#pet safety series

[justplainwhump]

Bea

In a moment of despair, Bea finds herself.

[Pet Safety Masterlist]

Content: BBU, BBU recovery, recapture(-ish) - but really, mostly recovery.

Bea. Bea.

She'd said the new name to herself in the mirror, every time she looked at one; sometimes out loud when she was home alone; just a soft mumble at other times. "Good morning, Bea", she would say, or "Good evening, Bea", and the one-eyed woman in the mirror would smile a beautiful smile, and the pet who wasn't really a pet any longer would smile back.

She held on to her old name, too, deep inside, the old name and its old life, its flickers of memory, vague faces, echoes of touches.

Bea, however, was now. A new life, a new name, even a new face. Maybe less regular than the old one, less perfect. But beautiful. Happy.

And she owed it all to Adrian Delgado, the man who was cowering next to her on the street right now, his hands on the shoulders of a skinny, shaking runaway pet.

"We'll get you out of here," Adrian mumbled into the runaway's hair.

They'd found him huddled up in a narrow alleyway on their walk home from dinner, feverish and injured. Adrian hadn't hesitated. With practised routine, one hand had dialed Marta's number, the other wrapped a scarf around his face, before he'd sank to his knees to check the pet's health. He wasn't good. Bea knew. She'd seen similar injuries. She'd suffered them, too. And she'd barely survived.

"Please," the pet whimpered now. "Please don't make me go back, please."

"You won't. My friend will be here soon," Adrian said, holding his hand. "She'll help you."

"Negative." Marta's voice through the phone was pressed, sharp. "A, B, you need to bail, right now, we have a WRU re-ac team coming in."

"Please," the pet whispered again and grabbed Adrian's other hand, too. "Please. Not back to my owner."

The phone cracked. "Are you leaving? Fuck. You're not leaving, A, I'd hear that. Fucking run, or you bring him in to WRU yourself, you hear me? Don't blow your cover."

The pet sobbed.

Bea reached for the phone and got to her feet. There wasn't a mirror here, only Bea's dull reflection in a dirty storefront window, her face half shadowed in the streetlight. Hi Bea, she thought. Hi, girl. You're good. You've got this.

"Bea," Adrian called. "What are you doing?" He shook off the pet's hand.

Bea held his gaze. "Get A and the pet," Bea said into the phone, carefully avoiding their names just as Marta did. "I'll handle the team."

"What?"

She shoved up her sleeves, turned her wrist in the streetlight, so the black lines of her bar code shone. "They return runaways to their owners," she said. "Let them return me, not him."

"No," Adrian rose as well, the pet mindlessly sobbing at his feet. "You can't go back to Ja-"

"Jack's not my owner," she reminded him softly. "You are." She smiled. "Tell them I ran, after dinner. I am a good liar, Sir. So are you."

"Do it, B," Marta called via phone. "Now!"

Bea tossed the phone back to Adrian and pointed to her feet. "You told me to run. I have good shoes."

From the main street, the brakes of a heavy car echoed into the alley. Adrian deftly grabbed the pet, pressed a hand on his mouth. Already running towards the corner, Bea knew they were getting cover.

Just in time.

A man and a woman in WRU black stepped out of a van, just as Bea cut around the corner. "Hey," the woman called, hand on her shock baton. "You! Stop!"

Bea stopped, slowly lifted her hands, making sure they could see the bar code.

It was some meters. It was fine. She just needed to get them away from Adrian Delgado and the injured pet. She took some measured steps backwards, keeping her distance. "Please," she cried, just as the runaway had. "Please. I can't go back!"

"Respect," the man boomed, his own baton already in hand.

Bea's knees trembled, but didn't waver. Broken, they'd called her in WRU refurb. Messed up. Stupid. Dysfunctional. Problematic. Because she'd obeyed, done her best to appease them, to survive. But she'd stopped believing. In the handlers, in the truth of the rules, in the power of their orders.

"No," she whispered. Because she could. "Never."

"Stubborn, little shit." The man reached for his taser.

Bea spun on her heel and ran.

"Fuck," the man yelled. "After her. Go! Go!"

She heard footsteps behind her, the screeching tires of the van as it turned on the street, and she knew she wouldn't be able to escape them.

But she didn't need to. She just needed to make it around a corner or two, just clear the path to the alley with Adrian and the runway.

And she knew she could do that.

Good job, Bea, she thought.

Running away from a WRU reacquisition team, her good shoes carrying her, wind in her face, raindrops on her skin, Bea felt herself smile.

She still did, two corners later, when the van drove on the sidewalk in front of her, when a baton crashed into her ribs and she was thrown over the van's hood. When a scanner beeped over her wrist, when the man mumbled number and designation.

For the first time, it didn't feel like hers.

She wasn't a number. She was Bea. And finally, she knew, who Bea was meant be.

----

-

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[why-animals-do-the-thing]

average United States contains 1000s of pet tigers in backyards" factoid actualy [sic] just statistical error. average person has 0 tigers on property. Activist Georg, who lives the U.S. Capitol & makes up over 10,000 each day, has purposefully been spreading disinformation adn [sic] should not have been counted

I have a big mad today, folks. It's a really frustrating one, because years worth of work has been validated... but the reason for that fucking sucks.

For almost a decade, I've been trying to fact-check the claim that there "are 10,000 to 20,000 pet tigers/big cats in backyards in the United States." I talked to zoo, sanctuary, and private cat people; I looked at legislation, regulation, attack/death/escape incident rates; I read everything I could get my hands on. None of it made sense. None of it lined up. I couldn't find data supporting anything like the population of pet cats being alleged to exist. Some of you might remember the series I published on those findings from 2018 or so under the hashtag #CrouchingTigerHiddenData. I've continued to work on it in the six years since, including publishing a peer reviewed study that counted all the non-pet big cats in the US (because even though they're regulated, apparently nobody bothered to keep track of those either).

I spent years of my life obsessing over that statistic because it was being used to push for new federal legislation that, while well intentioned, contained language that would, and has, created real problems for ethical facilities that have big cats. I wrote a comprehensive - 35 page! - analysis of the issues with the then-current version of the Big Cat Public Safety Act in 2020. When the bill was first introduced to Congress in 2013, a lot of groups promoted it by fear mongering: there's so many pet tigers! they could be hidden around every corner! they could escape and attack you! they could come out of nowhere and eat your children!! Tiger King exposed the masses to the idea of "thousands of abused backyard big cats": as a result the messaging around the bill shifted to being welfare-focused, and the law passed in 2022.

The Big Cat Public Safety Act created a registry, and anyone who owned a private cat and wanted to keep it had to join. If they did, they could keep the animal until it passed, as long as they followed certain strictures (no getting more, no public contact, etc). Don’t register and get caught? Cat is seized and major punishment for you. Registering is therefore highly incentivized. That registry closed in June of 2023, and you can now get that registration data via a Freedom of Information Act request.

Guess how many pet big cats were registered in the whole country?

97.

Not tens of thousands. Not thousands. Not even triple digits. 97.

And that isn't even the right number! Ten USDA licensed facilities registered erroneously. That accounts for 55 of 97 animals. Which leaves us with 42 pet big cats, of all species, in the entire country.

Now, I know that not everyone may have registered. There's probably someone living deep in the woods somewhere with their illegal pet cougar, and there's been at least one random person in Texas arrested for trying to sell a cub since the law passed. But - and here's the big thing - even if there are ten times as many hidden cats than people who registered them - that's nowhere near ten thousand animals. Obviously, I had some questions.

Guess what? Turns out, this is because it was never real. That huge number never had data behind it, wasn't likely to be accurate, and the advocacy groups using that statistic to fearmonger and drive their agenda knew it... and didn't see a problem with that.

Allow me to introduce you to an article published last week.

This article is good. (Full disclose, I'm quoted in it). It's comprehensive and fairly written, and they did their due diligence reporting and fact-checking the piece. They talked to a lot of people on all sides of the story.

But thing that really gets me?

Multiple representatives from major advocacy organizations who worked on the Big Cat Publix Safety Act told the reporter that they knew the statistics they were quoting weren't real. And that they don't care. The end justifies the means, the good guys won over the bad guys, that's just how lobbying works after all. They're so blase about it, it makes my stomach hurt. Let me pull some excerpts from the quotes.

"Whatever the true number, nearly everyone in the debate acknowledges a disparity between the actual census and the figures cited by lawmakers. “The 20,000 number is not real,” said Bill Nimmo, founder of Tigers in America. (...) For his part, Nimmo at Tigers in America sees the exaggerated figure as part of the political process. Prior to the passage of the bill, he said, businesses that exhibited and bred big cats juiced the numbers, too. (...) “I’m not justifying the hyperbolic 20,000,” Nimmo said. “In the world of comparing hyperbole, the good guys won this one.”

"Michelle Sinnott, director and counsel for captive animal law enforcement at the PETA Foundation, emphasized that the law accomplished what it was set out to do. (...) Specific numbers are not what really matter, she said: “Whether there’s one big cat in a private home or whether there’s 10,000 big cats in a private home, the underlying problem of industry is still there.”"

I have no problem with a law ending the private ownership of big cats, and with ending cub petting practices. What I do have a problem with is that these organizations purposefully spread disinformation for years in order to push for it. By their own admission, they repeatedly and intentionally promoted false statistics within Congress. For a decade.

No wonder it never made sense. No wonder no matter where I looked, I couldn't figure out how any of these groups got those numbers, why there was never any data to back any of the claims up, why everything I learned seemed to actively contradict it. It was never real. These people decided the truth didn't matter. They knew they had no proof, couldn't verify their shocking numbers... and they decided that was fine, if it achieved the end they wanted.

So members of the public - probably like you, reading this - and legislators who care about big cats and want to see legislation exist to protect them? They got played, got fed false information through a TV show designed to tug at heartstrings, and it got a law through Congress that's causing real problems for ethical captive big cat management. The 20,000 pet cat number was too sexy - too much of a crisis - for anyone to want to look past it and check that the language of the law wouldn't mess things up up for good zoos and sanctuaries. Whoops! At least the "bad guys" lost, right? (The problems are covered somewhat in the article linked, and I'll go into more details in a future post. You can also read my analysis from 2020, linked up top.)

Now, I know. Something something something facts don't matter this much in our post-truth era, stop caring so much, that's just how politics work, etc. I’m sorry, but no. Absolutely not.

Laws that will impact the welfare of living animals must be crafted carefully, thoughtfully, and precisely in order to ensure they achieve their goals without accidental negative impacts. We have a duty of care to ensure that. And in this case, the law also impacts reservoir populations for critically endangered species! We can't get those back if we mess them up. So maybe, just maybe, if legislators hadn't been so focused on all those alleged pet cats, the bill could have been written narrowly and precisely.

But the minutiae of regulatory impacts aren't sexy, and tiger abuse and TV shows about terrible people are. We all got misled, and now we're here, and the animals in good facilities are already paying for it.

I don't have a conclusion. I'm just mad. The public deserves to know the truth about animal legislation they're voting for, and I hope we all call on our legislators in the future to be far more critical of the data they get fed.

[taeyongdoyoung]

wolf and bunny

summary: you ask your best friend to fuck you in your sleep but your bottled up feelings come out to the surface... pairing: chan x reader genre: smut, best friends to lovers warnings: cnc/somnophilia, discussion of boundaries, eating out, touching, groping, unprotected sex, spanking, stranger+wolf/bunny roleplay, little red riding hood references, face-slapping (once), size kink, cockwarming, multiple rounds, feelings (ew), pet names, discussion of future scenario 👀 (i know i said this is the end but...we'll see) author's note: hii everyone, this is the third and final part of my wolf and bunny series, thank you so much for going on this nasty journey with me 🤍 part one & part two word count: 2k

You and Chan are having a bit of a disagreement in connection with the circumstances surrounding your next game.

“But I want to know exactly which night you’ll do it.”

“If you know, you won’t be able to fall asleep,” Chan reasons with you. “Kinda like Santa Claus. Kids stay up all night waiting for him and then he never comes.”

“Please, even if the kids were asleep, he’d still never come ‘cause the parents are putting the presents under the tree!”

“It was just a metaphor.”

“A bad one. You’re gonna have to work harder to convince me.”

“Hey, wasn’t this your idea in the first place?” Chan reminds you teasingly. “You’re the one who wants me to fuck her in her sleep.”

“Ey, don’t pretend you won’t be into it,” you shake your head.

You are both so stubborn you don’t see this ending unless one of you retreats. Then, after a brief consideration, you speak again.

“Fine. You can keep the secret of the exact night you’ll do this. On one condition.”

“Sure, bunny, let’s hear it,” Chan listens eagerly.

“If I wake up, you won’t stop. I’ll just pretend I’m still sleepy and we keep going.”

“Is that even possible? I mean, for you to not wake up?”

“It is if you drug me or something,” you shrug.

“Ugh, don’t give me such evil ideas. You never know when I might take advantage of you.”

“Oh, I’m counting on it, wolfie.”

“But are you sure the sleep thing is a great idea? I mean, you wouldn't be able to say a safeword...” Chan can't help but worry, always putting your needs first and planning every scenario in great detail to make sure you're alright. Damnit, could he get any more perfect? He's so sweet and considerate you wish you could just tell him how you feel. But what if that scares him away? What if you lose not only your wicked game buddy but your best friend in the entire world? You wouldn't be able to live with yourself.

“Yes, I'm positive, Chris,” you place your hand on top of his. “I trust you 100% and know that you'll look after me. The question is, do you trust my judgement?”

“I mean, I do trust you. It's just that last time you didn't communicate your discomfort clearly and I wouldn't want to risk messing up to the point of accidentally hurting you,” Chan verbalizes his anxieties.

“I get what you're saying but it's not like I'm open to doing this with a stranger. It's you we're talking about. You've always been great at taking care of people so I know you wouldn't go too far. But at the same time, I wouldn't mind if you went loose. If anyone can take it and accept you fully, it would be me.”

“Yeah, I know. You're right. But just in case, I want you to know beforehand that I care about you and respect you like a lot. So, even if I get carried away, I still want you to feel safe.”

“Aww, Chris, ya old softie! I always feel safe with you, it goes without saying!” you insist.

“Well, I like hearing you say it.”

You gulp nervously. His voice is so commanding and yet so reassuring that your words have never rung truer. He's more to you than a safety net and you hope he knows it. He's incredibly thoughtful and infinitely kinder than the first impression. He's a riddle in the way he keeps surprising you and yet you wanna keep learning more about him. He's hundreds of the loveliest words in the dictionary multiplied. He's more comforting than your favourite blanket. He's warmth personified and you would be an idiot to let him go.

“I'll try to say it more often, then,” you promise. “When I'm with you, I know no harm will come my way. But here's the thing...you're the only one I'd willingly let hurt me.”

“I don't want to hurt you, though.”

“You don't?” you pout, suddenly feeling guilty. Then, what have you been doing? Was he forcing himself to act out these fantasies for your sake alone? You genuinely thought he was enjoying them as much as you were.

“Sorry, that came out wrong,” Chan is quick to explain. “I like our games. I meant that I don't want to hurt you emotionally. Ever.”

“Ah, yeah, that makes sense,” you chuckle, feeling a little stupid. “Well, you don't need to worry about that. Glad we had this talk.”

“Me too,” Chan gazes at you fondly.

“So, which night are you fucking me while I'm asleep?” you attempt to find out while he has this dazed look in his eye.

“Next- Hey, nice try! I'm not telling you, you impatient devil.”

“Aw, man, I was so close,” you bemoan the uncertainty of your future.

“You wish.”

The long-awaited night finally arrives. Chan has a key to your place so entering it is too easy. He makes sure he picks a night when you’ve complained about being exhausted and sleepy all day long. And he is certain that you’re passed out in your room, not suspecting a thing. Well, a part of you is always anticipating what could happen, but still.

He’s beyond glad to find you sound asleep. You’re wearing nothing but a t-shirt and some flimsy panties. Chan admires your sleeping form for a couple of brief moments before he gets down to business.

He wonders where to start. Should he tear them up? Or maybe push them to the side? Should he grope your boobs through your shirt? Or perhaps slide his hands beneath it, stroking your nipples directly? So many opportunities. He wants to do everything, he decides.

Chan starts by moving your panties to the side and licking your tiny pussy. He touches you with his fingers, gently prodding your entrance but not exactly sticking them inside yet. Then, he sneaks his hand underneath your shirt, teasing your nipples. Fuck, you’re so soft.

He marvels at the knowledge that you’d trust him with something like that. Though the previous scenarios were hot and intense as fuck, this one hits different for him. Maybe because last time you were awake, you were still in control because you could say the safeword whenever. Maybe because you want him at your most vulnerable even in your sleep. Or maybe because he’s slowly falling for you, but he doesn’t know how to say it.

It’s okay. Chan’ll show you, instead. He pinches your nipples lightly and continues to make out with your pussy. You are so wet already it’s adorable. He wonders if you’re dreaming of him, as you shift slightly in your sleep. He wants to drag this out. But how?

He uses his nails to trace circles on your skin, which causes goosebumps to appear. Are you cold? He wants to keep you warm and full at all times. Chan can’t take it any longer and takes his cock out, sliding in so perfectly. As if you were made for him. Made to take his cock and let him do crazy things to you. His sweet little bunny…

You moan desperately and the spell is broken. You’re awake. He wanders if you’ll speak or he’ll have to make you. Both options sound quite appealing. But he wants to hear your voice more than anything.

“Shhh, go back to sleep, sweetheart,” Chan whispers gently.

“W-who are you?” you cry out.

Aw, you’re gonna pretend not to know him? That hurts. But it can be fun, he thinks.

“Just the big bad wolf,” he chuckles at the irony of it.

“Please, don't do this,” you fake not wanting it, even though you've never wanted anything so badly in your life.

“Oh, bunny, but I already am,” Chan replies, spanking your ass a couple of times in the meantime.

“G-gonna split me in h-half,” you mumble, voice muffled against your pillow.

“Yeah? G'na ruin my sweet girl?” he speaks to you so softly you want to melt right there and then.

“Feel so full 'n so s'eepy,” you slur helplessly.

“Aw, tiny, go back to sleep, then,” Chan pats your head soothingly.

“Can't. What a deep voice you have!” you play along too well.

“All the better to degrade you with, my slutty bun,” Chan laughs, while still continuing to fuck you.

“What big hands you have!” you keep saying.

“All the better to grab your tits with,” Chan chuckles and makes good on his promise by playing with your boobs.

“And slap me with!” you remind him playfully.

“As you wish, princess,” Chan growls and slaps you across the face harshly but not harsh enough to actually leave a mark.

“What big eyes you have,” you sigh wistfully.

“All the better to stare at you fall apart,” Chan responds cleverly.

“And what big cock you have!” you scream, barely resisting the urge to laugh. Are you a silly little bunny or Little Red Riding Hood? At this point, you don't care, but it feels too good regardless.

“All the better to fuck you with,” he grunts loudly, spilling inside of you.

You follow rightaway and urge him to stay like this for a while. Maybe round two is in order?

“You know what else is big?” Chan teases you.

“Oh, shut up, Bigfoot!” you reply and are no longer able to hold it in, breaking into laughter. Chan also finds the interaction hilarious and buries his head in the nook of your shoulder. You stroke his hair without realizing. Shit, he's so adorable you almost say the three words. Is it too risky? Too soon? You need a distraction. You need... “Fuck me again.”

“Already? Aren't you tired?” Chan wants to make sure.

“Fuck me till I fall asleep again,” you ask him.

“Um, okay, sure,” Chan looks a bit confused but does as you ask.

This time there is less talking and more fucking but no matter how many rounds you go, sleep doesn't come again. You both orgasm more times than you could count, but somehow, it isn't nearly enough to distract you from the inevitable. You love him. Your heart knows it, your pussy knows it, even your brain knows it but is stubborny telling you not to confess for fear of somehow ruining things.

Once Chan decides he's completely spent for the night, he pulls out of you and rips off the bandaid.

“Are you alright? Something suddenly shifted but I can't quite place it,” he tucks a piece of hair behind your ear and nudges you softly with his shoulder.

“Do you want the truth that might mess up everything or do you want me to lie to you and say I'm fine?” you ask, even though you're already on the verge to tell the truth.

“With you? Always the truth, please,” Chan clearly states his preference.

You sigh deeply and tilt to the side so you're facing him properly.

“I think...no, I know I love you.”

“I love you, too, babybun,” Chan responds fondly and kisses you on the nose.

“In a non-friendly way. And I don't mean just sexually, either. I mean, the friendly way and the sexual way haven't diminished, of course. But I also love you in a...I want to be yours, your girlfriend, your lover, your romantic partner, your everything.”

Chan is taken aback by your words. You...feel the same?

“You already are,” he confesses genuinely.

“Huh?” you blink in shock.

“I mean...you are already my everything. But, if you'd like me to officially ask you, then...will you be my girlfriend, angel?”

“You...you'll have me?” you are still in disbelief.

“I thought I already had ya,” Chan pinches your cheeks lightly.

“Damn right you do, Mr. Wolf,” you giggle and pull him into a kiss.

He smells like autumn, his embrace exudes warmth and his lips taste like home.

“You have no idea how badly I've wanted to tell you about my feelings,” Chan confesses. “When I found that story of yours in your drafts, I just couldn't resist the opportunity. I hoped that if I turned your fantasies into reality that you'd eventually fall for me.”

“Oh, Channie...I've been falling for you for longer than you realize,” you admit shyly. “How could I not? You're everything I've ever wanted.”

So, this is what it feels like to have the world in your hands. Huh. You could get used to it.

Bonus:

“No, I'm not kidnapping you!” Chan is adamant as you two sit in a nice restaurant.

“But Chriiiis,” you whine. “You said you'd do anything for my birthday.”

“Anything but that!” Chan shakes his head in amusement.

“Why not? It can be fun!”

“Fun? What if something goes wrong, what if someone sees us and thinks I'm actually kidnapping you, what if...hear me out, here, I go to prison for it?”

“Well, duh, then I'd bail you out!”

“As if you could afford it,” Chan rolls his eyes.

“Hey! But seriously, I'll just tell the cops that I asked you to kidnap me.”

“What if they don't believe you and think you have a Stockholm syndrome?”

“I'll...think of something. Come on, we're going too far with the what-ifs.”

“You gotta be prepared for any situation. You'd know that if you carried the heavy burden of being a dom,” Chan tsks at you.

“I'd know that if you let me,” you give him a wink.

“That will only happen the day I agree to fake-kidnap you.”

“So, tomorrow? It's a date!” you grin excitedly.

“Keep dreaming, darling.”

“Oh, I will.”

The End

[secretsofafangirll]

oral fixation - m.s.

summary: matts girlfriend loves to have things in her mouth. when she gets home after a day of minor inconveniences, she seeks comfort from her boyfriend, in a rather, unconventional way.

warnings: oral (male receiving), praising, pet names (baby, sweetheart, etc.), soft!dom matt, sub!fem, talk of anxiety,

a/n: couple of things; one, the girl doesn't have a name so you can imagine whomever you'd like, two, i've started planning my Matt series...anyways, hope you guys like it! :)))

"A touch / From your real love / Is like heaven takin' the place of somethin' evil"

⏜︵♡︵⏜︵୨୧︵⏜︵♡︵⏜⏜︵♡︵⏜︵୨୧︵⏜︵♡︵⏜

For my entire life, I’ve loved having things in my mouth. 

When I was younger, it was impossible for my parents to get my thumb or my pacifier out of my mouth. The comfort that came from having the object resting in my mouth was too intense for me to leave behind. Behaviors like that followed me into childhood with things like gum or lollipops. In high school, I chewed copious amounts of gum, always had a pen or pencil in my mouth and played with my lips all the time. 

Naturally, when I managed to find myself a boyfriend, he became aware of my oral fixation in many ways. He would always notice how often I had things in my mouth or if I was biting my lips, he would offer me something else so I didn’t tear up the delicate skin. It got to a point where, if he and I were laying down together and one of his hands was unoccupied, I would simply reach down and grab his hand, bringing it to my mouth and wrapping my lips around one of his fingers and playing with it in my mouth. Of course Matt enjoyed this himself, but there were other ...situations, where this oral fixation benefitted him much more than putting a finger in my mouth. 

Matt also understood why I do what I do. Him and I both struggle with anxiety, and we both have for years. In high school, I was medicated for it and had a hard time getting through the day. However, I hated the way that the meds made me feel and I swore to my parents that I wasn’t going to take them anymore and that I’d find another way to cope. Matt copes with alone time and silence but I get more overstimulated than he does and when I do, all I want is to have something in my mouth and someone to touch. 

Which is why on days like these, anxiety ridden and insane days, I need my boyfriend and one of his extremities to rest between my lips. 

After several cars cutting me off on the road and almost hitting me on the way to the gym this morning, I was already slightly shaken up and worried for my safety. When I got to the gym, there was a man somewhat following me around, conveniently using all of the machines next to me. After that, I went to the grocery store in hopes that they had some grapes and snacks for me to feel better, they were out of seedless grapes which sent me into a frenzy about the way that the seeds feel in my mouth, and the self-checkout lanes were under renovation and I had to talk to the cashier to check out. 

I took shallow and quick breaths as I walked swiftly out to my car. I tossed the bag into the back seat and swung open the driver door. The second that I was enclosed in my car, in my space, I was able to calm myself down. Once I had myself under control, I started the car and drove home. When I arrived, I grabbed my things from the car and headed inside. I used my house key to unlock the front door, using my foot to close it behind me. I tossed my keys in the dish and heard Matt typing on the couch. 

“Hi baby,” He said without looking up. I didn’t respond because I just wanted to put the groceries I picked up away and sit with him. “Alright,” He said and continued typing away. 

I put the cold stuff in the refrigerator and the dry stuff in the pantry and cabinets before heading to his room to slide out my dirty and uncomfortable gym clothes and into one of his shirts. Once I was comfortable and the smell of his cologne filled my nostrils, I was finally ready to lay down next to him on the couch. 

“Sorry,” I murmured quietly, gently taking a seat next to him and pulling a blanket over my legs, curling into his side and latching onto one of his arms, “I just wanted to put those away so that I could sit with you.” 

