The next was too low cut, the slit on the other one too high.”

“I just, I don't think this is me. Can't it be just a simple black dress, no fancy feathers, stones or whatever. For all I care, run down to Primark and get me a slip dress and I'd be fine with that.”

Sofia gave you a stern look, brandishing her powder brush as if it was a weapon to hit some sense into you. “Absolutely not. You're going to be the dame of the ball, you hear me. Everybody will be so jealous Austin is having you in his arms.”

Taking a deep breath you reminded yourself that the four women wouldn't let you say anything else. So you sat and let them flit about and do their thing.

“Okay, I've got one more dress, if you don't wear that, you'll have to walk about in your underwear.” Sandra smirked at you, holding up a black evening gown. “I think this one will be what you want. It’s Saint Laurent and paired with those gorgeous black Jimmy Choo heels you’ll look amazing.”

Your fingers brushed along the dress, feeling the cool silk underneath, that’s when you saw the back. The fabric was bound together in the back but if you wore that, you’d not be able to wear a bra. “My boobs are going to fall out of this one.” You moaned looking at the stylist and the model.

“Nope, that’s where the boob-tape comes in. Now let Jamie and Sofia swing their magic wands and get you in this dress ASAP.” Sandra commented, winking at you.

Kaia chuckled next to her, taking a sip of the coffee room service had brought half an hour ago. “You know, that sounded a bit dirty right there, Sandy.”

An hour later you found yourself at the back entrance, hair and makeup on point, pictures taken for your parents and hands clutching the bag like a rope. Kaia smiled at you, her arm linked with your own. “You, you're going to come with me, right?”

“I'll be at the show, but I'm taking a different car.”

Panic seized you, gripping her hand so tight she winced slightly. “I can't go there alone, I don't even what to do.”

Shaking her head, Kaia pulled you into a hug. “You'll be fine, I promise. Now get in the car, Austin will be in in a second.”

“Aus” Your eyes widened, but she already shoved you inside the car. Swallowing against the dryness of your throat you leaned back into the seat. Even sitting down you felt like your knees were going to give away. Then the door on the other side opened and you felt your heart stutter. He looked so handsome in his suit and bow tie.

“Darlin’?” He smiled, his hand reaching for you. “I, what are you doing here?”

“I-I, Kaia, she said I should meet her here and then suddenly they were on me, dressing me up and telling me I was your date for tonight.”

Austin's smile widened as he leaned closer. “I'm not complaining at all, but, are you okay!”

“I don't know.” You shrugged, grabbing his hand in yours and giving it a light squeeze. Thank god the privacy screen was up or you probably wouldn’t have had the courage to talk with him right now. “I keep thinking that I might have hit my head, that maybe Kaia really hated me and I'm up in that room and wake up soon.”

He chuckled softly, shaking his head. “I assure you, you're very awake. Because if you aren't then I'm asleep as well and it would be such an amazing dream.” Leaning in, his lips brushed against your cheek. 

“I'm sorry about before.” Your eyes watered, leaning your forehead against his own, the fingers of your free hand brushing along his chin, the light stubble scratching your palm. “Truth is, I never wanted to fall in love with you. I loved before and was hurt badly in the process. But you were so different and you were in a relationship. Your a celebrity, I'm just me, I'm a nobody. And the girls, they are my world and you were the only one putting them first, not even their own father does that.”

His Adam's apple bopped and you could see his emotions swirling in his ocean eyes. “You're not a nobody, darlin’, you're somebody to me and if I'm honest with you, I never wantesnto fall in love with you either but Lottie and Millie made it hard not to fall in love and in the end all I wanted was the three of you with me.”

Your eyes flitted between his eyes and plush lips, the butterflies dancing inside your belly until you used all your courage and sealed your lips with his, no thought left to the carefully applied lip gloss Sofia used on you. It had taken you months to admit to yourself what you really wanted and now you finally found it. 

Austin's arms wound around your waist, pulling you closer, only just stopping before you straddled his waist. He moaned into his mouth, your arms slinging around his shoulder, fingers playing with the hair in his neck.

“I love you, Austin and I'm sorry I tried to push you away.” You confessed, breaking the kiss.

“I'm happy, you came to your senses. You’ll be my lucky charm tonight.” 

Smirking, your fingers brushing over his lips, taking away the gloss you left there with your kiss. “I'll try to be the best lucky charm you can have.”

“The best and everyone will be jealous of me having the most beautiful woman of the night in my arms.” Chuckling, Austin’s hand moved up along your bare back. “I love that dress.”

“Hm, I think I like it as well.” You had to give it to Sandra, she was a master of her art. She truly made you irresistible to him. "Oh, you want to call the girls before you head off to the carpet?"

“Yes, I missed them today.”

He brushed his lips against your temple, leaning against you as you grabbed your phone from the clutch his stylist grabbed for you.

“Mummy! Austin!” Lottie called loudly, jumping off the sofa to sit next to her little sister who was coloring a page of her Elvis coloring book. “Granny said you were going to a party tonight and we could stay up to watch you win that award.”

“Lottie, I don't think that's what granny really meant.” You admonished, but knew they'd probably be too tired to watch it all once the ceremony started.

“Right, little lady, you listen to your mama, no staying up late just to see me, okay? I'll meet up with you tomorrow, take you girls out to have some ice cream, how's that sound?”

Your heart swelled, listening to him talk to your daughters that way. He truly was made to be a dad one day and you hoped this was actually what he really wanted.

“Now, I'll be heading off to the red carpet, take some nice pictures for you and then you can watch the start of the show. If there's a camera I'll send some kisses your way, okay? You be good for your grandma and grandpa and listen to what they say.”

They nodded their little heads, accompanied by aha’s and uhu’s before they sent Austin off with big kisses and loads of good luck. You waved your goodbyes at them and enjoyed the rest of the ride talking about his upcoming projects and the rest of awards season.

Of course you were his lucky charms that night. He won his BAFTA and you couldn't have been prouder of him than you were at the moment he accepted his award.

The video of you running into his arms and kissing him soundly was one of the most viewed of the night, but in that moment, you couldn't care less if everyone knew about you.

[farfromstrange]

Halloween | Matt Murdock x F!Reader

PART 5 of The Vault

See this post for more information on my Valentine's Day Special & Follower Celebration, but these fics can be read separately!

Pairing: Matt Murdock x F!Reader

Summary: Matt hasn't been paying attention to you lately. So, on Halloween, you decide to try and get his attention in a way he can't refuse.

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), Dom!Matt, choking, praise, degradation, unprotected p in v, no foreplay, slight orgasm control, mentions of oral sex, use of "good girl", Matt looks like a bore in the beginning, there is a stranger who can't take a hint, a very common Halloween costume, protective!Matt, cliché tropes

Word Count: 4.7k

A/n: This is... well, let's just say that you can tell that it was written a while back and then rewritten in parts by Me today because the smut lacked depth, BUT I do kind of like it. It's a Halloween fic, so apologies about that. For this, I got inspired when I bought my "I'm Not Daredevil" sweater in 2022. Plus some general horny thoughts during my first Kinktober on Tumblr that I didn't participate in (2022). I hope you like it anyway.

He hasn’t paid enough attention to you lately.

Between work and the nights spent protecting the streets of Hell’s Kitchen, he is hardly home. He tries to be, but he fails almost every time. The bed is starting to grow colder, and his scent lingers only half-heartedly in the atmosphere. You miss him. You miss his touch, his skin, his voice but most importantly, you miss the spark. It has been two weeks of Matt being slumped, but that is more than enough to drive you crazy.

When it gets colder outside, you need your boyfriend by your side, to hold you and cherish you like he usually would. You miss being desired by someone. You miss being the center of his world. Not that you want him to ignore his responsibilities forever, but just for a few hours, you want him to yourself wholeheartedly. Missing him when he isn’t gone is the worst feeling, and it often leads to tensions in your relationship. 

Matt can be so selfless that it sometimes starts to look and feel like he is being selfish by going after what he deems to be right. He doesn’t realize it though, not until he is hit over the head with it and suffers a concussion.

As Halloween rolls around the corner, having an absent boyfriend grows into a problem you can no longer ignore. And you don’t want to, either.

Karen decided to throw a party, and she sent out invites to her closest friends months ago to make sure everyone could somehow fit it into their schedules. She has invited everyone she knows and encouraged those to bring their friends as plus ones. Costumes are mandatory.

Halloween used to be your favorite holiday, but this time, you aren’t even sure if you can make it to the party without getting pitiful glances because your plus one has to be busy—the plus one that Karen also invited separately because he is her colleague and friend. 

Matt doesn’t seem to care much about Halloween, especially not this party. Even though it’s not only important to Karen but to you, he has expressed how much he doesn’t want to go because he can’t neglect his Daredevil duties for one night. Not right now. 

When you reminded him a few weeks ago, he told you that the 31st of October is boring and overrated, kissed you, and then you both went to bed. 

You decided that night that it was time to use a different set of weapons. If Matt knew, he would go crazy, but that is what you aim for. You want him to go crazy. Crazy for you. 

The first step of your plan sounds easier than it is: convince him to come with you.

“You going to Karen’s party?” he asks you one evening before going out into the night.

You answer curtly, “Yeah.”

“Got a costume?”

“You know I do.”

His lips curl into a smirk. “Are you going to let me feel it? Or do you want me to guess?” 

“I want you to come with me.” You help zip his Daredevil suit back up. “I want you to put the mask down and come with me. Karen invited the both of us,” you say. “She’s gonna be asking questions.”

If it’s the disappointed cadence of your voice or the fact that he’s curious about what you’re going to wear, you’re not sure, but when he suddenly agrees, you’re taken aback. “I’ll join you guys later,” he murmurs. “Right now–“

Your excitement falls flat again. “The city needs you. Yeah, I know.” 

You’re starting to grow sick and tired of that sentence. He doesn’t deserve this. He is trying his best, and you act like a needy child. You’re angry while he is saving lives and making sure the streets are a little safer. But you stood by for weeks without complaining once that you felt a bit neglected. You always show him unwavering support. Even now, you want nothing more than for him to do what he needs to do, but you do so with a bitter aftertaste. And a lot of misplaced jealousy. 

Not having him close is torture. You need him. Even dressed in protective red leather, he looks too hot to handle, and that makes you crave him even more.

You brush off the ache in your core and focus on getting him dressed for the night. You don’t want him to get hurt.

“You going to wear the costume?” you ask.  

He cocks an eyebrow. “You mean the sweater that says ‘I’m not Daredevil?’”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on, it’s a joke only the four of us will understand. It’s perfect!”

“It’s not that I don’t want to,” he says, his unfocused eyes darting up toward the ceiling. “I just… How about I just put a suit on and say I’m James Bond?”

“Please?” You wrap your arms around his neck. 

He sighs warily in response. “Will you tell me what your costume is?”

“No,” you answer plainly.

That’s the second part of your plan; wear the most revealing costume you could wear, and drive him crazy when he does appear at the party and hears you mingling. When he smells your bare skin, and when he realizes that you’re getting all the attention he should be giving you. 

“Please,” he copies your pleading tone, lips pursed into a frustrated pout. The conflict in his eyes is not yet covered by the red mask. 

He’s contemplating. For a moment, he considers staying. He wants to spend time with you; he wants to go to the party and have fun. You love Halloween and he would do anything to make you happy, but he can’t. The city is busier than usual. Louder. More intense. His ears can’t seem to catch a break. He tries to focus on you, to tune out the noise, but he fails miserably every damn time.

He doesn’t sleep, not much, and he barely eats anymore because he drowns himself in work so deeply that he forgets his basic needs. He just needs it all to stop. He has to go out to get some semblance of relief—to fight, to get his fists bloody, and come home exhausted enough to get a few hours of shut-eye before the cycle inevitably repeats itself.

It has been like this for weeks now. He is always overstimulated, always overworked; he can’t even kiss you sometimes because the thought alone burns his skin. It hurts that much.

He isn’t going to stop. You know that. You understand, but even the devil’s advocate grows tired sometimes. 

You’re so tired of the distance. You are so tired of him not talking to you when something is bothering him, and you’re tired of having to pretend it doesn’t bother you. 

Still, neither of you want to start the conversation. It’s a series of petty attempts to gain attention, a constant tiptoeing around each other until one of you caves. 

You peck his lips. “You come to the party, you find out,” you say. “You don’t, I guess I’m showing all of this ass for nothing.”

His ears perk up. “You’re what?” 

“Nothing,” you wave him off. 

“No, what did you just say?”

“I said you should come to the party.”

“After that. Is it—I swear to God if you’re wearing something short…”

“Then what? You gonna drag me home and spank me?” You scoff, trying your best to hide the fact that this is exactly what you want him to do.

The silk of your dressing gown hits the floor. It’s time to play even dirtier than before. Your plan is made to be adaptable, after all.

Matt stops breathing. “This isn’t fair,” he growls.

You smirk. “You should go.”

“You’re torturing me, you know that?”

“You decided to go out tonight,” you counter.

“Because I have to.”

“Do you?”

He curses under his breath, “Fuck. Okay, whatever game you’re playing, sweetheart, I need you to stop.”

You’re nowhere near satisfied. In all of your naked glory, you take a step forward. “Or what?” 

“Or,” he says, and his voice lowers barely above a dangerous whisper, “I’ll stuff your cunt with my fingers until you’re begging me to come. And then, just when you’re about to, I’ll pull away and leave you to take care of it yourself because I know you won’t be able to come without my help. That’s what I’m gonna do if you keep teasing me like that.”

Your jaw drops. You’ve got him right there, with his teeth buried in the hook, but he knows that if he lets the trap fall shut, you win. This isn’t just a desperate attempt at getting his attention anymore—you’ve got that now. This is turning into a game. 

Matt smirks, hearing the uptick of your heartbeat. He thinks he’s so smart. Reaching out, he cups your bare pussy with his rough palm, eliciting a sweet moan out of your mouth that shoots right to his cock. “Already so fucking wet for me,” he purrs. 

His touch feels like electroshocks shooting right into your bloodstream. It has been way too long, and you’re already burning for him before you can even fight back.

You want to beg him to keep going, but as quickly as he has put his hands on you, he retreats again. 

Matt marvels at the feeling of your slick between his thick fingers. He takes a whiff. Your arousal is so prominent in the air that his face contorts in agony. And then, he slides the digit into his mouth. Your distinctive taste explodes on his taste buds, and he moans, “Delicious.”

The show he’s giving you is utterly erotic, and it takes everything in you not to drop to your knees and take his aching cock out of his suit. 

Pressing his lips to yours in a bruising kiss, he whispers, “I’ll see you later.” 

He’s gone before you can protest.

He’s not the only one who has tricks up his sleeves though, and you’re more than ready to seek your revenge later tonight and finally get what you so deeply crave from him. He has to let go eventually, and he has to pay attention to you for longer than five minutes. You both need it.

Dressed in your costume and with a bottle of liquor, you make your way to Karen’s apartment. You’re determined to make this night last. Well, at least long enough for Matt to arrive, and then it’s showtime. 

Your friend greets you with a welcoming hug. Her small living space is already crowded, and you make your way through toward the table with the drinks. You can feel several eyes on you. Without your coat on, the costume you’re wearing leaves little to the imagination. You wonder if Matt can smell you across the city, wherever he may be right now. Maybe he does, and maybe he can tell what the thought of him is doing to you. Maybe he can tell that this is exciting you and he will cut his patrol short tonight. But you know he isn’t paying attention to you. He only does so when he fears that you’re in danger.

“And who are you supposed to be?” a low voice asks beside you.

You turn to find a tall guy dressed as a werewolf approaching the punchbowl to your right. 

“The tag said ‘slutty witch’,” you answer. “But I find the term a bit… problematic, so I’m a witch who likes to wear very short clothes on very cold days.”

He chuckles. Underneath his makeup and the fake fur, you can’t make out his features, but it’s not like you care anyway. “Well,” he says, “you’re a very beautiful witch.”

Oh, now he’s flirting with you. 

Your plan for tonight includes mingling to draw attention to you and make Matt jealous when he gets here, not flirting with strangers. You would never do that to Matt. You also don’t feel the need to flirt with anyone who isn’t your boyfriend, even though the attention does make you blush for a moment— mostly out of discomfort. 

You’re not interested in this man. Werewolves are only your type when they’re fictional, and even then you will always prefer your devil over hairy mythological creatures. 

You take a sip of your drink. “I accept the compliment,” you say. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” the man answers. He takes another step toward you. “Are you here alone?”

You take a step back. “Yes, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

“Playing hardball, huh?”

“No, actually, I’m just not interested.” 

“Nah, I don’t believe that. Is it another guy? It’s a guy, right? It has to be a guy.”

You glare at him. “Why? Because you’re so hot and irresistible and can’t take no for an answer?” Your voice drips with sarcasm. 

He leans toward you, and he’s getting dangerously close to your personal space. “You think I’m hot. You said it,” he says. 

Thankfully, he turns around to pour himself a cup of punch before touching you against your will. You wouldn’t hesitate to snap his neck like a twig. 

Your heart is pounding as the adrenaline mixes with fury in your veins. You forget about Matt and the fact that you dressed like this for him. He will appreciate it, and his opinion matters most to you. You just hope that this guy will leave it be so you can join your friends on the other side of the room.

“No offense, dude,” you tighten your grip around your cup, “but I think I’d rather be anywhere but here.”

Karen and Foggy are mingling somewhere, and you know that you’re definitely safe with them. 

The werewolf smirks. “Can I come?” 

Before you can tell him off, the very thing you thought wouldn’t happen happens. 

“I believe the lady said she’s not interested,” Matt pipes up behind you.

So he was listening to you from across the city. His locked jaw is an indication that he is fuming inside. More than fuming. He’s about to explode.

Oh fuck. 

He appears next to you, and one look at him makes you beam. He is wearing the red sweater with the big, white “I’m Not Daredevil” written on it. He even put on the antlers. 

The werewolf takes a good look at him when he wraps his arm around your waist, and he finally retreats. “She’s all yours,” he says. 

“Yeah, she is,” says Matt. You can’t see his eyes, but the rest of his face is expressive enough to give the other man a faint idea of what he is capable of. As innocent as he may look, he isn’t.

There’s a certain dominance he carries that could make any grown human being weak in their knees. You are the only one who would voluntarily do so and thank him, and beg him for more. 

Once the werewolf has disappeared, Matt turns you toward him. His feral demeanor slips for just a moment. “Are you okay?” he asks softly. He cradles your face in his hand, his thumb brushing your cheekbone, and you once again find yourself on fire.

For you, he put the costume on. For you, he came. And everything you have been struggling with these past weeks while he was absent feels so stupid now because he has been trying from the start, you just didn’t want to see it because you were so upset and needy. 

You nod weakly, leaning into his touch. “He was just…weird,” you murmur. Reaching out, you touch his sweater. “You’re wearing the costume.”

Matt shows the faintest hint of a smile before it completely fades from his face again.

“Yeah,” his answer is breathless. “But what the fuck are you wearing?” His hand slips from your waist to your exposed thighs with a low growl. A shiver ripples through him.

“A costume.”

He brushes over your ass, and there is hardly anything there to cover the fishnets you’re wearing. If he grips a little tighter, he will hold your flesh in his hands. Just a little lower and he will touch your wet cunt. Your scent is overwhelming, and the feeling of your skin in the crowded room makes all the lights in his brain go dark as they burst. He’s already so hard in his jeans. 

“Was this your plan all along?” he asks. His grip on your cheek tightens, and the other hand grabs your ass. “Get me to come with you just to hear your thighs brush against each other? To smell how wet you are with barely any fabric covering your pussy? Did you want me to bend you over in front of everyone just so I’ll touch you? Are you that desperate?”

You’re in trouble. Big, big trouble—and it’s exactly what you wanted. To be fair, it stands in a slightly different light now, but it’s Halloween. Things always go differently than planned on Halloween.

You swallow thickly, fluttering your lashes at him as innocently as you can. “You’ve been so busy,” you confess, “and I just missed you. I missed you so much, baby. I had to do something to get your attention.”

He bares his teeth. Those gorgeous teeth behind those gorgeously plump lips. You can only imagine them on yours. You can only imagine what it will feel like to have him between your thighs now, wildly licking at your slick folds while thrusting his skilled fingers in and out of your cunt. God, you want that. You need it. The thought alone is enough to make your thighs clench, and you cross them. You’re positively dripping. 