I sat there looking for something of his to grab onto but his hands were occupied and I don’t think he’d appreciate it if I put anything else, if you know what I mean, in my mouth at the moment. I sighed quietly to myself and began to bite on my lips. 

“You don’t have to apologize,” He said, leaning over to kiss the top of my head. 

I continued my assault on my lips and I felt the skin tear and the metallic taste of my own blood rested on my tongue. When it started to hurt too bad to bite my lips, one of my hands found my mouth and I started to bite and suck on that instead, the other arm wrapping impossibly tighter around his. His elbow nudged my side and he looked over at me. 

“You doin’ okay?” He asked without looking away from his computer where he was replying to emails and taking notes in a Google Doc. I only hummed, unwilling to take my fingers out of my mouth. My lack of a real response, which I know he hated, made him finally look up at me. My eyes blinked guiltily at him when his brows went from furrowed to concerned, “Sweetheart,” He sighed and reached up to pull my hand away from my mouth. I flexed all of my muscles to keep it in my mouth but he tilted his head at me and pulled harder, his strength easily overpowering mine. 

“I’m sorry,” I sighed, relaxing my muscles and looking down my hands with guilt and embarrassment written all over my face. 

“Hey,” He said softly, reaching out to grab my jaw and gently pull my head up to look at him, “You don’t have to say sorry. There’s nothing to apologize for.” He shook his head and looked into my eyes for an explanation, “D’you have a bad day?” He asked and closed his computer screen ¾ of the way down. 

“Kind of,” I said, questioning in my tone, “I don’t even know. It’s just been, like, too much.” I tried to spit it out but I struggled to pin-point how, exactly, I felt. It was just too much.

“That’s okay, baby,” He cooed, “You want my hand?” My eyes widened in excitement and I nodded before correcting myself with a ‘Yes, please’. 

He brought his left forearm up to my mouth and I played with his long fingers trying to pick which one I wanted. I decided on the pointer first, but planned to use every finger but the pinky. He used his other hand to scroll through emails and business inquiries, also scrolling through pinterest to find inspiration for future videos. 

I, on the other hand, swirled my tongue mindlessly around his fingers, taking them all the way into my mouth and then back out, my saliva coating his fingers down the knuckle. Every so often, he would shift his hips slightly or clear his throat and scratch his neck. I knew how this was affecting him, but he also respected my needs more than his and wouldn’t want to make me uncomfortable. After close to twenty minutes had passed of my sucking on his fingers, he looked at the time on his computer and closed it all the way. He leaned back against the couch, his hand still in my mouth and he turned his head as it laid against the top of the couch and he watched me mindlessly play with his fingers. When I fully pulled off his middle finger alone, I pushed his ring finger to meet it and took them both fully into my mouth. He groaned and I snapped my eyes to meet him and worked my mouth around his fingers. 

“God, don’t fuckin’ look at me like that when you’ve got my fingers down your throat, honey,” He instructed gently, understanding of my rather fragile nature. I pulled off his fingers, letting my tongue teasingly drag across the length of them. 

“Sorry,” I swallowed to clear my throat and scooted closer to him. He reached across himself and wrapped his dry hand around my thigh and under my knee to pull me onto his lap. I squealed at the sudden movement but settled and nuzzled into his lap. 

“How many times are you gonna apologize, hm?” He questioned with a smile, tucking my hair behind my ears. 

“You know how I am, Matt,” I laughed and grabbed his wrists and put them on top of my thighs, encouraging him to tickle them. 

“Yeah, I do,” He smiled, “But that means that I know you’re gonna keep saying sorry until you feel better.” He accused me and I smiled like I’d been caught stealing, “What else do you need, baby?”

I blushed and looked down at my hands, “I don’t wanna-,”

“Oh, you’re gonna.” He said sternly. 

“I want you.”

“You have me.” He said and nudged my chin with his knuckle, “What do you need?”

“Need your cock,” I said quietly. 

“What was that?” He turned his ear toward me. 

“I need your cock, Matthew.” I said louder. 

“There she is.” He said and gently moved my thighs to allow me to sink to my knees in front of him. “See? Wasn’t that hard, no?” 

When I was comfortable at his feet, I worked to remove his belt and unbuckle his pants. He did the work of actually pushing them down. His hard cock sprung out of his pants and he hissed as the cool air penetrated the sensitive and tacky skin. His tip was lathered in a small amount of pre-cum and he pulsed and twitched slightly. I pouted at the sight for two reasons; one being that it made me want him in my mouth even more, and two, I felt bad for the state I’d put him in. 

“Matty,” I whined, tracing circles with the fingernails on his knees, “I didn’t know it was this bad. I’m sorry.” 

“If you say sorry one more time, all you’re getting is my fingers,” He tutted. My eyes widened in fear. 

“Okay, I’ll stop.” I promised and he smiled down at me. 

“Good girl.” 

I got to quick work pumping his cock in my hand to get him ready. His cock looked so big compared to my smaller hand. It didn’t even fit around the entire thing. He groaned and hissed at the stimulation, his breathing getting heavier and slightly more labored. Soon, I leaned down and gently licked the tip before wrapping my lips around the tip. Pleasure and comfort washed over me and I continued to sink my head down onto his dick. His hands gathered my hair in a make-shift ponytail on my head and he held my hair out of my face. He didn’t push my head down, he just simply aided me in my quest for comfort, which I was most definitely finding. 

“There you go baby,” He praised, “So fuckin’ good,” He whispered, more to himself than anyone else. 

I took his cock down my throat slowly, suppressing the slight gag reflex I still have, though it’s not too bad. I whined around his dick with comfort and need. 

“What baby?” He asked breathlessly, pulling me off him, “Why’re you whinin’? You got what you wanted, no?” 

“No!,” I protested, pushing his hands away, “I’m fine! I just love having you, s’all.” I explained with a smile before going back down on him. As I continued to work his cock, my body visibly relaxed and the sighs of content that left my mouth. Matt simply closed his eyes above me, opening them periodically to watch me take him down my throat. 

Matt started to get close, his hips becoming restless under me and his hands that were in my hair started to guide me down his cock faster. He moaned and whimpered as he grew closer and closer to the edge. 

“Oh fuck-,” He whimpered, “God, so good, baby. So close.”

His stutters and whimpers encouraged me to work with him faster, yet take my time on all of his sensitive bits. I relied on the relief that accompanied the weight of his cock on my tongue. I worked him until hips stuttered and bucked off the couch and he moaned my name and praises into the air.  

“Gonna cum, gonna cum, gonna cum.” He whispered, bucking his hips into my throat making me choke slightly but I didn’t care, “M Sorry. Fuck,” He whispered and then e shot his load down my throat. I felt the warm liquid hit the back of my throat and I swallowed it down. “Show me,” He demanded, once he caught his breath and he pulled me off him all the way. I stuck my tongue out to show him that I swallowed it and he smiled at me in response, lightly tapping my cheek with the hand that held my jaw. 

“Thank you,” I sighed, my throat somewhat sore. 

“No, thank you, my beautiful girl.” He leaned down and kissed me gently, rubbing my cheeks with his thumbs. When I pulled away, I bit the inside of my lip and looked into his eyes, silently yearning for more. His brows pinched together and his mouth opened slightly, “What, baby? Not enough?” I looked at him with a guilty smile and shook my head. 

“I just want more,” I said quietly. He opened his mouth to respond but as soon as he did, his laptop and phone dinged several times, he looked at his phone and saw what it was. 

“Look, sweetheart, I’ve got more work shit to do,” I groaned and sat back on my heels below him but he pressed a finger to my lips, “But, if you’d let me finish you impatient little baby,” he teased, “if you’re good and hold me without moving your tongue at all, you can stay where you are.” 

“Yes please. I promise I’ll be good,” I nodded my head and sat back up right. He nodded at me and grabbed everything he needed to continue working and I took him back into my mouth. I zoned out with him in my mouth but it was still exciting to be getting what I’d been craving all day and my tongue jerked against a few times. 

“Ah, ah,” He asked, “Settle, sweetheart. You promised me.” He directed and when I calmed down around his cock, his hand patted my head softly and he went back to typing away. 

//

a/n: i'd been working on this for about a week or so. hope you guys liked it!!

[hellishjoel]

chokehold

1.6k / pairing: tattoo artist daddy dom!joel miller x sub f!reader

series masterlist | main masterlist | notifications blog | ko-fi

chapter summary: Joel teaches you how to face fuck. 

chapter warnings/information: MA 18+ (minors DNI), no outbreak, unspecified age gap, established relationship, reader is described to have hair and is able-bodied (but otherwise, unspecified), swearing, dirty talk, smut, lots of pet names (sweetheart, angel, little bunny, etc.), dacryphilia (kink = getting aroused by tears), dom/sub dynamics, innocence kink, praise kink, degradation kink, daddy kink, face fucking/oral (m!receiving), size kink

A/N:  very lightly edited, but I wanted to give a little love to joel and little bunny since the third chapter is taking me some extra time! divider is by @firefly-graphics! and always a thank you to @thetriumphantpanda for reading this over and endless encouragement <3

Joel’s eyes roll to the back of his head, slow and steady, because that’s just the pace you’re taking him. 

Facefucking is still experimental to you. He’s your first partner, and you’re nervous to impress. 

What you don’t know is that Joel would never judge your inexperience. All sexual pleasures involve trust, praise, and a little direction.

Joel stokes your hair affectionately, growing more possessive as he gently guides your mouth up and down his thick length. 

You can feel the power shift as your knees dig into the floor, eyes hesitantly meeting his while you try to take more of his shaft. You want more, you’re willing to push your limits. 

Joel seems to sense your loss of inhibitions, your twinkling eyes meeting his whiskey ones. 

“Want me to use that pretty little mouth of yours?” Joel’s words vibrate through the room. He pulls his cock from your lips, smearing his tip from one corner of your mouth to the other as you catch a breath. His warm pre-cum slips onto your tongue, and all you crave is more. 

Watching you desperately try to get him past your parted lips again is enough to force out a dark, low chuckle. 

“Wanna hear y’say it, baby.” 

Your impatient whine and eager hands on the back of his thighs make you beg, “Please, Joel,” in that wrecked voice that he loves so much. 

Joel presses his hips forward once more, watching his tip slip past your puckered lips and back into the hot heat of your mouth. “Yeah, right where I belong, huh, baby? Right where that cock belongs.” Joel’s hand comes to cradle your face, tracing the bulge of his length against your cheek with a sinister smirk. 

The further he pushes on, your tells start to show. He admires the way your eyelashes flutter, gagging and coughing around him but insistent not to let yourself off. A stray tear slips down your cheek. He collects it with his thumb and brings it past his lips, tasting what you give him. 

“Even your tears taste pretty, sweetheart,” he mutters predatorily, watching as your eyes blow wide, shyly moaning against his length. 

“When it gets to be too much, try to stay on. Swallow around me,” Joel gently nods his head. “Go on.” 

You obey, swallowing around the thick trunk of his cock, throat feeling a little looser now. You’re oh so willing to take on the discomfort just to please him. Anything for Joel, because he’d do anything for you. 

As his hips pick up a lazy pace, Joel encourages you to drop your hands from the safety blanket of his thighs. Like the good girl you are, you ease them to the base of your spine and lay one wrist over the other. He’s tied you up in that position more times than he can count, allowing Joel to take control and use you as he pleases. Such a good fucking girl. 

Tears pool along the top of your cheeks, the sight of glassy eyes igniting a fire deep in his belly. The overflow of saliva trickles out along the corners of your mouth, pooling down to his length and soaking the coarse hair on his balls. 

Joel watches as you shift anxiously on your knees, eyes pleading because somehow you want more. 

“Oh, honey,” he drapes in a degrading tone, stroking your hair away from your wet face and letting you catch a breath as his hips halt. “Need more, don’t’cha, doll?” He drawls, cooing softly as you lay your head against his thigh. Your orbs lazily look to him and nod weakly, still measly sucking on his tip. 

You bravely flick your tongue along his tip’s sensitive slit, toying at the idea of getting a rise out of Joel. 

A hiss is released past his clenched teeth, his whiskey eyes turning wild. And then you do it again. 

Joel’s hips jerk like that of a bucking bull. His hand in your hair turns to a fist, causing you to clench your eyes closed at the scorching prickle along your scalp. Joel scoffs as you fucking moan against him. 

His grin turns wicked, twisted at the thought of you enjoying some rough love. 

“Fuckin’ naughty, aren’t ya, little bunny? Yeah, bein’ a damn brat,” he chastises, watching as you frown around his tip and sucking it insistently. “Think m’gonna have t’finish deep down that pretty throat of yours, make ya choke on it,” he remarks as he repositions your head with a newfound need to punish.

Joel gathers your hair into two sets of pigtails, fisting them between his large palms. He watches you struggle to stay upright and drags you into position. “Keep that cock in your mouth, don’t let it go, sweetheart,” he gripes as you struggle to maintain him. It almost feels like a twisted game the way he nearly slips loose from your heat. 

Your mouth was full, jaw aching for a break that was nowhere in sight. Your fingers intertwine to keep them locked at the very base of your spine, whining nonsense against his cock. Soaking wet and dripping onto the hardwood, your pussy clenches around the ghost of what is currently occupying your mouth. 

You wanted to touch yourself so fucking bad. The self-discipline it took to keep your hands together makes your stomach churn. Your pearl twitches with enthusiasm, drenched in your own arousal. 

The muscles in your thighs are tight, your chest heaving and causing your bare breasts to rise and fall at a quickened rate. The overflowing spit that drips down from his balls lands on your chest. Joel can’t seem to stop staring at the gleam. 

Your nose brushes against his thick pubic hair as he buries your face against the base of his stomach, and you sputter up a cough. Lungs squeezing, throat tightening, you will yourself to swallow around him and stay right where you are. I’m yours, Joel. Please, take me, use me. 

“Fuck,’ he growls upon yanking you off his cock, smirking widely as you gasp for lost breaths. “Love that goddamn throat,” Joel mutters before reaching past you and pulling your hands to the front of his thighs, which quickly form a home for you. It’s grounding, to feel him, to feel his blood pumping through his body, and etch mine on the inside of his upper thigh mindlessly. 

“Got me so close, honey,” he starts, and you’re already eagerly nodding. Joel brings his thumb to your throat and slowly circles one spot against the column of your flesh. “Wanna feel myself right here, think you can do that, sweetheart?” 

Your eyes soften at the depth he wishes to go, but you’d do anything for him. You nod shyly and drop your jaw, flattening your tongue just for him. Always for him. 

Joel’s pace is gentle at first, working up a rhythm that has your throat molding perfectly around him. You gag each time he thrusts all the way, knowing when to swallow and when to breathe, Joel has taught you this new erotic art. 

The saliva dripping down to the base of his cock greets your chin repeatedly. You hollow your cheeks around him, and he moans naughty filth. 

“Such a pretty slut for this cock, make me feel so fuckin’ good- god damn,” Joel pauses with his length fully down your tight throat, grinding himself against your mouth as you clench your eyes close and gag. Joel places his thumb on that sacred spot against your neck, and he can feel his tip bulging against the column of your throat. You’re so fucking full of him, and it’s enough to make him spill. 

The hold he has on your hair tightens, scalp prickling as you cry out along his length. Salt bitters your tongue, weakly swallowing back load after load of his warm, thick finish. You swallow around his length and moan lowly, all muffled and messy for him as he crashes harshly through his own concocted orgasm. 

Your nails etch half-moon shapes into the back of his thighs, keeping him there, pushing for him to cross the finish line. And it was all for you. 

Tears of happiness stream down your face as you let him finish painting your throat, releasing with a dramatic pop as you do your best to swallow every last dribble. You’re careful as you give his sensitive tip a few sweet kitten licks. His hands are at the ready in your hair as he hisses harshly, ready to control you if it’s too much overstimulation for your poor old Daddy. 

Sponging kisses down his softening length, you lay your head against his thigh, and he cards his fingers through your hair. A soothing hum leaves your throat, fluttering your eyes closed as his thumb comes along to brush away the stray tears. 

It’s easier to ignore the throbbing between your legs now that Joel has found peace. Your heart pounds in your ears, and you listen only slightly as he begins to coo gentle affirmations for you.

Joel holds your hands and helps you stand, your arms already tiredly linking around his neck as you lay your head on his shoulder. 

“Such a sweet girl,” he whispers, “always make Daddy so happy, you know that?” Your head bobbles loosely. His sweet remarks make your muscles even more pliant in his arms as he easily sweeps you off your feet and moves you to lie across the bed. 

Joel takes all of you in. Sweat glistening along your temple, parted lips lacquered in spit, the extra effort it takes you to swallow, how perky your nipples are, and the slick that’s all but made a mess down your thighs. 

“Shit, she’s so pretty f’me,” Joel whispers as you grin weakly.

“My turn now?” Your wrecked voice squeaks, to which Joel slowly nods, helping you pitch your legs up on the edge of the bed.  

“Your turn now, little bunny.”

[mercif4l]

𝗰𝗿𝘆𝗯𝗮𝗯𝘆 — kmg

MDNI, this blog is for 18+ users only. blank blogs will be blocked.

pairing: afab!reader x kim mingyu

word count: 3.5k

summary: sometimes it's hard to say what you want. sometimes, mingyu is just being insufferably coy.

content warning: more smut, slight angst, boyfriend!mingyu, nudity, explicit sexual acts (dirty talk, dry humping, fingering, unprotected sex), discussions about contraception, dacryphilia(?), dom/sub dynamics, slight degradation, pet names, sub!mingyu is losing his mind

a/n: hugely inspired by @highvern who made my soul sparkle when i read the 'teach me' series and then had to get all my feelings out in a self-indulgent gyu fic. ty once again to @beomcoups and @wonuwoe for being my champions <3 and for your patience! hope this is even a little bit as special for you to read as it was for me to write ˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶

Broad, brawny, strapping young idol, Kim Mingyu. The very image of a gym rat, filling every space he enters twice the size of everyone else; A true BFG. 

And a total mess beneath your gaze as you ride his fingers without rest, legs bucking you up every time he presses against your g-spot and sends stars flying up your body and out through your mouth. 

Mingyu has always admired (envied, resented, adored) your self control. It makes him feel like a horny loser for never lasting as long as you do, and eternally grateful that he can stay hard after cumming just to feel you palpitate around him with your quiet, quivering sighs, launching him into another orgasm even more devastating than the last. 

When you’d first got together and had the sex safety talk, you told him he could ‘just pull out’, and in that moment he’d felt relatively confident about his abilities. But then he’d felt you, and tasted you, and before you could even get your panties off, he was leaking more precum than felt humanly possible.

You’d agreed to take birth control to curb his crippling fear of coming inside unexpectedly. And for your own peace of mind. Which seemed easier settled than his, frighteningly resigned to the side effects that birth control might bring — a concern he wouldn’t let you neglect, encouraging you to attend regular check ups every other month. 

Eventually you told him that while it was endearing he cared so much, it could feel a little overbearing from time to time. It still took a boat load of convincing to get him on board with the pill. You’d said you knew the risks, and while it was unfair there was no male equivalent, you’d shown no abnormal reaction to the pill and were an adult; you knew well enough how to take care of yourself. How you cared a whole lot about your body, and his misled doting could border on condescension if he wasn’t careful. 

(He’d put on a brave face for your conversation, never wanting to make it about himself, then cried to his mom on the phone later that day about how selfish he’d been. She told him to get over it and to try being a woman.) 

Perhaps if he was a woman he’d be in less pain right now. Watching you wind down over a glass of wine like he wasn’t sulking up a fit, his cock so hard that it crooned against his boxers. 

Despite his size and laid-back demeanor, he’s always been a bit bashful. Blushing at the slightest pinch of attention and covering his face with his jersey over some good-natured teasing. It was too bad he’d made himself such an easy target over the years. Any attempt to become non-chalant was at odds with every preexisting relationship in his life and was imminently met with even more teasing. 

Still, no one makes him feel as embarrassed as you do. It’s like a sick cycle. You peek one second too long at his lips and his ears turn pink, making you grin, filling his chest with a familiar ache and making his dick purr.

“Excited, Gyu?” you’d asked him just an hour ago, sat squished together on the lounge loveseat. Your hand poised on his thigh as he tried not to salivate over your compliments. You’d just been doting on him over his latest interview, head heavy with giggles as you rolled around and gushed about your ‘gorgeous boyfriend’ . You’d been particularly tickled by the discussion of ‘Men in their 20s’, Mingyu’s input being as loathing as you’d expect. Once you’d had your fun imitating his exasperated response, you pet his hair like he was a well-trained dog and scratched under his chin for good measure. 

That’s where this particular spiral started. 

The bristle of your nails against the hollow of his jaw left him struggling not to pant. It hadn’t been two days since you’d last touched him, and already he was feeling a little lightheaded. This didn’t stop him from tucking his tail between his legs and pretending to be a good, placid, boy. Eyes all round and twinkling like a deer in headlights; mouth agape as he tries to say that dinner is in the fridge and he’d happily heat it up for you as soon as you’d—

Then, you’d raked those same hands over his neck. And like a never-before-touched-40-year-old-virgin, he let out a pornographic whimper, curling into you with legs spread just wide enough to display the stiff beneath his shorts.

“My puppy, what’s wrong?” 

Instead of answering, he purses his lips and takes a few short, constricted breaths. Closing his eyes as if he can will this whole situation away (or to a head) by pretending it doesn’t exist.

“Can’t help you if you won’t talk to me, Gyu.” 

It was his least practiced skill: just fucking saying what he wants. He’s always too caught up in how turned on you make him or how vulnerable he feels. How deeply he enjoys the way you look at him with the eyes of a predator, and how hot he gets at the thought of being your prey.

“Gyu. Slow down.” For a man with the body mass Mingyu possesses, he’s always had a lack of spatial awareness. Bumping into the kitchen island every other morning; bonking heads in the elevator when he tries to give you a forehead kiss; generally not noticing injuries until he’s flexing in the bathroom mirror and a large bruise has appeared where once there was nothing.

His sex drive was no exception. He grinds against the cotton of his trousers without a single thought, even now as you lay your hand heavy against his throat and mock him for it.

“Such a desperate little puppy, can’t even breathe, humping yourself like a bitch in heat.”

With his airways partially blocked and his eyes squeezed shut, this friction feels almost as good as your hand might. 

“Stop.” This time, the instruction is clear, the heel of your palm digging into his hip bone and forcing him to sit still. He trembles like an injured animal and you don’t hide your snort; the sound is like a bitter spirit left on his salivary glands and it only makes him more liquid in your arms.

“Tell me what you want me to do and I’ll help you, bug.”

“M’sorry, can’t…” 

“Gyu.” It’s a firm warning and still he bites his tongue in resistance:

“I— Fuck… ngh, can’t, I can’t—“

Working himself up over something as simple as wanting to be touched… Well, it makes you wonder if he enjoys being punished. Tears already trail down his temples, thick and heavy as they fall into his damp hair, and every time you lick at the salty water he bucks up into nothing again.

There’s only one way this is going to end. At this rate, with how you’re repeating his favorite nickname in the arch of his ear, the idea of playing nonchalant seems hilarious. How could he ever stay quiet or, god forbid, composed with you around?

It wasn’t always this way, mind you. Communication was a huge part of your relationship. Of course that included acknowledging anything that made you feel ashamed or unattractive. Physical, taboo, emotional: when one of you got shy, you were given a week of grace to iron things out, then you’d have to face the music and let the other in. It didn’t matter how. Actually, there were an infinite amount of ways to sort things out and you were both sticklers for likelihoods and probabilities.

But after six months, Mingyu still couldn’t verbalize his needs. The two ways he’d express himself were whimpering at inopportune moments or folding his legs extra tight until you got the idea. Initially, it was endearing; even after all this time, it’s still sweet and adorable (and a little bit of a turn-on). It sure gave you ample ground to assert your dominance over him. It also gave you a lot to tease him about after the fact. But in some ways, it suffocated you. In some ways, it made you feel gross for controlling the narrative. 

“Actually,” you reckon with a tone so disinterested he isn’t sure how to recognize it as your voice: “I don’t feel like this right now.” 

Then you cross your legs and shuffle across the couch, plucking your phone from the coffee table to retreat inside of it. You’re sure there was an abandoned webtoon chapter to keep you distracted. Anything to quell the bile rising in your throat. 

Before he has a moment to recognize how blue his balls are, Mingyu makes the most sorrowful sound you’ve ever heard. Your head whips around, and what you find is devastating: the big lug has his knees tucked to his chest with his hands squishing against his cheeks. His pearly teeth are gnashed together but barely visible behind his forearm as his shoulders shudder, up and down, up and down.

“Please, please, don’t stop… touching, me, need… Please don’t stop, want you— can you?” and when his begging ends in a whisper of your name, your resolve snaps. You slide onto the ground, hands weaseling between his knees as you look up at him through bleary eyes of your own. 

“Gyu?”

“no, no, I’m sorry, I know. Know I’m the worst — so stupid,”

While you expect him to react poorly, this was not the way you’d wanted it to go. The tears that leave his eyes aren’t pleasant or cathartic-they’re crushing. The weight of his sobs makes him look so so small, and his shoulders twitch at your slightest touch, and now you feel even sicker. But you hold it in, knowing that there’s no way he’ll calm down without a steady hand guiding him.

“Mingyu, breathe baby. Breathe. Let’s just try to breathe together.” 

It only takes a few rounds of counting in squares to wind him down, after which he wipes his tears roughly and clears his throat. 

“Sorry for—“ 

“It’s okay to cry. I’m sorry for overwhelming you. And stopping so suddenly.” A small point of contact between you remains at the apex of his ankle and the soft of your hand. It’s not enough but it’s the only thing that reminds him to breathe. 

“I know—know it’s okay to cry.” 

You snuffle a giggle at his pouty response; “I know you know it’s okay to cry. But sometimes we don’t feel that way, y’know.” 

God. You’re so stupidly smart. So patient with him. God, he’s in love with you. And he’s such a mess.

“Of course… Of course I want to say it,” he tries to avoid your gaze but the fingers now pressing on his calf won’t let him. 

“Want to tell you what I want. But I’m really.. I’m so scared. Scared and not really of you, even though it’s kind of hot when I am, but something about it feels… wrong?” 

You listen without interrupting him or egging him on, chuckling when it seems appropriate and nodding as he trips over his words in worry.

“Like I’m… being like, I dunno, I’m not being the man? Or… something.

His hesitation is filled with sniffles against the overpriced hoodie he’d purchased just a week before. He’ll curse himself out for that later, undoubtably. Good thing he has the knack for a good hand wash.

—But I want to… I wanna try. Can I try?” 

“Now?”

“Mm… want you now.” 

Hearing it from his mouth for the first time in so long sends a bright red flush all over you. Your head dips low as a coy grin replaces that wrinkle between your brows you’d been keeping warm. Mingyu settles his focus on your face to avoid any more distractions. The demure purse of your lips is more than enough to encourage him to continue. Even if he stutters in anticipation a bit along the way.

“So beautiful. I, I love your smile, makes me feel so warm and…weird? Good weird, just like I wanna kiss you all the time. And look at you smiling. And at the same time, smiling at me, and I love it when I feel your tongue on mine, fuck, when I feel your tongue at all” 

His words flow freely as you stretch your legs over his and settle in his lap. His hands move in even strokes down your sides and arms and thighs, gently cupping your face as he admires you. Well, it certainly seems like he’s getting the hang of it. 

“S’all I can think about when I get sweaty… So weird, but I get sweaty and I imagine you licking it off me, shit, look at how pretty you are, shit, shit,”

As he hears himself, he suddenly feels like he could wax poetic for hours (or ramble, whatever this was). If it meant making you look as pleased as you do right now, he’d happily make a living out of it. 

“Can I touch you? So beautiful, wanna feel ya…” The drawl of his accent gets thicker as he rambles on.

“You sure, puppy?” After all that emotional exhaustion it feels a bit strange to be so intimate. The last thing you want is for him to smother his feelings with sex. But then you see the conviction in his flared nostrils and set lips; the very face he makes when you’ve had a bad day and insist everything is fine. When all he ever wants is an excuse to shower you with his love. 

“Yes. F’you’ll let me?” And when he asks so nicely, who are you to deny him?

There’s a slight back and forth as he tries to unbutton your jeans as fast as possible and it all goes so quickly you don’t really register how awkward it is, wiggling out of them in his lap on the couch. But Mingyu’s athleticism never fails him, especially in moments like these. 

The foray over your sticky panties has him searching maniacally for some purchase beneath you. He rubs and pulls and taps until you’re canting into his knuckles sporadically. By the time he’s pulled them to the side and gathers your wetness in his grip, he might be the hardest he’s ever been. 

“God, gonna, wanna make you cum—can I please? Show you?” 

It’s your turn now to be silent, nodding profusely into his cheek as you nibble at his earlobe. There’s one sentiment you refuse to voice in this moment, as the pad of his thumb zeroes in on your clit and drags it in circles: that you’re cooked. You’ve never been this wet in your life, and if you had an ounce of self-awareness left in you, you’d shudder at the slick mess you’ve made. Or the blown out pupils lolling to the back of your head. Or the saliva that drools down your chin in excess and slings onto his. 

But Mingyu is no better: if you weren’t sitting atop him, a dangerous puddle of his own precum would be proudly on display. Somehow the thought turns him on even more. 

“Could come like this, in my pants, nnghh, but I wanna, wanna do it while you ride my fingers, can you…” 

“Fuck! Gyu, just gimme—“ The sentence dies before its finish as he takes your excited exclamation and sprints. The longest of his four fingers push into your hole to fit snugly against your walls, pulsing against him like they’re welcoming him home. 

“Love feeling you on me, my fingers, my—nngh, my cock, made for me, made for you” It comes out a sadistic whine while he bullies them into you with that same doe eyed look.

“Got so much to do, wanna do, wanna make—“

“Gyu, s’good. So good. All mine.”

“Yours. All yours, f’you’ll have me? Have me?”

The words circulate from your empty head straight to your core and you swear, you could cry. He keeps pleading for you to have him and take him and the fever of it all overwhelms you.

In the fissure between the pit of your stomach and where all this untenable excitement likes to linger, something weird begins to coil. Heating so rapidly that you have no time to warn him of it. One moment you’re there, and then next, you’re not; You’re somewhere where there’s color as far as the eye can see, and all you can feel is bliss. Once you do manage to open your eyes, you notice the pool of liquid that now sticks his tank top and pants to his lower belly and thighs. 

Well, shit. You just squirted. And in record time, Mingyu might add. Was this all he had to do to get you riled up? Just divulge his every wet dream and watch you crumble beneath (or atop) him?  

You don’t even double take his soaked white shirt, now stuck to his abdomen with slick, or the dampened the seat of his pants that leave very little to the imagination. You’re wasted with the whiplash of everything that has just happened and truthfully, you couldn’t care less. 

The only thing that brings reality back to your conscience is the continuing buck of his hips.

“My baby, did so good. You wanna cum?” 

“Yes!” He’s squeaking at this point, a pile of incoherent pet names and wet moans. He could probably come in his pants if you hadn’t suggested otherwise, just happy to be in close proximity to you like this: Soaking his clothes and skin and all sweaty all over him. 

Mingyu is so distracted by the image that he barely notices the sticky feelings of his trousers being pulled off. 

“Hands are shaking, m’sorry, your hands—“ 

“I know Gyu. It’s okay.”

There’s no space for him to hold you til you’re steady—his primary concern—with your entrance fluttering over him, still reeling from your orgasm. An ache he didn’t even realize was there is relieved the moment you stretch around him. Welcoming him home. He really could die happy like this: admiring the curve of your chin from below and so, so warm. The image of you, anchoring yourself on his shoulders and hips settled between his, is one he’ll be haunted by forever. 

“Go.” You say it with the last of your energy and a firm bite to his neck. 

He doesn’t need any further instruction; he’s so fucking glad you’ll still tell him what to do. 

The rhythm he sets is animalistic. Heaving and whining and fucking up into you with more force than you’d expected him to be capable of. Something feral takes over your boyfriend and you wish you had the energy to watch it. Maybe you’ll just have to do this all again with a camera filming. God, that would drive him absolutely insane.

With the pace and how worked up he’s become, it’s no surprise when he pulls out a few minutes later to come. Strong arms yank you down and suddenly you’re sat on top of his cock, grinding it against his stomach with his direction.

“Coming, I’m, nnngh fuck!” Mingyu’s voice rises about two octaves as he finishes in white all over his belly. It spurts out long enough for you to feel the aftershocks. In his shivering thighs, in his clenched abs, and the overstimulated cries that catch in his throat.

It may take a long time to recover, but you’re grateful for the break. When Mingyu stands from the couch with you in his arms, you already know he’s taking you to the shower. He strips you as carefully as he can muster and grimaces at the messes made of you both in the harsh overhead light. 

“You shower first.” It’s the first thing you’ve said in a while and he seems bewildered; not just by your wary voice, but by the idea of taking care of himself before taking care of you. So cute, you think. But you refuse to let up. You take a towel from the heated rack and gather all of your clothes in it, holding the sack out as if to say ‘add it to the pile’. Once he’s naked you shove him gently towards the running water and drag yourself out to the laundry room. It only takes a few seconds before you hear those long feet shuffling behind you. 

“Don’t even think about it. I’ll be right back.” 

A silence lingers and you know full well he hasn’t turned back just yet. Alright. You’ll coax him through this part. 

“I’ll shower with you. Just make sure it’s warm for me?” He giggles at that. All it takes is making something a task for Mingyu to thrust himself into it, full force. The retreating footfall that follows is more than enough to make you smile. And laugh, just a bit. 

“Thank you, Gyu.” 

“Anything for you.”

penned by rowan. in reference to this interview among other things.

[jaythes1mp]

Cat reader idea: which one is your favorite. Like Damian would be nice but he’s always on you for improper diet (you ate fruit and not the horrid wet food he leaves out for you)

Dick has no sense of personal space and he wants to squeeze your adorable little toe beans despite your protests.

Jason would be okay but he practically steals you at night for cuddles and for your own safety. Nothing safer than sleeping with a knife under your pillow.

Tim is iffy, he just likes your company, but the moment you sneeze he’s sending you to the vet- even worse when you get out, using your chip to locate you.

Bruce and alfred just adore you, but only get to see you now and then due to their busy schedules, mainly petting you when they walk by or doing your training.

:3 hope this is accurate lmao

Okay, this is beautiful and a perfect way to incorporate some things into the fic.

More on cat shifter reader.

01

Damian is 100% on your ass, meticulously keeping track of your dietary habits, setting up charts to keep track of your meal times, ensuring that the family knows exactly what you've consumed and what not to give you. This way, he can ensure that you're sticking to the food plan he's designed, with zero room for deviation. He even resorts to constantly reminding Alfred and Dick not to give you anything, no matter how hard your adorable little eyes plead up at them. Determined to make sure you stick to his meal plan. It’s even worse when you’re in your human form, despite his repeated warnings. — and don’t get him started on Jason. The man is the most difficult of them all to control when it comes to your diet. He completely ignores Damian's instructions and will immediately scoop you up and secure you in the cat carrier attached to his motorcycle if you even hint at being hungry. Then, he'll spirit you away to his apartment without a second thought, offering you an array of forbidden human foods in exchange for your sweet meows.

Don’t think about attempting to escape through him however, that would only lead to being futile. He's engineered his bike with a series of safety precautions, meaning that if you even displayed the slightest indication of trying to jump out or escape, the restraints would immediately tighten, making it virtually impossible for you to break out. Let alone breathe comfortably.

Moving back to your diet; Damian has completely altered the Wayne Manor’s kitchen to cater exclusively to your feline dietary needs. He’s even managed to ensure that the rest of the family has adapted their own diets to match yours, to prevent any accidents regarding food you’re not supposed to eat. Despite your attempts to reason with him, Damian refuses to acknowledge that as a human, you can safely consume foods like chocolate without getting sick. You’re a kitten after all.

Though, if by some chance you do manage to infiltrate the kitchen, an assortment of only the finest fruits are packed at the ready for you. Small bits of cut up mango, fresh unpackaged pineapple, blueberries, melon, bananas, apricots, apples and watermelon at the ready. The fridge always stocked full of cooked meats, fluffy cooked rice, boiled eggs, and vegetables.

Damian might not be overjoyed when you venture from the specific meats and hundreds of lavish wet food brands that he's tasked Pennyworth to prepare, he still begrudgingly accepts it as a form of compromise. As long as you’re eating things that fall within his carefully controlled parameters, he can justify allowing it. He’s aware that you need some form of autonomy and independence to survive in the manor, unlike many of his brothers.

He treats you the most reasonably.

02

Dick is definitely one of the people who gets loads of little cat clothes to dress you up in and needs to have you in his little cat bag so he can take you around everywhere.

Who cares about the numerous concerned remarks regarding your drowsy appearance? Dick simply laughs off their concerns. His kitten is just tired, he promises! After all, it’d be quite a hassle to have to explain to every person who stops for a photo that it's nothing more than the effects of the medication he's given you to ensure you remain placidly content and docile during cuddle sessions and neighbourhood walks.

Once Dick starts on your adorable little toe beans, there's no stopping him. He gushes incessantly about the cute contrast of pink and black on your little paws and how they're just perfect for the miniature cat-themed socks that Alfred has patiently taught him to make. He gleefully coos over your small digits, marveling at how perfectly they fit into the little socks. Aren’t you happy your big brother made them for you? Can’t you just purr this once, please? He won’t even get mad if you kick them off or tear them to shreds again!

He’s definitely the type to have an entire wardrobe filled with little outfits for you. A nice red bow tie to get you to look nice and handsome or a warm purple sweater for you to look pretty.

Dick's affection for you remains steadfast, even when you shift to your human form. However, in his mind, you'll always be his precious little kitten, and no amount of whining, hitting, or swearing can convince him otherwise. He's stubbornly determined to shower you with love and care, undeterred by any resistance you may offer. The world’s just too big for you, and he needs to protect you from it. So come sit on his lap and stop whining, the movie’s starting.

03

In stark contrast to Dick, Jason has a clear preference for your feline form, showing little interest in you when you appear as a human. He often ignores you entirely, showering you with love and attention only in your feline body.

It's a double-edged sword, this dynamic with Jason. On the one hand, you've discovered a way to make him leave you alone – simply appear in your human form, and he'll instantly lose interest. He'll glare, shake his head in distaste, and then storm out of the room, grumbling incoherently under his breath as he goes. Unfortunately, when Jason realises your tactic to avoid him, he'll barge into Tim's room unannounced, no matter the time of day or night. Tim, due to his habit of staying up late, will inevitably be awake, and Jason will insist that he make you transform back. Following his forceful tactic of making you transform back, Jason will quickly switch gears and act as though nothing untoward has happened. He'll enfold you in a tight hug and bury his face in your soft fur, nuzzling against you affectionately, completely unbothered by his previous behavior.

Given your penchant for exploring the outdoors, Jason often takes advantage of the darkness of the night to whisk you away. He's aware that you need to experience life beyond the confines of the Wayne estate's gardens, and he prefers to do it when the rest of the family is less likely to notice your absence. Or rather, more occupied with their nightly duties so they’re unable to stop him from taking you.

You’re still under complete lock and key, but at least you get to experience the night air every once in a while.

04

If I had to pick my favourite out of the ones you’ve written I’d go with Tim’s. It’s the one I agree with the most.

Tim likes to keep you sedated. Having you laid out nice and docile on his lap, desk, or of the many cat trees that litter the place, while he works away on the batcomputer.

He’s the most precocious, being particularly meticulous when it comes to your well-being, even the slightest sneeze prompting him to arrange a visit to the vet. Monthly veterinary checkups are non-negotiable, and he ensures that your health is consistently monitored. Saying that, he’ll never take you to a hospital with doctors that specialise in anything other than animals.

A sleek, high-tech collar encircles your neck, constantly transmitting your vital signs in real-time to Tim's phone. Additionally, a microchip planted in your body and trackers strategically installed on various parts of your anatomy ensure that they can monitor your location at all times ensuring that under no circumstances are able to escape.

Tim is the one who suggested and ultimately confirmed your declawing, dismissing your protests and tears as mere tantrums. Despite your pleas and emotional outburst, stating that it would render you disabled — equivalent to cutting off your fingers down to the knuckle — he remains cold and uncompromising. Your objections are disregarded, treating your fears as if you were a pet throwing a tantrum, denying you any agency in the matter. If you didn’t want this to happen, you wouldn’t have scratched them in the first place. It’s easier this way, really. They get to look after you in human form and there’ll be no more scratching up their arms or the furniture.

Initially, Dick supported your side, recognising your profound distress and desperation. However, after a conversation about how you would be completely reliant on him while in your human form, he changed his stance. He stopped giving the issue a moment's consideration, fully accepting Tim’s conclusion.

When it came to the decision, Jason and Bruce were in favor from the beginning. For Jason, it meant his new couch would remain unscathed, and prevented you from clawing at Bruce during business meetings while he held you snugly in his lap.

The sole member of the family fiercely opposed to the idea of declawing you was Damian.

Nevertheless, to Damian's dismay and your own, you'll be made to undergo the declawing against your will anyway. Despite his disagreement, he'll still be there to gently bandage up the raw nubs where your former fingers once were, and he'll lovingly pet away your tears and sobs. You were still his kitten, he’d coo. Just a slightly less fierce one.

05

I’d have to disagree with you here.

Bruce will undoubtedly make time for you, despite any disagreements you may have. You're a top priority in his life, and he'll ensure that you receive the attention and care you deserve.

The eldest Wayne will go to great lengths to accommodate you in his busy schedule. He'll happily reschedule meetings and carve out special time just for you. If there's a vital meeting he can't avoid, he'll bring you along, insisting on having you by his side.

You’re theirs, through and through.

Thanks for the ideas! Any and all asks are encouraged and appreciated.

Previous cat asks: 1 2

Link to Masterlist.

Link to offical chapter

[cevansbrat0007]

A Friend in the Dark Part II

Summary: After receiving an unexpected call from you in the middle of the night, Ari's not going to let anything stop him from getting to you. But will he make it in time? Takes place directly after the events in A Friend in the Dark: Part I.

Warnings: Mature Themes, Ari Being A Menace, References to Home Invasion, Scared Reader, Pet Names, Cursing, Minors DNI

A/N: Special thanks to my creative consultant, @curls-and-eyeliner, who helped me come up with the opening. Part my Sweet Renegade Series. Semi-proofread, not beta'd. All mistakes are my own. Likes, comments, and reblogs are always appreciated. Thanks for reading!

Ari Levinson’s P.O.V.

Although it feels like hours, it’s really only a matter of minutes before Ari finds himself pulling onto your street. Not wanting to call attention to himself, he immediately kills his headlights before throwing his truck into neutral, quietly gliding down the block. 

He already knows which home is yours – the one with the rose bushes out front. Stopping a couple houses down, the bounty hunter swiftly exits his vehicle. After triple-checking the gun in his waistband, he knows it’s time to make his way to you. 

Ari moves with lethal grace, his corded muscles tense and ready to strike should an enemy make the mistake of crossing his path. As he gets closer, he spots Milton’s cruiser parked a ways down the street.

Perfect.

The burly lawman tosses a brief glance over his shoulder, just to make sure he isn’t being followed – the last thing he needed was someone sneaking up behind him. A blow to the back of the head could be deadly, even for someone as big as him. 

He does a swift scan of your front yard, noting that nothing appears out of place. Holding his breath, Ari tunes his ears to the silence, quieting the sound of his own heartbeat as he wills his military instincts to take over. During his brief conversation with you, you’d said that the intruder had been at your back door.

Which meant that was exactly where he needed to be. Heaven help the fucker if he was dumb enough to still be there, scaring the shit out of his girl. 

He draws his gun and dispenses the safety, holding it low with both hands as he stealthily makes his way around the side of your house. It was time to confront whoever was out there, hiding in the dark like a coward. 

“Gotchu, motherfucker!” He barks, aiming his weapon in the air. 

Except there’s nobody there. 

Although he’s surprised, he remains on high alert. Keeping his head on a swivel, he slowly climbs the steps leading to your back porch. He takes a moment to examine the door, smoothing his fingers along the cracked, splintered wood. The frame itself is also bent and hopelessly warped.

It didn’t take an expert to see that someone had indeed been here at one point. Most likely trying to kick the damned thing down. The whole thing appeared to be hanging on by a thread as it was.

“Shit.” Ari hisses under his breath. Raking an agitated hand through his hair, he pulls out his phone and dials your number once again. “C’mon, baby. Answer the fucking phone for me.”

Why the fuck weren’t you picking up? Had the intruder managed to make their way inside some other way? Ice fills his veins at the prospect of someone holding you captive inside. Scaring you. Hurting you. 

If that something happened to you because he hadn’t gotten here fast enough, Ari would never be able to forgive himself. 

And just where the fuck was Milton? Out in the woods somewhere holding his dick?

At that moment, Ari makes a snap decision. He was determined to get into that house. Frankly, he’d already wasted enough time out here hemming and hawing as it was. Taking a step back and leveling the door with the most powerful kick he can muster, sending it flying open with a loud thunk. 

Taking no time to celebrate, the bounty hunter goes to make his way inside only to duck when he notices an object come flying at his head at the last second. Thankfully, it connects with the door frame instead of his skull.

Your P.O.V.

“Get the fuck out of my house!” You screech, swinging your bat wildly at the large figure that just tried to break their way into your home. “I’m crazy and I’ll kill you! Lord, help me, I’ll do it!” You continue swinging, attempting to keep the intruder at bay on your front porch until help arrives. 

“Wait – stop!” The intruder pleads, throwing up a hand in the dark as his weapon goes flying. 

“I’ve called the cops, you pig-fuckin’ bastard.” You spit, raising your Louisville Slugger high. They’re on their way and –”

“Goddamn it, baby!” Ari roars, scrambling away from the assault. “It’s me! I am the cops!”

That’s enough to knock the wind out of your sails almost immediately. Blood roaring in your ears, you belatedly realize that you’d almost just turned the very man who came to rescue you into a frickin’ vegetable. 

“Ari?” You whisper, finally allowing the bat to fall limply at your feet. “Oh…oh God.”

For a brief moment, all you can do is stare at each other. You, relieved to see him here. Him, relieved to see you unhurt. And it’s only as that feeling of relief begins to settle in is that you begin to shake. Covering your mouth with trembling hands, you watch the bounty hunter stand and collect his gun, before turning on the safety and tucking it back into the security of his jeans. 

“Hey there, sweetheart.” 

You don’t think. Don’t question. Instead you just launch yourself into his arms, praying that he’ll catch you.

Of course he does.

“Why the fuck didn’t you answer your phone?” He growls after a beat, pulling away to assess you for injuries. His large, warm hands make quick work of checking you out before gently cupping your face. “Huh? Why the fuck did you go quiet on me like that?”

You rest your smaller hands atop his as Ari brushes a feather-light kiss along your brow. His big body feels so tense beneath your touch. He’s wrapped so tightly, you’re almost certain he’s bound to go off at any moment. 

“I…” You swallow thickly as you will yourself to stop shaking. “I was trying to use the element of surprise. I took my phone with me but…when he started really trying to bust down the door I knew I had to do something, so I –”

“FREEZE!” A new voice yells, taking you both by surprise. Your bounty hunter immediately spins on his heel, pushing you behind him to protect you from view. 

Fucking Milton had finally arrived. A day late and a dollar short. 

“Jesus Christ, asshole.” Ari snarls, briefly raising his hands in the air long enough for the officer to recognize the fact that there was no discernable threat. “Where the hell have you been?”

“Got held up on the way here. I’ll, uh, tell you about it later, Levinson.” Is all he says, holstering his weapon. “You okay there, darlin?”

Later he would pull the lawman aside and let him know that someone had tried to hold him up. Make it difficult for him to get here as fast as the situation had warranted. It wasn’t quite suspicious, but still odd nevertheless. 

“She’s fine.” Ari answers on your behalf, circling a possessive arm around your waist. “Fine as can be, anyway.” He continues when you nod at his side. “Almost took my head off with a baseball bat before you got here.”

“Well, I reckon I wouldn’t expect anything less from one of The Creek’s champion softball players.” Milton responds with a tired grin, his hand coming up to massage the back of his neck. “How bad’s the damage to the door?”

“Eh…” Your bounty hunter attempts to shoo you inside with a guiding hand. “Whoever our guy is did a pretty good job damn near kicking the thing off the hinges. I just finished the job. I just wanna get her indoors so we can – wait.”

Ari stops cold, his entire body going stiff as if he’d only just realized something. 

“What’s wrong?” You ask, turning to face him, briefly halting his attempts to move you along. 

“You said you just got here?” You know the question is meant solely for Milton. 

“Yeah.” The officer responds, clearly perplexed by where Ari seems to be going with this. “Why?”

“Baby, you ain’t wearin’ nothing’ but a gown and slippers.” He murmurs, his lips hovering just above your ear. “Stop fightin’ me and go inside where it’s warm. Please.”

It’s an order, that much you can tell. But as much as you want to protest, you decide to do as you’re bid, leaving the two lawmen alone. 

Just this once.

“Good girl.” He praises you, still keeping his voice low even as his words warm your belly. “We’ll be along in a moment.”

Ari’s P.O.V.

“What’s up, Levinson?” Milton tries again once you’re safely out of earshot. 

“When I pulled in, there was a cruiser already parked halfway down the block. Assumed it was you and kept it moving.” 

“That’s awful strange.”

“I know.” Ari grunts, hands on his hips. “Did you call this out over the radio?”

“Well, yeah.” The officer shrugs as he wracks his brain for more details. “But nobody responded. Figured it would just be me and you and that would be enough.”

“Well, clearly someone else heard it.” Your bounty hunter snaps. “You didn’t see anyone when you pulled up? They weren’t still parked there?”

“No.” Milton scrubs a hand along his jaw. “I came the opposite way you did. Only saw your truck.” Turning on his flashlight he flashes it towards the woods beckoning along the edge of your property. “And did you see anyone trying to break-in when you got here?”

“No. But the damage was already done.”

“Think you chased ‘em off?”

“Maybe.” Ari murmurs, his tone rife with suspicion. “But I doubt it. Somethin’ tells me the fucker dipped before I even stepped foot on the lawn.” 

“Fucking. Awesome.” The officer blows out a tired breath. Turning off his flashlight, he lightly claps the other man on the shoulder. “Look. We ain’t gonna get anywhere with this shit tonight.”

“Yeah.” He drags out the word. “Yeah, I know.” God, he needed a fucking cigarette.

“It’s late. I still need to get her statement. We…we can pick this up in the morning.” 

With nothing else left to say, the confused and frustrated men head for your front porch. Regardless of wherever Milton stood on the subject, Ari vows to get to the bottom of this bullshit. 

But first he wanted – no, he needed – to see to you.

Your P.O.V.

It’s nearly 5:00am before Officer Milton walks out your front door, leaving you alone with the one man who had the power to keep you off balance. Right now the two of you are sitting in your kitchen, each sipping a mug of hot tea with an added splash of whiskey. 

Ari had been quiet for most of your conversation with the young officer, only interjecting where and when he felt it necessary. He’d also fetched you tissues when you started to cry, and even held your hand during the…more harrowing portion of your evening. 

“Thank you.” You tell him, your voice barely above a whisper when you finally break the silence. “For coming tonight.”

He wants to tell you that he’ll always come, whenever you call. But he can’t quite seem to summon up the words. So instead he simply settles on: “You’re welcome.”

“You…you don’t have to stay.”

“I know.” 

But Ari makes no move to get up. He’s not sure he’s capable of it. Not with you sitting here looking every inch the fragile little bird that you are. Now he knew that you, his woman, had two sides.

You were either his firebrand of a Duchess, or his sweet, soft little Bird. But what you didn’t know is that he was absolutely willing and wanting to keep you. Both of you. 

Clearing his throat, your bounty hunter leans back in his chair, his turbulent blue gaze clashing with yours. “You’re gonna need someone to fix that door.” His tone comes off a little more gruff than he intends.

With a sigh, you come to rest your head on your hand. “I’m afraid it’s too early for me to call the insurance company just yet.”

“I’ll take care of it.”

His response catches you completely off guard. You stare back at him with wide eyes, silently wondering how much the whiskey was talking. 