“Listen to me,” he demands, and his grip moves to your chin. “You’re going to finish that drink, alright? You’re gonna drink up, you’re gonna say goodbye to Foggy and Karen, and then we’re going to get out of here so I can fuck that feeling of inadequacy right out of that beautiful head of yours. Are we clear?”

You stare into your reflection in his glasses. The blood is rushing in your cheeks. You don’t trust your voice; all you can do is nod.

“Good girl.” His hand drops from your face. 

You’re shaking. Your knees are weak, and your legs feel like jelly. You breathe and you live solely for him. He has a power over you that is almost embarrassing to admit to. 

When you try to down the rest of your punch in one gulp, Matt stops you. By slowing you down, he’s teasing you. You suppose that you deserve it, but you’re not sure how much longer you can wait. 

It takes an agonizing while for you to finish your drink, say goodbye to your friends, and call a cab. Matt keeps his hands to himself. It’s so unlike him, but it gives you an idea of what’s to come, and the anticipation is killing you.

The door to his apartment hasn’t even fully shut behind you when he flips you around and pushes you against the wall, chest first. He does it with such force that your palms burn upon landing. You gasp.

“You’ve been teasing me all night,” he rasps into your ear. “I put this costume on for you. To be nice. If I’d known you would make it your mission to make my dick hard in front of dozens of people, I would have fucked you before going out tonight.”

You know that he wouldn’t have, but the thought still sends shivers down your spine. Not a single coherent thought is left in your mind.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t–” you break off into a moan.

Your tights are torn in two by his eager hands, and you moan when he pulls you back against his hard cock. You can feel his straining against your pants against your now bare skin. You want to reach out and touch him, but he won’t let you. 

And then, his palm lands flat on your bare ass cheek. He doesn’t even bother to take the rest of the costume off.

“You didn’t mean to?” he asks. “Are you sure about that?” 

You buck your hips. His dark chuckle grazes your ear. 

“Answer me, sweetheart.”

“I meant to,” you cry out when his hand comes back down on your red ass cheek. It stings, but the pain shoots straight to your middle where it settles in your needy core. “And I don’t regret it.”

“That’s better.” 

“Please.” You don’t know what you’re begging for, but this aching emptiness is driving you crazy. You need his cock, and it’s becoming pathetically obvious.

Matt gives your backside another slap before pressing you further against the wall. “Don’t ever doubt that you’re the most important thing in the world to me,” he says. “But slutty witch? You know what that does to me?”

You can’t help but smirk. “Yeah.”

He tears the underwear under your skirt in two. 

“If you want to be a slutty witch,” he presses his lips to your ear, “then act like it.”

Without a warning, without preparation, he thrusts into you. Your lips part in a lustful moan. 

Matt is relentless. One arm wraps around you, the other around your throat. He thrusts his hips upward, filling you to the brim with his cock. He pulls out just enough to move past your G-spot and directs the tip of his cock toward that spongy spot that makes you see stars. 

His name tumbles from your lips like a mantra. Matt, Matt, Matt… 

Your chest deflates. The corset of your costume is so tight, you can’t breathe. Your nipples ache underneath the fabric. They want to be free. They want to be touched. 

“Matt,” you beg. 

He doesn’t hesitate to open the ties at the front, pulling you free from the metal cage. 

The air gets knocked out of your lungs. He tightens his grip, locking the oxygen in your windpipe. Skin slaps against skin, moans fill the air scented with the stench of sex and every time his cock penetrates your tight walls, he pushes you further to the edge of the precipice.

From around your waist, he moves his arm down and his hand to your pussy. He catches your clit with precision. His thrusts speed up. They hit deeper and harder, and your eyes roll back into your head.

Matt, Matt, Matt…

“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he grunts. “Such a good little slutty witch for me, sweetheart. Push back against me.”

He doesn’t have to tell you twice. You move your hips back to meet his thrusts. He lets out a moan of his own, digging his teeth into the soft flesh of your shoulder.

“That’s it.” He rubs in rapid circles over your clit. Your body is begging for a release.

The wall feels cold against your heated forehead. His fingers tighten around your throat again, causing you to clench around his cock. He twitches. You can feel every desperate drag of him inside of you, and he only keeps on giving you more, and more, and…

Your hand finds his against against the wall. The warning of your impending orgasm gets lost, but he doesn’t need verbal confirmation for something that he can feel every time he thrusts into the walls of your cunt that are hugging him so tightly, he is holding on by a thread. 

As if to distract himself, Matt lands another harsh slap against your bottom. “Who do you belong to?” he asks, feeling the flesh jiggle under his touch. 

You moan. “You, Matthew. Only you!”

Your screams of pleasure are music to his ears. He repeats the motion of his hand. You will have imprints on your skin tomorrow, and he will proudly feel them before you have to go to work. Leaving his mark on you is an exciting thought.

His balls tighten. He won’t last much longer if you keep squeezing him like that—if those thoughts keep popping into his head, and he barely manages to keep himself from coming right then and there, coming deep inside of you and fucking his cum into you until you#re overflowing. 

The pain from the sloppy spanking—he isn’t capable of seriously hurting you—floods your system and your pussy at the same time, amplifying the lewd noise echoing in his otherwise silent apartment. With the added wetness, the circles he rubs over your clit with his calloused fingers become impossibly faster. The sensitive bundle of nerves starts to scream; you can barely take it anymore, but you need his permission to come. In this scene, at least. You must always wait for his permission when he punishes you like this. 

You have a safe word for a reason, but you’re too blissed out to care. You love what he’s doing to you. You love how it feels, and you love how well the little pain he introduces you to every time mixes with the pleasure that consumes you whole. 

He buries his nose in your neck. You smell of sweat, salt, and his shampoo. It makes you feel better, you told him. To him, it’s a sensory dream. You complete him, and your scent complements him in ways he doesn’t fully understand. All Matt knows is that it makes him feel good, and not just because he gets a little possessive sometimes. It’s a warmth that runs deeper than the words of the English language could describe.

Again, he flicks your clit. “I want you to come,” he finally says the five words you have been waiting for. “I want you to come all over my cock, and I want you to scream my name so this entire city knows who’s taking care of you.”

Your pussy clenches around him again, and with a shout, you come undone. Your legs shake as the coil in your lower stomach snaps, tearing down your walls. You spasm, and you cry out his name. No feeling could ever be as powerful as the orgasms that Matt manages to give you. They are like tsunamis, and they know no mercy. They are a force of nature that no one can control. You know it will happen, but you never know the force of it until it happens. And every time it does, you feel like you’re floating in a world far from home where only he, his godly hands, and his cock exist. 

Matt fills you with his cum after a few more sloppy thrusts. He comes hard, and it doesn’t seem to stop for quite a while. He’s leaking onto your thighs at this point, but the stickiness is only another reminder of him, and it makes you feel warm inside. 

With your breathing slowed to a more acceptable pace, you allow yourself to lean back against him. “Wow,” you mumble. 

He catches some of his cum from the inside of your thigh. “Yeah,” he says. “Wow.”

You greedily open your mouth. The salty essence of him spreads over your tongue. He’s the only man whose taste you would carry with you proudly for days. 

The kiss Matt delivers to your cheek is sweet. 

“Did you like my—” 

He cuts you off, “Yeah. Too much.”

“But it did work,” you say. 

“You could’ve just talked to me.” 

You look over your shoulder, you notice that he’s still wearing his costume, minus the glasses. His hazel eyes are full of hurt. Shame. Guilt.

“I’m sorry, I just didn’t think you’d listen.”

“I always listen,” he says. “Even when you think I don’t.”

You whimper at the loss of his cock when he pulls out. Matt doesn’t turn you around right away, and for a split second, you fear that this will turn into an argument. 

Instead, he sweeps you up into his arms.

“Don’t disappear on me again,” the plea is whispered directly into his ear.

His hold on you tightens, carrying you toward your shared bedroom. “I won’t.”

“Thank you.”

“I love you.” The sincerity in his voice lights the candle in your soul that threatened to go out. 

You answer without missing a beat, “I love you too.”

“Do me a favor?”

“Anything.”

Matt throws you down on the mattress. “Keep the costume.”

Halloween might just become his favorite holiday, after all. 

Matt Murdock Smut Tag List: @acharliecoxedfan @gpenguin666 @linamarr @mcugeekposts @itwasthereaminuteago @norestfortheshelbywicked @yarrystyleeza @littlenerdyravenclaw @etanordoesbullsh1t @thychuvaluswife @harleycao @schneeflocky @imjustcal @pipsqueakkitten @merlinbtch @sya-skies @amberritonicole @ravenclaw617 @pigeonmama

[thunderheadfred]

Been a while since I posted an update on the kitchen, mainly because it is 95% done and I’ve enjoyed not having to think about it as an All-Consuming-Project

We still have to tile the backsplash but that is literally. It. We just finished the LED strip lights today. (Well, my dad did lol, I paid him with 2 home-cooked meals)

But LOOK! KITCHEM3MWM

[wanderinginksplot]

What to watch during the writer's strike:

Don't pay attention to companies who blame writers for delayed movies and television shows! The WGA strike comes from people who are trying to make things better - not only for themselves and other writers, but the films and tv shows we all love.

While we wait for a resolution, I thought I would share some existing television shows that I enjoy. I didn't bother with too much well-known stuff. Instead, I focused on shows I feel many people missed because of the glut of content that all premiered at once over the last few years. (I may make another one of these for movies later on, but this one is about tv.)

[Update: Movie version here]

Feel free to add on! Just try to give a quick, spoiler-free synopsis for the show and the streaming service where it can be found.

List under the cut!

Netflix:

The Good Place (2016-2020) - A 'bad' woman is accidentally sent to heaven. She and her moral philosophy professor of a soulmate try to save her soul by making her a better person. Genre: Comedy with deeper implications and one of the best endings in television history.

Russian Doll (2019-2022) - When Nadia dies at her birthday party, she's more than a little confused to come back. Especially when it keeps happening. Genre: Time loop drama with a wicked sense of humor and a dash of theoretical physics. Potentially not ended?

Narcos (2015-2017) - The fight of the American DEA and the Colombian army against cocaine kingpin Pablo Escobar and his reign of terror. Genre: Drama with thrilling elements. Lots of violence, some sex and language. Lots of subtitles. Features Pedro Pascal and Boyd Holbrook, if you need some extra incentive.

Derry Girls (2018-2022) - Five teens grow up in Derry, Ireland in the 1990s, amid the final years of the Troubles, a low-level war that lasted roughly 30 years. Genre: Comedy. Some sexual content, some religious content, less violence than you would expect, and the best nun ever to appear on film.

Arcane (2021-?) - Two sisters are alienated when one accidentally kills their adoptive father. Their different paths threaten the fragile peace of a city already on the breaking point. Genre: Drama with elements of action-adventure. Though it's animated, Arcane's animation is beautifully done with tantalizing steampunk elements that will keep you invested.

Disney+:

Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008-2020) - If you haven't seen any of the Star Wars animated series, this is a good place to start. Set in the time gap between Episode II and Episode III, this series helps flesh out Anakin Skywalker and the Jedi. It is also a great introduction to some of the characters and plots of The Mandalorian. (Star Wars: Rebels is another good choice.) Genre: Adventure with some drama. Violence and death are a large part of The Clone Wars, but it's usually appropriate for children. The clone troopers will steal your heart!

Gravity Falls (2012-2016) - Dipper Pines and his sister Mabel are sent to Gravity Falls, Oregon to live with their great-uncle for their summer break. But when Dipper finds a mysterious book in the woods, the pair find that Gravity Falls is far more mysterious than it seems... Genre: Adventure with a lot of comedy. Though it's billed as a children's cartoon, Gravity Falls is an intriguing watch with mystery subplots that will keep anyone guessing. It also features a famously strong and cohesive series ending. I was in my late 20s when I first watched this and I was still invested!

Daredevil (2015-2018) - After being blinded as a young boy, Matthew Murdock trained his other senses to replace the sight that he lost. He uses his skills to protect the helpless in the New York City neighborhood of Hell's Kitchen. Genre: Action and superhero. Features a lot of incredibly choreographed violence. (Jessica Jones is also an excellent show to watch, especially if you think of David Tennant as the consummate 'good guy'. He's got range!)

HBO Max (Just 'Max' now, I guess):

Ghosts (2019-2023) - Petty roommate squabbles don't stop just because you're dead! Alison and her husband Mike inherit a house, then a near-death experience allows Alison to see its ghostly inhabitants. Chaos and humor ensue as the ghosts try to adjust to the house's new owners. Genre: Humor. Ghosts is a British sitcom, but since the writers are comedians (writing and performing in Horrible Histories), the show is done in a style that feels more natural to American viewers. Hint: watch the BBC version, not the American one. They're fairly similar, but definitely not the same!

Pushing Daisies (2007-2009) - A pie-maker with the ability to bring back the dead helps to solve murders. He's helped by his once-dead childhood sweetheart. Genre: Comedy with some dramatic elements. Some of the CGI-heavy moments haven't aged particularly well, but the show has a unique premise and an incredibly talented cast!

Hulu:

Abbott Elementary (2021-?) - This mockumentary series showcases an inner-city elementary school in Philadelphia. The teachers and administration do their best for the kids, but they're constrained by budgets and the limitations of the educational system itself. Genre: Comedy mockumentary. Though Abbott Elementary is fictional, some of the issues brought up are all too real. This is a funny and incisive look at the American public school system.

Amazon Prime:

Fleabag (2016-2019) - The unnamed protagonist of the show struggles through life on her own with limited support from her alienated family and the memories of her recently deceased best friend. Genre: Comedy with lots of dramatic elements. Lots of sexual content and references, some language, breaking the fourth-wall, and several characters you just long to hit. I watched the second season in a single day, that's how good this was.

Unknown Streaming Service:

Black Sails (2014-2017) - This prequel to Treasure Island features elements from the book, original characters, and real pirates from history in a setting that emphasizes realism. Captain Flint and his crew search for a legendary prize... one that might allow them to claim Nassau for their own. Genre: Action and adventure. Think Game of Thrones, but with pirates. Incredibly well-written and well-acted with gorgeous scenery, LGBTQ representation, and just enough historical accuracy to keep things grounded. Black Sails also boasts one of the best endings ever given for a television show.

Like I said, please feel free to reblog and add your own television show recommendations onto this list! There are plenty of things to watch and plenty of ways to support the WGA strike that don't involve giving in to big studios.

[fruity-mega-coconut69]

The Quiet Kid Pt. II.

[pairings]: Tara Carpenter x Reed!Fem!Reader

[Summary]: You managed to save yourself and almost everyone. Just this one time.

[Warnings]: Blood, 'death' (Quinn), swearing.

A/N: i...couldn't do it. I couldn't kill her off, i'm so sorry!

---------------------------------------------------------

After Mindy told you all the rules, everyone decided to stay at the apartment, just to be sure.You and Tara were in the kitchen, cooking , when she spoke up. “ I think you should go and stay with your friends in Atlanta. It’s safer there.” You looked at her with furrowed eyebrows. “You know, considering what happened to you last time.” You smile slightly at her. “ I mean- I-I wouldn’t blame you if……..you wanted to go.” You nodded at her and looked back at whatever you were cooking. “ That’s…I mean-I. “ You pause to gather your thoughts. “ I’m not really concerned about my safety. “ She raised an eyebrow at you. “ I just…don’t want you..or your friends to get hurt. “ She chuckles. “ That’s pretty impossible. I mean to not get hurt. “ 

Suddenly, you hear a gasp behind you. Both of you turn around to see who it is. “ Oh my god, L/N! Are you stealing my brother's girl? “ Says Mindy.

You look down at your foot. “ I-...No- I “ 

“Stop, Mindy. I'm no one’s ‘girl’  “

She rounds the table and goes over to you guys, Chad shortly after who takes a spot beside Tara. “ Sam” 

“Yep? “ Sam says coming into the kitchen. You sigh and start walking out of the kitchen. Tara grabs your wrist and looks at you, confused. “ What’s wrong? “ She whispers. 

You just shake your head and go over to the couch, taking a set beside Anika. As ‘the core four’ talk in the kitchen, Anika turns to you. “Sooo, Tara? “You laugh and shake your head. “ What’s up with her? “ 

“I mean, we all know you have a crush on her.” You nod your head and lean back. “Doesn’t mean anything though. They chose Chad. Which is understandable. “ She looks at you, pity in her eyes. "If it makes you feel better, I vote for you.”

You are about to answer when you glance at the TV. The news is on and the title says, ‘Prime suspect Samantha Carpenter.’ You gasp and nudge Anika in the shoulder, catching her attention. She looks at the Tv and gasps. “ Guys. What the hell? “ She picks up the remote, turning the volume up while the others come into the room. 

“We are hearing from sources inside the homicide division that the prime suspect is none other than Samantha Carpenter, one of the survivors of the woodsboro killings in 2022, seen here attacking a woman on the street last night.” Soon a video shows Sam pushing some random girl in the street while covered with something wet. The others are trying to hold her back.

You look up slowly at Sam, seeing her just staring at the TV. You look at the others who are sighing in annoyment. Your leg starts to shake as your hand curls into fists. You push yourself off the couch and practically run to your room, slamming the door. 

Your breathing starts to increase as tears flood from your eyes. Leaning against the wall and slowly sliding down on it, your shaking hand reaches into your pocket for your phone. You are soon dialing Kirby’s number as you put up the phone to your ear.

“Hello?”

You let out a sob. “Kirby” 

“Y/N? What’s wrong? “ 

“ I-I-...don’t wanna do this again. Fuck!” 

“Hey, hey, hey. Calm down, okay? Just-” Her voice is cut off as you get a notification. You pull your phone down to see a picture. A picture of Quinn, getting stabbed in her room. Gasping, you get up shakily and open your door to see the others already at her door.You join them. 

“Run” 

At that moment, Quinn was seemingly pushed out of her room with ghostface behind her. All of you take a step back while yelling. Quinn’s body fell onto Anika as they both went down. Mindy was quick to get Quinn off of her girlfriend. They looked at the corpse and Anika screamed. 

Suddenly, Chad grabs Tara from your hold and starts running down the stairs. “Guy’s come on! “Tara screams .You all look at ghostface standing still, just staring. 

“Oh, fuck” 

He stepped forward and sliced Mindy’s arm. Your eyes widened as he looked at you, tilting his head.But before he could get to you, Anika grabbed his leg. He leaned down and started choking her. You looked at Sam then started helping Mindy up. Sam ran into the kitchen for weapons. You sat Mindy down and noticed Ghostface getting up with Anika and pushed her against the bookshelf. “Oh, hell no” 

Running over you threw a punch at him as he groaned and pulled his knife out of Anika. He turned around, swung his arm back and plugged his knife into your belly. Your body froze as pain shot through it. He tilted his head at you then pulled the knife out, then pushed it back in. You screamed at the top of your lungs. Suddenly, his head was smashed with a knife holder-thing. 

Sam took a hold of you as Mindy did with Anika. Ghostface was pushed back, causing him to slam into the door. Sam pulled you quickly into Quinn’s bedroom. She let go of you to close the door as you held your hand to your wound while whimpering and groaning, the other two girls too. 

Ghostface banged on the door as Sam tried to hold it shut. Blood dripped down from your hand as you sobbed, squeezing your eyes shut. Anika looks at you and then at MIndy while crying. The banging suddenly stopped. Sam looked back at you guys then at the other door in the room.

“Mindy, bathroom door. Hurry! “ 

She got up, stumbling over to the bathroom, She screamed loudly when she was inside. “Oh, fuck! That guy is dead.” Ghostface appeared out of nowhere and she screamed again, going to shut the door at him. Sam went to help, but unsuccessfully. They stepped back and closed the other door instead. Sam went and got a drawer, pushing it over to the door.

You got up to help, when Anika groaned in pain. Mindy’s head shot up and looked at you with pleading eyes. You hesitated before nodding. She stepped away from the drawer and over to Anika. You went into her spot and leaned against the drawer. Sam looked at you while you put one of your hands over to your stomach. 

She then looked out the window to see the so-called ‘Cute Boy’ shouting for you guys. She went over and opened it. A couple of seconds later you see him picking up a ladder and pushing it out the window. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Do you have a better idea? “ Sam looked back at you guys then at him.”Fuck. No” She started reaching for the ladder as ghostface continuously banged at the door as you tried your best to hold it shut. The ladder reached Quinn’s window as Danny shouted. “ You have to come one at a time.” She nodded and looked back at you.

“You three go first. Y/N!” 

“What? Hell nah. Someone needs to hold the door! You three first!.” Sam hesitantly nodded and turned around, getting on the ladder as Danny assured her. 