“Sweetheart.” Once again you find your hand encased in the warmth of his, squeezing gently. “It’s gonna take the insurance company days, if not weeks, to handle this. You and I both know you can’t go that long without a proper door.”

“But I still need to report it…” You protest, hating the fact that you can’t get your brain to work as fast as you would like. 

“So do that. But in the meantime, I’ve got a buddy who owes me a favor. I’ll get him and his boys out here and we’ll get you fixed up good and proper.” 

“I can’t afford that.” 

“Did anyone ask you to pay?” He responds, making it known that he had it in him to be just as stubborn as you. Releasing his grip, he scoots away from the table. Standing up, he picks up your mugs before depositing them in the sink. 

“Ari.” While you mean to sound firm, his name comes out more like a whine, making him smile. 

“How about you get on up to bed, hm?” He murmurs when he sees your head start to dip. Now that all that adrenaline had run its course, you were plum exhausted. “I’ll close up down here. Maybe find some tarp to put over that back door until we can get you the real thing.” 

“You’re so bossy.” 

“Hmph.” Ari grunts as he helps you stand. “Afraid it’ll only get worse the more I have to repeat myself.” 

Your sweet, yet incredibly stubborn lawman runs an affectionate hand over your curls. Unable to help yourself, you lean in, burying your face in his chest to inhale his scent. And even though part of you is waiting for him to push you away, you struggle not to melt on the spot when you feel him press a tender kiss on top of your head. 

“Off to bed with you, little Bird.” He rumbles after a minute, knowing this has already gone on longer than it should’ve. “Get a move-on, now.” 

You’re in such a haze that you don’t even bother to call him out over yet another stupid nickname. First Duchess and now this? You were gonna give this handsome jerk a piece of your mind after you got some sleep. Perhaps you’d threaten to peck his eyes out or something…

Leaning on him even as you plot, you don’t balk as he leads you toward the stairs. Nor do you complain when you feel a territorial hand settle on your hip as he guides you to the foot of your bedroom where he watches you climb into bed. And you decide to ignore the way your belly flutters when you hear him calling you his “good girl” one last time. 

END

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[just-mya-writing]

“Would you still love me if I was a worm?” ~ South Park Boys

I was in the middle of writing something completely different when this idea hit me like a metal bat. I will not offer an explanation, but I will make this a series. I’m half sorry

SP boys x gn!reader

Stan

It’s a cold, rainy night and the two of you are lounging lazily on his couch

you were meant to go home a little over two hours ago, but Stan’s car is practically frozen and broke down on the way to work yesterday and you refuse to walk back in the freezing rain

instead, you and your boyfriend were content cuddling together, enjoying each others company

resting on his chest, you could hear his steady heartbeat, lulling you into a sense of security and safety

sighing through your nose, you snuggled up closer to Stan as he tightened his grip around your waist while his other hand scrolled endlessly on YouTube shorts

he’s watching Minecraft videos

looking up at him, you softly break the comfortable silence

“hey Stan...?”

“hm?” he looks away from his phone, the smallest hint of a smile on his lips as he pressed them against the top of your head

“Would you still love me if I was a worm?”

he’s silent 

stunned

he expected you to say something cute or cheesy, not something a middle school girl would ask her boyfriend 

“...yes.”

“you hesitated” you pointed out, sitting up slightly 

“well. I had, uh, had to...to think about it first”  he stuttered, trying to figure out what you want to hear

“you had to think about if you love me?” you tilted your head to the side, trying to hold back a smile

“I do! I love you, even if you were a worm!” his panicked voice squeaked out, pulling you closer to him so your face was burred in the crock of his neck  

he smiled when he felt you giggle against his skin

“no matter what or where you are, I’ll always love you...you know that” he whispered, running his hand over the back of your head

you didn’t even need to answer him, you both knew the answer

“...my little worm” 

he snickered

well shit

new pet name unlocked

he gets you one of those fuzzy noodle worms on a string for your birthday

your his little worm now

be the best worm you can be

Kyle

he had taken you out to eat 

he wasn’t paying attention when you mentioned you wanted to eat him out but you forgive him

picking up your tray of food, you brought it to the outside table Kyle had spent fifteen minutes picking out, cuz it just had to be perfect

you smiled at the red head as you sat down, picking up his drink and handing it over 

“hey Kyleee...” you started, watching his entire face break out into a smile

“yesss...” he responded in the same sing-song tone of voice, picking up a straw 

“Would you still love me if I was a worm?”

his smile dropped

a look of confusion took its place

he wrinkled his nose

“the fuck?”

“would you still love me if I was a worm?” you repeated simply, taking a sip of your own drink

“why would you be a worm?” 

you shrugged

“it could happen” you reasoned, hiding your smile behind your cup

“no it can’t, you can’t just randomly turn into a worm” he argued, fiddling with the unopened straw

“I could end up drinking a...worm turning into potion” 

he just looked at you with a deadpan stare

you took a long sip of your drink

“..oh no, I think the café accidentally gave me a worm turning into potion” you gasped, looking between your drink and Kyle

he opened one end of his straw, putting his lips to the exposed plastic tube and blowing, causing the paper wrapped around to hit you squarely in the forehead 

“my poor little worm head...” you pouted, finally causing a snort out of your boyfriend

the rest of your lunch was mostly uneventful, the two of you chatting and people watching

a few hours later, at your house, your taking your sweater out of the dryer

Kyle spilled food on it, he said he’s sorry

Kyle walked up behind you, wrapping his arms around you for a quick hug and kissing your temple 

“...yeah” he muttered before walking away 

“yeah what?” you called after him, confused

“Yeah, I would love you if you were a worm” he smiled before rounding a corner “don’t let it go to your head” he added from down the hall

too late

your ego has been boosted and the smile won’t leave your face

he’d be the best boyfriend a worm could have

Kenny

laughing his ass off

help him

he’s going to choke on his gum and die again

you both were sitting on his bed

but now he’s practically rolling on the floor

his contagious laughter making you struggle to contain your giggles

“aha...wha, what did you...” he took a deep breath, tears nearly forming in his eyes “can you repeat the question?” he finally managed to say 

you took a deep breathe of your own, trying to contain your laughter

“Would you still love me if I was a worm?”

once again he erupted into a fit of laughter, just like when you first asked him

you’re not sure what you were expecting him to do or say when you asked, but it surely wasn’t a reaction like this

he suddenly stopped, sitting up and looking into your eyes, deathly serious

“I can’t fuck a worm”

now it was your turn to laugh

the laughter that came from the both of you could probably be heard from outside, not helped by the fact that Kenny was making things worse

“wait wait wait...” he shuffled over to you, hands on your shoulders “what if I...hahaha, what if I was a worm too.” he snickered, almost unable to finish his thought. “We’d have hot worm sex!”

you couldn’t even respond to him as his laughter started to mix into him coughing his lungs out, leaning onto you for support

he thought he was so funny

you started to gently rock him back and forth

“Kenny, Kenny, you didn’t answer the question!” you reminded him

“I can’t” he squeaked, voice growing horse 

his arms were now wrapped snugly around your body and you could do nothing but shake your head, running your hand through his fluffy blonde hair

his laughter slowly died down, his head still stuck on your shoulder as he squeezed you

“I dunno, would you love me if I was a worm?” he giggled 

“hmm...no” you joked, earning a little nip on your neck from him in protest

“well that’s unfortunate...cuz I’d love you, even if you were the ugliest worm in the dirt” 

you rolled your eyes

“excuse you, I’d be a hot worm” you smiled

he lifted his head up and kissed your cheek

“I’d make you a little worm house, and sing you little worm songs at night, and carry you around with me in my parka...” he rambled, small ghosts of of kisses being peppered around your face 

“alright, alright I get it” you conceded, feeling your face heat up from the relentless kisses 

“nooo, my perfect partner needs to know that they’d be the perfect worm” 

he’s not letting you go

keeps telling you how he’d care for you if you were a worm

wants to cuddle like worms

its just him laying on top of you

you can’t move

it’s fine

Cartman

“abso-fucking-lutely not”

“Cartman!”

“I barely love you now”

“Cartman.”

“What kind of stupid question is that, dumbass?”

“Eric”

he’s in trouble and he knows it but doesn’t care

he needs you to know how stupid your question was

why a worm?

why would you even be a worm?

why would you ask him in the middle of watching a horror movie?

would saying yes make him some kind of furry?

these are the questions that plague his mind while you’re lecturing him

hope you weren’t expecting him to pay attention

“I’m not even attracted to worms, stupid, I’m attracted to you”

Cartman is a self claimed yousexual

he’s only got the hots for you and you only

no worms allowed

you’re a moronsexual

now actively steps on worms when it rains

no slimy worm in going to steal his partner if he has anything to say about it

Butters

starts tearing up

starts thinking the worst

what if while your cuddling he accidentally crushes you

what if a bird comes and swoops you up while you guys are having a picnic

do worms have lips? could he still kiss you?

maybe he could kiss your little worm head

oh gee how long do worms live for??

his thoughts are swirling and he doesn’t know what to do besides mildly panic

he promises he’ll be the best boyfriend a worm could ask for

he’ll try his best to keep you happy

“oh, please don’t leave me for a hotter, more capable worm”

you’re gonna have to explain it’s a joke before he starts googling ‘what to do when the love of my life turns into a worm’

bless his heart

[koqabear]

Wish Me Luck?

♫: Wake Up In The Sky, Bruno Mars

“In which working with these two makes your life impossible— because they’re annoying, and won’t leave you alone— you try your best to ignore them but sometimes, it’s too tempting.”

hueningkai x fem!reader x taehyun

Genre: pwp, rockstar au, makeup artist!reader, smut

Word count: 6.2K

Warnings: genuinely like.. none, i think. 

Smut Warnings: dom!tae, dom!huening, sub!mc, threesome, unprotected sex, they’re both pervs sorry, use of mirrors(?), pet names (pretty, doll, cutie, etc.) dry humping, slight marking, handjob, fingering, hair pulling, spanking, praise, masturbation, slight exhibitionism?, multiple orgasms, creampie(s), lmk if i should add anything!

Notes: part of a rockstar!txt mini series. lowkey gave up on formatting so if shows don’t tell me. anyways! happy birthday to my bf huening 😁 again this was like… barely edited so it’s a little uhh… idk. enjoy, hopefully..

There are many perks that come with the rockstar lifestyle— money, clothes, fame, women.

Taehyun tries to take advantage of it all— and he has, though he finds that the last perk is reserved for someone more… special. 

Taehyun is currently in his favorite place to be before a concert— the makeup station, of course. This could mean many things for him; a chance for him to rest, a relaxing time to get his hair and makeup done, able to get perfectly dolled up just for him to ruin it all during his shows. 

But that’s not the reasoning at all— rather, his reasoning lies with the pretty makeup artist who, unfortunately, is not tending to him today. 

It takes a bit of enjoyment out of the experience— however, he will say that he’s not complaining about the view he’s getting now, watching the way you tend to Kai and touch his face as though he’s made of glass with a fond smile; before he can control himself, his eyes fall to the cute skirt you’re wearing today, a tug of guilt hitting his stomach at the way he feels slightly disappointed upon the realization that they have built-in safety shorts— what can he say? It was always a total accident when he looked over to you bent over, pretty ass on display as you worked diligently on the member assigned. 

Hueningkai, Taehyun notices, definitely isn’t faring well with your proximity to him. Unlike Taehyun, who’s always dying to get his hands on you and keep you to himself, Hueningkai has always preferred to watch from a distance— so to have you here, taking over his senses with the alluring perfume you use and feeling your delicate fingers brush against his skin as you do his makeup— well, safe to say Hueningkai is practically meditating to not pop a boner then and there. 

“___, have you been busy? I barely see you around anymore,” Taehyun asks, peeking up from his phone and over to the next chair where you continue to meddle with Hueningkai, standing back to observe your work before you’re jumping at the sound of your name. 

“Well, I’ve been assigned to the rookie group the company debuted, you know,” you sigh out, having had this conversation more times than you can remember as you reach to brush away a stray hair from Hueningkai’s forehead; you watch as his eyes flutter shut and his brows twitch, and you wonder if you may have irritated him as you press your lips together. 

“That’s unfair…” Taehyun pouts softly, pretending as though his phone is much more interesting as he continues to sneak glances at you, eyes darkening at how cute you look while concentrating, not paying attention to Taehyun’s words as you begin applying lip tint to Hueningkai, “They’re taking my makeup artist away from me, I don’t like this one bit.”

“I’m not your makeup artist,” you fuss, sighing in exasperation as you take a step back from Hueningkai; you tell him to open his eyes as you take in the final result, smiling softly in satisfaction as you observe your work on him— looking at Taehyun, you cross your arms, frowning at the way you catch him staring at you already, “I’m the company’s makeup artist. Who I get assigned to work on is entirely up to them, so I don’t get why you’re acting like this right now.”

“Is it wrong to want a pretty girl to do my makeup?” He asks, and your face twists as you watch his current makeup artist throw an incredulous glance your way— just as you’re about to turn and leave, you’re surprised to find Hueningkai grabbing your wrist and pulling you back to him. 

“My hair,” he mumbles quietly, so soft you almost missed it— you lean down to try and hear him better, unaware of the way his eyes dart down to your low neckline and your lips that pout in concentration, “Can you fix it? It’s… different now.”

As far as you’re concerned, he looks completely fine; you’re quick to tell him that as well, only to see as he insists that it was different before you worked on his makeup. 

“Well if you want, I can go get your hairdresser—“ you begin, only to stop short at the feeling of Hueningkai’s grip tightening slightly. 

“But you can do it, no?”

God, these two were impossible. 

Their behavior was nothing new to you, and you oftentimes found yourself the victim of teasing as your coworkers poked fun at the way the two seemed to be attached to you like lost puppies— you always tried to refute such claims, but the way they constantly wanted you around them really didn’t help. 

“You can do it, ___,” Taehyun says, and you feel a bit bad for his makeup artist as he moves to look at you, “Gives us an excuse to keep you here a bit longer.”

Out of the two, Taehyun is much more blunt— but that doesn’t mean you’re used to it, feeling your face grow hot at his words as you attempt once more to run away— it’s all in vain of course, because Hueningkai is tugging you back and giving you a look that almost makes your knees buckle.

You don’t think you’ve ever seen him like this.

“Please.”

Nothing about that is a request. He looks up at you with lidded, dazed eyes, and you find yourself complying hesitantly the longer he looks at you like he’ll devour you any second. You don’t even know what he wants his hair to look like— so you go with his usual ruffled look, his long dark hair soft under your fingers as you stand in front of him and run through the locks with mousse. 

You try to keep a straight face the whole time; even when Taehyun continues to make baiting comments at you, complimenting you with a deep purr as he tries to get your attention back on him— even as you feel the way Hueningkai can’t take his eyes off you, much bolder than usual as you bite your lip and hover over him, quick hands desperate to finish his styling. 

Your hands freeze in his hair as you feel something warm on the back of your thigh. 

That something warm serves as Hueningkai’s hand, resting on your skin as he simply continues to look up at you innocently, chewing his gum and tilting his head as though to ask what’s wrong? 

You try to contain the shiver that runs through you as his thumb begins to softly caress your skin, venturing under the cloth of your safety shorts for a moment before he’s moving it back down.

“Something wrong?” Taehyun drawls out, and a glance at him shows that his makeup artist has left— it’s just you three, and your brows knit together as you take in the way his makeup isn’t done yet, “You look like you just saw a ghost.”

You’re shaken out of your reverie at his words; putting the finishing touches, you step away from Hueningkai, feeling the way his hand is reluctant to leave your skin, his arm falling limply at his side as he stares at you with hungry curiosity. 

“I think I’m done here,” you breathe out, attempting to hide your shaky hands as you place them behind your back, “Make sure you’re changed and ready in time for the show.”

Bowing politely, you make your way to the exit— only to be stopped the moment you pass Taehyun, an exasperated sound leaving you involuntarily as he takes your hand and tugs you back to him. 

“Are you done?” he asks, sparkly eyes not enough to conceal his mischief as he tilts his head to the side, “There’s nothing missing here?”

Of course something is missing. Taehyun doesn’t have his lip tint on, but you refuse to point it out as you hum softly, pretending to be in thought for a second before you finally shake your head no.

“No?” he pouts— he’s then puckering his lips, nodding his head toward you and sending you a kiss as he smiles coyly, “Are you sure?”

“You seem to be missing…” you grit out, watching as he raises his brows expectantly, as though encouraging you to finish your train of thought, “Your lip…tint.”

“Oh. You think so?” he asks, looking back at the mirror and swiping a finger across his lips before he hums, “Could you do it for me, please? I’ve always loved how you left my lips all pretty.”

You’re inhaling slowly to not turn on your heels and run away— not because you don’t want to do your job, but because you’re anxious about what might happen if you’re left alone in a room with these two for a moment longer; all you know is that if the way they look at you serves as any indicator, then they’re definitely up to no good.

“My lips always look like candy with the combo you use,” he continues, watching as you go to the vanity to search for the products you usually use for him— after a moment, you’re turning to him, products in one hand a small lip brush in the other— your eyes meet his, and you’re slightly startled with the way he suddenly leans forward, eerily close to you as his eyes flicker down to the way your lips part in a silent gasp, “Don’t you think so?”

“I’ve never thought of it like that,” you mutter swiftly, immediately getting to work in hopes that Taehyun can just shut up for once— he does, but you’re still left at the mercy of his intense stare, trying to pretend as though his proximity isn’t enough to make you feel nervous.

“You look really pretty today ___,” It’s Hueningkai’s turn to torment you— if you weren’t so focused on Taehyun, you would’ve scoffed, opting instead to let out a noncommittal hum instead. 

“Are you doing anything after the show?”

He says that as you’re finally stepping away from Taehyun; silently, you’re happy for the timing of his words, because you know that you would’ve messed up Taehyun’s makeup from your surprise— which would’ve meant you staying longer to fix it. 

“No,” you say, refusing to elaborate even if their curious stares silently plead you to— turning around, you continue to ignore them as you put your stuff away, pretending as though you weren’t rushing in hopes to leave quicker. 

“Taehyun and I are going out for drinks after to celebrate the end of the tour,” He says quietly, and you make the mistake of looking up at him through the mirror— he’s looking at you of course, though the way his dark makeup only makes his eyes look more intense doesn’t help you at all— softly, he smiles. 

“You should come with. Our treat.”

“Oh, I— I don’t know, I don’t wanna be a bother,” you stutter out, your nonchalant demeanor beginning to slip the moment you see them stand up behind you, shaky hands rushing to zip your makeup case shut, “I should really get going now, you two still need to change—“

“Yeah, but what’s the rush?” You’re fucking trapped— they stand on either side of you, looming dangerously and looking at you as though you’re nothing but a treat for them to devour— you can feel their breaths fanning on each side of your neck as you attempt to close yourself off pathetically, trying to take a step back before you feel two hands on you— one on the small of your back, the other on your hip as they both push you back against the vanity; the startled yelp you let out is embarrassing, your hands flying down to support yourself from how firmly they push you forward. 

“We have well over an hour to finish getting ready,” Taehyun breathes out, lips brushing against your jaw as he lets out a soft sigh, “And that’s a lot of time, isn’t it?”

Hueningkai hums in agreement; his hand is the one on your hip as it rubs soothing circles, leaning down to where you hang your head and sending you a misleading smile.

“We should do something to pass the time.”

God, were they always this close? They’re filling your senses and making you dizzy, your hands beginning to ache from how hard you’re gripping the edge of the vanity as you simply gulp in response. Their lips are soft and fucking sticky from the gloss you just put on them, leaving kiss marks along your skin as they kiss you softly, mumbling compliments and praise that you can barely get through your head from how dizzy you feel. 

“Do you know that we try to request you for every show?” Taehyun asks, watching the way your eyes flutter shut as Hueningkai begins to trail kisses down your neck, open-mouthed and sultry as he nips at your skin teasingly, “Some bullshit about you knowing our complexion best— don’t get us wrong, you do, but…”

“You’re like a lucky charm,” Hueningkai finishes for him, pulling away and bringing a hand up to grab at your chin, tilting you to look at him as he stares at you with lidded eyes, “The show won’t go well if our pretty makeup artist isn’t here with us.”

You whimper— and shit, it’s humiliating, your cheeks growing hot immediately after as you wish nothing more than to dig a hole for yourself then and there— but oh, their words are so hypnotizing to you, speaking about you like you’re something they can’t live without, touching you like they’re starved and desperate to get a taste.

And judging by the way they look at you, they definitely are. 

“Sometimes… we wonder if it’s enough, just getting a look at you before we go on stage,” Hueningkai says, and it’s Taehyun’s turn to nod along and leave teasing touches, his hand playing with the hem of your shirt as he noses at your throat, taking in your scent with a satisfied sigh.

“I think it’d be nice if you wished us luck tonight,” Hueningkai says, tilting his head as he gives you a puppy-eyed look, “Don’t you wanna?”

Fuck. You can’t think straight, not when they’re taking up your space, unable to keep their hands and lips off you as they wait not-so-innocently for your response. Shutting your eyes, you try to move past the warm and welcoming feeling of their hands to think.

“This is dangerous,” you finally spit out, biting your lip at the way they immediately back off, “You could get in trouble— I could lose my job.”

“Oh please,” Taehyun scoffs, sitting back against the vanity as he crosses his arms, “The company doesn’t care about what we do in our private life— you’ve seen the way the others can get with their little groupies, right?”

You mull over his words for a second; it’s no secret that this band is very active and reckless, though you suppose the company has taken advantage of that and began to use it as their image halfway through their career— at least, that must be the case if they’re able to advance on you so boldly, the rest of your coworkers unfazed by the whole situation. 

“But— my job—?”

“You think none of these other people that work here haven’t fooled around with their groups?” Taehyun asks, the incredulous smile on his face quickly turning to a pout as he coos at the innocent, wide-eyed look you give him, “They know how to keep a secret, pretty— so do we.”

This is ridiculous— even more so because you find yourself considering it, quickly shaking your head upon the sobering realization— though, the two are keen to notice the way you have yet to try and scurry away from them like always. 

“Don’t you feel tired of being so uptight all the time?” Huening asks, your head snapping up to watch as he places his hands on your shoulders, hovering behind you as he massages them gently, “We could help you relax. Have some fun, even.”

The two try to keep it cool the moment you lean into Hueningkai’s touch— though, you can still pick up on the way Taehyun’s eyes widen and Hueningkai’s hands freeze for just a second, your eyes threatening to shut from the way you remain too shy to gauge their reactions. 

“Won’t someone come in?”

In response, they laugh— poor thing, they think, glancing back at the door that got locked long ago, if they were finally going to get their hands on you, the last thing they would do is allow someone else to see. 

“No one will come in right now— we’re supposed to be changing, aren’t we?” Hueningkai says, smiling against your skin as he continues, “It’d be an invasion of privacy to try and come in now.”

They grin at the way you remain silent, clearly lost in thought by their words.

“Want us to treat you good?” Taehyun asks, placing a hand on your waist before he’s leaning in, his lips brushing against yours as he lets out a shaky breath, “Thank you for your hard work?”

Finally you break. 

“Please.”

Taehyun is a messy kisser— though, you don’t find yourself to be too surprised, always more eager out of the two to get his hands on you as he begins to kiss you with abandon— his hand cupping your jaw to keep you close, tongue prodding your mouth open and sharp teeth sinking into your plush lips teasingly; behind you, Hueningkai has moved his hands to your hips, pulling you back and forcing your back to arch as you feel him begin to rut his cock into you slowly, dark eyes taking in the way you only whine and moan under their touch. 

“Fuck, let me use those pretty hands, baby,” Taehyun sighs against your lips, guiding you down to his hard bulge and smiling against your lips the moment you begin to palm him; you’re slow and unsure with your movements, but that only makes Taehyun needier as he begins to rut his length against your palm, eager to get stimulation as he places his hand on top of yours to guide you to hold him through his sweats.

“Is playing hard to get fun for you?” Hueningkai asks, his voice low and rough as he plays with the hem of your shorts, pulling at the waistband before letting it go and allowing it to snap against your skin, “I can feel you soaking through your shorts— so fucking needy, why have you been avoiding us so long?”

You don’t have half the brain to answer that question; not when Taehyun has slipped your hand under his sweats and Hueningkai currently pulls down your skirt, leaving you exposed as you hold Taehyun’s cock and allow him to fuck into your first with shaky breaths against your lips. 

Trying to avoid them was such a stupid decision— because if it meant you could have these two boys like this sooner, drunk off your touch and desperate to take even more from you, you would’ve given in to their cheeky comments and shameless flirting long ago. 

Hueningkai’s fingers are slender and long as they glide up and down your slit; pressing against your panties, taking in the way you’ve soaked through them with a deep satisfaction as he lets out a breathy laugh. His middle and ring finger press at your entrance, listening to the way you whine and almost letting out a groan at the way you wiggle your hips and press them back in hopes of feeling him inside you. 

“Waited so long for this,” Hueningkai breathes out, hooking his fingers under the waistband of your panties and pulling them down sloowwly, watching as you whine impatiently before you’re stepping out of your garments— You pull away from Taehyun, staring down at the way he bucks into your fist and missing the way he bites his lip to suppress a laugh at the sight of Hueningkai pocketing your soaked panties. 

“Wanted to fuck you the moment you got assigned to us— our pretty makeup artist,” Hueningkai sighs, placing a kiss in between your shoulder blades before he’s fucking his fingers into you, jaw clenching at the way you suck in his fingers and tighten around him pathetically, the wet sounds that come from his shallow thrusts enough to have your head hanging with pleasure. 

“Do you…” you sigh, letting out a soft whine as Taehyun takes a handful of your hair and forces your head back up, clearing your throat in a weak attempt to continue as the said man now begins to kiss and suck softly at your neck, careful to not leave any marks, “Do this to… fuck, every crew member you think is attractive? Mess with them shamelessly and try to corner them so you can finally fuck them? …Hmm?”

Hueningkai’s index finger is tracing your entrance teasingly— he laughs softly at your comment, choosing not to say anything as he stretches you out with a third finger instead; he’s curling his fingers and grinding his hand into your cunt, taking in your expression with hungry eyes and noting the places that make your legs shake. 