Mindy glanced at you from beside Anika with a worried expression on her face. Tears streamed down your face as blood dripped from your shirt and onto the floor. Your left hand on your stomach and the other curled at your side. Mindy looked at her girlfriend who was also heavily bleeding. “They are losing a lot of blood!” 

“Say something more positive,” Anika cried out.   

Soon, Sam was on the other side. She shouted out to you guys. “Come on, Mindy!” Mindy’s hand now drenched in blood, held at Anika’s wound. “Anika! Come on!”

Your body shook as Mindy put Anika’s arm around her shoulders, helping her up. They shouted at each other, and eventually Mindy got on the ladder. You looked at Anika’s slouched over body and sighed. “You know you are going to go next, right?”

She looked back at you with wide eyes.”No! You-”

“Just shut up--uh, please! You are going!” Her jaw clenched as her grip tightened on her wound. She slowly nodded. Mindy arrived at Sam and Danny and Anika slowly got on the ladder. Your weak body started to give out as you fell onto the ground. Ghostface’s arms swinging in through the door.

“Anika! Get your ass on the fucking ladder!”You screamed after her, pushing your body backwards with all your strength. She got on, the others reassuring her. You got up slowly and ghostface almost busted through. You gasp and slam your body onto the drawer. Anika was in the middle of the ladder when your body finally gave up and you fell. Ghostface walked in and looked at you, laying on the ground with fear in your eyes.

The others’ screaming stopped as he took your legs and swung you to the side and into the wall. You screamed with agony and your body shook. “Go, Anika! Go!”

Ghostface dropped your legs and made his way over to the window. You cried out and tried to push your body up from the ground. He took the end of the ladder into his hands and started to shake it. The others reached out to Anika. You finally managed to get up and threw yourself at Ghostface. Mindy took her girlfriend into her arms then looked back at you as Sam screamed. “Y/N!

Suddenly, you heard sirens in the distance and he tilted his head at you, just laying on the ground, glaring at him as more tears poured out of your eyes and blood from your wound. His gloved hands clenched into a fist then he grunted and took his knife, leaving you there. You Put your shaking hands on the end of the ladder and pull yourself up. You got on the ladder and started crawling. As soon as you arrived, Sam took your body into her arms and Danny put pressure on your wound. You sat up and leaned up against the wall as Sam spoke to you.

“You did it! You saved Anika! Ar-Are you good?” You nodded your head as you let out a breath of air.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

@dksjskx

[northameicanblog]

The Edge, 30 Hudson Yards, New York: 30 Hudson Yards is a supertall skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan's West Side, New York City. It is positioned near Hell's Kitchen, Chelsea, and NY Penn Station. As of November 2022, the building is the sixth-tallest in New York City and the eighth-tallest in the United States. The skyscraper offers a unique feature: a triangular observation deck known as The Edge. Located on the 100th floor, The Edge includes a bar and event space on the adjacent 101st floor. Wikipedia

[shakirawastaken]

dsmp if...they wanted to propose to you!

dsmp if... series goes wild  anyway

dream: - he’d put himself out there with a poise of confidence and strategy - like bro is prepared . he knows when where what why and how all this shit is happening  - but is also kinda like “ill just wing it and we’ll see how it goes lol” - get this man a schedule - he doesnt want to do a whole public thing so in my head i see him proposing to you in like a restaurant but like a fancy one - hed splurge for sURE  - one of those guys who had like 50 million meeting with ring companies to design the perfect one - asked his mom for help on designing a ring  - he had the blueprint for a speech in his head but when the moment came he went with the flow  - but when hes proposing hed remember his speech so hed be like - “i had this speech that id written, but looking at you made me forget it all, will you marry me?” or some shit like that LMFAOOO - pays sapnap money to come eat the place too so he can take pictures 

sapnap: - okay sapnap is a family man in my head - hed also want to do a destination proposal - maybe greece? rome? somewhere not in america is what im feeling - or hed do it in a fucking ranch in texas or like down the street from the dream team house either one - EITHER WAY he would want your parents and his parents MINIMUM to be there - searches up “best wedding ring designs 2022″ in google and hopes and prays - hed have one or two meeting to plan the ring but i think he’d be confident in what you like  - even if he has no clue - like “so sir, do you think your future fiance would like a rose gold band or gold band?” “rose gold for sure” *has no idea what you like * - would not try to plan a speech, he knows he’d forget it and wouldn’t even use it - saves all that material for the vows - so confident you’ll say yes that he starts calling ahead to look at venues to tour - LMFAO IMAGINE YOU ANSWER HIS PHONE AND THE GUY IS LIKE “hello yes we’re calling nick because he had interest in touring our wedding venue! congrats on the engagement!” - and youd be like “tf” - so you know - but dont tell him you know please it would make his year 

george: - is nervous - “dream what if they say no idk” “bro youre a fucking idiot” - def doesnt want to do a public proposal, he likes the private aspect - so he does it at home or some shit and his phone up to record cause bro knows youd be mad if you had no memento - but he doesnt do it secretly - hed press record and set it up so you can obviously see it - and youre expecting some prank - but then he gets down on one knee and youre tearing up and shi right in the middle of your kitchen - get mad at him for not letting you dress up and look nice for it - has a speech planned out in his head. word for word. and recites that shit back to you like its fucking drama class - once u say yes hes on discord like “SHE SAID YES” and sapnaps like “no fucking shit” - he’s the type of guy to make a ring that he likes and hopes that you like it too - luckily you do like the ring so it all works out - if not just tell him he wont be mad hell just go make a new one

quackity: - asks you like a few months earlier if you want to get married - “do you wanna get married” “sure” - so he knows youre locked in and ready to go LMFAOO even if you interpreted it as light hearted at the time - because of that theres a little suspicion that goes on in your mind when you see him go “i gotta take this call” or “no im def not looking up wedding venues 2023 what do you mean” - but you being the great s/o you are just ignore it - is he proposing or did he take you on a late night drive to an outlook thing - is he proposing or did you catch karl in the bushes with a camera - is he proposing or did he say youre beautiful - is he proposing or did he get down on one knee?? YK WHAT IM SAYING - bro just stares at you and you stare at him like - “babe” “babe” love - youre nodding ur head yes before bro gets a chance to speak - which is good cause he didn’t know what he wanted to say - not that he doesnt know what to say its just - he has so many words for you that he cant put them into words - was ready to blurt out a mixture of spanish and english and hope u caught his drift

karl: - enlists the help of his friend - “hey tina take y/n to get their nails done” - “hey brooke take y/n to get a new dress” - “hey sapnap give me money to buy y/n a ring” LMFAOFMOA - no hed be saving up that shit for AGES - started a proposal dream pinterest board the minute he knew you were the one - subtly ran ideas by you over the course of the years you were together - you didnt think of anything. blissfully unaware - “look at this picture on pinterest!” “oh its sO PRETTY!! imagine getting engaged there” - *saves it to the board* - BUT AS A RESULT he cant make up his mind on where to propose - so he just picks one enie-meanie-miney-mo or however you spell it  - wherever it ends up being its so sweet - mr beast or someone tricks you into coming to the location under the guise of a video  - and you show up and its karl in a suit - “lets go on a walk love” “okay?” - you get an idea of whats about to happen

wilbur: - stalks your pinterest stalks your moms pinterest stalks your ex friends sister met someone at the club and he kissed her’s pinterest - is SO CONFIDENT he’s got everything right because all his information is form you directly - plans that shit out to a T  - “okay phil at 11:02 am you call y/n and say good morning any plans for the day then tommy at 11:34 am call y/n and ask her if she wants to join you for a vlog at [location]” “dude wil we know lets just get on with it” - chooses somewhere with ambience with music perhaps by the ocean or a river or something - meticulously listens to all of spotify for the perfect song to play in the background - hired james and ash (professionals) to film  -  public proposal wants the world to know that he is wilbur and he loves you -  isnt nervous about proposing but is scared something is gonna go wrong -  the whole build up to the proposal is a blur to him  - he wants it to be perfect - hes mentally checking everything off in his head as it happens - “okay so we arrived on time, check” “we’re standing in the right direction check” - when the time comes to propose he blanks - cause everything went right and now its showtime - says whatever is on his mind and then gets on track - “oh my god everything i alright this is amazing! but i love you dear like a lot and...” - cue cheering from tommy (and a lot of soft smiles from random people) when you say yes 

please send me requests it took me days to figure out what to write about here

[artyandink]

the art of heresy forged 1943

SUMMARY: Modern day, 2022, and you have no clue what’s going on. You knew what you went through. You knew it was real, but why were there people trying to convince you that everything that happened to you wasn’t real. Hell, you called bullshit. But you get your chance to fight back when you get a call at your door.

TW: psychological torture, trauma, angst, drinking, prostitution, smoking, mentions of sex, Ben (cause he’s an individual warning), Ben and Psyke being little shits, it’s The Boys so be careful guys, really creepy shit, alcoholism, shitty dad, literal crack

A/N - divider by @chachachannah

Song Inspo: Confident - Demi Lovato

four - head to the back

1943:

The sound of silverware clinking against porcelain plates filled the modest dining room. The table was set simply, with a mismatched collection of plates and utensils that had seen better days, but they were polished and placed with care. The tablecloth, though worn, was clean, and a small vase of freshly picked wildflowers sat in the center, a touch of beauty in an otherwise plain setting. The smell of roasted chicken and potatoes lingered in the air, mingling with the faint scent of woodsmoke from the hearth.

You moved deftly around the small kitchen, hands familiar with the rhythm of preparing a meal for your family. The task had long since become second nature to you—boiling the potatoes, seasoning the chicken, making sure everything was just right. Though you were only nineteen, you’d taken on the role of caretaker in your family for as long as you could remember.

Edward, your father, sat at the head of the table, his expression a mixture of weariness and disinterest. His shirt was slightly rumpled, and his face bore the marks of too many nights spent with a bottle in hand. Though his presence was imposing, you’d learned to navigate around his moods, finding ways to keep the peace when necessary.

Your mother, Bethany, sat across from him, her thin frame wrapped in a shawl to keep warm. She was frail, her once vibrant eyes dulled by the illness that had taken hold of her over the past few years. Despite her condition, she managed a tired smile as you brought the food to the table.

“Thank you, dear,” Bethany said softly, her voice barely above a whisper. She looked at you with a mixture of pride and gratitude, though there was a sadness in her eyes that you tried to ignore.

“It’s nothing, Mama,” you replied, placing a plate in front of her. “Just rest and let me take care of everything.”

Beside her, your younger siblings, Elizabeth and Henry, waited eagerly for their dinner. Elizabeth was ten, with a mop of unruly curls and a mischievous grin that reminded you of your mother before she fell ill. Henry, just six years old, was wide-eyed and innocent, his curiosity about the world around him untainted by the hardships that had become your daily reality.

“Careful, it’s hot,” you warned as you placed the chicken in the center of the table. Elizabeth and Henry watched you with anticipation, their eyes lighting up as they caught sight of the meal you had prepared.

“Smells delicious, sis,” Elizabeth said, reaching for a potato as soon as you’d placed it in front of her.

“Wait until it’s cool enough to eat,” you chided gently, giving her a fond smile. “You don’t want to burn your mouth.”

Henry giggled, reaching for his fork with both hands. “I won’t burn my mouth. I’ll be really careful!”

You chuckled, ruffling his hair as you took your seat beside him. “I know you will, Henry. You’re always careful.”

Edward watched the scene unfold with a distant gaze, his fingers wrapped around a glass of whiskey. You caught his eye briefly, offering him a small smile, but he only grunted in response, taking a long drink from his glass. The tension in the room was something you were used to by now—your father’s moods were unpredictable, and you’d learned to navigate around them, keeping your siblings safe from his occasional outbursts.

As the family began to eat, the conversation remained light, focusing on the small joys of the day. Elizabeth eagerly shared stories from school, her animated voice filling the room as she recounted her adventures with her friends. Henry, though quieter, chimed in occasionally with his own observations, his youthful enthusiasm infectious.

“And then Miss Turner said we’re going to start a garden at school!” Elizabeth exclaimed, her eyes shining with excitement. “We’ll be growing vegetables and flowers, and we can take some home when they’re ready!”

Bethany smiled softly at her daughter’s excitement. “That sounds wonderful, darling. You’ll have to teach us all about gardening.”

Elizabeth beamed, nodding eagerly. “I will, Mama! I’ll make sure our garden is the best in the whole neighborhood!”

You couldn’t help but smile at Elizabeth’s enthusiasm. It was moments like these that made the difficulties of your life bearable—seeing your siblings happy, even if only for a little while, gave you the strength to keep going.

As the meal continued, you kept an eye on your father, subtly ensuring that his glass remained half-full. You’d learned to manage his drinking as best you could, making sure he didn’t drink too much too quickly. It was a delicate balance, one that required constant attention, but you were determined to maintain it for the sake of your family.

When the meal was finished, you began to clear the table, gathering the plates and utensils while your siblings continued to chatter excitedly about their day. Your mother, exhausted from the effort of sitting up for so long, leaned back in her chair, her eyes closing as she listened to the sound of her children’s voices.

“Let me help, dear,” Bethany said softly, trying to push herself up from her chair.

You shook your head, gently placing a hand on her shoulder to keep her seated. “No, Mama, you rest. I’ve got this.”

Bethany smiled weakly, her hand covering yours for a moment. “You’re a good girl,” she whispered, her voice full of emotion.

You returned her smile, though your heart ached at the sight of her so frail. “I just want to take care of you, Mama.”

As you moved to the kitchen to begin washing the dishes, you couldn’t help but feel a sense of contentment despite the challenges you faced. This was your life—caring for your family, making sure everyone was safe and fed. It wasn’t easy, but it was the only life you knew, and you wouldn’t trade it for anything.

The sound of Elizabeth and Henry’s laughter filled the house as they played in the living room, their voices a reminder of the innocence that still existed within the walls of your home. You could hear them teasing each other, their playful banter bringing a smile to your face as you scrubbed the dishes clean.

Outside, the world was at war, the headlines filled with stories of battles fought far from your small town. But here, within the walls of your home, you found solace in the simple routines of daily life. The war had touched your family, as it had touched every family in the country, but you were determined to shield your siblings from its harshest realities for as long as you could.

As you finished washing the last dish and set it on the drying rack, you took a moment to look out the window at the darkening sky. The stars were just beginning to appear, tiny pinpricks of light in the vast expanse of night. You wondered if your father had ever dreamed of something more—if he had ever looked up at the stars and wished for a different life. But those thoughts were fleeting, quickly replaced by the pressing demands of the present.

“Hey, sis, come see what I drew!” Henry’s voice called from the living room, breaking your reverie.

Drying your hands on a dish towel, you made your way to the living room where Henry and Elizabeth were sitting on the floor, surrounded by crayons and scraps of paper. Henry held up a drawing, his face beaming with pride.

“It’s a picture of us!” he announced, his eyes shining with excitement. “See, there’s you, and Mama, and Lizzie, and me!”

You knelt down beside him, taking the drawing in your hands. The lines were wobbly, the colors outside the lines, but it was a masterpiece in your eyes. “It’s beautiful, Henry,” you said, ruffling his hair affectionately. “You’re quite the artist.”

Elizabeth peered over your shoulder, giggling. “He made your hair purple!”

You laughed, pulling both of them into a hug. “I think I like it,” you said, smiling as they cuddled close.

Bethany watched the scene from her chair, her expression softening as she took in the sight of her children together. Edward, however, remained distant, his eyes fixed on the glass in his hand. You caught his gaze briefly, offering him another small smile, but he only nodded before taking another drink.

The evening passed in a comfortable routine. After helping your siblings with their homework and tucking them into bed, you returned to the kitchen to finish tidying up. Your mother had already retired to her room, exhausted from the day, and your father had disappeared into his study, no doubt to finish off the rest of his whiskey.

You moved quietly through the house, checking on your siblings one last time before heading to your own room. The house was quiet now, the only sound the faint creak of the floorboards beneath your feet. As you closed your bedroom door behind you, you let out a small sigh, allowing yourself a moment of peace.

Sitting on the edge of your bed, you picked up the small radio that sat on your nightstand and turned the dial until you found a station playing soft music. The gentle melody filled the room, and you leaned back against your pillows, letting the music wash over you.

The morning sun filtered through the thin curtains of the dining room, casting a warm glow over the modest table where your family gathered for breakfast. You were up early, as always, making sure everything was in order. The scent of sizzling bacon and freshly brewed coffee filled the air, a comforting aroma that made the small house feel like a haven, even amidst the challenges you faced.

Elizabeth and Henry sat at the table, eagerly awaiting their breakfast. Elizabeth was busily drawing something on a scrap of paper, her brow furrowed in concentration. Henry, on the other hand, was more focused on the food, his eyes fixed on the plate of bacon you had just set down.

Bethany sat at her usual place, looking a little stronger than the day before. She offered you a grateful smile as you poured her a cup of coffee, though you knew that the effort it took for her to sit there, to even sip her coffee, was enormous. But she was trying, for you, for Elizabeth, for Henry.

“Thank you, darling,” she said, her voice still weak, but with a note of warmth that filled your heart.

“Of course, Mama,” you replied with a smile, placing a plate of toast and eggs in front of her.

Edward shuffled into the room last, bleary-eyed and grumpy. His shirt was half-buttoned, and his hair was in disarray. The stench of whiskey clung to him, as it often did these days. You could see the toll it was taking on him, on all of you, but you pushed those thoughts aside, focusing on keeping the morning peaceful.

“Morning,” he grunted, dropping into his chair at the head of the table. He reached for his coffee, not bothering with a greeting to the rest of the family. You quietly placed a plate of food in front of him, hoping to keep his temper at bay.

The clinking of cutlery and the soft murmur of conversation filled the room as everyone dug into their breakfast. Elizabeth chattered about school, excitedly telling you and your mother about the garden they were starting, while Henry tried his best to sneak extra pieces of bacon onto his plate.

You smiled as you watched them, feeling a rare moment of contentment. For all the struggles and hardships, these moments made it worth it—seeing your siblings happy, seeing your mother’s faint smile as she listened to them.

But that fleeting peace was shattered by a loud knock on the front door.

You exchanged a quick, uneasy glance with your mother before wiping your hands on a dish towel and heading to the door. Edward barely looked up from his coffee, his focus already on the bottle he’d hidden in his lap.

Opening the door, you were met with the sight of two men in dark suits. They stood rigidly, exuding an air of authority that sent a chill down your spine. One of them, a tall man with slicked-back hair and a stern expression, held a clipboard. The other, shorter but just as imposing, looked around with a critical eye.

“Good morning,” the tall man said in a clipped tone, not bothering to introduce himself. “Is this the residence 85 Shorebridge Lane? We’re looking for Edward?”

You swallowed hard, your heart beginning to race. “Yes, it is. I’m his daughter. Can I help you?”

The man with the clipboard glanced at his companion before looking back at you. “We’re with Vought-American. We’re here regarding a debt that he owes our company.”

A sense of dread settled in your stomach. You knew your father had been struggling to make ends meet, especially with the drinking, but you hadn’t realized it had gone this far. “A debt?” you repeated, trying to keep your voice steady.

“Yes,” the man confirmed. “A significant sum, in fact. It appears that your father was involved in an incident that resulted in the damage of Vought property. The debt has been outstanding for several months, and our attempts to collect have been ignored.”

You felt your heart drop. Vought was a powerful corporation, and you knew they didn’t take these matters lightly. “I-I’m sorry, but I wasn’t aware of any debt. I’m sure there’s been some mistake.”

The man’s expression remained cold, unyielding. “There’s no mistake. The debt is substantial, and it needs to be settled immediately.”

Your mind raced, trying to figure out how to handle this. There was no way your father had that kind of money—if he had, you wouldn’t be scraping by as you were. “We don’t have the money,” you admitted, your voice trembling slightly.

The man with the clipboard sighed, as if he had anticipated your response. “In that case, Vought-American has decided to pursue an alternative form of compensation.”

You blinked in confusion. “Alternative form?”

The shorter man stepped forward, his gaze sweeping over you with a look that made your skin crawl. “We’ve been authorized to take his oldest child as collateral until the debt is repaid.”

The words hit you like a punch to the gut. “What?” you gasped, taking a step back. “You can’t do that!”

But the men didn’t flinch. The tall one flipped through the papers on his clipboard, nodding as if confirming something. “Your father’s contract with Vought allows for this action. It’s all legal.”