“You think we do this to just anyone?” Taehyun asks, brows furrowed as he pulls away, taking in the way you wince at his appearance— more specifically, his lip tint that has smudged all over his lips and chin and onto your skin, “Baby, I hope you realize that you’re the first person we’ve ever pulled this shit on.”

“And the last,” Hueningkai chimes in, looming over your shoulder as he bites at your earlobe teasingly, his other hand circling your waist to rub at your clit, “We plan to keep you.”

God. You hope he didn’t notice the way you clenched pathetically from his words, but judging by the way he laughs breathily and fucks his fingers harder into you, he definitely did. 

“Shit, what aren’t these hands good for?” Taehyun asks, watching the way you pump along his length and reach up to swipe the precum that leaks from his tip, spreading it along the rest of his length as you watch the way your hand glistens and becomes messy from your actions, “You have no idea how much I thought about this— always felt so guilty watching as you did my makeup so innocently, unaware that I’d give up my job if it meant I could— I could bend you over this vanity and fuck you good.”

“Did you ever fantasize about us?” Hueningkai teases, only to be surprised by the way you nod your head frantically, eyes shutting from embarrassment as you grind your hips back into him, just to get a feel of his cock against your ass, “Yeah? What’d you think about? Maybe we could make it happen.”

You shake your head no— you’re reluctant to spew out your fantasies as easily as the two are, but that only proves to be a mistake from the way Hueningkai’s fingers slip out of you, instead landing down harshly on your ass as you jump at the sudden feeling. 

“What, too shy to tell us?” Taehyun asks, placing a hand on top of your own and making you slow to a stop as he examines your face, “Then again, you’ve always been a shy little thing— it’s your charm, you know.”

You can only let out a pathetic whimper at that; Taehyun is shaking your hand off him, your eyes fluttering open as you watch him tuck himself back in, giving you a sly smile before he’s sitting back down in his chair— Hueningkai is taking a step back, but it’s only to bend you over as he lets out a soft chuckle at your reaction— nodding to Hueningkai, Taehyun grins, his dimple poking at his cheek as he speaks.

“You first, Kai? I’ll give you the honors for being so patient.”

Your mouth is falling open the moment you feel his tip glide along your entrance— going up and down, clearly teasing you as he allows your wetness to collect on his dick, forcing you to listen to the sounds as you let out a shaky sigh, staring down at the vanity and your tense hands that are curled into fists— slowly, he begins to push into you, enjoying the way you bite your lip in an attempt to muffle your sounds, failing to do so as Hueningkai resorts to the next best thing— his hand is firm against your mouth as he holds your head up, your eyes meeting his through the mirror as you watch him begin to fuck you slowly.

The stretch has you blinking away tears of pleasure— if it weren’t for Hueningkai keeping you quiet, you’re sure you would’ve gotten the attention of the rest of the crew, your sounds muffled against the palm of his hand as your body begins to jolt forward from his pace, the vanity shaking slightly from the impact. 

“Fuck,” Hueningkai grunts, brows furrowed together as he watches himself disappear inside you, “So perfect. Pussy was made for me, look how good you take it.”

The two only laugh as you let out a weak whine at the praise— they’ve got you figured out good, and you’re meeting Taehyun’s gaze through the mirror as you catch him staring at you, stroking his cock at a slow pace as he simply gives you a teasing grin.

“Why don’t you watch the way Huening fucks you, pretty?” He asks, and your eyes flicker back to the sight he’s talking about, meeting Huenigkai’s eyes as he simply sends you a coy smile, “You look so perfect like this— bent over the desk like a pretty doll, perfect for us to use… isn’t that right?”

Before you can moan out a muffled response, a sharp knock on the door takes your attention; you’re jolting to try and get Huening off you in a hurry, but the boy merely retaliates by pulling you back against him, colliding against his chest and letting out a weak whimper at the feeling of him rutting his hips up into you— watch, he growls into your ear, grinning with satisfaction as you immediately follow his orders.

“Yeah?” Taehyun calls out, his tone much too casual for someone who’s watching his fellow band member fuck the cute staff member the two have been pining for. 

“Have you seen ___ anywhere? The makeup artist?” It’s Soobin, you all realize, your reaction of horror greatly contrasting the way the two merely smile casually at the realization, “They’ve been looking for her, and I thought you two would know where she might be.”

“Uhhhhm…” Taehyun draws out, crossing his arms and tilting his head as he watches the way Hueningkai continues to fuck you, fingers digging into your cheeks as his eyes widen at the way you’ve begun to squirm from his grip, your orgasm approaching as you try to grind your hips in search for more stimulation. 

“If we knew where she was at, we’d probably be there bothering her,” Taehyun jokes, a crooked smile on his face as he listens to the way Soobin scoffs on the other side, “But seriously, we’re changing right now. She finished our makeup a while ago, we haven’t seen her.”

A moment passes; you think you might explode from how hard you’re trying to hold back your orgasm, but Hueningkai seems to be hellbent on making you cum from the way his free hand goes to circle your clit, your mouth falling open as you practically shake from the feeling. 

“Well…” another pause— Soobin sighs, and Taehyun can already picture the man running a hand through his hair on the other side of the door, “Let me know if you find her.”

After a moment, his footsteps fade entirely— it’s only then that Hueningkai bends you over once more, grabbing your hips and using this as leverage to fuck you back into him as you whimper that you’re close— seconds after, you’re squeezing Hueningkai so hard he thinks his cock might slip out, fucking you through your orgasm as your legs simply tremble from the intensity of it all. 

“Did that get you off, baby?” Hueningkai murmurs, his hips beginning to stutter as he watches you lay against the desk, your cheek pressed against the wood as you only let out weak whines in response, “Knowing we were about to get caught? Is that what made you cum, cutie?”

In a pathetic attempt to dodge his question, you bury your head in your arms— the man behind you simply laughs, pressing on the small of your back and grinding into you slowly, biting his lip at the sight. 

“Want me to cum inside? Fill you up and have it leak down your legs, making people wonder just where you disappeared to for so long?” frantically, you nod; you’re pressing your ass back against him, trying to fuck back into him as Hueningkai only groans at the sight— moments later, you’re practically biting through your lip from the feeling of him filling you up so well, trying his best to fuck his cum back into you the moment it begins to drip back out. 

A moment passes where the two of you simply remain still, attempting to regain your breaths— then, you hear sounds of shuffling and footsteps, and you’re meekly raising your head from your arms to watch as Taehyun approaches the two of you with a teasing smile.

“You should go get cleaned up and change,” Taehyun says, tapping your ass with a smile, “It’s my turn now, isn’t that right baby?”

Hueningkai rolls his eyes at the other’s antics— then, he’s slowly pulling out, hissing softly at the feeling before he’s grabbing your face and bringing you up for a kiss— it’s slow and sensual, his plump lips addicting as he sneaks his tongue in for a taste of you— he’s reluctant to pull away, and only does so when you grip his shirt in your hands weakly and whine petulantly in his mouth— pulling away, he’s sending you a soft smile, taking in the sight of your shining and swollen lips before he’s telling you I’ll be right back— Taehyun rolls his eyes at his words. 

“Tell me,” Taehyun begins, bending you over once more and keeping his head next to yours, encouraging you to hold eye contact with him as he smiles softly— his index and middle finger are slowly massaging up and down your slit, and you let out a weak whimper at the feeling of him gathering the cum that’s leaking out of you before he’s pushing it back in slowly, “What would you fantasize about? I’d love to try it out on you.”

He won’t do anything until he hears your confession— a sign that you really did want them all along, forcing himself to tease you instead as he takes in the way you begin to break slowly, your hips attempting to chase pleasure, only to be stopped by Taehyun’s firm grip on your hip. 

“I could do so many things to you,” he mutters softly, placing a chaste kiss on your shoulder before he continues, “All you have to do is tell me.”

Fuck, where do you even begin? All the things you’ve ever thought about these two boys were reserved for the dark hours of the night when you couldn’t control your wandering mind, never to be revealed as you always told yourself you’d take this attraction to your grave— but now, as you feel Taehyun’s fingertips continuously dip into your entrance teasingly, able to feel the way some of Hueningkai’s cum has already run down your thighs, you really can’t be blamed for the way Taehyun’s sparkling doe eyes are able to extract the words from you without a second thought.

“Thought of riding you while I did your makeup,” you whimpered out pathetically, the confession enough to make your face feel like it was on fire— Taehyun, however, thinks the image might just make him cum on the spot, so he doesn’t have it in him to be apologetic as he quickly guides you back to his makeup chair and makes you hover over him.

“Well? What’re you waiting for?” He asks breathlessly, straddling his lap and staring down at him with wide eyes as he keeps his hands on your waist, having yet to find release as he feels his cock straining painfully against his sweats, “Now’s your chance, cutie.”

You stare at Taehyun— at his smudged makeup, his flushed cheeks, and his eyes that are blown open with need— and nod meekly, your hand reaching to take him out before you’re lining him up with your entrance, brows furrowing slightly as you properly take in his size.

That does little to hinder you; the way you sink on Taehyun is fucking painfully slow, and the said man is cursing in your ear as he feels the way you clench around him, your and Hueningkai’s release already coating his dick and making a mess of the chair as you stare at him with bleary eyes. 

“Don’t you need to fix my makeup?” Taehyun asks, his voice a bit strained from the effort to not pound into you recklessly— cluelessly, you nod, your expression making Taehyun let out a breathy laugh, “Do what you need to— I’ll do all the hard work, pretty thing.”

You’re unsure of what he may mean until he’s nodding back at the makeup case behind you— letting out a soft oh, you reach for your supplies, shaky hands taking what you need before you’re turning back to Taehyun. 

His hands are on the swell of your ass, smiling fondly at you before he begins to buck his hips up into you— softly at first, giving you the illusion that he’ll actually let you work, then becoming rougher as he watches the way your expression breaks, coherence leaving your eyes as you simply look at him with bleary, clueless eyes— your actions are oh so slow as you try to touch up on his makeup, trying your best to not make things worse than they already are— but the task seems to be impossible with the way Taehyun fucks you, biting his lip and guiding your hips up and down to get you to ride him as well, already noticing a second orgasm building up from the way you help him out eagerly. 

“Tyun,” you whimper out, makeup supplies in your fists as you place them firmly on his chest, “This isn’t working— I can’t… ah…!”

You’re interrupted mid-sentence as you’re finally coming undone on top of him— the makeup supplies in your hands dig into your skin from how hard you grip onto them, a weak, choked moan escaping you as Taehyun only continues to fuck you through it, not slowing down even after you’ve ridden out your high, going back to whining that you can’t do it, it’s too hard— too much.

“Yes you can,” he grins, taking in the way you only shake your head with satisfaction, “Okay then, can you hold out until I cum then? Can you be good for me, pretty girl?”

You don’t hesitate to nod at that; it has Taehyun laughing before it’s choked off into a moan, finally able to use you to his liking as he begins to fuck you rougher— shit… you hear him groan, and one look at him is enough to tell you that he’s staring at the sight in the mirror behind you— taking in how pretty you look as you bounce on his cock, hands desperately holding onto him as you tuck your head into his shoulder— The feeling of your lips sucking absentmindedly at his skin is enough to set him off, bottoming out inside you and groaning at the way his cum spurts inside you, barely able to stay in from how full you already are. 

Gradually, his pace slows down to nothing but a slow grind— you’re attempting to regain your breath once you finally sit up, still perched prettily on his cock as you begin to touch up his makeup with shaky hands. 

“Hmm? That’s unfair,” Hueningkai’s sudden voice has your head snapping up, looking to where he stands as he taps a finger at his collarbone, “Why didn’t I get one of those?”

Your eyes widen as you’re turning back to Taehyun at break-neck speed— sure enough, you’ve left a mark, and you can already feel your stomach sinking at the thought of having to cover that up. 

“Relax, our outfits are pretty covered,” Taehyun scoffs, reading your expression with a playful roll of his eyes, “But I wouldn’t really mind having others see it.”

“No fair, can I get one?” Hueningkai pouts, even more so when you deny him shyly, focusing on your task and pretending as though you’re currently not sitting firmly on Taehyun’s cock with both their cum leaking out of you.

“Baby,” Hueningkai calls out softly, making you turn your head as he captures you in another kiss— it’s even messier than last time, which you really didn’t think was possible as you’re left panting for breath once he pulls away, your eyes widening at the lopsided grin he sends you. 

“Fix my makeup next?”

Fuck, they’ll miss their damn show at this point. 

[justplainwhump]

They deserve it

This is a prompt fill for Day 3 of Whumpmas in July, @whumpmasinjuly-archive.

Set in parallel to the beginning of my BBU series Pet Safety, refers to the first two chapters.

Renee is just being a very creepy person.

Content / warnings: BBU, voyeuristic whumper pov, creepy/sadistic whumper, mention of (group) noncon, filmed whump, forced to watch, demeaning language, this is pretty rough in general. Also short pregnancy mention but that is in no way part of the whump, and not related to whumpee.

Renee has never told Cory, that she's paid WRU's refurb unit double to be sent the tapes of their pets' processing. He wouldn't understand, she wagered. Her husband had always had a soft spot for his plaything.

So she patiently waits until he is at work, before she puts on a record of Haydn's "The Creation" and then curls up on the couch to watch the tapes for a third time, just as the first soloist starts to sing.

They're vile, these videos, but it's that particular, thrilling flavor of vile, that makes the hair on her arms stand up and her heart flutter.

It's nothing sexual that she feels, as she watches Cory's pathetic little WRU whore writhe in the brutal hold of two sturdy Guards, underlined with Haydn's magnificent music. It's another sort of pleasure. Peace of mind, maybe.

The pet on the screen is in a disgusting state, covered in blood and come. One of the men in the video fucks her roughly from behind, the other lands punch after punch. And next to them, fixed to the white wall with clinical looking fastings, Renee's own pet, the good, perfect Rosa, cannot to anything but watch.

Renee smiles at the perfect composition of that ensemble. It's the same lazy, content smile she sees on her friends faces after a holiday or a day at the spa. She's ordered that treatment, after a short consultation with WRU Customer Satisfaction.

They deserve it.

Blanca deserves it for her audacity.

Rosa deserves it for her lack in loyalty.

Cory deserves it, for the too long looks he liked to spare for Blanca, for the lingering touches, for the barely veiled adoration of her whore body.

On screen, when the man pulls out, lets her drop to the floor like a wet rag only to make space for a fresh team, Blanca doesn't even react any longer. Pathetic.

Renee hums and takes a sip of that pricey, fizzy non-alcoholic peach drink she's bought just for this occasion and imagines it's champagne. She has to take care of herself and her body these days. Not too much stress, the doctor has ordered.

Good that she has just the way to unwind.

The video is silent, but it's easy to see that Rosa's cries must be devastating, as she witnesses the wayward pet get beautifully, perfectly ruined.

She'll never forget her place again.

Renee smiles fondly and rests a hand her rounded belly. There's a month or so still, until Rosa is needed back here, to fulfill the duty she's been purchased for.

WRU assured her that Rosa's loyalty would never be diverted again.

On the screen, a handler drags Blanca's lifeless body away.

"Bye bye," Renee whispers, and lifts the champagne flute to her lips.

Only Rosa remains in the white room, crying, strung up on the wall. Renee zooms in on her teary face and smiles softly. The video won't end for another 43 minutes. And, just like the last two times, Renee is not going to miss a second of it.

[godmadeaterribleerror]

Chapter 21 - Some Things You Just Can't Speak About

Series Masterlist

Author's Note: I think it’s high time I admit I accidentally gave Her a praise kink and both of them size kinks. Oops. That’s my bad y’all. Chapter Title from epiphany by Taylor Swift

Word Count: 30k (so long I had to combine paragraphs...)

Chapter Summary/Warnings: Everyone takes steps forward, and a few back. Usual warnings, with extra alerts on the smut. Just so much smut.

Tags: Soldier Boy/Supe!Female Reader, canon divergence, enemies to friends to lovers, canon divergence, slow burn, fluff, smut, angst, pining

Read on A03!

Chapter 20 - Chapter 22

He hadn’t meant to fall asleep. Ben hadn’t even been that fucking tired, but his eyes had somehow closed and his brain that had been supposed to stay alert—focused on Her, her safety and every shifting movement she made against him—became glossed over and lulled into a haze by Her. In his arms, tucked into his body, with her breath hot against his skin and her heartbeat slow and steady in his ears. Safe and home, smiling slightly in her sleep and holding onto his shirt in the dark. Ben loved her, and when she’d hooked one leg over Ben’s hips and given a content sigh in her sleep he’d almost exploded. She was perfect, and clinging to him like he might vanish from her hands, and he’d made the mistake of kissing her brow.

She’d leaned into it. In deep sleep, without a single fucking thought about it, she’d pushed herself up Ben’s chest and made a small, happy humming sound that shattered all of Ben’s will and vigilance because it was just Her. So peaceful and calm, sleeping in Ben’s arms like nightmares weren’t even something to fucking consider. It was contagious. She’d used that stupid flower shampoo—it was better on Her than Ben, stronger and more potent—and her hands were still as her heartbeat rolled through him like a drug. Pulling Ben down, down, down without a fight, because she was in his arms and everything was right.

When Ben woke up, it was easy. Eyes pulling themselves open because he was rested, and the pillow against his face had blocked out all the light of morning pushing into the room. He’d rolled over in his sleep, but She wasn’t under him or at his side. There was a weight on his back that felt like Hers, and a soft sound of a piano that they didn’t own surrounding Ben’s head that Her voice floated over, smooth and controlled, brighter and warmer than the sunlight on Ben’s face when he turned his head. The whole room smelled like honey, and Ben could feel a soft wind coming from nowhere. He made a low sound—against his fucking will—and the music stopped.

“Hi,” Her voice was near his ear, and one of her arms was resting on his shoulders. She was on top of Ben, sprawled across his body with her legs half-straddling him and half-tanged in his, her hand fucking petting Ben’s hair. She was trying to fucking kill him. “You’re up.”

“Fucking obviously,” he muttered, and She just laughed into his neck. A light, joyful sound that made Ben’s whole body relax and his mouth twitch up. “Why are you sitting on me.”

Her hand trailed down the back of Ben’s head, resting on his neck. “You’re comfortable.”

“We’re on a goddamn bed-“

She leaned up, kissing Ben’s cheek with a small hum, and rolled off his body, onto the mattress beside him. Ben’s arms flew out to catch Her, stop her from getting too far away or falling off of the damn bed, and when her perfect, beautiful face landed in his view, she was smiling.

“Grumpy-“

Ben yanked Her forward, back against his body where she fit so fucking well, and kissed the small yelp out of her mouth. Let Her moan into his throat as he sat up against the headboard, pulling her with him until she was in his lap and was falling right onto his chest. Where she was fucking made to be. But, even as he fucking ate Her, Ben kept vigilant attention to her every movement and reaction. Every shift of her hips and small sound that escaped her throat when he squeezed her waist that drew them closer and closer to Ben having to stop, to reaching that unspoken limit of what he could take and take and take and give, and having to pull back so She could make that choice for him. 

She ground down on Ben once with a breathless moan, and froze. Dropped Her head down to his chest and sighed, resting against him with nothing more. She was going to apologize. She was going to try and fucking apologize to Ben for this—he recognized that small, sad sigh that meant she was going to be sorry—and he didn’t want it. He didn’t want Her to keep apologizing for everything, to keep thinking Ben gave a shit what they were doing or not doing when he had Her back. All that fucking mattered was that she was here and safe, and if Ben had to be a celibate fucking monk pussy for the rest of his life so be it. She’d be there, and Ben loved Her, and that was enough. He wished he could just tell Her he loved her, and make her understand that if she said sorry for this again, Ben would lose his fucking mind.

But he couldn’t. Not now, not when She wasn’t ready. When she was ready Ben would make Her whine and moan and do whatever the fuck she asked him to. He might die on his knees for Her, just to try and make her get it. Finally fucking believe that She was the most important thing in the universe, and Ben was lucky she was just sharing oxygen with him. That he fucking loved Her, and she should never apologize to him. He would rather eat a goddamn bullet than have her think she ever needed to apologize to him. So he spoke before She could even try to.

“You were singing.”

She tilted her head up, watching Ben with a frown. “What?” 

“Before I woke up,” he grunted, pulling Her a little higher up his chest. He wanted her closer, as close as she’d fucking allow. “You were singing.” 

“Yeah, I,” She sighed, and her arms moved up to wrap around Ben’s neck. “I just wanted to see what I could do. If I’d regressed.” 

Ben paused, examining Her sad expression, her soft words echoing in his head. “You didn’t sing at Vought.” 

“No,” She shook her head. “They never even mentioned it. I don’t think they forgot, Sage wouldn’t forget. Homelander-“ She made a small, pained sound with the name, and that was enough of that fucking shit. “He-“ 

Ben kissed her, gentle and soft until she sighed and her nails stopped digging into his skin. When he pulled back—She was so fucking perfect, swollen lips parted and pretty eyes watching him—Ben said Her name, firm and slow. “Tell me what you were singing.”

She blinked. “But-“ 

“No.” Ben glared at Her, and she swallowed her own words. “Tell me about your fucking song, or shut the hell up.” 

“Rude.” Her words were mumbled, but lighter. No strain in her voice, the pure fucking sadness in her eyes fading when she looked at Ben. “You’re not the boss of me, Benjamin, you can’t tell me what to do.”

He snorted. “You don’t even listen to your real boss, Sunshine. I don’t think that would change a single goddamn thing.”

“Well-“

“And,” Ben leaned down, bumping his nose with hers. “I don’t need to be your boss to tell you what to do. You like it when I order you around.” 

Her face was flushed, breathing heavy against Ben’s mouth, and she was so fucking perfect. “Fuck you.” 

He winked. “That’s the idea.” 

“Horny old man.”

“It’s all for you, beautiful.” He kissed her nose, and she made a small, high sound that was going to make Ben cum in his pants like a teenager. “Tell me about your music, or admit you get turned on when I tell you what to do.”

“You can’t fucking prove that I-“

“Don’t need to.” Ben pulled back, grinning down at Her. “I know how fucking wet you get when I throw you around, or make you beg.”

“Ben-“

“If it helps,” he grabbed Her chin gently, holding her gaze to his. “I think it’s fucking hot when you tell me what to do.”

She swallowed, chewing on her mouth as she watched Ben with wide eyes. “You do?”

What he wanted to say was don’t be dumb, Sunshine, of course I fucking do. You get all bossy and loud, and it makes me want to throw you against a wall to see just how loud I can get you. It makes me fucking love you more, because you’re not afraid of me and trust that I’ll listen to you. Because you never fucking waver, and I love you, and I think you should keep telling me what to do for the rest of fucking time, because that means you’re with me for the rest of fucking time and I can fuck you and make you so goddamn happy and I love you. I fucking love you, and you’re a brat who thinks she knows everything, but you actually do and it’s so fucking hot. And I love you. But He can’t say that. Not now.

“I do.” Ben smirked at Her, running his thumb over her lower lip. “Just like you it when I tell you how beautiful you are, and tell you to say my name, and how good you are-“

She made a strangled sound, and something flashed through Ben’s body. Some sort of feeling that was consuming and vast and powerful, that rushed through him before being almost yanked away. She’d leaned back, away from Ben, and this was the line he had to walk. He didn’t fucking understand it, why She’d let him say almost every filthy thought he had aloud, why she’d let Ben tell her all the ways he wanted to fuck her, but wouldn’t allow him to just do it. Just fuck Her smart as shit brain empty and blissful, let Ben make her feel good like she deserved. Why when she peeled off of his body she did it like it was impossible, why she kept looking at Ben with a fucking want and adoration but wouldn’t just tell him what to do to help. He wanted to fucking help her, make this better for her, and she wouldn’t tell him how.

All he could do was stay, and wait, and keep finding that exact line between making Her smile and happy and heartbeat steady, and telling her he fucking loved her and having her moan into his throat while he fucked her until she was good. Ben didn’t want Her to be okay or fine, she needed to be goddamn good. Nobody deserved to be fucking good like she did. To feel as desired as Ben desired her, to have someone love them like Ben loved her. He’d do anything for her. The longer she was near him to more certain Ben became that he’d do fucking anything for her. Which was why he had to wait. He had to file away how She’d looked at him when he’d called her good and try to ignore his boner—making a poor attempt to shift it away from Her thigh—and just wait. She wanted him, Ben knew she wanted him, and now all he had to do was wait.

“I’m-“

“Music,” Ben snapped, because she wasn’t fucking apologizing to him. She’d stayed on the bed— leaning into Ben’s side with her head buried in his shoulder—and there wasn’t a single reason she needed to apologize. “Tell me about your music.”

“It’s not interesting,” Her voice was muffled against Ben’s body, breath warm on his skin. “I was just practicing. I don’t even really remember what I was singing-“

Ben knew what she’d been singing. It was one of the songs he’d tried to learn while she was gone, but had been so slow and long and tedious so he’d given the fuck up and moved onto something with a goddamn beat. And when he grunted the answer for Her, she looked up at him with narrow eyes. 

“How did you know?” 

“You’ve sung it before,” he muttered. “I pay attention, Sunshine-” 

“And I’ve never sung that one.” She shuffled up, onto her knees, until her eyes were level with Ben’s. “Truth, Benjamin. Now.”

“That was-“ 

“Nope.” She shook her head. “It wasn’t.” 

Ben scowled. This shouldn’t be so hard to tell Her. He’d missed her, she knew he’d missed her, and it wasn’t a big fucking deal. She might tease him, but she always teased him. And she wouldn’t figure out Ben loved her just from this. He wouldn’t lose his chance to tell Her the right way—holding her perfect face in his hands, when there was nothing to interrupt them or try to separate them, when Ben could fuck her immediately after—because there wasn’t a chance something this stupid would give him away.

“I listened to your music while you were gone.”

“Oh.”

“I missed you.” He grunted, trying to figure out if that was a confused oh, or a turned on oh, or a I’ve figured out you love me, Benjamin oh. “And I was bored as fucking balls. I listened to all your stupid songs, and that was one of them. It’s not-“

“Ben,” Her voice was a whisper, and her whole face was soft. Looking at Ben with that adoration in her eyes, tugging on his arm until his words trailed off. “I missed you too.”

“I fucking know that-“

“No,” She shook her head, hands running mindlessly up and down Ben’s skin. “I really, really missed you. And I’m-“

“Don’t say sorry,” Ben glared at her. “If you say sorry, I’ll never kiss you again.” 

She scoffed. “Fuck off, Pretty Boy. We both know that’s not true.” 

It was. Ben would probably die if he never kissed her again. But he wasn’t losing this argument. “You don’t want to take that bet, Sunshine.” 

“Yeah, I do.” 

“Someone’s real fucking sure of herself-“ 

“Well,” She grinned, smug and perfect and Ben fucking loved her. “It’s hard not to be when I just had Soldier Boy say he listened to music because he missed me-“

“I told you not to fucking call me that,” Ben leaned forwards, letting their lips brush, savoring how her words died with the pretty flush of Her face. “And of course I missed you.” I fucking love you. “Nobody else moans my name quite like you do. Brat.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “You’re such an asshole.”

“You fucking love it.”

She was silent, watching Ben like he was everything but with something heavy in her eyes. Mouth a small pout Ben couldn’t understand for his goddamn life. She’d looked at him like this before, and Ben never fucking understood what it meant. If it was just lust—her eyes were blown out, and Her heart was fast—or that adoration, or want or need or fucking what-

“I do,” She sighed softy, and Ben was fucking confused. “You’re a cunt, but I do.” 

He grunted Her name, because she needed to stop looking at Ben like that or he’d tell her he loved her. If She kept staring at Ben with her hands warm on his arm and that small smile on her mouth that he couldn’t understand, Ben would damn any consequence or repercussion and say he loved Her. 

“You didn’t have any nightmares.”

Ben blinked at Her, word dying in his throat. “What.”

“You were asleep for hours,” She tilted her head at him. “No nightmares.”

“What the fuck does that matter.” 

“You said they were getting worse. I can start working on your PTSD again-“ 

“No.” Ben’s words were fast, firm, and rough. He hadn’t had a fucking nightmare last night, he’d slept like a goddamn baby, but She was with him, so everything was fine. And even if it wasn’t, Annie’s words kept fucking rattling around in his head. Don’t hurt her. “I’ve got a grip on it.”

“But-“

He said Her name, moving up to kiss her brow and hum words against her skin. “This isn’t your fucking problem. I’ve got it.”

“I want to help-“

“I know,” he sighed, because of course She did. Stupid fucking perfect and kind woman. “But I’ve fucking got it handled.”

She nodded slowly, rising higher on her knees until they were level once more. “Promise?” 

“Swear it.” 

“You’ll keep,” She swallowed. “You’ll keep sleeping in bed with me? Even with the nightmares?”

“Do you want me to.” 

“Yes-“

“Then I will.” Ben shrugged, because it was that fucking simple. She wanted him here, this was where he would be. He still thought it was a dumb as shit idea—she needed to be able to always sleep peacefully, never be worried about Ben’s nightmares of blood waking her up—but he’d still stay. If all he could do was stay, he’d stay. “But you don’t get to waste time on my shell shock.”

“It’s not wasting time,” She frowned. “It helps you.” 

“I’m fine, Sunshine.” 

“But-“ 

“No.” Ben moved a hand into Her hair, stopping the frantic shake of her head. “I keep sleeping in the bed, you don’t work on the shell shock. Deal?” 

She sighed. “Deal.” 

Ben grinned, and kissed her once. It was long, biting her lip and running his tongue along the roof of her mouth, going until she was breathless and slack against his body. They probably had to fucking move, Ben could see the sun higher in the sky, and they both had shit to do. Soon, Butcher would start barging into their bedroom and demanding they attended the team meeting, and Ben was not going to allow that shit. This version of Her—where she molded perfectly against him and smiled at him so easily—was sacred, and Butcher wasn’t allowed to see. Nobody was allowed to see it but Ben, because she only showed it to him and he’d protect that with his goddamn life. So—in a display of restraint and sheer fucking willpower that should earn Ben some sort of medal—he pulled back. Ben gave Her one last tug of her lip between his teeth, sat in the needy sound that left her throat, and grinned down at her perfect, relaxed face. “Hungry?”

She nodded, and made a soft, heady sound that made Ben’s brain a little fucking foggy.

“Up,” he grunted, wrapping his arms around Her hauling her up his chest. “Let’s move.”

“What time-“

“Late.” He muttered. “And we need to eat before the meeting.”

“The meeting?” She frowned, arms tensing where they still rested around Ben’s neck. “What meeting?”

“Team meeting. At noon. It’s-“

“At noon?” She whacked his shoulder, and Ben tried to keep his gaze locked ahead as he stood, feeling Her glare burning into him. “Benjamin, why didn’t you fucking tell me-“

“I forgot,” he snapped. “I got fucking distracted, you’re just as much to blame-“

“Oh, fuck you.” Ben made the mistake of glaring down at Her, finding her sticking her tongue out at him and having to fight the urge to toss her back onto the bed and keep Her there forever. “I didn’t know. You did.”

“Well, if you hadn’t fucking sat on me, I wouldn’t have gotten off track and we’d have been downstairs a goddamn hour ago.”

“If you weren’t such a horny old cunt,” She grinned at him, kissing his neck and trying to fucking kill him. “You’d have been able to remember to do your job.”

“Brat.” He scowled into the air, trying to ignore how her pretty giggle rolled through his body, and she was trailing up to him jaw and driving him fucking insane. “I am doing my goddamn job, and we’re not fucking late to anything yet-”

“Yet,” She hummed. “I think you almost completely forgot. I think your memory is going-“

“My memory,” Ben found a better grip on Her body, using one arm to support her legs wrapped around his body and allowing the other to reach up and tug her face away from him, forcing Her to meet his eyes. “Is goddamn fine. You’re just a fucking needy, beautiful distraction.” He paused at the bottom of the stairs, watching her mouth fall open and smirking at the small whine that escaped her. He wasn’t even fucking touching Her. “But next time, I’ll just ignore you. I won’t suck your pretty face, or make you feel good. Is that what you fucking want?”

He’s won. She’s scoffing and rolling her eyes, squirming out of Ben’s grip, and he’s finally won one of these stupid things with words.

“Shut up.”

“No, you fucking said I should do my job, Sunshine, so next time you climb on me, I’ll throw you off and leave-“

She shoved his chest, pulling away from Ben’s arm trying to steady her feet. “Fuck you.”

“I won’t, not it if you don’t admit-“

She pulled his head down, kissing him like he was water and she’d been lost in the desert for years. Ben understood that, because he’d nearly fucking died of starvation while she’d been gone. He hadn’t even been hungry before her, he’d felt satisfied and been completely fucking satiated, then he’d gotten her and now he’d crave her for the rest of goddamn time. She was fucking perfect, and Ben loved Her, and when she kissed him like this he had to growl against her and dive down to make Her whine so he didn’t say it. He could say it. She was kissing Ben like he was everything and maybe, if he said it now, She’d just keep going. She’d smile at him and say Benjamin, I love you too, and he’d tell Her I love you more, Sunshine. You’re so goddamn perfect, and I love you so fucking much. It’s not possible for you to love me more than I love you, because nobody’s ever loved anyone like I love you. You drive me goddamn insane, and I’m going to fuck you until you get that. Got it? 

Ben almost heard her response, breathless in his ear even as she moaned into his mouth. Got it. But I love you more.

The feeling was back. For a split second something flashed like lightning through Ben’s body, setting him on fire before vanishing. She pulled her mouth away and took a small step back, and all Ben could do was stare at her and bite his tongue so he didn’t say it. She’d moved away again, she wasn’t ready, and Ben couldn’t say it.

“We should get ready,” she mumbled, staring intently at Ben’s chest. Not meeting his eyes. “It’s 11:30.”

“You need to eat-“ 

“I’ll go get dressed,” she glanced over her shoulder, frowning at the kitchen. “And you make some food? I don’t know what we have-“

“I can do it,” Ben muttered, taking a careful step toward Her. Another when she looked up at him and didn’t move away. “Sandwich?”

She nodded. “That sounds good. Do you want your phone?”

Ben grunted in agreement, and she smiled at him.

“Thank you.”

He rolled his eyes. “Shut up.”

She took a small step, standing right before Ben without actually just fucking touching him. His back went straight, his whole body tensing as he waited. She’d tell him what she wanted, and this was fucking killing him but he’d let her. He wouldn’t pick her up and eat her out on the dining room table, or slam her back into the wall and make her cum on his fingers like before. He had to wait, and it was worth it. All she did was smile at him with teeth and pure goddamn joy on her face, reaching up and kissing Ben’s cheek, and Christ on a fucking cross it was worth more than anything in the world. He didn’t breathe until She pulled back, didn’t do anything but watch Her and swallow down a shout of I love you, I fucking love you, do that again because I fucking love you and it’s better than any fucking high or rush as she turned and walked back up the stairs.

Ben made Her a sandwich and coffee—stupid goddamn love was turning him into a pussy and he couldn’t even bring himself to give a fuck—and caught his phone when she reappeared over on the loft strip, leaning over the railing and chucking it at his face.

“Jesus fucking christ, woman-“

She scoffed. “Don’t be a baby, Benjamin, you caught it. You’ve got a text from Butcher.”

Ben frowned down at his phone, where William Butcher; asshole, bother as much as possible, 3 Messages was displaying in a small banner on his lock screen. When he looked back up She was already gone back into the bedroom—Ben could hear her shuffling around, hear drawers opening and fabrics shifting, and had to actively fight the image of her naked out of his head—so he returned his attention to his phone and read Butcher’s texts.

William Butcher; asshole, bother as much as possible

Mallory said she’s been cleared, so you both better be at the meeting

Ryan will meet you both in the gym after

You two twats need to stop reunion fucking long enough to get to the dining hall

Nobody had told Ben they had a gym. He’d been here for four fucking months, and not once had anyone said they had a gym. He’d have to yell at Butcher about that later though, because she was walking back down the stairs, frowning at him and glancing at the phone in his hand.

“Everything good?”

He gave a tight nod, looking Her up and down. She was dressed—that was Ben’s fucking shirt—and her fingers were tapping at her side. “What’s wrong.”

“Nothing-“

Ben said Her name flatly, narrowing his eyes and holding her gaze. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I’m fine, Ben.” She sighed. “Will Ryan be there? At the meeting?”

“After. We’re meeting him in the gym.” Ben frowned, hearing Her heartbeat stumble. “If you don’t want to-“

“No!” She shook her head, eyes widening. “I want to, I do. I’m just, what if he doesn’t like me? Then what?”

He loved Her. Her eyes on Ben’s were so soft and concerned and Ben fucking loved Her. He took one long step across the room, pulling her up into his chest and holding Her perfect face between his hands, kissing Her until that worried little frown vanished and was replaced by an open mouth for Ben to mutter into.

“Stop being fucking insane.” 

She pushed his chest, but didn’t try to pull away. “Fucking rude-“

“I’ve already told you,” he grunted Her name, and her hands loosened on his shirt. “The Kid likes you.”

“You don’t know that-“

“I do.” Ben moved back, glaring at Her. “I’ve fucking talked to him about it, and he wouldn’t stop asking about you. Asking to meet you. He’s going to like you just fine, because he’s not a goddamn idiot.”

She swallowed. “You’ve really talked to him about me?”

Ben needed to learn when to shut the fuck up. His inability to not just tell Her everything he did and everything he thought didn’t bode well for keeping the fact that he loved her a secret. “I told you I did, and I’m not a fucking-” 

“Liar pussy, I know.” She was grinning again, and her eyes were sharp, so Ben decided however she was about to fucking tease him for this was worth it. “You didn’t say what you told him.” 

“I don’t remember.” That wasn’t a lie. Ben couldn’t fucking remember exactly what he’d told the Kid, because the Kid had asked a fuck ton of questions and Ben had answered all of them. He genuinely didn’t know what he had and hadn’t told the Kid. “But he already likes you. So don’t lose your damn mind worrying about it.”

“Okay.” Her voice was a whisper, and Ben kissed the top of Her head.

“You’re good.”

“I’m good.” She pulled back, tilting her head at Ben. “Did you say gym?”

“Butcher said we’re meeting the Kid there after the meeting.”

“Huh.” She frowned. “I didn’t know we had a gym.”

Ben snorted. Fucking Christ he loved Her. “They don’t tell us fucking shit, Sunshine.” He kissed the space between her eyes, light and soft and because he fucking could, and forced himself to step away. “I’m going to get changed. Eat.”

She wrinkled her perfect nose at him. “I was going to, don’t tell me what to do-“

“You like it.” 

“Fuck you.”

Ben winked, starting to walk past Her to the stairs. “You’d like that as well, wouldn’t you.”

She flipped him off, stalking to the kitchen, and Ben laughed. Really, fully laughed, feeling his goddamn cheeks hurt from grinning at Her. He fucking loved Her, and he’d missed so many goddamn things about Her—Her beautiful face, her pretty smile, her big words and smart fucking mouth, the sounds she made when Ben touched her—but he’d mostly just missed Her. The way that everything was good when she was there. How Ben could laugh and it felt so fucking simple to do so, because She was there and it would be a goddamn crime to keep joy from her. The whole fucking apartment looked better with her in it. It wasn’t big, barely three fucking rooms, but Ben hadn’t even realized how hollow it had felt without her presence filling it up. Her heartbeat echoing around it, her soft cursing when she dropped something, her tapping on the surface of the table as she ate. The light leaking in through the windows was a little brighter, everything smelled like Her again, and when Ben opened the drawers of their dresser Her clothes had moved. Because she was home to move them.

Ben changed fast, and managed to get downstairs right before the clock hit noon. She was waiting for him at the door, arms crossed, glaring at him as he walked to meet her.

“We’re going to be late, Benjamin.”

“What the hell are you talking about, it’s noon right now-“

“The meeting is at noon, dummy.” She linked Her arm through Ben’s, tugging him into the hall. “We’re supposed to be there already.”

“They can’t fucking start without us-“

“Exactly,” she gave him a flat look over her shoulder. “So walk faster, Pretty Boy. And you’re taking all the blame when we get there.”

Ben’s glower and eye roll was a complete fucking performance. She was touching him and talking to him, so he’d do whatever she told him to. He’d take the blame—Mallory could suck his fucking dick if they got shit for being five minutes late—and if She was really upset about being late, Ben would make it up to her later. He’d steal her some chocolate, or watch a movie with her, or tell her about all the shows he’d watched while she’d been gone until she smiled at him. Then he’d eat her face until she moaned. He’d probably do all of that shit anyway, but she never needed to know that.

Everyone was waiting for them, giving them varying levels of dirty looks when they walked into the dining hall. Mallory seemed to be the only one truly pissed, because MM’s glower was probably about respecting people’s motherfucking time and Butcher’s was lined with a smug amusement at Ben being pulled behind Her like a fucking dog. A-Train looked nervous—Ben was a little fucking shocked he was even here—and The French Prick, Kimiko, Annie, and Hughie just looked happy to see Her. Everyone should always be happy to see Her, so Ben wasn’t going to award them any points for that. He would appreciate Kimiko standing up and crossing the room, though, signing shit Ben didn’t understand that made her smile. Point against Kimiko, She had to fucking let go of Ben to respond. Point back to Kimiko, they hugged. Without hesitation, Kimiko hugged Her, and that was what made Ben give the woman a small nod when they pulled apart.

“Look who finally managed to pull his bloody dick out-“

“Butcher,” Annie sighed. “Can you save the sex stuff for after the meeting? Please?”

Butcher looked like he was going to argue, but Mallory snapped over him.

“We’re working, William. Save the personal talk for your own time.”

“We fuckin live here,” Butcher muttered. “Ain’t no difference between our work hours and personal hours.”

“Well this is work,” Mallory’s glare turned to Her and Ben. “And I expect professionalism.”

Ben scowled, slinging his arm over Her shoulders as they walked to the table. “We’re not fucking in front of you, so shove it up your damn ass, lady.”

“You’re late-“

“By five damn minutes,” Ben snapped, dropping on the end of the bench, keeping her at his side. Fighting the instinct to hide Her from Mallory’s tight lips and angry eyes, because she’d want to handle herself and Ben wasn’t interested in her kicking his ass right now. “We’re not delaying fucking shit anymore, that’s all you.”

Mallory looked them up and down, eyes narrowing. “Next time, I expect you both to be five minutes early.”

Ben shrugged. “Make this worth our fucking time.”

“Mallory,” She injected, and Ben looked down to find her leaning forward, elbows on the table. “We’re sorry, but can we please just get started?”

“Fine.” Mallory crossed her arms, shooting Ben one last sneering glare. “We’ll start with new developments. Campbell, updates on the V?”

“Um,” Hughie glanced around the table. “There aren’t any. I’ve been going through all the shell companies, but half of them were dissolved. Two weeks ago, actually.”

“What about the offshore accounts?” A-Train frowned. “I gave a shit ton of them, Hughie, you should’ve been able to find something.”

“No, I shouldn’t have.” Hughie was actually glaring. Ben had never seen him glare. He looked like a damn angry mouse. “All of them were emptied into the shell companies, then the shell companies were dissolved.”

MM ran a hand over his beard, shaking his head. “That money didn’t just fucking vanish, Hughie. They put it somewhere.”

“I know, I just can’t find where-“

“Keep at it, Lad, you’ll come through.” Ben gave Hughie a nod, and Hughie leaned back with a sad look at Annie. “MM, any progress on Sacramento?” 

“I reached out to my contact at the FDA, but they said that the port worked with pasteurized produce, not narcotics.”

“That was the cover,” A-Train muttered. “We were supposed to keep it off the feds radar. There’s V there, I swear-“

Butcher scoffed. “Just like you bloody swore ‘bout Atlanta?”

“Sage must have gotten there first-“

Ben felt a tug at his arm, and looked down to find Her frowning up at him. What’s going on?

We’ve been looking for the V. A-Train gave us a long as fuck list of locations and shit, but none of them worked.

She nodded slowly. What about the FDA? Or Military?

Ben blinked at Her. What.

After everyone found out about V, didn’t the government confiscate like, a shit ton of it?

I don’t fucking know, I was in Russia.

And I was underground. She gave Ben a flat look. I read about it, Pretty Boy. You could’ve as well.

Why would I read when I can just have you tell me everything? He winked, and She stuck her tongue out at him.

Cunt.

Brat. Ben glanced up, and everyone was still fucking talking about Atlanta. Tell them about the FDA. 

She gave a small shake of her head. I don’t think Mallory will like it. 

Mallory can go fuck herself with the stick up her ass. Tell them.

She sighed, and raised Her hand. When nobody noticed, Ben gave an aggressive cough that turned everyone’s eyes to them.

“What the fuck was that, are you sick-“

“I can’t get sick, dumb-fuck.” Ben cut MM off with a glare. “We’ve got an idea.”

“We?” She elbowed Ben’s ribs. “Who’s we, Benjamin?”

Ben scowled, and She just grinned at him. “Fucking Christ, she has a plan.”

“Well will you cunts stop bloody eye-fuckin and tell us?”

“We weren’t eye fucking Butcher. And it’s,” She sighed, fingers tapping on the table. “I’m not sure about it.”

“It’s better than nothing,” MM sighed Her name. “What do you got.”

“When I got out, I read about the V scandal.” She frowned, and Ben knew she was thinking, picking out all the right words to convince them. “I also read that a large amount of V was confiscated by the FDA, and the Department of Defense was granted a warrant by Congress to take some for ‘studies’,” She made small air quotes, looking around the table. “Sage probably has people in the Pentagon, but it would be harder for her to make V that’s under federal control vanish.”

“What, exactly, are you implying?” Mallory’s voice was cold, and She swallowed.

“MM has a contact at the FDA. We could ask if they still have any V.” She sighed. “Or we could meet with Singer? He kind of owes us, after Nueman-“ 

“The President doesn’t owe you anything.” Mallory snapped, and Ben’s vision went a little red as She gave a small nod. “Vought has international locations, it’s unlikely Sage has been able to flush all of them out-“ 

“This isn’t a horrible idea, Grace.” MM was watching Her, brows knit. “It’s a sure fucking bet, and a hell of a lot safer than raiding a Vought warehouse. I can reach out again, see what they’ve got for us.“ 

“It wouldn’t hurt to ask Singer either,” Annie added, nodding slowly. “Worst he says is no, right?”

Mallory’s lips somehow got fucking thinner. “We are not wasting his time-“

“It ain’t wastin’ time if he’s got what we’re fuckin lookin for.” Butcher drawled. “And if he do, we’ll all take turns suckin him off as a thank you.”

Hughie blinked. “I, uh, I don’t want to do that-“

“I’m not sucking anyone off, Butcher, you can shove that right up your ass-“

“Bloody hell,” Butcher rolled his eyes, cutting MM and Hughie off. “Frenchie will, then.”

The French Prick shrugged. “For America, of course.”

“Me and you, Mate, are the only cunts committed to the safety of this bleedin country, and we ain’t even citizens-“

“Butcher,” Annie sighed. “On topic, please.”

“Fuckin party pooper, ain’t you Starlight.” Annie’s scowl deepened as Butcher turned away. “MM, reach out to the FDA again. Grace, it ain’t gonna kill Singer or destroy America for him to meet with us for a bloody hour.”

“William-“

“If you don’t, I will.” Butcher’s eyes narrowed at Mallory. “I’ll even send Soldier Boy ‘ere to drag ‘im by the ear. We’re runnin out of options, now ain’t the time to be picky.”

Ben didn’t even bother to tell Butcher to shove it up his ass and stop giving orders. He would drag Singer by the ear, what the fuck could that pussy do to him anyway? 

Mallory scowled, looking around the table and seeing the determined, set faces all siding with Her plan. Apparently Ben wasn’t surrounded by complete fucking idiots.

“Fine. Let’s move on to the next item on the agenda,” Mallory’s gaze rested on Her, saying Her name in a clipped voice. “Have you checked the news today?”

“No,” She mumbled, fingers tapping faster. “But I don’t have a phone to check it with.”

Mallory frowned, but gave a tight nod. “In that case, I recommend you pay attention. Marvin?”

MM leaned forward. Giving Her an apologetic look that made Ben’s skin crawl.

“Homelander gave an address.”

Her heart picked up, and her hand shot up to Ben’s arm around her shoulders, smoke rising against his skin. “What,” Ben pressed his thigh to hers, and she took a steadying breath. “What did he say?”

“I’m not fucking sure how to-“ MM cut himself off, pulled out his phone, and slid it across the table with a sigh. “I think it’s best if you see for yourself.”

It was a news article. A video playing of Homelander behind a podium with a sad, weak fucking pussy expression as he addressed the camera. Sage was standing behind him, with her face neutral and bored. The audio was off, but Ben didn’t even really fucking notice it. He read the headline above the video, and clenched his jaw so hard his teeth might have shattered. 

Homelander Accuses CIA of Kidnapping Fiancée, Anomaly

Ben read the word once. Twice. A third time just to certain he wasn’t going fucking insane. Fiancée. Homelander’s Fiancée.

“What the fuck is this.” He growled, not addressing anyone in particular. Pulling Her further into his side, running his fingers in small circles on the skin of her shoulder as her heart picked up faster and faster. Her breathing was mechanical, and it was making Ben cold. She looked so fucking afraid and Ben’s whole body was cold. He felt fucking sick, and between Her every breath he could almost hear her voice going no. No, no, no. “Someone better start talking, right goddamn now-“

“It’s Sage’s move,” She whispered, staring at the table and shaking her head. “She’s giving herself jus ad bellum. I should’ve known. I should’ve seen it coming.”

Hughie frowned. “Pretend that some of us don’t know what jus ad bellum is-”

“Right of war,” MM muttered. “Justification for further escalation. But how the hell would you have seen this shit coming?” MM said Her name, nodding at the screen. “It’s an insane gamble, even for Sage-“ 

“No, it’s not.” She looked up slowly, taking a long, unsteady breath that made Ben’s heart move into his throat. “It’s what she’s been planning. She knew I’d escape-” 

“How?” Hughie leaned around Annie to look at Her, titling his head. “Sorry, I mean, how could she have known? Wouldn’t she have tried to stop you-”

“No, that sounds like Sage,” A-Train shook his head with a sigh. “That bitch plays 4-D chess, you won’t understand why she does something until it’s too late and it’s paid off for her.”

She nodded. “She told me a week ago I was going to propose to Homelander on TV, as a surprise. And if I didn’t, She’d-” Her eyes flicked up to Ben, and she swallowed. “Hurt people. She knew I wouldn’t, she knew I’d escape. I think I surprised her by telling Homelander I was going to marry him, though-“

Butcher gaped at Her, voicing Ben’s almost exact thoughts. “You fuckin what-“

“I needed him away from Vought. It worked, and it might be the only thing Sage didn’t anticipate. She probably thought I’d just run, and Homelander would give up on me.”

“No more hang ups,” MM muttered. “No more dealing with his obsession and erratic outbursts about you.” 

“Exactly.” She swallowed. “But I told him I’d marry him, and now he probably just thinks I was taken from him again. So her move is to back us into a corner. We say I left of my own volition, and we’re ignoring the gravity of the situation. We admit I’m here, it’s because you took me.”

“What if we just ignore it?” Annie’s suggestion was hesitant. She didn’t even fucking believe in it herself. “Don’t even respond-“

“We have to respond,” She gave Annie a small, sad smile. “I’m too important to this now. I made myself important, and Sage doubled down on that. If the CIA doesn’t put out some sort of statement, Sage will say silence is complicity.”

“You got any ideas?” MM glanced at Ben, giving him a small nod. “Soldier Boy said you were working on something-“ 

“I was,” She whispered. “But I didn’t plan for this. I don’t-“ 

“We’ll figure it out,” Ben grunted, unable to stand the slightly strangled sound of Her words. “They haven’t fucking won, Sunshine, we’ll figure it out.” 

She nodded, and when she leaned into his side Ben didn’t feel quite as cold anymore. “I know. I mean, I could try to distance myself-“

“That ain’t gonna fuckin work, Love.” Butcher muttered. “You’re America’s bloody Valentine, don’t matter what you say or do.”

“Butcher’s right,” Annie gestured between herself, A-Train, and—after a moment of hesitation—Ben. “We all know, these things get away from you. You’re more of a symbol, whatever people want to hear, they will.”