Panic surged through you. You’d heard stories about Vought and their ruthless methods, but you never imagined it would happen to your family. “Please, there has to be another way,” you pleaded, your voice shaking. “Take something else, anything—just not me.”

The shorter man smirked, a cruel glint in his eyes. “We don’t want your old furniture or broken-down car. Vought invests in people, not things. And you, miss, are quite the investment.”

You felt like the ground was crumbling beneath your feet. Your mind raced with thoughts of your family—your mother, sick and unable to care for herself; your siblings, who depended on you for everything. How could you leave them? How could you let Vought take you away?

“Let me speak to my father,” you said, your voice trembling as you tried to hold yourself together. “Maybe we can figure something out.”

The men exchanged a glance, clearly impatient, but they stepped aside to let you close the door. You rushed back to the dining room, your heart pounding in your chest.

“Papa,” you said urgently, trying to keep the panic out of your voice. “There are men here from Vought. They say you owe them money, and they’re threatening to take me if you don’t pay.”

Edward looked up at you, his face pale. You could see the fear in his eyes, the realization of what his actions had led to. But he didn’t say anything—he just stared at you, as if he couldn’t believe this was happening.

“Papa, please,” you begged, tears welling in your eyes. “There has to be something we can do.”

But your father just shook his head, his shoulders slumping in defeat. “I…I can’t,” he muttered, his voice barely audible. “I don’t have the money.”

Bethany, who had been silent until now, reached out to take your hand. Her grip was weak, but you could feel the desperation in it. “We’ll figure something out,” she whispered, her eyes filled with tears. “We’ll find a way to get you back.”

You wanted to believe her, but the fear gnawing at your insides told you that this was a battle you couldn’t win. The men at the door were from Vought, and when they wanted something, they got it.

Taking a deep breath, you squeezed your mother’s hand and looked into her eyes. “I’ll be okay, Mama,” you said, forcing yourself to smile even though you felt anything but okay. “I’ll come back. I promise.”

You turned to Elizabeth and Henry, who were watching with wide, frightened eyes. You knelt down in front of them, trying to keep your voice steady. “Take care of Mama, okay? Be good for her. And don’t worry—I’ll be back soon.”

Elizabeth threw her arms around you, her body trembling as she sobbed into your shoulder. “Don’t go,” she cried. “Please don’t go.”

Henry clung to your other arm, his little face scrunched up in fear. “I don’t want you to go,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

You hugged them both tightly, fighting back your own tears. “I have to, Lizzie. But I’ll be back before you know it. I promise.”

Edward remained silent, staring into his coffee cup as if it held the answers to all of life’s problems. There was no fight left in him, no words of comfort or strength. The man who should have protected you was defeated, beaten down by his own vices and the crushing weight of his mistakes.

You rose slowly, feeling the weight of the moment settle over you like a leaden shroud. The reality of the situation was sinking in—Vought wasn’t just taking you away; they were taking your future, your freedom, your life as you knew it.

The men were waiting when you returned to the door, their expressions unchanged. The shorter one smirked again, a sick satisfaction in his eyes as he watched you struggle to maintain your composure.

“I’m ready,” you said, your voice trembling despite your efforts to sound strong.

The tall man with the clipboard nodded, his expression neutral. “Good. Let’s go.”

They led you out of the house, your heart pounding in your chest. You didn’t look back, couldn’t look back. The sight of your family—their tear-st

reaked faces, their broken hearts—would have shattered what little resolve you had left.

As they escorted you to a sleek black car parked in front of the house, you felt a sense of unreality wash over you. This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t how your life was supposed to turn out. You were supposed to take care of your family, grow up with your siblings, and maybe, just maybe, find some happiness of your own.

But now all of that was slipping away, stolen by the cold, calculating hands of Vought-American.

The car door slammed shut behind you, and the engine roared to life. As the car pulled away from the only home you’d ever known, you stared out the window, watching as the house grew smaller and smaller until it disappeared from view.

And in that moment, you knew that nothing would ever be the same again.

NOW:

The dim light of the motel room flickered, casting long shadows on the worn carpet. The room was a far cry from the luxury they once knew, but for now, it was their base of operations. A map of the United States was spread out on the bed, littered with notes, pictures, and names crossed out in red ink. A half-empty bottle of whiskey sat precariously on the edge of the nightstand, and the faint scent of cigarette smoke hung in the air.

You were nestled between Ben’s legs, your back pressed against his solid chest. His arms were wrapped loosely around you, his fingers tracing lazy circles on your stomach, occasionally dipping lower just to make you squirm. It was comfortable, familiar, even with the electric undercurrent of violence that seemed to hum around the two of you these days. You had always thrived on chaos, and being with Ben meant there was no shortage of it.

“Alright, let’s go over it again,” you said, picking up a marker and tapping it against the map. “Crimson Countess is toast, thanks to you. Butcher took out Gunpowder. Who’s left?”

Ben chuckled, his breath warm against your neck. “Fucking love when you talk dirty like that.”

You rolled your eyes, though a smirk tugged at your lips. “Focus, asshole. We’ve got a few more of these Payback assholes to deal with.”

Ben’s hand slipped under your shirt, his calloused fingers brushing against your skin. “Mmm, I’m focused. Focused on how fucking tight you are, baby doll.”

You let out a sharp breath as his hand dipped lower, but you grabbed his wrist, stopping him just short of where he wanted to go. “Not yet, you horny bastard. We’ve got shit to do. And you know I used to wear those.”

“Always such a tease, sweet thing,” he growled, but he didn’t push it, at least not yet. His hand settled back on your stomach, and he nipped at your earlobe before finally, reluctantly, turning his attention to the map.

“Okay, so, who’s left?” Ben’s voice was a low rumble against your back, the vibrations sending a shiver down your spine.

You pushed the marker across the map, stopping at a photo of a man with slicked-back hair and a smarmy grin. “Swatto. He’s a fucking bug, always buzzing around and pissing me off. Turns out he survived that rocket thing, Butcher’s doing recon to find out if he’ll fight.”

Ben snorted. “That dipshit was always hiding behind his wings. Like a fucking coward. Should be easy enough to swat.”

You laughed, the sound sharp and humorless. “Fucking hilarious, Ben. I’m sure you’ll have a real blast with him.”

He shifted behind you, one of his hands sliding down to your thigh, squeezing it possessively. “Oh, I will. Can’t wait to tear those wings off and see him squirm.”

“Jesus, you’re a sick fuck,” you muttered, though you couldn’t help the smile that crept onto your face. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy the idea of seeing Swatto get what was coming to him. After all the years of seeing these assholes get away with everything, the thought of finally doling out justice—your version of it—was intoxicating.

“I’m an amazing fuck.”

Ben’s hand continued its slow exploration of your thigh, inching higher, and you had to force yourself to stay on task. “Okay, who else?” you asked, trying to keep your voice steady.

“Mindstorm,” Ben growled, his mood shifting instantly. His fingers tightened on your leg, his touch no longer teasing. “That fucking psycho. You know how much I want to rip his fucking head off.”

You nodded, your own anger flaring up at the mention of Mindstorm. That bastard was a menace, always getting into people’s heads, fucking with their minds. “He’s a tough one,” you admitted. “But we’ll get him. He’s paranoid as hell, always looking over his shoulder. That’s gonna be his downfall.”

Ben’s lips found your neck, kissing and biting as his hand moved higher. “And what about Noir?” he murmured against your skin, his voice a low growl.

You tensed slightly at the name. Black Noir was different. He was more dangerous, more unpredictable. You and Ben had both seen what he was capable of, and you knew that taking him down wouldn’t be easy. But that didn’t mean you weren’t going to try.

“He’s tricky,” you said, your voice softer now, more thoughtful. “But he’s not invincible. We just have to be smarter, catch him off guard.”

Ben’s other hand slipped under your shirt, cupping your breast as he sucked a mark onto your neck. “Always did have a thing for sneaking around, didn’t you?”

You laughed breathlessly, arching into his touch despite yourself. “I’m fucking good at it, too. But Noir… he’s not just sneaky, he’s—”

“Dangerous,” Ben finished, his voice a low rumble. “But so are we.”

His words hung in the air, heavy with truth. You and Ben had always been dangerous, both of you forged in violence and fire. The world had tried to break you down, but all it did was sharpen your edges, make you harder, stronger. Now, you were like a blade, honed to perfection, ready to cut down anyone who stood in your way.

“Damn right,” you murmured, turning slightly in his arms to look up at him. His green eyes were dark, intense, filled with a hunger that went beyond just the desire for revenge. It was a hunger for you, for the violence you both thrived on, for the chaos you created together.

“Fuck, I love you,” he growled, and before you could respond, his lips were on yours, rough and demanding. You kissed him back just as fiercely, the map and the list of enemies forgotten for the moment. There was something about the way Ben kissed you that always made your blood boil, like you were both on the edge of something dangerous and exhilarating.

His hands roamed over your body, possessive and greedy, as if he couldn’t get enough of you. You could feel the heat between you building, the tension coiling tighter with every touch, every kiss. It was like a storm gathering strength, ready to unleash its fury.

You broke the kiss, panting, your lips tingling from the roughness of it. “We should…fuck, we should focus,” you gasped, but even as you said it, you didn’t make any move to pull away from him.

“Later,” Ben muttered against your skin, his lips tracing a path down your neck. “Right now, I’m focusing on you.”

You let out a shaky laugh, your resolve crumbling under his touch. “You’re such a fucking distraction.”

“Good,” he growled, his teeth grazing your collarbone. “Because I’m not stopping until you’re screaming my name.”

The moon was high, casting a pale, cold light over the suburban neighborhood. It was quiet, too quiet for what was about to go down. You stood just inside the tree line with Ben, Butcher, and Hughie, all four of you hidden in the shadows as you surveyed the modest two-story house in front of you. It was the kind of place that could belong to any average middle-class family. The lawn was neatly trimmed, a swing set sat in the backyard, and the porch light was on, giving off a warm, welcoming glow.

But you knew better. Inside that house was no average man. Inside that house was Swatto, and tonight, he was going to pay for everything he’d done.

Butcher and Hughie were huddled together a few feet away, whispering about the plan, going over details you and Ben didn’t give two shits about. Butcher was being his usual self—gruff, methodical, and annoyingly focused on the specifics. Hughie was trying to keep up, nodding along as if he actually understood everything that Butcher was saying.

“Alright, here’s how it’s going to go down,” Butcher said, turning to face you and Ben. His eyes narrowed when he saw the two of you standing there, looking like you couldn’t be bothered to listen. “Oi, you two paying attention?”

Ben rolled his eyes and leaned back against a tree, arms crossed over his chest. “Yeah, yeah, we get it. We go in, we fuck him up, we get out. Simple enough for you?”

Butcher’s jaw tightened, and he looked like he was about to tear into Ben, but then he just let out a heavy sigh. “Just don’t go in guns blazing. We need this to be clean. Swatto’s a slippery fucker, and if he gets wind of us before we’re ready, he’s gone.”

Ben snorted, a smirk tugging at his lips. “Trust me, he’s not going anywhere.”

You couldn’t help but grin at Ben’s confidence. You knew he was right—once you and Ben set your sights on someone, there was no escape. Swatto didn’t stand a chance.

Hughie, ever the nervous one, looked between you and Ben with wide eyes. “Just…try not to burn the house down, okay? There are neighbors. Innocent people.”

You patted Hughie on the back, a little harder than necessary, making him stumble forward. “Relax, kid. We’re not complete psychos. Just…mostly.”

Ben chuckled, but the sound was low, dark. He reached out and grabbed your hand, pulling you closer. “Come on, Psyke. Let’s get this over with.”

You squeezed his hand, feeling the familiar surge of adrenaline that always came before a mission like this. There was something about the anticipation, the knowledge that you were about to bring hell down on someone who deserved it, that made your blood sing. You lived for this, and you knew Ben did too.

Butcher gave the two of you one last hard look, then nodded. “Alright, you two lead the way. Hughie and I will be right behind you. And remember—quiet.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you muttered, already moving toward the house. Ben was right beside you, his hand slipping away from yours as you both switched into mission mode.

You reached the back of the house first, the old habits kicking in as you moved silently, your steps careful and measured. The back door was locked, but that didn’t slow you down. You reached into your pocket and pulled out a small device, one of those nifty little gadgets Frenchie had rigged up for you. You placed it against the lock, and within seconds, the door clicked open.

Ben shot you a grin as you stepped inside, and you returned it, feeling that familiar rush of excitement. The kitchen was dark, empty, but you could hear the faint hum of a television somewhere deeper in the house.

Swatto was here. And he was about to have a very, very bad night.

Ben was already moving toward the hallway, his movements smooth and confident. You followed him, your senses on high alert, ready for anything. The plan was simple enough—get in, corner Swatto, and make sure he didn’t leave the house alive.

The two of you moved like shadows, silent and lethal, the perfect predators. You reached the living room first, and there he was—Swatto, sitting on the couch, his back to you as he watched some mindless late-night infomercial. He hadn’t even noticed you yet. Stupid.

Ben paused, looking back at you with a grin that sent a thrill down your spine. You knew that look, knew what it meant. It was the look that said he was about to do something reckless, something that would probably piss Butcher off. And you couldn’t wait to see it.

Without a word, Ben took a step forward, and as if he sensed the movement, Swatto’s head snapped up. He turned, his eyes widening in shock when he saw the two of you standing there.

“Psyke. Soldier Boy,” Swatto spat your names, his voice full of venom.

Ben didn’t give him a chance to say anything else. He was across the room in a flash, grabbing Swatto by the collar and yanking him off the couch. The guy yelped, his wings flapping uselessly as he tried to get away, but Ben had him pinned in seconds, one massive hand around his throat.

“Miss us?” Ben growled, his voice dripping with menace.

Swatto struggled, his hands clawing at Ben’s arm, but it was no use. Ben was stronger, meaner, and right now, he was in the mood to make someone pay.

You took a step forward, your eyes locked on Swatto’s. “You’re a real piece of shit, you know that?”

Swatto tried to say something, but Ben squeezed his throat tighter, cutting off his air. His wings buzzed frantically, but it was all just noise, useless and desperate.

Ben leaned in close, his voice low and deadly. “You’re not getting out of this, Swatto. You’re done.”

Swatto’s eyes darted to you, pleading, but you just stared back, cold and unfeeling. You’d seen too many people like him, too many cowards who thought they could get away with anything because they had power, because they were part of something bigger. But tonight, Swatto was learning the hard way that no one was untouchable. Not anymore.

You reached out for Ben’s hand, taking it off Swatto, but just when the slippery fuck thought he’d been let go, you grabbed him by the throat instead, your eyes gleaming with purple and slightly hollow with darkness. “Stop squirming.” His eyes turned the same colour, and he went limp, the only sounds from him his ragged gasps for air through your hand on his neck compressing his airway.

“Good boy.” You smirked, chuckling. “I’ll make this quick.” And with a casual flick of your wrist, Swatto was finished. You dropped him to the floor, to which he fell like a ragdoll. Good.

“Fuckin’ good work, sweetheart.” Ben sneered at Swatto’s body with a firm squeeze to your ass before patting it. “C’mon. Let’s go, Butcher and the kid are waiting outside.”

1943:

The small room was dimly lit, a single lamp casting a sickly yellow glow over the worn furniture and faded wallpaper. The air was thick with the stench of sweat and cheap cologne, mingling with the faint scent of smoke from a cigarette that had long since burned out in the ashtray on the bedside table. The bed creaked as you shifted, the black silk robe you wore clinging to your skin like a second, suffocating layer. You hated it, hated everything about this place, but you’d learned long ago that hate was useless here. It didn’t change anything. It didn’t stop the hands that groped and grabbed, the leers, or the demands.

You’d been "Heaven" for what felt like an eternity now, though it had only been a few months. The name was a cruel joke, a twisted reminder of everything you’d lost. Heaven was supposed to be pure, divine, untouchable. But here, Heaven was just another girl in a black silk robe, another plaything for the men who worked at Vought.

You heard the door creak open behind you, and you stiffened, bracing yourself for whatever would come next. They always came in without knocking, without a word, as if you weren’t even a person, just something they could use whenever they wanted. You kept your gaze fixed on the wall in front of you, focusing on the peeling wallpaper, the little details that let you pretend you were somewhere else.

But this time, something was different. The footsteps were heavier, more deliberate, and when the door clicked shut, you felt a presence in the room that was… different. You turned slowly, your heart pounding in your chest as you looked up to see who had come for you this time.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, and wearing a green silk kimono that looked almost out of place on someone like him. His hair was perfectly combed back, his jaw set in a way that made it clear he wasn’t here for pleasantries. His eyes—cold, green, and hard as stone—fixed on you with an intensity that sent a shiver down your spine.

Soldier Boy. You’d heard stories about him, of course—who hadn’t? But seeing him in person, standing in your little room with its faded wallpaper and broken dreams, was something else entirely. You swallowed hard, your throat dry as you tried to find your voice.

“Sir,” you said, your voice barely above a whisper.

He took a step closer, his eyes narrowing as he looked you over, taking in every detail. The robe, the way you sat on the edge of the bed, the way you tried to hide the tremble in your hands. “They call you Heaven, don’t they?”

You nodded, keeping your eyes downcast. “Yes, sir.”

“Bullshit name,” he muttered, his tone sharp. “What’s your real name?”

You hesitated, your mind racing. You hadn’t heard your real name in so long it almost felt foreign to you. But you knew better than to disobey someone like him. “I… I don’t remember, sir.”

He let out a low growl of frustration, crossing the room in two strides and grabbing your chin with one hand, forcing you to look up at him. His grip was firm, but not painful. Not yet. “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”

You did as you were told, meeting his gaze. The intensity in his eyes was almost unbearable, like he could see right through you, like he knew everything that had been done to you, everything you’d become.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” he said, his voice low, but with an edge that made it clear he wasn’t to be taken lightly. “I’m here to find out what the hell’s been going on.”

Your heart skipped a beat. “I… I don’t understand, sir.”

He let go of your chin, taking a step back. “Don’t play dumb with me. I know what they’ve been doing to you. I just want to hear it from you.”

You swallowed hard, feeling a lump in your throat. You didn’t want to talk about it, didn’t want to relive everything that had happened since they’d taken you. But you could tell from the look in his eyes that you didn’t have a choice. He wasn’t going to leave until he got what he came for.

“They… They make me…” You trailed off, your voice shaking. It was too hard to say it out loud, too hard to admit what you’d been reduced to.

“Spit it out,” he ordered, his patience wearing thin.

“They make me entertain the men,” you finally said, your voice barely more than a whisper. “They say it’s to keep them happy, to make sure they keep doing their jobs. But… But they… they’re not gentle, sir.”

There was a long pause, the air between you heavy with tension. He didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just stood there, watching you with those cold, green eyes.

“I see,” he finally said, his voice low, almost a growl. He looked away for a moment, as if trying to collect himself. When he looked back at you, there was something different in his eyes, something darker. “And you let them?”

Your blood ran cold at his question, your heart sinking as you realized what he was implying. “I don’t… I don’t have a choice, sir. They… They said it was to pay off my father’s debt. They said if I didn’t do what they wanted, they’d… they’d hurt my family.”

He exhaled sharply through his nose, running a hand through his hair in frustration. “Fucking bastards.”

You bit your lip, trying to keep the tears from spilling over. You’d cried too many times in this room, in front of men who didn’t care, men who only wanted one thing. You didn’t want to cry in front of him, too. “Please, sir… don’t make me talk about it anymore.”

He didn’t answer right away, just stood there, his gaze fixed on you like he was trying to make sense of it all. Finally, he shook his head, letting out a low, bitter laugh. “You don’t need to call me ‘sir.’ Name’s Ben. Get it right.”

You blinked, surprised. It felt strange, like he was trying to level with you, make things less formal. Less like the men who came into this room night after night. “Ben,” you repeated, the name feeling foreign on your tongue.

“Yeah, that’s better.” He seemed to soften a little, the hard edge in his voice fading. He took a seat on the bed beside you, the mattress dipping under his weight. “How long have they been doing this to you?”

You hesitated, unsure of what to say. Time had lost all meaning in this place. Days, weeks, months—they all blurred together. But you knew you had to answer. “Since… since they brought me here. It feels like forever.”

He nodded slowly, like he was taking it all in, processing what you were telling him. “And no one’s tried to stop it? No one’s helped you?”

You shook your head, feeling a wave of despair wash over you. “No. They all just… they just use me, then leave. Like I’m nothing.”