“What if,” She was chewing on her cheek, frowning ahead at nothing, and Ben knew she was about to say something fucking insane. “Everyone keeping in mind that there are no bad ideas in brainstorming, what if I kill myself?”

Fucking Christ.

“I think,” Hughie swallowed. “I think there might be bad ideas in brainstorming.”

“Just, listen-“

“No,” Ben snapped, trying to ignore the drums sounding far away. “Shut the fuck up, you’re not doing that.”

“I wouldn’t actually kill myself, Ben.” She leaned forwards, starting to talk far too fucking fast for how Ben’s heart was still pounding in his ears. “I mean, I can’t. But I need to be out of the picture, and this way you can say Homelander drove me to it-“ She cut herself off, frowning at nothing. “No. Wait.”

The room was silent, and Ben could fucking hear Her thinking. Hear her brain running through scenarios, her voice in his head going Sage will twist that. Say it’s a CIA cover up. It needs to be something she can twist, but not well. Not a red herring for our intentions or where I might be, but a placeholder. Make it static, make it ready for when we need it. Any attacks need to be easily deniable, implied, unactionable. Any response from Vought has to be suspicious, otherwise we’re just exposed. And I can’t be dead. That was stupid. If I’m dead, I’m too far removed, and it’s permanent. But I still can’t be here, that’s too easy for Sage to say I’m being held hostage. It won’t matter what I say myself, Annie’s right about that, so I need to be-

“I’m missing,” She said, and Ben blinked. That was aloud. “I’m just missing. Nobody knows where I am, and I’m certainly not here. The CIA is working to recover me, but you don’t have any leads. I left New York, and I’m missing, and,” she paused, tilting her head. “You’re praying for my safety.”

Mallory frowned. “Is that all you have? Just push the problem away-”

“No,” She was smiling, and it was manic and feral and a little fucking hot. A lot fucking hot. She had an idea, and it was one Ben could probably get behind, and she was fucking hot. “In the statement, say you’re not sure what happened, that it’s truly just a bipartisan tragedy, and mention that you’re not sure how it all got away from Vought. No matter what, I was in their care. That’s two people who Homelander cares about, Ryan Butcher and I, who have just vanished. You can’t say it’s because Homelander hurt me, but you can allude to it. You can say it’s so heartbreaking that I disappeared right after we got engaged. How odd.”

“It’s a non action,” MM nodded, watching Her carefully. “Walk the line. Keep Homelander going full fucking human genocide, dwindle supporters, bide time.”

She nodded. “Exactly. The CIA can’t be on the record with the rest, people won’t trust it.”

“The rest?” Butcher narrowed his eyes, looking between Her and Ben, as if Ben had a fucking clue what she was talking about. “There ain’t much more-“

“There’s more,” She took a deep breath, smile wavering slightly and falling into a determined, set look. “It’s time to tell the truth.”

“What fuckin’ truth.”

“About me,” She swallowed. “The truth about me. A few hours after the CIA’s statement, Annie’s going to tell the truth about me. And exposé on Vought, out of necessity. That I didn’t want people to know, but now I’m missing and people need to be aware.” 

“How much of the truth?” Hughie rubbed the back of his neck, shaking his head at nothing. “Like, what you’ve been doing with us? Or-“

“All of it,” She mumbled. “My real identity. What Homelander did. All my powers, how I broke out, how I’ve been working with you guys, with Ben, how Homelander took me. All of it.”

“Why not have the CIA make these accusations?” The French Prick frowned. “Make them official, or believable.”

“They need to be unofficial. We can’t incite legal action, there’s no telling what Homelander will do.” She sighed. “People will either go all in on the Homelander train, or finally realize what he is. His more powerful supporters, senators and representative and military officials, will want to distance themselves. It will slow him down from government power, and Sage will latch onto this. She’ll point out how there’s not any evidence, because technically it’s just speculation and I’m not here to testify. But it has to be the whole truth. And it has to be Annie.” She gave Annie an apologetic grimace. “Sorry.”

“I’m okay with it,” Annie shook her head, giving Her a nervous look. “Are you? It’s going to be a lot-“

“I know. I’m ready.”

She was fucking lying. Ben knew she was fucking lying. Her voice was too steady, she was half on-top of him, and all her movements were mechanical. The picture perfect image of someone who was okay, the one she presented right before she collapsed, screaming in Ben’s arms.

He didn’t get a chance to call Her fucking shit, though, because behind them the dining hall door creaked open and half the table jumped up with their guns pointed at the intruder, Ben taking a large step to block Her from view.

The Kid yelped. “It’s just me! It’s Ryan Butcher! Don’t shoot!”

“Blood hell, Ryan,” Butcher glared at the Kid as everyone’s guns lowered, Ben not missing Mallory’s glower at him as he tucked his own back into his pants. “I told you to fuckin wait-“ 

“It’s 1:30,” the Kid mumbled, glancing at Ben. “They were supposed to meet me at 1:15, I just got nervous-“

Butcher frowned. “I told you they’d be there at 1:45.”

The Kid shook his head. “1:15. It’s okay, I can wait, I just wanted to make sure nobody had, um, forgotten.”

Ben felt bad. He hadn’t fucking done anything, but the Kid looked so fucking sad and now Ben felt like a piece of shit. It didn’t help when She bumped his arm, and he turned to find Her watching him with pretty, hopeful fucking eyes.

Can we go now, Ben? The meeting’s kind of over, and Ryan’s already here. We don’t even know where the gym is, and he can show us.

It was fucking amusing she was phasing it as a question. If she’d said Ben, we’re going now, it would have had the exact same goddamn effect. They were going, now.

“Wait outside, Kid, we’ll be there.” Ben looked up, glaring around the table. “Anyone got a fucking problem with that?”

“This meeting is not over-“

“Yeah, it is.” Ben snapped, holding Mallory’s glare. “You’ve got a plan, we’re done.”

Malloy crossed her arms. “I still have yet to receive a debrief about Vought Tower-”

“I don’t have much to say about it, Mallory,” She mumbled, sounding fucking guilty. “I mean, I was a hostage. You don’t tell hostage’s your evil plans for world domination.”

“Is that her?” The Kid piped up, still at the door, not in the hall like Ben had defiantly fucking ordered him to be. Looking at Ben with a small, nervous expression and wide eyes. “She’s still coming with us, right?”

“Yes,” Ben pointed at the door. “Hall.”

She was moving behind him. Ben could hear the scrape of the bench and the slight pick up of Her heart that meant she was standing up, and when he turned she was glaring up at him, pressed between his body and the table.

“Move, Benjamin.”

He scowled at Her, but couldn’t find a reason to even justify to himself keeping her hidden—The Kid wouldn’t hurt her, and moving himself over her had been more instinct than anything—and stepped to the side.

Ben was certain the Kid was going to like Her. She was perfect, everyone should like her, and people who didn’t were shit-headed dumb fucks. The Kid wasn’t a shit-headed dumb fuck. He was a fucking nerd, and talked all polite, but so did She. The Kid would like Her, and it didn’t really fucking matter if he didn’t because nothing was riding on this. Ben alone loved her enough to power the Eastern Seaboard, one random child not understanding how fucking amazing She was wouldn’t do any harm to anything. But Ben still felt something taut in his throat and around his lungs. It mattered to Her. Ben could feel Her hand warming up on his arm—starting to sear and smoke against his skin—and this felt like it mattered. She’d given her whole fucking life for the Kid, and Ben seemed to have somehow found himself important to the Kid’s life, and this might matter.

They were just fucking staring at each other. Everyone else was staring at them—even Mallory had dropped any protests—and this did matter. These two people needed to like each other. She needed to walk away from this with clear eyes and an easy smile, and the Kid needed to understand that She’d scarified to make him safe and—if Ben knew her, which he fucking did, better than anyone—would probably do it again. Then they’d both stop apologizing for their fucking existence, and whatever was choking Ben and tightening his fists would die a sad, withering death. If they didn’t start fucking moving, Ben was going to pick Her up and carry her over-

“Hi,” Her voice wasn’t a whisper, but it was quiet, gentle, unsteady. That was Her for once I don’t know what to say voice. “It’s, um, it’s nice to meet you, Ryan, I’m-“

She’d barely said her own name before the Kid was running across the room, slamming her into a tight hug. She froze, face slightly panicked—everyone in the room tensing but not launching forward to pull them apart—but when she looked down at the Kid it shifted. Became almost disbelieving, mouth parting into a small smile, eyes growing soft. 

Whatever she was feeling from the Kid, whatever was making her so relaxed, was good. She hugged the Kid back, her arms wrapping around his shoulders and holding tight, and she squeezed the Kid once in a way that Ben knew meant reassurance. The Kid liked Her—Ben had fucking known it, and now he’d get to rub that in her perfect face later—and she looked like she might cry. If she did start crying, Ben was going to have to push the rest of the team out of the dining hall so she could do it in peace. He wasn’t even sure why they were still fucking here, this was for Her and the Kid.

Butcher coughed, and Ben was going to rip out his throat. “Ryan, try not to crush the lady. She ain’t made of steel.”

“I’m fine,” She mumbled, shooting Butcher a glare over her shoulder. “And I’d live if he did.”

The Kid pulled back, looking up at Her with an admiration that Ben understood. She was admirable, she was fucking amazing.

“I, I won’t hurt you?”

“You can’t,” She shrugged, not peeling herself from the hug. “I have a regenerative healing factor.” She looked up, frowning at the group. “Did nobody tell you that?”

“They did!” The Kid shook his head, still watching Her. “But you’re not invulnerable-“

“No, but I’d live.”

The Kid nodded slowly. “Do you still feel pain?”

“Yeah,” She sighed. “I do. But you can’t control your strength, and I’d be okay.” She gave the Kid a smile, easy and content and real, and Ben fucking loved Her. She was so fucking kind and good. “It’s really nice to meet you, Ryan. I’ve heard a lot about you.” 

“Me too,” the Kid was smiling back, because when She smiled you’d have to be fucking insane not to smile back. “I mean, I’ve also heard about you.”

“We all have,” Butcher grumbled, still watching Her and the Kid with careful eyes. “Soldier Boy wouldn’t shut his fuckin’ cake-hole-”

“Butcher,” MM sighed. “Don’t be a bitter motherfucker and ruin the nice moment.” 

Butcher rolled his eyes, but shut his mouth. Smart move, because Ben was about to rip out his fucking tongue.

“What,” the Kid looked nervous, and Ben was starting to worry he might crush Her. “What have you heard about me?”

She huffed a small laugh. “A lot. Butcher over there’s a fucking hypocrite, because the first three months I knew him it was just Ryan’s a good kid. Smart kid. Bloody good kid.”

Ben had to cough to cover a snort, and Butcher scowled.

“That ain’t my fuckin’ voice-“

The Kid leaned around Her. “Did you really call me a good kid?”

Butcher shot Her a glare, and she returned it with a sickly sweet smile. “Yes.”

The Kid pulled away from Her, and walked over to give Butcher a hug. An awkward, tight hug that made Butcher freeze before returning it. “Thank you.”

“You’re like your mother, Ryan.” Butcher grunted. “Course you’re a good kid.”

She was smiling at them, and Ben fucking loved Her. He had to turn the words into walking back to her side and slinging his arm over her shoulder, kissing the top of her head and grinning at her when she smiled up at him. Fucking perfect. The whole world was better when she was here, because the Kid had been with them for months and Ben hadn’t actually seen him and Butcher hug. But she made everything good, because she was a goddamn miracle worker. She was a miracle herself, and Ben fucking loved Her.

“You got some trainin’ to do with Soldier Boy, Ryan.” Butcher was giving the Kid tense pat on the back, but not trying to pull back. “Better get started.”

“William-“

“Stuff it, Grace. It ain’t like they’re all gonna fuckin vanish, like I said we live here. Just go knock on the horny cunt’s doors later.” 

“It’s okay,” the Kid pulled back, frowning. “I can wait if you have work to do-“

“We don’t,” Ben snapped, glaring at Mallory in a silent challenge, pulling Her closer into his side. “We’re fucking done with this shit, let’s go.”

The Kid looked at Butcher, who nodded, then Her. “Are you coming with us?”

“For a little bit, sure,” She glanced at Ben, and he gave a tight nod. Of course She was fucking coming with them, if it was up to Ben she’d go everywhere with him. “I might have to leave early, to help Annie with some stuff, but I can sit in on the start.”

Annie shrugged. “We won’t need you for the, uh,” she glanced at the Kid. “Thing. But if you want-“

“No, I need to be there. It needs to all be accurate, Sage will exploit any fallacies. Just text-“ She cut herself off with a sigh. “Ben, I guess. And I’ll head back here.”

“We’ll get you a new phone,” Hughie said Her name, giving her a reassuring smile. “They’re not that expensive, and you need one. I can work on that.”

Butcher frowned. “You worry about the V, Lad. Frenchie-“

“I will take care of it, petite Hughie. I can even find a discount from my suppliers.”

She blinked at the French Prick. “Frenchie, please don’t get me a crime phone.” 

The French Prick shrugged. “Beggars cannot be choosers-“ Kimiko whacked his arm and signed something that made the French Prick sigh. “Fine. I will not get a crime phone.”

“Thank you.” She glanced around the group, then up at Ben. “Ready?”

Ben nodded, looking at the Kid. “Let’s fucking move, Buddy.”

The Kid started to walk over to them, and Ben felt Her elbow his side. When he frowned down at Her, she was grinning.

Buddy?

Ben rolled his eyes. What the fuck is wrong with calling him buddy.

Call him his name, Benjamin.

Why.

Because you shouldn’t call real people buddy. I call bad drivers buddy. I call my brother buddy. 

Your brother is a real fucking person.

She shrugged. But I also call him by his name. Buddy is what I say when I’m doing an impression of a 1920s Chicago mobsters, not talking to someone.

Ben scoffed. Well your impressions are fucking terrible.

I’m sorry you can’t appreciate my talent, Pretty Boy. 

I can appreciate a lot of shit about you, Sunshine. Ben winked at Her. And you’ve got a fuck ton of talent. Your impressions are still horrible. 

She wrinkled her nose at him. Rude.

Yep. Ben kissed the top of Her head, turning as Ryan stopped in front of them, looking him up and down. “You think you can move in jeans?”

He frowned. “Yes?”

“Then let’s get a fucking move on.”

They gave a few nods to the team before leaving—Mallory still looking like a sour bitch—and Ryan led the way to the gym. This place was a lot fucking bigger than Ben had thought, but exploring hadn’t really been high on his priority list. Later—if the amazed expression on Her face as they walked through the halls was any clue—She’d probably pull them around to see every damn inch of this place, and Ben would gladly follow her. As long as She kept looking so fucking relaxed like she did now, a step ahead of Ben, walking at Ryan’s side.

“Do you like biology?” Ryan had been asking Her question after question, She’d been answering them all in the same genuine, serious tone—no matter how fucking stupid they were—and Ben had been watching, biting his tongue until he drew blood so he didn’t accidentally yell that he loved Her.

“I think it’s interesting,” She shrugged. “But I’m not great at science. I’m passible at it, but it’s never been something I excel at.”

Ben rolled his eyes at nothing, because she was fucking good at science. Her benchmark of passible was just way too damn high, because she was genius.

“You can do biology manipulation, right?” Ryan’s voice was almost goddamn bouncy. “That’s one of your powers?”

“I’m not sure,” Ben could hear the thoughtful frown on Her face. “It’s a working theory, but I’ve never really had my powers fully assessed. I didn’t even really know how to use them properly until a few months ago.”

Ben tried not to be too fucking proud of that. How She gave him a small smile over her shoulder at the words, how she was better at talking about and using her powers because of Ben. He’d done that for her. He’d made Her happy and comfortable, and now that was permanent.

Ryan followed Her gaze at Ben. “Did Soldier Boy teach you too?”

“Teach me as well-“ She stopped in her tracks, and Ben nearly slammed into her back.

“Goddamnit-“ Ben started to grunt out Her name, but she whipped around with a glare at Ben that told him he was in trouble. He hadn’t even fucking done anything-

“Why is he calling you Soldier Boy?”

Ben swallowed, glancing at a wide-eyed Ryan. “I don’t fucking know-“

“Don’t get mad at him, it’s what everyone calls him-“

She raised a hand, and Ryan cut himself off, giving Ben a nervous look.

“Benjamin.” Her eyes were narrowed at him, her voice smooth and firm, and fuck She was hot. Ben probably shouldn’t want to pick her up and fuck her against the wall as much as he did right now, but Christ she was so perfect, even when she looked like she was going to kill him. What did you promise me.

He frowned. I have been fucking nice to him. A name isn’t a big deal.

Yes, it is. She glanced at Ryan, then back at Ben. He doesn’t really have anyone, Ben. He has you and Butcher. Soldier Boy isn’t you, it’s the guy who tried to kill him.

He’s forgiven me for that, Sunshine. And what the hell else is he supposed to call me, because he’s sure as shit not using grandpa.

She gave him a small smile. He could call you your name?

Ben scowled. Smartass.

She’s won, and she knows it, because Her smile grows into a wide grin. Thank you.

Shut the fuck up. Ben turned back to Ryan, who was looking between them with wide eyes. “Fine.”

“Um-“

“You can call me Ben, kid. That’s it.”

Ryan nodded slowly, his facing turning a little brighter as he looked up at Her with nervous smile that she returned—less nervous, more encouraging—and Ben was going to fucking lose his mind.

When they arrived at the gym—a full fucking gym, Ben was going to yell at Butcher and Hughie later about a pamphlet or fucking something to tell people how big this place was—Ryan led them over to a large mat, and She grabbed Ben’s phone from his pocket and dropped near the wall with her legs crossed.

“Are you not,” Ryan glanced between them. “Are you not training with us?”

She sighed, shaking her head. “My powers are a little, um, different. My training is different.”

“But you said-“

“I did train her,” Ben grunted, walking over to Her to hand her the rest of the shit in his pockets. “It’s not the same as what we’re going to do.”

She leaned around Ben’s legs as she talked to Ryan. “I’m not strong like you and Ben. When I punch someone it’s really not that effective.”

“Fuck ton more effective than when we started,” Ben muttered, and she stuck Her tongue out at him.

“It’s your fire, right?” Ryan asked, and Ben could hear him shifting on his feet. “That you use to fight?”

She nodded, tilting her head. “What do you know about my powers?”

“Um, fire?” Ryan mumbled. “You said you can heal, like Kimiko. Right?”

“Kind of like Kimiko,” She hummed. “But Kimiko still ages. I don’t.”

“Why?”

“Ben and I,” She patted Ben’s leg, leaning forward to hang off his body, and Ben had to remind himself job. Job to do. Kid in the room and job to do. “Have the same V. Old V, more unstable, makes you immortal. That’s why he’s an ancient grumpy fuck that looks like that.”

“That?” Ben scowled at Her. “What the fuck is that?”

She grinned at him. “A Pretty Boy.” 

He rolled his eyes. Brat.

Ryan coughed, and Her gaze returned to behind Ben. “You have that V because of my dad, right?”

His voice was so fucking sad. Weak and sad and nervous, and Ben didn’t know how to handle it.

She did. She was fucking perfect, so she did. She was watching Ryan carefully, words gentle. Honest and clear, but gentle. “Yes. I do. But don’t blame yourself. Homelander did it, not you,”

“But he’s my dad-“

“But you didn’t do anything.” She squeezed Ben’s leg, and his hand dropped to run through her hair. Let her handle this, never let her think she’s alone. “You aren’t responsible for his actions.”

“I’m still sorry-“

“It’s not your fault, Ryan.” Her voice was gentle, even as her nails dug into Ben’s calf. “None of this is your fault. Homelander deserves the blame, don’t take it for him.”

Ryan made a small sound, and Ben glanced back to see him looking at his feet. “I still feel bad.”

“I know,” She was smiling that soft, sad smile that meant she was being kind and forgiving and good. “Trust me, I know. But it’s not your fault.”

Ben gently tugged on Her hair, just enough for her attention to turn up to him.

What?

You should take your own fucking advice, Sunshine.

She wrinkled Her nose at him. Fuck you.

Ben grinned, and didn’t even bother to tell Her I would like to. As soon as you say the word, before it’s even out of your pretty fucking mouth, I’m carrying you home and fucking you until you scream. I’m going to fucking worship you, beautiful. Fucking ruin you. You’re going to beg and whine and moan and cum, and I’m going to fuck you until you’re dizzy. You’re going to smile at me, and I’m going to fucking cum from it, and we’re not going to leave the bed for a hundred years. I love you, and you’re going to goddamn get that when I fuck you the way you deserve. All he did—right now, when she wasn’t ready and didn’t know he loved her, when Ryan was still in the room with them—was lean over and pull her up to Her knees and kiss her, sloppy and deep. Going until she made a small sound only Ben could hear, and he drew back up to his full height.

She stared at Ben with a slack expression, and even Her glare of Cunt sounded breathless.

Ben winked. Brat. And turned back to Ryan, walking to meet him on the mat. “Let's get started, Kid. Show me what you’ve got.”

Ryan was fucking strong. It barely took ten minutes for Ben to understand that Ryan was strong. Not quite as strong as Homelander or Ben himself, but with a little practice, he could be. Fuck, with maybe five years of solid, consistent work Ryan would fly past both of them. They started by just trying to find the limit, but ran out of weights and started adding equipment from around the gym. Eventually, at about 85 tons, Ryan looked a little nervous and they moved on. He had to control it, and Ben was sure not to pussyfoot around the fact that Ryan’s strength was dangerous, real dangerous, but controllable.

“Do you think I’ll be able to?” Ryan was fidgeting with his hands, looking nervously between Her and Ben. “I’m not sure-“

“You will.” Ben snapped. “That’s what my fucking job is. You do yours and listen- Fuck!”

She’d thrown a plastic bottle at his head. Ben didn’t even fucking know where She’d gotten a plastic bottle, but while he and Ryan had been testing Ryan’s limit she’d wandered the gym, and Ben wouldn’t put it past certain fucking members of their team not to clean up after themselves.

“It’ll take time,” She didn’t even look at Ben as he glared at her, flipping him off behind Her back where Ryan couldn’t see. “But you will, Ryan. You’ll get there.”

Ben scowled. “That’s exactly what I said-“ 

“I was being encouraging.” She wrinkled her nose at him “You were being a grump.”

Ben just scoffed, and returned his attention to Ryan as she sat back against the wall, fingers tapping on the back of Ben’s phone. It was only a half hour later the screen lit up with a buzz, and She was called away. Ryan gave Her another tight hug, and Ben kissed the space between her eyes, muttering against her skin.

“You don’t fucking have to go. Annie knows everything.”

She sighed. “I do, Ben. This has to be done right. I’ll be okay.”

Ben didn’t believe Her. She didn’t believe her. Her hands were curled against his chest, and her heart was unsteady and stumbling, and Ben knew she was nervous. “Just stay the hell here-“

“No,” She pulled back, reaching up to give Ben one last, light kiss. “I’ll see you tonight, Pretty Boy. Play nice.”

He wanted to tug Her back. There was something hollow forming in her eyes when she pulled away from him, and Ben wanted to just yell I love you. I know you’re going to do this no matter what I tell you, because you never fucking listen go me, so just do it knowing I love you.

But she was gone, and Ben was left alone with Ryan, starting to feel fucking sick. Love was making him a desperate, whining pussy who felt nauseous when She was gone. And he still didn’t fucking care.

“I forgot to say thank you,” Ryan mumbled, and Ben frowned at him. “I meant to tell her thank you for getting me out-“

“She knows,” Ben grunted. “Trust me, she fucking knows.” 

“Do you think she liked me?”

Ben snorted. “Yes. And she’s not fucking gone, she’s still on this same damn floor.” Those words were more for him. Ben trying to convince himself that she was barely a three minute walk away. That he was feeling worse and worse by the second, that something was sitting like a weight on his chest the longer she was gone, but if he was really that fucking pathetic without Her he could just go find her. She wasn’t gone, and she was fine.

They kept training. Ben tested Ryan’s grip strength, trying to see what could and couldn’t be crushed by accident in a hand, and made a note to tell MM they needed metal cups. Kimiko and Annie would sure as fuck appreciate it as well, and it would be a good placeholder until Ryan was better at controlling himself. From there Ben dragged out some mock targets—boxing bags that he drew large X’s on—and they worked on heat vision. Using it at will, trying not make the bags just immediately fucking explode.

And Ben still felt fucking sick. It was still getting worse and worse as the afternoon crept on, until suddenly it was gone. Fully vanished into thin air around dinner time, right when he and Ryan were wrapping up.

“Solid work, kid.” Ben muttered, giving up almost immediately on trying to rearrange and clean up the gym. MM would have a grand fucking time doing it himself later, and Ben didn’t have any interest in being told he’d done it wrong. “Here, next week, same time.”

“Thanks,” Ryan mumbled, and Ben nodded, picking his phone up off the floor. “Ben?”

He grunted, frowning up at Ryan’s nervous expression and waiting for him to continue.

“Are you going to dinner?”

“Maybe.” Ben sighed. “We’ve got some shit to deal with, but we’ll try.”

“We?” Ryan said Her name, watching Ben carefully. “Um, she’ll be there too?”

“As well,” Ben muttered, smiling to himself. “And if I’m there, yeah. She will be.”

Ryan nodded, and didn’t push further. They walked in silence back to the dining hall—which was fucking empty—and continued until they reached Butcher’s apartment. Ben knocked, loud in case Butcher tried to fucking ignore it, and the door opened almost immediately. 

“Oi, Gov, ain’t not reason to fuckin break it.”

Ben scowled. “Looks fine to me. We’re done.”

Butcher turned to Ryan. “Good session? Worth bloody houndin me about?”

Ryan nodded, eager and sincere, and Ben felt something warm and prideful flare in his chest. “I hit the target.”

“The target.” Butcher repeated, glancing at Ben. “What target.” 

“We worked on his laser eyes,” Ben grunted. “Can’t have him exploding the fucking building.”

“And I hit the target.” Ryan’s chest was puffed out, and Ben sighed.

“And he hit the damn target.”

“Well then, bloody good work, lad. Let’s get you in a fuckin shower, you smell like ass.” Butcher gesture for Ryan to enter the apartment, but Ryan turned to Ben and pulled him into a fucking hug.

“Thank you, Ben.”