His jaw tightened, a muscle in his cheek twitching. “That’s because they’re fucking cowards, every last one of them.”

You didn’t say anything, just stared at the floor, feeling the weight of his words. He was right, of course. They were cowards, every one of them. But that didn’t change what had happened to you, what was still happening.

There was a long silence, and then Ben reached out, placing a hand on your shoulder. The touch was surprisingly gentle, and it made you flinch, not out of fear, but out of the sheer unfamiliarity of it. You weren’t used to gentleness. Not anymore.

“Listen,” he said, his voice low, almost soft. “I’m going to get you out of here. You don’t deserve this.”

You looked up at him, searching his face for any sign that he was lying, that this was just another cruel trick. But all you saw was determination, a kind of fierce protectiveness that made your heart ache with something you hadn’t felt in a long time—hope.

“Why?” you asked, your voice barely more than a whisper.

“Because I don’t fucking stand by while scum like them ruin people’s lives,” he said, his voice rough but sincere. “And because you deserve better than this. Way fucking better.”

You felt tears welling up in your eyes again, and this time you couldn’t stop them. You’d spent so long in this hell, so long believing that there was no way out, that you were trapped here forever. But now, here was this man—this soldier, this hero—telling you that you could be free.

“Thank you,” you whispered, your voice breaking as the tears spilled over.

Ben let out a long sigh, squeezing your shoulder gently. “Don’t thank me yet. We’ve still got a long way to go.”

You nodded, wiping at your eyes with the back of your hand. “What… What do I have to do?”

“Just stay with me,” he said, his voice firm. “I’m going to get you into a trial for something that might give you a fighting chance. Compound V. It’s risky as hell, but it’s better than staying here and letting them break you.”

“Compound V?” you repeated, the name unfamiliar. You’d heard rumors, whispers about some kind of serum that gave people powers, made them stronger. But you never imagined you’d be a candidate for something like that.

Ben nodded, his expression serious. “It’s what made me what I am. What makes us Supes. It’s not easy, and it’s not safe, but… it’s a chance. A chance to be something more than what they’ve made you.”

You bit your lip, the weight of the decision pressing down on you. It was terrifying, the thought of going through something like that, of risking everything. But what choice did you have? Stay here and continue to be their plaything, or take the chance to become something more?

“I’ll do it,” you said, your voice steady despite the fear gnawing at your insides. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”

Ben nodded, his eyes locked on yours. “Good. We’ll get this started as soon as possible. And from now on, you call me Ben. No more of this ‘sir’ bullshit, got it?”

You nodded, the faintest hint of a smile tugging at your lips. “Yes… Ben.”

“Damn right,” he said, and for the first time since he’d walked into your room, you saw a flicker of something almost like warmth in his eyes.

You didn’t know what the future held, didn’t know if this Compound V would save you or destroy you. But you knew one thing: with Ben by your side, you had a chance. A real chance. And that was more than you’d had in a long time.

“Get some rest,” he said, standing up and heading for the door. “We’ve got a long road ahead of us.”

You watched him go, feeling a strange mixture of fear and hope swirling in your chest. He paused at the door, looking back at you one last time.

“You’re not alone anymore, Heaven,” he said, his voice rough but sincere. “Remember that.”

The air in the small fitting room was thick with the scent of smoke and something else—something chemical and sharp that clung to the walls like an unwelcome guest. You stood in front of the full-length mirror, watching as the tailor adjusted the fabric of your new suit, the material shimmering under the fluorescent lights. The suit was a deep, vibrant purple, lined with silver accents that caught the light just right, and it felt like a second skin, hugging your curves in all the right places.

You couldn’t help but smile as you took in your reflection. It wasn’t just the suit that made you feel different; it was everything. The Compound V coursing through your veins had ignited something deep inside you, a newfound confidence that made you feel powerful. You turned this way and that, admiring how the suit moved with you, how it seemed to accentuate every line of your body.

From a nearby chair, Ben watched you intently, dressed in a black silk robe that hung loosely around his broad shoulders. He had a cigar perched between his fingers, the smoke curling into the air like a snake. His green eyes were locked onto you, an amused smirk playing on his lips as you struck poses in the mirror.

“Look at you,” he said, his voice rough and teasing. “A real fucking knockout. That suit’s gonna have every bastard in the room drooling over you.”

You shot him a playful glare through the mirror. “I’m not here to attract drooling idiots, Ben. I’m here to kick ass and take names.”

He chuckled, leaning back in his chair, the cigar still resting against his lips. “Right, right. Ass-kicking first, then maybe a little drooling later. But you know how it is out there, right? Being a Supes comes with a lot of fucking bullshit.”

“Like what?” you asked, arching an eyebrow, genuinely curious. You knew some of the dark sides of being a Super, but you wanted to hear it from him.

He took a slow drag from his cigar, the smoke escaping in a lazy cloud. “First off, you gotta deal with the goddamn media. They’re gonna twist everything you do, make you look like the villain if you don’t play their game. And trust me, they don’t play nice. Then there’s the fans—half of them love you, the other half think you’re the Antichrist. It’s a hell of a ride, sweetheart.”

You nodded, taking in his words, but you couldn’t help but feel a thrill at the thought. You were going to be someone important, someone powerful. “I can handle it, Ben. I’m not some weak little thing anymore. I’ve got control now.”

His eyes lit up, and he leaned forward slightly, his interest piqued. “Oh yeah? How does it feel? Being all-powerful and shit?”

“It feels amazing,” you admitted, turning back to the mirror. You could see the flicker of a smile on your own face, a grin that was becoming harder to hide. “I’ve never felt like this before. It’s like I’m finally awake, finally in charge of my own life. No more fucking around, no more letting others dictate what I do.”

“Goddamn right,” he said, his voice low and full of approval. “That’s the spirit. You’re gonna show those bastards who’s boss.”

You turned to face him fully, hands on your hips. “So, what’s it like for you? Being a Supes, I mean. You’ve been in this game a lot longer than I have.”

He took another drag of his cigar, letting the smoke curl around him as he considered his words. “It’s a fucking trip, I’ll tell you that. You get used to the perks pretty damn quick—money, fame, all that bullshit. But it comes at a cost. You’ve gotta stay on top, you’ve gotta keep proving you’re worth it.”

“Sounds like a lot of pressure,” you said, tilting your head slightly, intrigued. “But you seem to thrive on it.”

“Pressure’s just another word for motivation,” he replied, a sly smile creeping across his face. “Besides, I’m not just some pretty face in a tight suit. I can back it up. I’ve taken down more assholes than I can count, and I plan to keep adding to that list.”

You felt a warmth spread through your chest at his words, a rush of admiration mixed with something else—something electric that crackled between you. “I think I’ll enjoy backing it up, too. I’m not about to let anyone push me around again.”

Ben’s gaze locked onto yours, and the air felt charged, electric. “I like that about you. You’ve got fire. A real fucking spark. And trust me, you’ll need it out there.”

He leaned back in his chair, letting the cigar dangle from his fingers, his eyes never leaving yours. “You’ll be in the spotlight, and not everyone’s gonna like what they see. Some are gonna want to tear you down, but you’ve gotta stand tall. You’ve gotta show them you’re not afraid.”

You nodded, the weight of his words settling in. “I can do that. I’m ready for whatever comes my way.”

He stood up, the robe slipping slightly to reveal a hint of muscle underneath, and walked over to you, a grin spreading across his face. “Good. Now, show me that confidence. Strut your stuff. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

You couldn’t help but laugh, a thrill of excitement coursing through you as you turned back to the mirror, striking a pose like a model on a runway. You shifted your weight from one leg to the other, rolling your hips slightly as you watched yourself, feeling the power within you surging.

“Now we’re talking!” Ben said, clapping his hands together in approval. “Look at you! That’s how you own a room. You’re gonna make heads turn when you walk in, and you better damn well enjoy it.”

“Don’t worry, I will,” you shot back, feeling the fire in your belly. This was what you had been waiting for, the chance to reclaim your life and make it your own.

As the tailor continued to fuss with the suit, you felt Ben’s presence behind you, his energy filling the room with an intensity that sent shivers down your spine. You glanced over your shoulder, catching him watching you with an appreciative gaze, and your heart raced. “You’re staring, you know.”

He smirked, leaning against the wall casually. “Can you blame me? You’re a fucking vision in that getup. You could walk out of here and take on the world right now.”

“Maybe I will,” you replied, your voice teasing. “I’ve got the suit, the powers, and the attitude. What more do I need?”

“Just me, of course,” he said with a wink. “I’m the cherry on top of this whole badass sundae.”

You rolled your eyes but couldn’t hide the smile creeping onto your lips. “Yeah, right. You just want to take credit for all my hard work.”

He laughed, the sound rich and warm. “Hard work? This is all you, sweetheart. I’m just here for the fun parts.”

The tailor finished adjusting the last bit of fabric and stepped back, his eyes wide with admiration. “You look incredible. I think we’re done here.”

You turned to face him fully, spinning on your heel and striking another pose. “How’s this?”

“Perfect!” the tailor exclaimed, nodding vigorously before stepping out of the fitting room, leaving you and Ben alone once more.

“Now that’s how you do it,” Ben said, stepping closer, the space between you charged with energy. “You’re gonna be unstoppable, Psyke.”

“Psyke?” you echoed, a smirk on your lips. “Is that what you’re calling me now?”

“Yeah,” he replied, his voice low and teasing. “You know, for someone who’s so confident, you sure are fun to tease.”

You took a step forward, closing the distance between you, a playful glint in your eye. “I can hold my own, Ben. Trust me.”

“I don’t doubt it for a second,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper as he leaned in slightly, making your heart race. “But I’m still gonna have a little fun watching you figure this all out. Can’t wait to see you kick some ass.”

You felt a rush of warmth flood your cheeks at his words, an intoxicating mix of excitement and something deeper—something that made you want to lean closer, to bridge the gap between you. “You’ll be right there with me, won’t you?”

“Always, sweetheart,” he said, and for a moment, the world around you faded away, leaving just the two of you standing in that small room, the weight of the past lifting as something new sparked between you.

©️ 𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐤 / 𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲’𝐬 𝐬𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐢𝐨

𝐈 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐦𝐲 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐨𝐩𝐢𝐞𝐝/𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐝

TAGLIST: @goldngguk @sweetpeachbombshell

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@cheynovak @manicjk @riah1606

[pumpkinickel]

A Mix-Up || Egon Spengler x reader

Summary: Gender-neutral reader mistakes Elon as Egon (they really do look alike from the back!)

Relationship: Egon Spengler x gn!reader (established relationship)

Word Count: 669

Warnings: Not beta-read, but other than that none! This is just fluffy slice of life

Author's Note: This is actually a little old (early 2022). I'm currently writing for a different piece of media BUT I thought "hey, why not post this now because...why not!" I've always been kinda shy to post my writing on the internet in general but to hell with it tbh ! Cringe culture must die and I love my blorbos past, present, and future too much lol

On AO3

It was a regular, snowy day in downtown New York. Ray was in the downstairs of the firehouse, fixing whatever new problem the Ecto-1 had come up with. Janine was reading some magazine with smart shopping tips while Louis was on the phone discussing taxes, the latter having piles of paperwork on his desk. Business during the holiday season usually slowed down, and that meant getting to spend more quality time with the guys. Peter and Winston were engaging in a friendly but competitive game of pool, and Egon was nowhere in sight. He mentioned something about “bringing a surprise” to the station, baffling everyone since Egon certainly wasn’t the surprise type. You sat on the couch, head propped up by your hand, watching as Peter lined up his shot.

"I never understood this game," you said with a yawn.

Winston had a small laugh and shook his head. "It's alright, kid, neither does Pete."

"Hey!" The other man said as he thrust his cue stick, completely butchering the shot in the process. "I just don't play this game often enough, alright, Z? I got no practice,"

You and Winston share a laugh at the expense of your colleague, Peter placed his hand on his chest in feigned offense. Winston took his shot, clearly doing a better job than Peter as the other man had scowled as the ball went into the hole. As the two continue playing, the sound of familiar footsteps enters the second floor. Turning your head, you smile brightly as you finally see your boyfriend Egon. His back was turned, preoccupied with refilling the snack cabinet in the kitchen. As he rummaged through the seven eleven bag, you took the chance of slowly sneaking up behind him to give a surprise hug. The two men playing pool had paused their game to watch you, amused from the sight of seeing you crouch up behind their friend.

“Gotcha!” You yelled as you wrapped your arms around Egon’s torso and chest, placing your chin on his shoulder. Unexpectedly, he was completely frozen, unlike how he would usually turn around to return the hug. Your expression quickly morphed into one of confusion as the seconds passed and he stayed completely still.

“Anyway, Elon, I want you to meet-” You whip your head to the left to see Egon standing next to Ray, both the men having mildly concerned looks on their faces.

“...(Y/N)?” The man you were hugging spoke, his voice only slightly different from Egon’s but you could tell it wasn’t your boyfriend. Hastily taking your arms off him, you spew out apology after apology, face fully red.

“I’m so sorry! God I- I should’ve known the second you didn’t hug me back I-”

Elon waved his hand with a laugh, the other guys in the room except Egon cracking up as well. “No matter, no matter, at least I know my little brother is well loved,” Elon took the liberty of pulling you in for a hug this time, and just like Egon he was surprisingly good at giving them.

Egon’s cheeks turn a light pink color from his brother’s statement as he pulls you in for a hug and forehead kiss. Elon had headed over to the billiard table to greet the two men who ended their pool game. The mood in the room turned joyous as all the guys had not seen Elon in a while, making this occasion a real treat.

“Sorry, Eggs, he really does look a lot like you,” you whispered. He smiles before putting his lips on yours, causing your face to go red once again. Getting kissed by Egon certainly did not get old no matter how many times it happens.

“It’s alright, (Y/N), I missed you too.”

Ray called out, “Hey, lovebirds! Get over here before we finish all the pizza.”

You pull away from Egon and adjust his tie, taking his hand and walking over to the others to get a fresh slice of pizza.

[prince-rowan-of-the-forest]

Cozy Sweaters

----

Virgil finds himself without his hoodie and instead stuck with a comfortable sweater that belongs to one of his fellow sides… he really hopes this doesn't end badly.

----

| Ao3 |

----

Warnings: none

Pairings: implied prinxiety

Word Count: 2368

Notes:

This is just a fluffy cute fic that I started writing in like 2022 and have just finished because of a Monthly Challenge a discord server I'm in hosts! (Go check out the server: Here!)

This is based on some art I did wayyyy back when I first started writing this:

Virgil groaned, throwing the covers off of him and swinging his legs out of his bed. There was absolutely no way he was going to fall asleep like this. He'd woken up from some nondescript nightmare a whole two hours ago now. He'd sorted himself out afterwards, it wasn't even a bad one by his standards- hell he hadn't even had a panic attack this time!

But he couldn't sleep now, no matter what position he put himself in he was uncomfortable, it was too hot and too cold all at the same time and nothing seemed to fix it. 

Muttering to himself, he stood up and grabbed the hoodie from the back of his chair. He realised as he fumbled with it that it wasn't his usual jacket, rather a sweater. Something in the back of Virgil's mind told him that he didn't own any sweaters, but it shut up pretty quickly after Virgil pulled it over his head and he realised it was three sizes too big and so, so soft. 

It was pretty easy for him to shrug off the worry about possibly having stolen a sweater from one of the others - it was like four AM, no-one would be up to accuse him of stealing sweaters anyway and he could always give it back later. Instead of worrying Virgil left his room and padded down the stairs into the common room.

Unfortunately, though, Virgil's worries were actually pretty warrented, because when he arrived at the kitchen the lights were on. That could only mean that someone else was awake as well.

Virgil thought about turning around and booking it back upstairs, but he was already here now and he really wanted that chamomile tea. He really needed the sleep, even if he hated to admit it, at this point he was slightly worried about collapsing where he stood. 

He'd just have to be fast about it. If he put the sugar in the mug while he waited for the kettle rather than after it had brewed he could pour the water in and then sink straight to his room. Maybe he'd even be fast enough that he wouldn't be questioned by whoever was in here. 

He should’ve known he wouldn’t be that lucky.

As soon as he had scuttled into the kitchen he heard the other side- who was sitting at the kitchen island for fucks sake- gasp in surprise as Virgil picked up the kettle and filled it up before flicking it on to boil. 

“...Virge? That you?” Ah, great, it was Roman, he sounded exhausted. 

“...Yeah,” Virgil muttered as he grabbed a mug from the cupboard, no point trying to be fast now, he’d already been spotted. Unfortunately as he put the mug down he noticed from the corner of his eye the pattern on his sweater. It was white, mostly, with red and gold accents and a large simplistic crown in the middle. Of course it had to be one of Roman’s, Virgil thought as he went red. He should’ve guessed, Roman was about the same height as him, though he had broader shoulders, of course his sweaters were way too big on Virgil. 

“What uh- what’re you wearing there?” Roman asked slowly, as if he was worried about getting punched, which was completely valid because Virgil really really considered it. Ultimately he was too tired for actual violence. He wasn’t, in fact, too tired for threatening it, though.

“Princey if you question me before I’ve had at least four hours of sleep and or a cup of coffee I will skin you and use you as a doormat,” Virgil said mildly as he poured the boiling water over his teabag, fully prepared to splash the hot water in Roman’s direction if he dared to say something else about the sweater.

“Woahkay,” Roman said, leaning back in his chair, “Was just gonna say that you look cute in my sweater,”

“Fuck you,” Virgil practically growled.

“Ok ok!” Roman said, though Virgil was fairly sure he wasn’t about to stop, “Just wanted to let you know,”

“I’m too tired to deal with your shit,” Virgil groaned, scooping a teaspoon of sugar into the tea and stirring it in, letting the string from the teabag loop around the spoon a few times before he started stirring in the opposite direction to undo it. He repeated this motion a few times, just watching, it was so oddly satisfying.

“What’re you doing up, anyway?” Roman asked, changing the subject, Virgil turned to see him flopped across the kitchen island with his arms outstretched, the guy seemed to light up even just from Virgil looking at him.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Virgil shrugged, taking a sip of his tea and leaning back on the counter, “You?”

“Same,” Roman shrugged, “Too much to do,”

“Ah,” Virgil nodded, “Well- uh- try and get some sleep, ‘kay?”

“Will do,” Roman said with a half smile, “You too?”

“Mhm,” 

And Virgil left to go back to his room and he didn’t mention the sweater again.

—-

It wasn’t until a week later that Virgil was reminded that he had the sweater. It was early-ish in the morning- just after seven- and he was pretty sure Patton would already be downstairs getting breakfast ready for everyone. Virgil was almost never awake this early. But he had been awake all night worrying about the fact that he’d given Patton his regular hoodie to be washed pretty late the night before after he’d spilled coffee on it and freaked out. Obviously though that meant he didn’t have it back yet and he’d been wound up like a spring since and because of all that he hadn’t been able to sleep.

He needed to go downstairs, he wanted food and coffee, but he didn’t have his hoodie and usually when he didn’t have his hoodie he refused to leave his room until he got it back. Usually Patton would just leave it outside his door and knock once it had been washed but Virgil was starting to feel really hungry after staying up all night and he didn’t have any water or anything and his throat was starting to feel dry. He really needed to go downstairs, but he couldn’t go out without a hoodie. 

Which left him a little stuck.

That was until he spotted a white sweater slung over the back of his chair from a week ago.

Virgil groaned and stood up, walking over to the chair and picking up the sweater. He was considering it, the sweater was very very comfortable. But then again it wasn’t the same as going downstairs in the middle of the night. The others would see him in Roman’s sweater and probably question him about it. But then again, Patton was usually one of the only other sides up this early and Roman himself was never up early either, the creative side was a night owl just like him. Neither was Janus- who would probably sleep all day if he didn’t have actual things to do. 

So that meant the two sides Virgil really wanted to avoid whilst wearing someone else's sweater probably wouldn't be downstairs yet, which means he should be safe to go downstairs, grab some food and come back up. 

He nodded, mostly to himself, before pulling the sweater on, taking a deep, steadying breath, and opening his door.

When he got downstairs, he was relieved to find that Patton was the only one in the kitchen. He cleared his throat as he made his way over to Patton.

"Oh hey kiddo!" Patton said with a smile, "I didn't expect to see you this morning!" 

Virgil just shrugged with a noncommittal hum, making his way over to the coffee machine and pouring himself a cup.

"I already put your jacket in the wash when I got up this morning," Patton said as he flipped a pancake, "So it should be ready for you before lunch, okay kiddo?"

"Yeah, thanks," Virgil nodded.

"And the pancakes'll be done in a sec! So you can have a few," Patton smiled.

"Thank you, Pat" Virgil said, moving around to sit at the table, he really looked around then, noticing a suspicious amount of mugs on the table for Patton to be the only one awake. He narrowed his eyes at the half finished mug of coffee in front of another seat before looking back up at Patton.

“Is anyone else up yet?” He asked slowly. Patton turned and nodded.

“Oh, yeah! Uh- Logan’s definitely up, that’s his coffee there, I’m- uh- assuming he’ll be back to finish it,” Patton nodded, “Remus was here too but he already left for the imagination… uh… I don’t think I’ve seen anyone else yet this morning, kiddo,”

“Ah,” Virgil hummed, relaxing slightly and heading for the sofa, “Good,”

“Someone you’re trying to avoid?” Patton asked with a smile that was much too innocent looking to be genuine.

"...No," Virgil answered, slowly enough that Patton surely noticed, but instead of calling him out, he just smiled knowingly, glanced at the sweater and walked away.

Virgil sighed, finally relaxing as he sipped his coffee, Logan came back not much later and sat down at the table, greeting Virgil with a polite ‘good morning’ before turning to his book and finishing off his coffee. 

He had been planning to head back up to hide in his room as soon as he’d had some food, but after he, Logan and Patton had eaten at the table together, Patton had suggested that they put on a movie and have a chill day. He’d tried to fight him on it at first, but Patton had always been pretty persuasive. 

Virgil had fallen asleep on the sofa. 

—-

“Oh look at him - he’s so cute,” Said someone who might have been Patton, followed by a click of a camera. Virgil, in his drowsy state, assumed that they couldn’t possibly be talking about him. 

“I wondered where that went,” Said someone else with a low chuckle, Virgil grumbled at the disturbance and tried to sleepily pull up his hood only to realise it wasn’t there. He wasn’t wearing his hoodie? “Awwe - morning Virge!”

Finally, Virgil blinked his eyes open. Quickly he realised he was on the sofa and not in his room, nor was he wearing his hoodie. He started panicking almost immediately, looking around to see Patton and Roman standing over him. 

“Morning…?” He said, looking at the two of them confused. 

“Your hoodie’s done in the wash!” Patton said happily, “I’ve left it here for you when you want it.”

Patton turned to leave after gesturing to the coffee table, where Patton’s had left his hoodie neatly folded. Virgil’s eyes drifted from his hoodie back to Roman, who was still standing there staring at him. 

“What?” he asked gruffly, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. 

“Please don’t kill me for saying it - but you’re wearing my sweater again,” Roman pointed out. Virgil frowned, narrowing his eyes at the Prince and looking for anything teasing in his tone or expression, when he found nothing he huffed. 

“Yeah,” He said, “What about it?”

“Not gonna change into your hoodie?” Roman asked, carefully picking up Virgil’s hoodie before sitting down on the sofa next to him. 

Virgil shrugged, “I mean - your sweater is comfortable so… I don’t wanna move.”

“Oh? So you like my sweater, huh?” Roman said, and now he was teasing, Virgil glared at him, but did nothing, “Well - since I am now lacking a sweater to wear, would you mind terribly if I borrowed this?” 

“Yes, actually,” Virgil said, barely holding back a hiss, “That’s my hoodie.”

“And that’s my sweater,” Roman said, raising an eyebrow as he gestured at Virgil, who grumbled in response. 

“You know what - fine, if I can keep the sweater in return you can borrow my hoodie just - if you damage it I’ll kill you, got it?” 

“Wasn’t planning on it,” Roman said, smiling softly as he shrugged Virgil’s hoodie over the t-shirt he was wearing. It wasn’t quite as oversized on Roman - who was broader and taller than Virgil - but it was still incredibly comfortable if the look on Roman’s face was anything to go by, “Goodness - I see why you wear this all the time.” 

“Yeah, that’s why it’s my hoodie,” Virgil huffed, before curling up again. Now that Roman had seen him in the sweater, what was the point in hiding that he was wearing it?

“I’ll take good care of it,” Roman says happily, “I’m not planning on going anywhere anyway.”

“The hell do you mean?” Virgil said, just in time to see Roman sitting down on the sofa right next to him, before flopping sideways to lie half on top of him, earning a disgruntled noise, “Do you mind??”

“Yep,” Roman says, resting his head on Virgil’s chest and nuzzling into the fabric of the sweater. Virgil held his breath for a moment. 

“I-” Virgil stammered, trying to figure out what the fuck was going on right now, what was Roman doing? Virgil’s hands fluttered, not sure what he was supposed to do with them.

“If you’re truly uncomfortable, I’ll go,” Roman says, looking up at him. Virgil blinked a few times.

“Wh- no, no I’m just - really uh- really confused-” Virgil says awkwardly.

“Ah well - you look comfortable, and I’d like to nap, so I’ll nap with you, if that’s alright?” Roman asked, pushing himself up a little. Virgil huffed but eventually nodded, splaying out a little so that Roman could properly drape himself across Virgil. 

"Fine, come here then," Virgil said, opening his arms for Roman to join him. 

With a look on his face that reminded Virgil a little of a dog who'd just been presented with a treat, Roman laid down and happily snuggled up on top of Virgil. Taking a deep breath, Virgil let himself relax too, putting his hand on Romans back and closing his eyes, taking in the texture of his own hoodie under his hand. Virgil had never thought he'd be able to fall asleep without his hoodie, yet here he was - falling asleep twice in a row wearing Roman's cozy sweater.

----

Tags: @full-of-roman-angst-trash @your-local-random-dino @cutebisexualmess @glacierruler @roseianxiety @bella-bugatti-frogetti-baguetti @scalesfeathersnfur @oatmeal-stans-the-trash-rat @littlerat2 @goldnskyart (if anyone wants to be added, let me know!)

[farfromstrange]

Interview With The Vampire | Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader

-> Main Masterlist

Pairing: Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader (she/her)

Summary: You are the first journalist to interview Hell’s Kitchen’s resident vampire vigilante after he requested you personally to tell his story. He’s offering you a way out of your miserable job—to make your voice be heard. You’re desperate and curious, so you decide to take the risk. Most people only know him as Daredevil, but you are about to learn who’s really behind the mask. How hard can it possibly be? As it turns out, interviewing a vampire is a lot more complex than you expected it to be, and Matthew Michael Murdock has set his mind on ruining you for any other man to come.

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), alternative universe, blood play, marking, scent kink, slight Dom!Matt, unprotected p in v, oral f!receiving, biting, vampirism, angst, religious imagery & symbolism, Catholic guilt, mentions of violence, allusions to suicidal thoughts, lots of plot, age gap

Word Count: 12.2k (this is a beast)

Other Characters: Vampire!Elektra (mentioned), Ben Urich (mentioned)

A/n: I finally got this one edited. This is a beast, y’all! I drew inspiration from Anne Rice’s Interview With The Vampire, but particularly the 2022 AMC series (I fell in love with it then and there), but it’s not based on it, so I just played around with the idea and this came out. It’s a lot, but it wasn’t enough for a full-blown series, so you’re getting a big ass One Shot instead. I used my usual Smut tag list, but since this is slightly Dead Dove Do Not Eat, heed the warnings and proceed with care! Don't read it if you don't want to. Anyway, I hope you like it!

Read Me On AO3!

The sun has long set over the Big Apple. Artificial neon, cars, and ceiling lights burning in the highrises along the riverfront cancel out the darkness that has befallen the country’s east. Noise melts into a flood that rolls over people’s senses, but most in New York City have grown numb to the city that never sleeps. 

Sirens follow cacophonies of screams. Teenagers get into clubs with their fake IDs, adults get drunk in bars or go to work the night shift at their underpaid jobs, and the other half cry themselves to sleep, knowing they will have to get up in the morning and go through the same hell all over again. 

Life has become a miserable existence, and it leaves human beings wondering, ‘How much longer do we have to endure this before we all finally drop dead?’

The system fails them. The law fails to protect them. All they can do is lie down and wait to die. And they will die sooner or later. That’s inevitable. 

In Hell’s Kitchen, in a penthouse with a view of the Hudson through colored windows that gloss over during the day and show the city throughout the night, resides someone who most of the city only knows by an alias—Daredevil. 

If anyone crosses him, he will suck them dry. It’s not a metaphor, I’m afraid; his reputation precedes him. Criminals fear the red eyes that come with fists and a sharp set of teeth that will surely run them into the ground. The rest of the city feels a little safer with him, but so far, no one has dared to question his nature. 

Fear is known to work as a paralytic. And this man living in the penthouse by the Hudson is the personification of what one might consider fear-inducing. Without the fear of others, he would not be thriving. 

An apex predator like him lives for the thrill of the kill. When the adrenaline spikes, it makes the prey start running and the blood taste so much sweeter. It is to a creature of his kind what a good glass of century-old red wine would be to a human being; he savors every last drop of it.

Two years out of your Master’s degree at Columbia University, you have become one of those hard-working adults who fall into bed later than they should, and you lie awake at night, wondering how much longer you have to exist before you can live.

You interned at the Bulletin; you ran the true crime and mystery column for over a year before the newspaper shut down. A billionaire from downtown Manhattan bought it to start his own magazine, and you were the only employee he didn’t fire. Instead of relying on your top-tier education and experience though, he has banned you to the lifestyle and beauty column. He’s a beast if you have ever seen one. 

On a Monday in June then, after the sun has risen and is now falling again, you find an envelope on your desk. You glide your fingers over the fancy paper. The letters are written in handwriting that resembles the old letters from the 18th century you had the pleasure of using as research material for your Bachelor’s thesis.

Your heart skips a beat. Could it be…

It is no secret that vampires exist.

Over two decades ago, scientists published papers on the existence of blood-sucking creatures after years of valuable research, and now governments around the world have set out to burn the inhuman species out before they can cause any more damage. Vampirism though is older than humanity itself and unless law enforcement has evidence of homicide, vampires have the right to exist amongst humans. 

They are excellent at hiding their true nature, that much is true. The lore that has been passed down since the beginning of time is only partly true. They know how to adapt and rise from the ashes like elegant phoenixes. The misconceptions surrounding their existence stem from fiction, horror, and fear, but they persist. 

And a rule has been established in society ever since the truth was revealed: don’t talk about vampires! 

Don’t talk about them unless it’s in a fictional context. Don’t put your research out there. Don’t fraternize with them. Don’t risk becoming prey. Don’t be fascinated by them, and God forbid, don’t you dare write articles about them for the public records. If you want to know about vampires, you have to dig, and you have to do so quietly or society will deem you crazy and a freak. 

The worst thing to be is not a flying android or a super soldier with a shield; the worst thing you can be, in this day and age, is a vampire. 

You were a curious child who turned into an even more curious adult. At times even a bitter one because she couldn’t get the answers she yearned for and had to do it herself. So, of course, the We Don’t Talk About Vampires rule came across as rather absurd, learning about it back when you were merely a teen. 

You started researching, and you found out more than you thought you would—more than you thought you could. You wanted to cover the issue in the Bulletin back when you still worked there, but since humans were raised to fear the very mention of vampires in the real world, no longer romanticizing the concept but rather running from it, the truth shall remain hidden. Again, that seemed absurd, but you had to accept it to get ahead. 

You kept researching to the point you convinced yourself you could be one of them if you tried. You felt like you understood them, but nothing could ever fully answer all of your questions to the point it felt truthful. Honest. Real. 

Growing up, everyone told you dead things aren’t supposed to walk. They aren’t supposed to breathe and exist among the living. They are cruel, and vampires are killers that leave trails of bodies the government is hiding from us. Greediness exceeds common sense. The human mind tends to get sick and twisted, and those who don’t fit in hardly ever stand a chance.

Hell’s Kitchen is particularly quiet on the issue. Rumor has it that the vigilante chasing criminals at night and leaving the worst of them dry at the shore of the Hudson while, at the same time, surrendering those he deems worthy of rehabilitation to the authorities, is one of those vampires. 

They call him Daredevil; the savior of innocents and the downfall of the vile. Only a handful of people know who he is. The truth is caught in a spider web of lies, unable to come out unless someone were to tell his story for the world to hear. 

That Monday in June when you open the mysterious envelope on your desk, everything changes. 

He addressed you personally. Your name resembles a masterpiece, the letters swirling at the edges. 

You don’t know me, but I know you.

It’s strange to read your name out of the mouth of a stranger.

I must admit, Miss, I’m a big fan of your writing. And I’m not talking about the lifestyle and beauty column Mr. Doherty of the ‘Silver Lining’ has confined you to.

No, I am a big fan of the work you used to do for the New York Bulletin. I remember your name headlining many articles on crime here in Hell’s Kitchen—a column my late friend Ben Urich used to call his home.  

It’s a shame that the paper was shut down. I tried to prevent it, but the disappearance of half of humanity and Wilson Fisk’s irreparable damage to the city’s foundation tied my hands. 

The token female journalist reporting on unsolicited beauty advice and lifestyle choices no one is going to follow in the days of social media and fake marketing. It must be frustrating, right? Not having a story to tell. Not getting recognized for your impeccable talent. The Bulletin gave you a platform, but Mr. Doherty and his goons took that away from you.

What I’m asking myself is, are you satisfied? You were probably imagining a different future for yourself. A woman of your caliber must want to be more than a mere object used to make a bottomless magazine look better on the market. 

Excuse my overstepping. I read one of your essays on the magical and the mythic—lore versus reality—the other day, and it inspired me. My life has been taking quite a few turns lately, so I required some new… let’s call it insight. 

You don’t know me, but I am one of those creatures you are fascinated by. I’m the kind of creature people have been telling you not to write about because the weak minds of the public would not receive it well. The Catholics, the church, the fragile and fearful human beings that can’t imagine anything in fiction being real and want to remain the superior species—trust me, I know what it feels like to be backed into a corner. To be abandoned. To be underestimated. Not quite like you, I admit, but I have a few years of experience in and with this world to show for myself. 

I imagine you’re tired of your position. I imagine you’re dissatisfied with human idiocy. You crave answers to your questions. Questions you have been asking yourself ever since college failed to answer them. My kind is being censored—partly for good reason—but that doesn’t sit right with you, does it? To live life in a monotone line with no clear way out of this boring rhythm you have had to fall into? 

I can offer you a different path. A story. Answers to your questions. And the unfiltered truth of a 242-year-old man. 

You are going to find a card with my address attached to this letter. I can assure you, sweetheart, we both want the same thing. I will wash your hands if you wash mine. Think about it, and come find me when you have made your decision. Preferably after the sun has set. 

Yours sincerely,

M.

The paper crumbles in your hands, but only at the corners. Your eyes are glued to the lost drops of ink, the blue blood of an old fountain pen caving under too much pressure. 

He chose his words carefully. Every paragraph circles around your head. You breathe in, and it suddenly feels as though the whiff of the unknown is an inhalable drug, twisting your brain inside out. 

The pull threatens to submerge you in a stormy ocean. You’re flailing your arms around helplessly, but there is nothing for you to hold onto. All buoys have drifted into oblivion, leaving a sea of utter emptiness behind, and in the midst of it, there you are, drowning.

In a moment of clarity, you fold the letter back down on the desk. It lands with a thud, and you look around frantically, checking if anyone is watching you. They aren’t. 

M. That’s all he’s giving you. And the fact he is over two hundred years old proves the rumors to be true. He’s standing by it, but only to you. He wants to reveal himself to you, show you his true face for a story, but he’s a vampire. 

You’re alone. You can wash his hands, but is just showing up enough for him? You don’t even know him. 

You’re in trouble. This time though, you didn’t even do anything. You did your job, and he caught an interest in you. How does that work? 

Your heart skips another beat. It should not, but it does. The danger is exciting. It shouldn't be exciting. You hate what your body is doing, but how can you make it stop? You can’t. You can’t do anything but take it.

This stranger has got you in a chokehold, but in his hands, you might as well surrender to your certain demise. You don’t consider vampires inherently evil, but there is a reason people warn you not to walk alone at night in Hell’s Kitchen. He’s dangerous, no matter his nature, and he is not supposed to lure you in the way he does.

But you’re a curious kitten, and he is offering you the holy grail of answers to questions you have been grappling with for years. He hit the nail right on the head. And it doesn’t even scare you how well he knows you. 

This is a gold mine. Realistically speaking, telling a vampire’s story could make or break your career as a journalist. If you do it for the magazine, you’re done before you can even bring your words to print, but if you do it individually and you do it well, people will certainly eat it up. The question is just, are you going to play your entire life safe, conforming to your boss’s view of you until you get the freedom you crave, or are you going to take the risk and fly? 

The answer is as clear as day, but it takes you a moment to process. It’s as though someone is in your head, steering you in the direction of whoever this M is. Daredevil. This vampire who wants you to interview him, and for what? That’s still an open question you don’t have the answer to. But you do know what to do.

You scramble for your laptop, your notepad, and the letter in the envelope. The clock strikes four. You have another two hours on the clock, but you can’t be bothered to stay. 

Upon hearing the sound of your shoes hurriedly scraping against the linoleum floors, one of your colleagues turns in her chair. “Where are you going?” she asks.

“I, uh, have somewhere to be,” you tell her as you brush past her.

“What, now?”

“Yeah. I forgot I had an appointment.”

“What about Mr. Doherty?”

You stop on your way out, looking back over your shoulder. “If everything works out,” you say, glancing through the window to his office at the other end of the hall, “He’ll have my letter of resignation by the end of the week.”

She gasps softly. “You’re quitting?” her voice is barely above a whisper.

Almost sinisterly, you chuckle. “That’s the plan, yeah.”

“But—”

“Tell your daughter Happy Birthday from me. I gotta go.”

Your steps echo for minutes still, but you are long gone with the wind.

Silver linings are considered an advantage that comes from an unpleasant situation. The name has proven to be entirely unfit for the magazine that replaced a big piece of Hell’s Kitchen’s history. The Bulletin had cultural value as much as it was laden with decades of the city’s stories told to the average person. 

Wilson Fisk was the dynamite that sent New York alight. The Bulletin’s destruction was mere collateral damage in the fight to get the city back on track. You have had so many reasons to leave presented to you, yet you never took them. If you had, maybe you wouldn’t be here, making bad decisions on what started as just another Monday in June. 

The fact is though, you didn’t leave, and you are here now. Facts are what matter. They count. Your hypothetical past, present, and future have no place in this reality because you can’t travel back or forward in time. Vampires may exist, and the Avengers time-traveled to save the world, but things aren’t quite as easy once you look at the bigger picture. You are not a superhero, you’re just a journalist chasing the kind of story that will finally make her voice be heard. 

You know that Ben Urich, at least, would be proud of you.

His address weighs heavy on the small card you pulled out of the envelope earlier that evening. You passed it on to the cab driver, and he began to navigate the dark streets of Hell’s Kitchen. The luxury condominiums in this part of the city can be counted on one hand. You know exactly when you’re there. 

The sun has once again set over New York City. You’re wide awake, not quite sure though if you’re ready to face what you are walking blindly into. Even your driver refuses to take you past a certain point, and that is how you know that you’re not dreaming. This is real, and it’s supposed to be terrifying. 

How come you’re not scared then?

You slip twenty dollars to the cab driver, then climb out of the backseat. The salty air from the Hudson River a few blocks down wafts around your sensitive nose. In the distance, you can hear waves crashing into the docks as the wind picks up in speed. The boats must be moving wildly by now, swaying from side to side and possibly even making the fish in the depths of the water seasick. You would be if you were them. 

With every step, you grow closer to your target. On second thought, maybe you should have brought more than just a pathetic bottle of pepper spray and your precious laptop. You could have brought your grandfather’s cassette recorder, at least that would leave a mark if you hit someone over the head with it. 

Do vampires get concussions? That is another question you can add to the seemingly endless list in your mind. It’s a confusing place as of late, and the weird sense that someone is playing with the controls won’t leave you alone. Either you are overthinking, or you are worse off than you originally thought. 

The apartment complex the card directs you to stretches high above you. You look up, seeing not a single light on. That’s odd, you think, but then again, you are meeting with the city’s most notorious man. If he is who everyone says he is, and if the rumors are even true, that is. 

As you are about to approach the entrance, your fingertips start to burn. A gasp escapes past your lips. Staring down, the cubical piece of paper goes up in flames. You are mere feet from the door, nowhere near close to an open source of fire, and the card starts to burn like a wildfire. 

You pull back, your heart hammering against your ribcage. The ashes fall to the ground, but before they can hit the asphalt, they vanish.

“What the–” before you can finish, the doors before you swing open toward the inside. The lights turn on. Someone even has called the elevator for you. 

Another step forward, and a voice stops you. “Fourth floor, down the hallway, first door to your right,” the voice says through the speaker. Only then do you notice the lack of a doorbell. 

Everything in you is screaming for you to run, but you are rooted in the spot. He dragged you here with a mere letter, and you were more than ready to jump. Desperation was the only thing that drove you here. Your brain seems incapable of rational thought.

What if that is what he wanted all along? To get you complicit by playing on what you so desperately need, which is a story and a way out of this boring everyday life that is threatening to slowly kill you.

He’s like a siren, luring you into his deadly trap, but even knowing all of this, you still can’t find it in yourself to run. 

The second you enter the building, the door shuts behind you, and your only way out is officially locked. You made the decision; you have dug your own grave, possibly quite literally, and now you have to lie in it. It’s better to die chasing a good story than dying at a desk in an office that doesn’t respect you.

You are a disgrace, you can hear your father’s voice in the back of your mind. He always warned you not to be too reckless or your bad decisions will eventually catch up with you. He always taught you not to trust strangers, and to stay the hell away from those who disgrace God, but you have never cared much about being a good girl. 

Your thoughts are as morbid as your obsession with the walking undead. It is time you embrace what people are already saying about you.

The elevator ride feels like an eternity. It goes up and up and up until it finally stops on the fourth floor. The walls smell like nothing but a faint hint of bleach. It’s clean, parquette not carpet, and the walls are kept in a shade resembling a mixture between crimson and maroon, and it is blending into a sort of marble.

The metal doors slide open. Again, you hesitate. A sweet whisper echoes in your ear, dragging you toward the edge. You breach the border between the elevator and the hallway that waits behind it. The voice is distant, and it doesn’t sound human—it reminds you of a siren’s song, calling for you. He is calling for you, and a fog settles over your mind. You’re not in control anymore, he is. 

You imagine him to be an old man, possibly middle-aged. Vampires stop aging when they’re turned. Their mind doesn’t. You’ve read the research plenty. They are wise beings, more intelligent than human beings could ever fathom. That makes them dangerous. 

Their venom rivals the intoxicating feeling of heroin, you’ve heard, and it heightens your senses to the point all you can feel is the one who bit you. Research suggests it’s a million times stronger than an orgasm, for both the vampire and the human being. 

Part of you has always wanted to try it. Part of you wants to know what it feels like to be sucked dry. You want to know what it feels like to be carried into a new dimension by someone who knows how to play the human body like a fucking piano, eliciting the sweetest melody through your very essence and the symphony of your moans.  

This M—Daredevil—is inherently dangerous. He’s as mysterious as they come; a man in a mask lurking in the dark corners of Hell’s Kitchen every night, turning the fight for justice into his hunting ground. 

It’s as though he curled his fingers, and you followed. 

You walk the dark hallway down to the door on the right. Paintings litter the walls. Masterpieces, blotches of white, red, and color. You recognize the red marble as a decorative theme on the wallpaper. Tracing your fingers over it, the rough drywall scratches at your skin. 

You reach out a shaky hand toward the golden knob. Before you can turn it though, the door already flings open. It must be witchcraft. 

Red appears to be his favorite color. At least judging from the hallway, that is true. When you step into the room with a pounding heart and blood pooling in your cheeks though, the inside of the room is a lot more… human. You wouldn’t have guessed it from the gloominess surrounding you on your way there.

A leather couch and armchairs stand in the middle, facing toward the window front. Colored windows, as you have gathered from the rumors. They are see-through now though, showing the city skyline and the moon up high. The chandelier on the ceiling is the only piece of furniture you would consider old. Browns meet hues of blue and dark green, a forest at midnight, and you suck in a sharp breath. The apartment is beautiful. 

You look to your left and see a bookshelf stretching the length of the wall. You can’t help but run your hand over the backs. You would have expected original editions from the 18th or 19th century, but when your fingers trace over the bindings, you are met with the bulging of Braille underneath the elegant golden writing of the titles. None of them seem to have collected dust. It surprises you to only find a mere handful of classics that haven’t been transcribed in Braille and a realization you did not expect starts to crawl its way forward.

“I stole that one from a library in Paris.”

Your racing heart stops beating. The book you’ve been holding falls to the ground, its worn-out leather cracking further around the spine. The thud is deafening. You gasp, turning around. Your shoulders fly up as the tension ripples through every last muscle in your bone. Your bones ache just from how stiff you’re standing, but you can’t move.

The man before you moves as quietly as a mouse. You didn’t hear him coming. The moonlight reflects off his dark brown hair, making it appear almost ginger. He’s wearing a simple suit without a tie, and the white of his shirt is as pristine and clean as the cut of his beard. You can see chest hair poking out from underneath the two open buttons, as dark as the locks on his head. His jawline is irresistibly sharp, leading up to a pair of plump lips he is wrapping around the brim of a crystal glass filled with rum.

Your heart remains frozen. Not a single drop of blood pumps through your veins, yet your cheeks burn brighter than a bonfire on a pitch-black night. 

But his flawless appearance is not what catches your attention the most. Looking up into his eyes, wanting to know whether they are as red as those set into the devil’s mask, you find nothing but your terrified reflection staring back at you. It’s as blurry as the picture of your face in a still ocean’s water, your wide eyes staring back at yourself. 

The red glasses are all you can see. Round with a black rim. Silver would have looked better on him, or maybe even gold. The black reminds you of an endless pit, a sinister embrace of vampire stereotypes, but you can’t look away from the maroon that won’t allow you even a glimpse into his eyes. They are shielding him from the world, and his eyes from curious, stupid humans like you.

He nods toward the ground. “You gonna pick that up?” he asks. His voice reminds you of rumbling gravel. 

He looks like a man. He talks like a man. If you didn’t know better, you would say he is human. There seems to be blood in his cheeks and air in his lungs. 

You have to pull yourself together. Clearing your throat, you bend down and pick the book back up.

“Thank you,” he utters your name. “It’s been a while since I’ve received visitors that don’t work for me.”

You put the book back on the shelf. Your lips are sewn shut; you can’t find the words. Every time you open your mouth like a fish on dry land, you close it again, and it is embarrassing to be standing in front of him with your guard down. 

“Welcome to my home,” he says. You wish you could see his eyes to know if he’s mocking you. “Do you want a drink, or do you need another minute to process?”

He is mocking you. His tone is gentle, as is his voice, but he smirks like a smug motherfucker, and your anger boils to a tipping point. The candle is about to burn out. 

“I–” you stammer. Internally, you curse yourself for being such a fool. 

“Another minute it is then.”

You don’t need a minute though. “You’re blind,” you blurt out. 

The beautiful—deadly—stranger nods. “Yeah.“

“How?”

“Accident when I was a kid.”

“But you’re…” you leave the missing part of that sentence hanging in the air like a noose. 

“Say it,” he murmurs. You want to say it sounds like a growl, but you’re not sure. He isn’t asserting dominance or trying to force you into submission by scaring you away, but he is toying with you regardless. 

You take a deep breath. The word, the truth, numbers your tongue and your lips with its weight. “A vampire,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, matching his. 

His smirk broadens. He pushes his tongue against the inside of his cheek for a moment, then releases it as it darts out to wet his bottom lip. “I’m a blind vampire, yes,” he answers. “We’re rare, but we do exist.”

Blind vampires. In all of your years of fascination, that has never crossed your mind. You used to believe that they had healing abilities that far exceeded your own. You were wrong. He lost his eyesight before he got turned into a vampire. He lived as a blind human being and didn’t regain his most crucial sense when he died. 

He came back to life, but he died. It is surreal to stand across from him. He’s not just letters on a piece of paper, he is very much real. And he’s blind. 

“Oh, my God,” you curse.

That elicits a soft chuckle from him. “I was starting to think you wouldn’t come,” he says. 

“I was considering not to.” 

He sees right through you with those empty glasses. “That’s a lie.”

“How would you know?” you counter. 

“I can hear your heartbeat. The blood pumping in your veins…” His head tilts ever so slightly in your direction. You take a step back. It’s an instinct. “Your pulse picks up when you lie, or when you’re nervous, or both,” he states. “When you first saw me, your heart skipped a beat. It did again when you lied to me.”

Your eyes trail down to his thick thighs perfectly fitted in his tailored trousers. His thick digits pat the rhythm with his fingers on the fabric. Thud-thudthudthud-thud. You place a hand on your chest. He wasn’t wrong; your heart is racing. 

His smirk turns into a smile, but only briefly again. It’s a glimpse of humanity he doesn’t want you to see. “I like that sound,” he says. “Has anyone ever told you that you smell good? Sweet, sour, and a little salty. Natural. You don’t use a lot of artificial perfume, but you like cherry chapstick.”

You swallow, taking a whiff of your arm. Besides your deodorant masking the scent of your nervous sweat, you smell nothing. How good must his nose be? His hearing? His sense of taste? 

“Right now, sweat is dripping down your back, and your muscles are tense enough to strain against your bones every time you breathe. Your heart just skipped a beat again. You find it weird,” he muses. “I can’t turn it off, but I get it must be strange for you.” 

“You–” The blood has collected in your head, pushing the temperature in the room to an all-time high. “Get out of my body!” you snap. 

He laughs. “That’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear.”

“And I never thought you would ask for an audience with me, but here we are.”

“Here you are.” 

You want nothing more than to wipe that smirk off his face. He looks so smug, standing there with his drink, wearing a suit too fancy for his own home. He’s fully in his element. It’s scary how alluring he is, too. You don’t want to think that way, but as soon as your eyes gaze upon him again, your chest contracts, and you forget how to breathe. 

He’s a wolf, and you’re a lonely little sheep that doesn’t know any better. That lonely little sheep just wants to be a part of something bigger, even if that means surrendering herself to the big bad wolf. He wants a taste of her, and the sheep would give him that in a heartbeat if he just asked. 

You blink. There is a voice in your head, and it isn’t your own. Far from it. You don’t want to be associated with this stranger. She thinks she knows you. She thinks she knows what you want—the sheep in the eyes of her natural enemy. This voice is the most irrational you could be, and you need to stop letting her win.

And yet you—not just the voice of the lonely sheep you appear to be—would follow this man anywhere, even to hell if he asked you to. 

Your eyes drill knives into his skull, but they are also full of curiosity. Can he hear your thoughts? Your heart beats in your throat. You can taste it on your tongue. If you bit your lip, you would bleed, and he would probably fall into a frenzy. Still, your teeth dig into your bottom lip. What if he can hear your thoughts—hear how fucking needy you are? You’re pathetic. What he must think of you, standing across from him, smaller than human life itself. 

You want to read him, but he is far from an open book. He’s not Braille you can run your fingers over, and even if he was, you don’t know how to read it. He’s an enigma. His face is set in stone; an iron mask you can’t penetrate. 

His chest heaves with another chuckle. He sets the crystal glass down on the coffee table, taking a step forward. “No, I can’t read your mind,” he says. 

You flinch. “What?”

“Your breathing pattern. The way you look at me. I can sense that you’re thinking about something.” He adjusts his glasses. “It’s just… Most humans ask me if I can read their minds, you know. I can’t. Some vampires can, but my senses are the only heightened ability I have.” This time, when he chuckles, a hint of bitterness dances in his voice. 

“At least you’re not in my head then,” you say. 

“No.”

“Good.”

A pregnant pause follows. You clutch your bag to your chest, your fingers digging into the frame of your hidden laptop. 

“Can I offer you a drink?” he asks, pointing to his empty glass.

You wave him off. That’s the last thing on your mind. “No, thank you.”

Sometimes at night, you fantasize about diving into the abyss of darkness. It looks and sounds a terrifying lot like him. You want to know him. You need to know him. When it comes to him and this—whatever this is—the lines between want and need are blurring into an unidentifiable mess. It’s an ocean of emotions with no land in sight. A total eclipse of the heart, if you will. You’re losing your mind.

“What you can do–” You straighten your shoulder, hoping it will add height to your beaten confidence. “You can tell me your name. Sir,” you say. 

He nods. “I suppose it would only be fair, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, it would.”

“Matthew. My name’s Matthew.” The softness of his features as his lips move to the rhythm of his words takes you back anew. His eyebrows raise slightly, and you catch a glimpse of a pair of beautiful, unfocused hazel eyes that steal your breath away. 

Matthew. It is a name that easily rolls off the tongue. It suits him.

You repeat his name aloud. “That’s an odd name for a 200-something-year-old man,” you point out. 

Matthew scoffs. “My parents were both Catholic.”

“I suppose you’re not?”

You hit a sore spot. His head dips, fingers running over his nails and tongue tracing his teeth. “Not anymore,” he says.

God died for him a long time ago, and all churches burned down.

Your grip on your bag loosens. “Then why Daredevil?” you ask. 

His lips part. “I, uh, have the Bulletin to thank for that one. After centuries of existing in this world, and being despised for no matter what I do, I’ve decided to embrace it. I am Daredevil, not even God can stop that now.”

Matt grabs his glass, turning away from you. He doesn’t use a cane to navigate from the couch to the mini bar on the other end of the room. You carefully follow his movements. One of his hands remains at his side, snapping his fingers as he navigates the familiar terrain of his home. 

He uncaps a half-empty bottle of Whiskey to pour himself another glass. 

“You know, Matthew,” you prompt, daring to step forward an inch, “as big as your reputation is in this part of the city, Silver Lining is not the kind of magazine that would cover your story.”

“You still came,” he says. 

“I could lose my job if anyone knew I came here.”

“And yet you’re here and not where you should be.” He turns his head over his shoulder. “You wouldn’t risk losing your job if it wasn’t important to you, would you?”

You stammer, “I–” He’s got you. You’re a fish with a hook in her mouth. 

“If Silver Lining Magazine won’t cover my story, why are you here?” Matt turns back to you, leaning back against the shiny Mahagoni of his minibar. It offers a beautiful contrast to his strong physique and the slight paleness of his skin. “Could it be because you’re fascinated by the mythic?” he asks, teasing. “By werewolves and witches and vampires?”

It’s your turn to scoff. “I won’t confirm or deny. My boss wouldn’t let me write a vampire vigilante exposé even if I begged him to.”

“And that’s why Mr. Doherty doesn’t deserve you.” Your body visibly recoils when he pushes forward, moving just an inch toward you. “Your curiosity is a virtue,” he purrs. The moonlight sets your reflection in his glasses alight. 

“Is that why you lured me here?” you ask him. “Because my curiosity is a virtue and you consider yourself better than the people in my life?”

“I didn’t lure you here, and I think you know that. That’s not what this is.” The distance between you starts to shrink, backing you into a corner. “I believe you came here because the thought of interviewing a vampire and sharing your findings with the world on your account excites you,” he says. “You want to be heard. You want to be taken seriously as a journalist, and you want to make people happy.”

The only way for you to come out of this with your pride and dignity still intact is to put up walls before the already existent labyrinth of walls keeping your heart guarded and your soul safe. “Again,” you ask, “why me?”

“Why not you? As I stated in my letter, I’m a fan of your work.”

You roll your eyes. “Yeah, about that. How did you write that if you’re blind?”

“I didn’t, my secretary did.”

“Of course.” Of course, he has a secretary. “I… I just don’t get it,” you say. “You’ve been hiding for so long–” 

Matt cuts you off with an urgency you didn’t expect, “Things have changed. Circumstances…” he trails off. 

“Wouldn’t it be a suicide mission?” 

His answer is silence. You let out an exasperated sigh. “If you want me to interview you, you have to be honest with me.”

“I’m not on the record yet.”

“Right. Maybe you can answer this though—off the record, of course—how can you be certain I didn’t call the cops or the FBI before I came here?”

His eyes crinkle. “I’m not stupid, sweetheart,” he says. 

He’s amused. You’re amusing him. 

“Don’t call me that,” you growl. 

He’s spreading you open, holding up a mirror for you to look into. It’s your miserable self in all its glory, and he knows you better than you know yourself. 

You ignore the sharp pain in your left ribcage as you pull the arrow out of your heart. “Unless someone holds up a sign that they are pro-vampirism, how would you even know I’d listen to you and not just refer you to the Journal of Psychiatry?” 

“Are you telling me you don’t believe in vampires?” Matt quips.

“That’s not… Answer my question!”

The sound of your heartbeat must sound almost like the rapid firing of a machine gun, that’s how fast your pulse is racing. Your veins threaten to burst with the excess blood. It’s a heat like no other. You’re a witch at the stake, and Matt is holding the torch to your gasoline-doused body. 

He clears his throat. Your face falls at the words that tumble out of his parted lips, and the rapid firing turns into a deafening silence and a monotone line on a heart monitor. 

“After what I’ve learned from reading Dr. Rice’s research on the phenomena of vampirism, I can confidently say this species is no different than an animal like the great white shark or the Homo sapiens sapiens—our kind,” he recites. “Vampires are a medium of fiction and propaganda to induce fear, but they are also a widely misunderstood species that is being silenced rather than heard. Our species, the human species, likes to consider themselves superior, even when we’re in a position of being someone’s natural food source. Dr. Rice’s research is based on a comprehensible set of facts, and isn’t that what we have been relying on ever since the beginning? Our psychology makes it possible for us to change the narrative in our favor, and more often than not, we ignore the very facts deemed by humans as an intellectual importance to spread the message of an entirely different agenda. Dr. Rice’s research only proves that egotism and humans themselves will be humankind's certain downfall.”

“My investigative journalism essay,” you breathe out. 

“Published by Columbia University.” 

Your heart restarts with a rush of adrenaline. “How… how do you know all of this?”

“I may be blind,” Matt says, “but I know how to read between the lines.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

The alcohol in his drink seems to have little effect on him. “I know you have questions, and I’m willing to answer them if you promise to publish a detailed report somewhere other than Silver Lining Magazine.”

You look down at your bag, then back at him. “Ben Urich could have told your story in a way that would’ve made people listen,” you murmur. “I don’t have an impressive career like him.”

“Yeah,” he smiles, “but you could have easily written ‘Attack on NYC’. Ben was a good man, an even better journalist, but he could not have written your college essay. And he could never have been you.” 

Your name rolls off his tongue—not a pretentious nickname that makes you want to vomit but your name, and it flicks a switch within you. 

You glance around the spacious living, pulling your laptop out of its confines, and you bridge the distance between you, finally. You notice he smells of sandalwood cologne and scentless soap. “Okay,” you cave. “Where do you want me to set up?”

Session 1.

The spacebar clicks underneath the tip of your index finger. The white of your screen fills with a series of red sequences as the microphone takes in every little sound around you. Except for the two of you and the fading footsteps of one of Matthew’s assistants though, the world has fallen silent in the dead of the night. He’s sitting across from you, legs crossed, head tilted; your life is about to change.

“So, Mister Murdock,” you begin, “tell me. How long have you been dead?” 

His mouth opens in a wide grin. “242 years,” he answers. 

“And what happened the year you died?”

“Well, it was 1782. I was a good few years out of law school. I was a good lawyer, but I wasn’t successful. That year, I met a beautiful woman at a banquet. I wasn’t rich—trust me, I was beyond penniless—but she had been adopted into a wealthy family, and that made her one of the richest women in the room. Everyone wanted her, but when I sensed her across the hall, she only had eyes for me. And she was the first woman to not see me just because I was blind.” He chuckles sadly. “I thought she was the woman of my dreams, the love of my life, but a few weeks later, after letting her into my life, I realized that she didn’t look at me that night because she was interested. She was hunting me. El— Miss Elektra Natchios…”

The year 1782 becomes apparent before your inner eye. As he tells you about the night he met her, you can see the dark-haired beauty making her way across the ballroom. Red lips and a gown to die for. Her dark eyes were full of mischief, but the passion in them could have knocked a grown man off of his feet. And that is just what she did to poor Matthew. 

“I was going to marry her,” he tells you.

He went to church regularly. His knees were bloody from praying, his senses already heightened before he died. God’s soldier, that is how he puts it. He was told that the accident that left him blind happened for a reason, and he had to fight a war that went beyond the country’s fight for independence. 

That summer, Elektra drained him. He didn’t know what she was. She fooled him. He was obsessed with her. Her dark eyes he couldn’t see lured her in, and it was the venom in her blood that became his downfall after she dug her teeth into him.

Matt tried to beg his priest for forgiveness, but he didn’t even make it past the marble stairs before the doors locked. He knelt in a pool of blood—both his and that of the first human he ever sucked dry to survive as a newborn vampire—offering an eternal sacrifice to Catholicism, but God abandoned him on his doorstep. 

The church walls would have been set on fire if he had touched them from the inside. 

You look up from your notepad to find him now standing at the window. He’s not looking out, of course, but he seems so deep in thought, the memories that aren’t your own but his start to dissipate, and you’re brought back to the here and now.

Matt poured his heart out to you. You expected answers, but not this kind, and certainly not of this magnitude. You see him in an entirely different light. He’s vulnerable, fragile, and human. He has endured trauma that killed him, but he couldn’t die because the woman he loved made him immortal. It’s a bigger curse than growing up with the belief that an accident made you God’s soldier. 

He lost everything. For centuries, he has had to live with that. It’s killing you, feeling his pain, the pure agony that radiates off him. 

Your voice is quiet when you ask him, “What was it like?” You don’t have to say it out loud for him to know what you are referencing.

Matt chuckles, the sound a mere breath in the atmosphere. “Like she took my soul from my body, setting fire to my belief system and already heightened senses,” he says. 

You swallow. “That sounds… overstimulating.”

“It was. Is. My heart stopped, but when that happened, something else awoke inside me. The hunger… the hunger was the worst part. It’s insatiable. One hour passes, and you feel like you’ve been starving for weeks.”

“Like you’ve been possessed by a demon?”

“Like I am the demon.”

“But you’re not.” You should stop the recording. You’re not on track; you’re incorporating your feelings into Matt’s story, but you can’t help it. The words tumble out of your mouth without a second thought, a train that cannot be stopped. 

He raises his eyebrows, you can see it in his reflection in the windows. “Are you religious?” he asks.

You shake your head. “This isn’t about me.”

“Are you?”

The veins on the back of his hands bulge as he balls them to fists at his sides. Your throat is a desert, and your heartbeat resembles a storm that burns right through it, sending the sand flying in all directions of the horizon.

You adjust in your seat, crossing one leg over the other. He takes a whiff. He’s smelling you, and that doesn’t help the speed of your pulse to calm down. 

Tapping your pen on your notepad, you watch the red sequences fill the white space of the recording program. It moves with the sound of your voice when you finally dare to answer. “It’s a complicated question because there is a difference between believing in God and believing in the church,” you say.

“Do you believe in God then?” Matt asks. It’s as though he’s trying not to seethe at the mere mention of someone he used to worship. You make a note of that.

“There is so much bad in this world. So much cruelty. I can’t…” You take a deep breath. “I don’t know how to believe in a God that would let the things humans do to each other happen. If God existed—if he was as merciful as Christians like to claim, he wouldn’t let this happen. And I’m so sick and tired of people using their faith, and their beliefs in God and the church as justification to be disrespectful. I don’t understand it. How can anyone? Why is someone who has to drink blood to stay alive—someone who didn’t even choose this life—worth less and the devil’s breed when humans do worse things to each other? Why would God allow us to start wars that kill innocent people? Children? It’s just not fair that we treat ourselves and others as though we are already in hell, and we’re just supposed to accept that God doesn’t care—” You stop yourself, the tears burning behind your eyes. 

Matt turns back around. You can’t look away. “When I was still human,” he murmurs, “I used to believe everything that happened to me was God’s will. The accident, God’s will. Me going blind, God’s will. I went to confession, prayed until my knees were bloody and bruised. I tried convincing myself that every scream I heard from down the block, every person who lost their life or their innocence was my responsibility. God made me this way for a reason, right?” The scoff is as bitter as the liquor in his glass. “I fell apart, you know. I was a kid, so I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand what was happening to me,” he tells you. 

You hold your breath. The glasses slip from his eyes as he takes them off with shaky fingers. You are met with the most beautiful pair of hazel eyes. Emotions dance a heated tango in a tornado. If you look closer, the green specks bring life to his eyes. It’s human nature in the purest sense of the word. 

Your reflection stands in his irises, his unmoving pupils, and the tears glisten in his eyes. They’re as red as blood, watered-down crimson essence. You want to reach out and stroke his cheek, but that would be crossing a very big line that you can’t bring yourself up to touch. 

“I studied law because I thought it would change something,” he continues. You listen. It’s the only thing you can do—listen. “It wasn’t enough. Nothing I ever did felt like it was enough. I lost my father. Jack. I didn’t know my mother until it was too late. Maggie. I had no one. No money, no prospects, just me and those voices in my head, telling me I was supposed to be God’s soldier.”

“You’re not,” you cut in. 

He shakes his head. “I prayed; I crawled up the stairs of the church, and I spent hours repenting for my sins. I bled myself dry for Him. I sacrificed myself. I sacrificed my youth, my heart, and my soul, and I got nothing back. I begged for help until my voice was sore, but nothing… God, nothing was ever good enough. Until Elektra came around,” he says. 

“She changed everything for you. It makes sense. She turned you into a vampire, but she also loved you.”

“She did love me, in her own twisted way.”

“It’s what you deserved,” you say.

He isn’t yours, but the pang you feel in your chest is treacherous. Your heart cracks like a porcelain vase, jealousy creeping in like a parasite of toxic waste.

In response, Matt only chuckles bitterly. “She made me believe again, then took my soul and crushed it in her hand.” The correction makes your shoulders slump. “Instead of feeling like my world ended though, I felt at peace when she sucked the blood out of my veins and fed me her venom,” he says. “It’s sick, I know. I was aware I died that night, that she turned me into a devil who could only survive if he drank the blood of others. The Catholic in me struggled to accept it, but I had no choice but to embrace what she made me.”

“And where is she now?” you ask.

“Gone.” The light in his eyes has fully disappeared now. “I stayed with her for a while until she died in my arms. She showed me what love is, and she showed me heartbreak. She made me hungry for blood, awakening the devil I’ve been trying to tame. She taught me how to feed, how to hunt, and how to chase. But she also cursed me,” he says. “I only exist for myself now. I only bleed for myself. No God, no church, and no more religion. I’m not Jesus, I’m Judas, and I retired the cross the day I was crucified.”

You have run out of questions to ask. Too overwhelming is the sight of his walls crumbling down, this stranger you now know better than any living being seems to. You no longer see money in this, or a story to chase, you only see Matthew, and the halo above his head he still believes is a pair of horns. The world broke him. His faith in God broke him. It crushed him, and he lost everything. How broken he must be. 

“Not such a pretty story when I say it out loud, huh?” He scoffs.

The spacebar clicks again. The recording comes to a sudden halt. One hour and fifty-eight minutes, the first session of your interview with the vampire. You need to put a halt to it now because what you are about to say or do as you reach your hand out to brush his cold, dead skin is not something that should be found on a record. And you won’t ever tell.

Matt pulls away when your warm fingertips brush his. You’re standing across from him now, so close he can smell, hear, and feel all of you at once.

Your touch is the holy water that burns his skin, but the fire sustains him and shoots straight to his core the same way the blood rushes to yours.

“It’s not a pretty story, no,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, “but it did tell me what I already knew.”

“And what’s that?” he asks.

“That you’re not evil. You’re not the Devil. You’re misunderstood. You’ve been beaten; you’ve been abandoned, hurt, and broken. That doesn’t make you a monster. Trying to make this city a better place does not make you a monster.”

“If you only knew the things I’ve done…”

“I know the rumors suggest that you were the one who fought Wilson Fisk and got this city back where it needed to be. You’ve saved countless women from the worst of fates. You are the reason the innocent people of Hell’s Kitchen feel safe. By picking up that mask, you became a hero, not a villain, and that is the story I want to tell.”

In lightspeed, he has moved you from the window to the other end of the room. Your back hits the wall. 

Matt towers over you in all of his intimidating glory. His eyes spark red, but you hold his unfocused gaze. He has such beautiful eyes. This pull between you is far from human; it’s unhealthy, and it is exactly where he wanted to get you. You’re trapped, pinned underneath him like a deer caught in headlights. 

Exhaling, your breath strokes his cheeks. He closes his eyes, savoring the taste of you. Every particle in the air, he inhales. His tongue darts out to lick his lips. Oh, what you wouldn’t do to suck that tongue into your mouth. 

Your pheromones play his head like a puppeteer pulling the strings of his marionette. He growls. “Do you have any idea how dangerous I am?” 

The moonlight catches his sparkling white teeth. This time though, you come face to face with the sharp edges of his previously concealed fangs. Your jaw drops open. He’s ethereal. 

“I could snap your neck—” Matt places his hand on your neck, “I could make that heart stop beating, take the air from your lungs. I could eat you…” He traces the vein in your throat from your jaw to your collarbone. “I could bite you and suck your blood until you’re empty. I could kill you, sweetheart. My kind is your natural enemy. You shouldn’t be here.”

You shudder. His nose brushes the sensitive skin below your ear. He’s so close you can smell him. On inhale, and his scent consumes your senses. He is all you can feel now. You reach out to hold onto his arms, his muscles tensing under your teeth. He’s big and strong, and those hands have a mind of their own as they begin to wander but never where you need him most. 

You shouldn’t be here, yet you came. He asked you to him, and you complied. Is this your fate now? Chasing after your big bad wolf like the helpless sheep that you are?

Your walls clench around an agonizing emptiness, your swollen clit brushing against your soaked underwear. Whatever he is doing to you, it’s the cruelest form of torture. 

A strangled noise breaks out of the back of his throat, rumbling in his chest. “You have no idea how badly I want to taste you,” he breathes. 

“Do it,” you beg. “Taste me.”

He utters your name again. “Stop.”

“Please.”

Your tone shatters him. When he kisses you, finally, fireworks explode in the universe around you. All the stars seem to finally align. Your heart opens, and it sucks him right into you. Your soul yearns for him. He’s so close yet so far away. 

The moon stands between you, but you cross even that ocean as you push against him, forcing your tongue into his mouth. He takes like heaven and hell; he’s the apple Eve bit into and cursed her for all eternity. But he’s also the snake, the one who compelled you to take this journey of bad decisions and jump right off the cliff’s edge. You melt into him like a broken candle. 

He pulls away. Those fangs are alluring, as sharp as a knife’s tip. You want to know what it would feel like gracing your skin, digging into your as he thrusts his cock into your tight cunt. The thought alone sends your mind into a spiral.

Your lips are swollen, but he has yet to draw blood. Matt looks as though he wouldn’t dare, his eyes darting around in a darkened conflict he feels might cost him more than your dignity. You are begging for it, as is your body, but he’s holding himself back. He’s the one who tied himself to an invisible pillar, keeping his hands locked behind his back. But that is not the Matt you want. 

You lean your head to the side, exposing the length of his neck. All control has slipped from your fingers. It’s in his hands now—you are. He cups your head gently. A mere few inches lie between your fountain and his lips.

You press a kiss to his calloused palm—a desperate and needy kiss, tracing your tongue over the lines that tell his life’s story in a way no interview can retell—and it is then he is forever done for. He’s doomed, and you are the second woman to pull him under the pits of hell. 

Saliva drips from his fangs. You hold your breath. He hisses, a weak admission of surrender; the words die miserably on your tongue when his lips close around your pulse point with all his might, and his teeth drive home. 

You moan aloud. Your fingers tangle in his hair, forcing him deeper as he sucks the dark red essence out of your vein. The sensation is more than you bargained for. It’s a drug that wrecks your system. The synapses in your brain backfire with all their might, and what follows the initial explosion of pleasure shooting white hot through your being is complete and utter silence as this God of a man feeds on you. 

The invisible string between you glows a bright crimson. It slings around you, tying you together like the roots of a tree. It’s an eternal sacrifice. You are giving your all to him, the very core of your existence that is now flowing into his mouth. You swear you can hear his thoughts mingle with yours. Yes, more, please. You taste so good. Your knees buckle, but you remain standing strong. He makes sure you don’t fall. Don’t slip away from me. I need you. 

A tear rolls down your cheek. You could sob. It feels so good—too good to be true. In that moment, you become one. There is no telling where one begins and the other ends. The coil in your stomach tightens, and the only pain you feel is the pleasure threatening to overwhelm you. He’s taking everything as you give him everything, but it is not enough. It has never been enough. 

When your body struggles to catch up with the lack of blood, he pulls away. His fangs drag out of your neck agonizingly slowly. You whimper at the sudden loss.

Matt catches you as you stumble into his arms. “You okay?” He cradles your face, brushing the hair out of your face. Your blood stains his lips. Blinking up at him, the force of your metaphysical connection slaps you awake. 

You cease to exist in all solar systems but his. 

He pokes the tip of his index finger with the sharp edge of one tooth, sliding it over the two holes that are pulsating with the work of your heartbeat.

“I shouldn’t have—” he begins. 

“No,” you say. “You did exactly what you should have.”

“I couldn’t stop.”

“But you did.” You wipe the blood from his mouth. “And I felt you. I only felt you.”

The living room passes by you. Before you know it, your back lands on something much softer than a concrete wall. He’s not a monster, that one, but he surely is an animal. 

You taste your blood on Matt’s luscious lips as he devours your tongue. It tastes of copper and a little bitter, but that is what makes him moan. That sound is the last thing you could ever grow tired of. 

His palm rests on your chest. Your heart pounds against his palm. “You’re so alive,” he says.

You cradle his face in your hands. “And you’re more human than you think.”

If he wanted to pull your heart out and hold it, you would let him in a heartbeat. 

He leans you back. He strips you bare. He kisses down your body like you are a fucking masterpiece for him to explore. That is how he sees you. 

Your head falls back. The kisses wander from your hips to the inside of your thighs. Every kiss brings his breath closer to your center. Matt pulls them apart. He opens you up to him. Your scent clouds his senses, and he groans, but he doesn’t touch. 

His fangs graze your skin. “Mine,” he growls. 

You gasp. He bites into the sensitive flesh. Hard, passionately. Your legs wrap around his head, trapping him there. He sucks, and he sucks, and he drinks, and the wetness pools out of your cunt in an obscene amount. This is foreplay to him. It drives you toward the edge leading to an abyss you are afraid you might never be able to crawl back out of. There is no bottom, it is just a pit, and he’s pushing you closer and closer, and—

Your back arches, but he pulls away before the coil can snap into a million butterflies. He pries your legs away from his head, spreading them further on the mattress, as far apart as they will go. 

Breakfast, lunch, and dinner have been served on a silver platter. He breathes in. The scent of your soaked pussy sticks to the hairs in his nose. It isn’t enough. He breathes in again, your arousal sweeter than fiction. You’re everything and more. He wants to taste that part of you more than anything, suck up the slick that is soaking the sheets—and you didn’t even think that was possible—but he waits because he needs to savor it. He doesn’t want it to be over too soon. neither for him nor for you. 

The blood is still dripping from his tongue and his fangs, and the raw inside of your thigh. He runs his finger through it. The sting runs from the wound to your folds, then back down. Still, he doesn’t touch. He plays with the blood, sucking on his fingers until they’re clean, and then he dives back in for a taste. He doesn’t bite, he kisses and sucks, but he doesn’t push it further. He doesn’t hurt you. 

You’re his saving grace; he has to worship you. Pain only has a place in pleasure. 

“Matthew,” you moan. 

He chuckles, kissing where his fangs left deep indentations. “No one will ever touch you again,” he purrs. “I’ll make sure of that.” 

You try to protest, but the words die on your tongue when he leans in, capturing your clit with his hungry mouth. The wound on your thigh closes. The blood from his lips mixes with your juices, and you cry out at the intensity of it all. 

He eats you with the ferocity of a man starved for weeks. He eats your pussy like he ate your blood, savoring every drop but still feasting for the taste to spread out in his mouth like wildfire. Sour, sweet, and copper. He sucks your sensitive clit into his mouth. His tongue drags through your folds, up and down, and then the tip slides inside, tasting your walls. He grows bolder as your moans accelerate. 

Matt cradles your thighs. He forces your hips back down to the mattress, stronger than the average human man. You have to endure his beard scratching and burning, and the pace he has set.

The orgasm creeps up on you. Before you know it, he has plunged his tongue into you, and your body convulses around him. You scream into a pillow as you come. 

You are each other’s forbidden fruit. No prayer in the world could keep you apart. 

Faintly, you can hear him say, “Good girl.” Your legs quiver. He pulls away, then comes right back like a boomerang. 

He’s warm now. He was cold before, but when he kisses you this time, he’s warm. He’s hot. You run your hands over his bare chest, the scars that lie under the dark strands of hair. You tug at it, and he moans. You can tell he is a little insecure, but by pressing your lips to one of the cuts on his shoulder, he relaxes. 

What he must have endured, what he must have lived through before he died and was resurrected in the same breath, just without a beating heart—you don’t want to think about it or you will break, but you can still feel him through the crimson tie that holds you together, and you know that he has suffered enough for more than two lifetimes. You wish you could take it all away from him. You wish you could have saved him before it was too late, loved him more than the woman who turned him, but turning back time is an impossibility. You are both acutely aware of that. 

“Hey.” Matt tilts your head toward him. “Where did you just go?” he asks. 

“Thinking about you,” you murmur. 

“Me?”

“You.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to be your salvation.”

You. His salvation. He kisses you, softly this time. He pours gratitude into his lips and bleeds them out in poetry as they slide into your mouth, and you swallow every last drop. 

If someone had told you a week ago where you would see yourself on that particular Monday, you would have laughed at them. And if someone had told you a week ago that you would be making love to the devil, you would have called them crazy. But it’s happening. 

He thrusts into you without a warning. His thick cock fills you like nothing and no one ever has before. Your cunt has been molded to fit him, you’re sure. You take him in, and you moan at the stretch. It’s a pain so delicious you could fall apart right then and there just from the feel of him inside you. 

Every thrust drags the tip of his cock along your sweet spot. Every added sensation drives you closer to your death. 

Your body tingles. He explores your face with his lips rather than his fingers, moving to your neck again. You cling to him, oh-so-desperate for him. He likes you like that, and you like him like that. 

“You’re fucking with my head,” he tells you. “Offering your pussy to a vampire. Letting me drink your blood. Begging me to fuck you. You’re in my head, baby. Can’t get you out of my system. Fuck.”

You are his downfall, his salvation, but he is all of those things to you as well—all of those things and more. If he could read your mind, you would tell him that. Words can’t do justice to how you feel. Not right now, maybe not ever. 

“Bite me again,” you beg.

His thrusts falter. He searches your body for any sign of regret. His fangs come out, and he buries them deep in your jugular vein. The floodgates open wide. Your walls clench around his cock, your clit pulsates, and the wave crashes into you. 

You come as he devours your neck and your blood. You transcend into another dimension, far away from everything and everyone but never him. Never Matthew.

The sensation of you wraps around him like a weighted blanket. His balls tighten, your blood unfolding its taste on his tongue. You are all over him, inside of him, everywhere at once. He falls head-first, dragging you down with him. 

He comes with a shout that is only muffled through his teeth buried in your flesh, his cum spurting into you and filling your cunt to the brim. Your eyes roll back. You’re flying and falling all at once. 

Oh, how good it feels to be consumed by him. To be fucked and sucked dry. You would have never expected this to come out of your week, let alone your life, but now that it has happened, you are floating on cloud nine. 

Dizziness threatens to take over, but before you can pass out, he forces himself away, allowing your heart to catch up with the lack of blood in your system. He collapses on top of you. His cock softens, but he stays inside. You need him there. You want him there. And that is the only place he wants to rest tonight. 

He heals the wounds on your neck. “You have a mark,” Matt rasps, tracing your skin with his finger. 

You choke out, “Yours.”

“Yes, you are.” He kisses you there. Once, twice, even a third time. “Mine,” he says.

You’re his. He’s yours. It doesn’t get any better than this. 

The minutes tick away on the obnoxious clock on the wall. Matt pulls out eventually, wrapping you up in a blanket. He coaxes you to drink, but you’re barely lucid. Only when he begins to stroke your hair you start coming back to yourself. You thought you might regret it, but as you look at him, his almost guilty eyes staring back at you, all you can do is reach out for him. 

“Session two tomorrow?” you ask.

He chuckles and retorts, “Have I not scared you away?” There is some truth to it though.

He’s covered in your blood. It sticks to his lips, his hands, and his chest. It’s sickeningly intimate, in a way.

You shake your head in response. “You could not possibly.”

He listens to your heartbeat. You’re as honest as they come. 

“Okay,” Matt says. “Session two tomorrow then.”

That night, you fell in love with the Devil, but he also fell in love with you, his angel in the form of a reckless journalist, and the only blood he ever wants to taste again until the end of his miserable, cursed days. 

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