Ben didn’t know what to do. The kid was squeezing his torso, and thanking him, and he was frozen, staring at Butcher. Butcher didn’t seem to know what the fuck to do either, but his glower at Ben a little too shocked for Ben to just push Ryan away. He didn’t want to push Ryan away, it felt fucking wrong to push Ryan away. Her words echoed in Ben’s head—he doesn’t really have anyone, Ben. He has you and Butcher—and Ben hugged Ryan back. It was tense, awkward, and weird, but Ryan didn’t seem to care. He just hugged Ben tighter before stepping back and disappearing into the apartment. Leaving Ben and Butcher staring at each other in the doorway, Butcher’s face looking as confused as Ben fucking felt. 

Butcher spoke first.

“Don’t fuck this up,” his glare on Ben wasn’t hateful, it was weary. “That kid don’t got much. Don’t give him hope then fuckin turn away.”

Ben narrowed his eyes. “Shut the fuck up. I know what the hell I’m doing.”

Butcher didn’t waver. “I guess we’ll bloody see if you do. But know that if you drop the fuckin grandpa ball-”

“Call me grandpa again and I’ll fucking twist you like a pretzel and shove your dick in your mouth.”

“I ain’t joking-”

“I won’t fuck him up.” Ben grunted Her name. “She’d kick my damn ass if I did.”

Butcher sighed. “You seen her?” 

Something tugged at Ben’s heart. “No. Why, what’s fucking wrong-“ 

“It’s been a real rough fuckin afternoon, Gov.” Butcher shook his head. “You should go find your woman.”

“Is she-“

“She’s okay. The media is full of cunts, and she’s on the blunt end of it now.” Butcher looked Ben up and down, face twisting into something tired and tight. “I’d just fuckin go. She might well need you.”

Ben didn’t bother with goodbyes, or even wait for the door to fully fucking close before he was tearing down the hall to their apartment. Butcher said she was okay, but everyone kept fucking telling Ben she was okay when she clearly fucking wasn’t. He seemed to be the only pussy in the whole goddamn world who had eyes, who was capable of hearing her say I’m okay and noticing how her smile wasn’t full and her eyes were too fucking empty for it to be true. Nobody seemed fucking worried about Her but Ben. Seemed to even think that maybe the was just a slim goddamn chance that after being kidnapped—fucking again—She wasn’t okay.

He pulled out his phone as he all but ran. The media was full of cunts, full of worthless fucking pussies whose jobs were make everyone’s life fucking hell. Full of idiots saying Annie was a liar, or speculating about Her life. Her real life. Her job and original address. If she’d asked Homelander to make her a supe, gone to that Vought party to stalk him. Why she’d left Her mother’s house so young, if it was really a coincidence that her step-father was a public figure, or if this had been engineered. Everyone had fucking something to say, and all of it was dogshit. Ben was mentioned. For the first time since this started, he could find articles where their names were the main headline. Saying Starlight claims that Soldier Boy and Anomaly are close, but what does that mean? and calling her a whore. A fucking gold-digger or power-chaser, saying she was jumping between powerful, older supes to get her what she wanted. Sinking her claws into Ben—just like she’d done with Homelander—and she was going to leave him the moment she was tired of him.

She was in the hall. Ben had the keycard, she couldn’t have gotten in herself, and she had tucked Herself against the wall outside their door. Staring at nothing, and from Her side-profile, her expression was slack. When Ben dropped to Her side, she didn’t flinch or start or even fucking look at him. He grunted her name, and She just hummed. He said it again, voice low and scraping his throat, and moved in front of Her body. She was flushed, and her eyes were hazy. He wasn’t even fucking sure she could see him for a second, but then her face lit up. It didn’t clear or focus, but a loose, happy smile crossed her face, and hands shot up to grab Ben’s face between Her hands.

“Ben,” She was trying to whisper, but doing a piss-poor job of it, pulling Ben’s face closer to hers. “You’re here. Wait,” She frowned, eyes narrowing at him as one hand started poking his nose. “Say something Ben would say.” 

“What the fuck are you talking about.” 

Her smile was back. Bigger this time, and she started falling forwards. Ben’s arms moved to catch Her, slumping against him, and she giggled. “You’re Ben. Ben frowns like that,” She traced a finger over his mouth, following the downward turn of his lip. “And he always catches me. And I can feel you.”

“Of course you can feel me,” he grunted Her name. “I’m fucking touching you. What’s-“

“No,” She shook her head, pushing herself up and half crawling up Ben’s body. “No, no. You don’t get it you handsome dumb dumb. I feel you here.” She jabbed a finger at Ben’s chest. “And it’s you. It’s big and strong and loud, and it’s very Benjamin.” 

She looked back up at him, he studied Her face. Relaxed, completely relaxed, parted lips and glossy eyes, words falling out of Her mouth without thought. Her heart was slow, but her face was flushed and her breath was short. 

He said Her name slowly, holding her face so her eyes stayed on his. “Are you fucking drunk?” 

“Maybe.” 

“Christ on a cross, woman.” Ben sighed, tucked stray hair away from Her face, dropping an arm under her thighs and hauling her up his body, standing cautiously. “How the fuck do you even get drunk.”

Her hands grabbed Ben’s face, pulling it to barely an inch from Hers. “Frenchie,” she whispered, staring at Ben with wide, serious eyes. “Is a fucking god. And very bad at hiding his experiments in the kitchen.” 

Ben sighed, carefully prying her hands away so he could open the door. “What happened, Sunshine.”

“Nothing,” Her lips dropped into a pout. “Ben?”

He grunted, and She buried her head in his neck.

“Why do you like me?”

He paused in his tracks, frowning down at Her. “What.”

“Why do you like me?” She mumbled. “I’m the worst.”

“You’re being insane,” he mutters, adjusting his grip so one arm was under Her knees, the other holding her back. “You’re drunk, and tired, and talking fucking nonsense. We’re going to bed.”

“Ben,” Her voice was almost a whine. “I’m not being insane. I don’t have friends, why would you be my friend.” 

“Why the fuck wouldn’t I be your friend.”

“Because I’m annoying.” She whispered, hands tightening around his neck. “And mean. And a whore.” 

“You’re not a whore.” Ben pushed the door to their room open. “I’m a whore. You’re perfect.”

She wasn’t letting Ben lower her onto the mattress. “I’m not perfect. I’m a liar-“

“You’re not a liar.” Ben made his voice, firm, a little louder than he’d normally be with Her, but she needed to hear. “You just told the world the truth. That’s the opposite of lying, Sunshine. And you are fucking perfect. You’re a genius, and funny as shit, and kind, and powerful, and beautiful-“

She snorted. “I’m not beautiful.”

Ben scowled. “Yes you are. Shut the fuck up and let me talk-“

“No,” She squirmed out of his arms, falling on Her back onto the bed, head hanging off the side, reaching to Ben until he knelt at her side. “You’re beautiful, Ben.” She sighed, rolling onto Her stomach. “You’re so beautiful.”

“Yeah, I know.” Ben stood up, dropping at her side on the bed and watching Her scramble into his lap. “You call me Pretty Boy every fucking day.”

She shook Her head, falling onto his chest and placing one hand on each side of his head. “You’re beautiful, Ben. You don’t get it, it’s not normal.” She was staring at him with something burning and desperate in her eyes. “Nobody should get to have your face and be you. It’s mean to me.”

He watched Her carefully. “How the hell is that mean to you.”

“Because,” She was glaring at him. “You don’t get it.”

“Then fucking tell me-“

She’d shifted up onto her knees, guiding Ben’s brow to Hers, eyes burning into his body. “You’re so beautiful,” She whispered, shaking her head. “It’s not fair.” Her eyes were drooping, words growing more and more slurred as she fell further into Ben’s body. “Not fair.”

“None of this is fair,” he sighed Her name, cradling her head against him. He didn’t know how to fix this. He didn’t have a fucking clue what to do to make this better for Her, and all he could do was stay. “But you’ve got me. And I’ve got you.” 

She made a small sound that might be a sob, or a moan, or a plea. Her words were barely a breath. “Please stay.” 

Ben leaned up to kiss her forehead, before pulling back to watch her eyes flutter, almost closed. “I’ll always fucking stay. You burn, I burn, Sunshine. That’s fucking that.”

“That’s that,” she whispered, a small, blissful smile crossing her face. She said something else, but Ben didn’t understand it. It was a noise from Her throat that sounded like words, but Ben didn’t have the foggiest fucking idea what words they could be. Then She was burying herself back into his neck, breathing growing steady, and something started to wash over him. That feeling, the one he’d felt a few times before that wasn’t wrong but fucking strange. It was so big, covering the whole world and circling around his head. Climbing into his every thought until everything was just this illuminated, boundless, earth-shattering feeling. 

It was everywhere. When he looked around the room, trying to figure out if there was some sort of fucking gas leak or if this was an odd, weird dream, everything was washed with it. His shield at the door, the sheets on their bed, their reflections on the dresser mirror and the deep green, fluffy carpet on the floor. The whole word was fueling the feeling until it was sweeping through Ben’s body, making his blood hot and his head light. This was holy and ancient and fucking everything. This was wider than the ocean, and brighter than the goddamn sun. It was some sort of song that called Ben like a siren, morphing his body into something beautiful. It was peaceful and electric and thirsty and safe, and Ben wanted it to go and go forever. He wanted to create it and then devour it, let it care for him and make everything better. It was natural, it felt like something inevitable and fucking sacred. It made him feel stronger. It made his whole body along with something deeper, further down and intangible, fucking eternal and unstoppable. He could fucking destroy and rebuild the universe without faltering, because this would be with him the whole way.

She sighed against Ben’s neck, and the feeling was gone. Dissipated into thin air, slipping between Ben’s fingers before he could figure out what the fuck it even was. He wanted it back. She was fast asleep against him, heartbeat in perfect time with Ben’s, and he wanted that back. It had been some sort of fucking drug, making him high in a way he’d never felt before. He needed it back now, he needed to feel that for the rest of his fucking life, but he didn’t know how. He didn’t even know what it was, where it had come from, let alone how to get it back in him, around him, through him.

She made a soft sound against Ben’s skin, and he couldn’t stop himself looking down at Her and smiling. She was so fucking beautiful. It didn’t matter what the hell she’d said in her odd, drunken state, She was the most beautiful thing Ben had ever fucking seen. She was the fucking night sky in the wild, when it was more stars than actual darkness, and everything was washed the millions of colors of northern lights. Nothing could ever trap Her, not really, because she wasn’t something that could be trapped. Ben could watch Her, though. He could stay near her, and let her keep being beautiful while he destroyed anything that tried to mar that. She could handle herself, Ben knew she could handle herself, but fuck he wanted to help Her. He wanted to hold her like this every time something in Her broke, and keep calling her beautiful and perfect and good until she stopped fucking fighting with him about it.

Ben loved Her. He still couldn’t tell her he loved her, because this wasn’t at fucking all about him. But he could hold Her like this. He could carefully, steadily pull off her clothing and replace it with his own shirt, keeping his eyes trained only where they needed to be. He could pull them both—still pressed together—up to the top of the bed and under the covers, run fingers through Her hair and savor in the feeling of her body clinging to his. Ben could drift in and out of sleep and watch over Her. Take care of Her in this one way that she allowed him to. Love her and whisper it into the dark, where she couldn’t hear. 

He kept eye on his phone on the bed beside him, and dawn was barely breaking when it buzzed, the screen glowing in the low light of their bedroom. 

Hughie Campbell; Cocksucker, don’t be a cunt, 2 messages.

Ben sighed. He really needed to change those damn contact names, he knew who fucking Hughie was. He’d ask Her to, because the only reason they’d stuck for so long was because She’d put them there, and Ben had no interest in changing them if she didn’t write out the new ones.

He swiped open the display, angling the light away from her closed eyes and reading Hughie’s texts.

Hughie Campbell; Cocksucker, don’t be a cunt

We’re having a meeting in the dining hall in twenty minutes.

I think you’ll want to be there. 

Ben frowned at the words. Hughie never told him there was a meeting. It was always Butcher or Mallory, sometimes MM or Annie, and they’d once sent Kimiko and the French prick right after he’d lost Her, when he rarely looked at his phone except to see Her perfect face in photos. 

He peeled Her off his body in careful, slow, and measured movements to make sure she stayed asleep. Resting Her head off his arm and on a pillow, pulling his legs away from hers and replacing them with blankets. Adding an extra comforter from their closet, because Ben was heavier than a blanket and she seemed to sleep easier when his weight was on top of Her.

It was difficult to get changed and ready for whatever fucking meeting Hughie had been telling him about without waking Her. Clothes off then on one at a time, not bothering to go to the bathroom because he’d have to flush the toilet, and brushing his teeth with one eye on the door for any movement. She shifted mid-spit, and Ben went rigid. He had to wait for Her to settle before walking out, looked at Her beautiful, neutral face one last time, and whispered into the silent room, “I fucking love you, Sunshine. Sleep.”

She made a small hum, but her heart didn’t flutter and breathing did break rhythm, so Ben knew she hadn’t heard him. He left the apartment in silent steps, and the moment the door was cautiously closed behind him he stalked to the dining hall. Everyone was already there, except Mallory, A-Train, Ryan, Ben, and Her. Huddled around the table, speaking in low, tense voices, turning to see Ben push through the doors with wide, surprised expressions. 

“Soldier Boy,” MM frowned at him. “You’re… up early.”

Ben scowled, looking around at their nervous, fucking guilty expressions. “Hughie said there was a meeting.”

A chorus of groans and sighs echoed through the room, and any pretense of silence was apparently thrown out the fucking window as everyone glared at a red-faced Hughie.

“Bloody fuckin hell, lad,” Butcher whacked Hughie upside the head. “You ain’t able to keep your mouth shut about this for one morning?”

Hughie rubbed the back of his neck, frantic words paired with gestures at Ben. “He should know! And he’ll help-“

“Kid,” MM shook his head. “We all fucking agreed he couldn’t be a part of this. He’s biased-“

“I am not fucking biased,” Ben snapped, voice loud enough to silence all the various protests and pussy fucking arguments. “And someone better tell me what’s going on, before I start chopping dicks of and shoving them down throats-“

Hughie said Her name, flinching as everyone’s glares grew sharper. “It’s about her. We’re, um, worried.”

Ben was worried as well. But he didn’t fucking trust that his worry, which was about how She was perfect and beautiful and needed fucking rest, matched their worry.

“Why.”

“As you know,” Annie sighed. “She passed the psych test. But she was really quiet last night,” Annie whispered. “She didn’t talk unless we asked her a question. And it wasn’t getting better, when we wrapped up.“

Ben studied their faces, and it was all concern. Granted, Butcher’s concern made it look like the emotion was physically fucking painful to him, but it was still worry. For Her. Just Her, not how she could help them or if she was a liability. He trusted them. Somehow, at least for this, Ben trusted that they at least fucking meant well for Her. And he could acknowledge that he was a little fucking biased. A lot fucking biased. He loved Her, and she was more important than the whole goddamn world, so he was a lot biased. 

“She got drunk,” Ben muttered, stalking across the dining hall to stand at their table. “Last night, I found her outside our apartment. Fucking hammered.” 

Butcher frowned. “She ain’t able to get drunk-“

“She said he,” Ben glared at the French Prick. “Hides his experiments in the kitchen. Fucking horribly.”

The French Prick’s mouth fell open. “Merde. That would, ah, that would be the V.”

Hughie blinked. “We have V in the kitchen?”

“No,” the French Prick ran a hand over his face, shaking his head. “I have been attempting to recreate V in the kitchen. But it has been trial and error, and I did not think it would, ah, have narcotic effects. It should not have narcotic, I must have made an error-”

“Frenchie,” MM grunted. “I want that shit out of my kitchen by this afternoon.” 

“Just the V, or would you like everything else gone with it?”

“The fuck you mean everything-“

“MM,” Butcher grunted. “Bigger fish, mate. Frenchie, take care of it, before MM’s fuckin head flies off his body. Soldier Boy,” Butcher turned to Ben, saying Her name with a frown. “Is she alright? Frenchie ain’t killed her on accident?”

Ben gave a tight nod. “She’s sleeping it off.”

“What do you think we should do?” Hughie was looking at Ben with sad fucking eyes. “I mean, she can’t go in public right now, but we also-“ 

“Can’t fucking bench her,” Ben finished for Hughie with a sigh, because they couldn’t. She’d climb the fucking walls and yell at them until they let her do something. “She can work on the V. Help us go through the records. That’s it.”

He’d have to ask Her. Later—even though everyone else seemed willing not to tell her about this—Ben was going to ask her what she wanted. It was a lot fucking easier for them to keep secrets from Her. They didn’t fucking love Her.

Annie frowned at him. “Do you think she’ll be okay with that? I mean, she might try to do something else-“

“She will try to do something else,” Ben snapped. She’d always try to do more, even when it killed her. “But she needs rest. So she can do whatever the fuck she wants, as long as it’s far away from Homelander and Sage. Got it?”

That wasn’t something he’d waver on. She could make all their plans and tell everyone what to do, and she could do it right here. At Ben’s side, where if She cried he could wipe away her tears, and if she fell down he could pick her back up. Everyone was nodding, mumbling agreements, and Ben stayed at the table as the group wandered off. The French Prick and Kimiko into the kitchen with MM glaring after them, Annie and Hughie to the hallway as Hughie whined about meaning well, and calling Ben having worked out, leaving Ben with MM and Butcher, silently watching each other.

“You’re going to tell her about this, aren’t you?” MM muttered, and Ben rolled his eyes.

“Of course I fucking am.” I love Her, you pussy. “And if you try and stop me I’ll rip out your asshole-“

“We ain’t gonna stop you, Gov.” Butcher grunted. “Just checkin.”

“Why.”

Butcher shrugged, giving Ben a look he didn’t understand. “No reason. Call it healthy fuckin curiosity.”

Ben scowled, but moved on. If Butcher wanted to be a weird, cryptic fucking dickhole, Ben wasn’t going to be the one that managed to force him to make fucking sense. “You dickhats seen the news?” 

“Yep.” MM sighed. “They’re saying some fucked up shit. You think it got to her?” 

“She was saying,” Ben paused, figuring out what he wanted to tell them. Not everything. Not how She’d called him beautiful, or passed out in his arms, or that strange fucking feeling. “Fucking weird shit. Things that only an insane fucking pussy would say.”

“Things Homelander would say?” 

Ben nodded at MM, something rolling in his stomach. “Things fucking Homelander would say.”

“Keep an eye on her,” Butcher frowned, hands tucking into his pockets as he stood. “She’s strong, but that shit was bloody hell. Right now it’s about the V, so let all fuckin lock in on that. Get Homelander well and bloody buried, twenty feet under. Agreed?”

Even as Ben grunted an agreement, sitting at the table and combing through more and more worthless fucking records with MM and Butcher—the French Prick and Kimiko filtering in and out—he didn’t fucking mean it. This was about Her, not Homelander. This didn’t get to be about Homelander. He didn’t get to fucking take Ben’s attention and energy from Her, along with how’d he’d taken her life and happiness and fucking peace. Ben was already here—sat in the dining hall with the papers in front of him—so he’d keep working at it, but the moment she called for him he’d be gone. Doing whatever she needed him to do. He fucking loved Her. This was about Her. For Ben, this had to be about Her. Nobody else would make it about Her—the real Her, not the speculation or lies or fucking Vought persona—so that was Ben’s most important fucking job. Love Her. Silently, piously love Her. Watch Her bounce around with Ryan and listen to her make plans and kiss her and nip at her until he was allowed to fuck her stupid. Never do anything that made Her feel annoying or the worst or like a burden. Just fucking love Her. Sit in her light and love Her. 

There were worse fates, Ben decided, than waiting for a perfect woman, sitting in Her light, and loving her forever. All Ben could really ask for now was to prove that he was worthy, really, truly goddamn worthy, of sitting in Her light forever.

——————

When you wake up, someone is banging on the downstairs door and Ben isn’t at your side. He was here. You’d gotten drunk, barely managed to keep the words Ben. Ben, I love you from falling out of your mouth, and he’d pick you up and carried you to bed. It wasn’t an exact memory, more of a clouded over flash of sitting in the hallway, alone. So alone. Everyone knows your name and they all have fucking opinions but you’re alone that turned into Ben. Ben’s here. He’s in front of you and real, and everything is warm now. Then you were on the stairs, then on the bed, then in Ben’s lap, then asleep. Not alone. Ben’s still here so you’ll never be alone. He’s so handsome and doesn’t know you love him, and this isn’t fair. You should be able to tell him you love him and it should be easy. Ben is so easy, so you should tell him you love him.

You hadn’t. You know you hadn’t because this part was clear in your memory. Not fair. This isn’t fair. Why you, why are you the one who has to be here and fix this. Why were you the one Homelander decided to take, why did it have to be you. You don’t want it to be someone else, you wouldn’t wish this for anyone, but it’s still so unfair. You didn’t do anything, you didn’t make this mess, but now you have to clean it up. It’s not fucking fair, but this isn’t about fair. Nothing’s fair, but Ben’s got you and you love him. He’s staying, you’ll burn together, and that’s that. You love him, and it’s not fair, but that’s that.

And then you’d fallen asleep. Deep, peaceful, dreamless sleep, that Ben had been here for. The bed smelled like him, and his Thing in your chest was just a little stronger than it had been yesterday. It was always strong—it was tattooed on a part of you that was far too carefully tended to and protected for it to fade—but when Ben was here it flared. Grew almost painful and loud. Like it was responding to his proximity, revitalized by the fact that Ben had been here. With you. You loved him, and he’d been here, so really nothing was that terrible.

The door bangs again, and you have to move. You were only wearing Ben’s shirt and underwear—it smelled like him, pine and salt and Ben—but whoever’s downstairs won’t let up, so you have to move. 

When the door slides open, Frenchie almost falls onto you with a shout of surprise and a hand flying forward you narrowly manage to dodge.

“Fuck, Frenchie!” You watch him with a frown, regaining steady footing and looking around the apartment with curious expression. “Are you-“

“It is lighter.” Frenchie looks back to you, looking you up and down. “The apartment feels much lighter.” 

You blink. “Lighter than what? What’s-” 

“The last time I was here, it was heavy. Full of Soldier Boy’s pain. It is now light.” 

“Yeah, okay, sure.” You sigh. It’s too early to decipher weird Frenchie sayings. “Can I ask why you’re here now?”

Frenchie nods eagerly, reaching into his pockets. “I come with gifts.” 

“Gifts?” 

“A phone,” he shoves a brand new, practically sparkling phone in your hand before returning to his pockets. “And your request, well and fulfilled.” 

He holds up a small, plastic baggie filled with white pills, and you swallow. “The suppressant?”

“Oui.” Frenchie passes it into your hands. “Take two a day. They will run on a thirteen hour cycle, and grow less effective as the hours pass. If you start to take them with more frequency, I will make more. And do not let anyone else take them. It would not be good.”

You narrow your eyes at the pills, glancing at Frenchie with a frown. “What would happen?” 

“Well, your empathy works as an extension of your limbic system beyond only your one self. It does not end with you, but connects beyond your body into others. Correct?” 

“Sure.” You don’t have a single fucking clue about the scientific aspects of your power outside of V goes in, something happens, but Frenchie’s talking fast and you’re tired. That sounds right, and as long as the pill works, you don’t really care. “So?” 

“This will destroy your limbic system. Bomb it entirely. For you, it will regenerate within the millisecond, fast enough that you will not even notice it was ever fully gone. Within the thirteen hours it will have returned to its previous capacity, and another pill will sever your connection to others emotions once more. Stop taking the pills, the empathy returns in a full force.” 

“And for others?” 

“Death.” Frenchie shrugged. “Immediate death. Their brains would likely leak out of their ears.” 

You grimace. “Gross.” 

“Oui, very much.” 

“So, I guess I just take one?” You look between the bag and Frenchie. “And that’s it?”

“They will not work immediately, Madame,” he says your name with a sigh, glaring at the pills like they’d disappointed him. “Your body will attempt to fight them off. If I have been correct, after one pill they will have more of an instant kick.”

You nod slowly. “Two a day?”

“I would do every twelve hours. Should the thirteen pass, you will be made to start from scratch once more.” 

“Okay,” you sigh. “Thanks, Frenchie. This really means a lot.” 

“Do not worry, I enjoyed making them. Let me know if you die.” 

You snort. “I’ll try not to, but sure.”

The door closes behind him, and you don’t bother to get any water to take the pill. Nothing happens—like Frenchie’d said—and now all you have to do is wait. For it to work, and for Ben to get back. You put the coffee on, hide the pills with the V, and take an inventory of what’s changed in your absence. The fridge is stocked better than you’d thought it would be, and all the dishes are clean. Most everything, actually, is clean and well maintained. You’ll have to tell Ben later that you were proud of him, because this was even more than you’d hoped for. You’re low on toothpaste, but toothpaste is cheap. There was a blanket and pillow still on the floor near the couch, and all that took to fix was carrying them upstairs into the hamper. Everything else was almost exactly as you’d left it.

Another reason to love Ben. He was a surprisingly good housekeeper.

I am not a fucking trophy wife, Sunshine.

You sigh into your empty bedroom, where everything still smells like him. Even when he’s probably just in the dining hall, he won’t stop haunting you, his voice rough and low in your ear. I didn’t call you a Trophy Wife, Benjamin. I called you a housekeeper. 

And? Those are the same goddamn thing-

No. Trophy wife implies wealth, and we technically live on welfare. And a housekeeper is a job. So if escorts don’t pan out, I can start a sexy male maid business.

I am not a fucking maid.

No, you’re a sexy maid. Big difference.

You can hear his chuckles, rolling somewhere near his Thing. You think I’m sexy? Think I’m fucking hot? 

Shut up.

I think you’re fucking hot. If you’d let me, I’d show you just how hot I think you are.

It’s not real Ben. It’s okay to indulge this, because it’s not real Ben, and he can’t feel all this love for him, swirling in with the thirst as something warm spreads through your body. How? 

There’s a pause, and then a grunt. You want me to tell you? 

Yes, please.

Silence again. I love you.

Ben, I told you-

I know what you fucking told me, his voice snaps your name. If you want to know what I’d do, I get to say I love you.

You sigh. You know him too well, love him too much, because even this phantom of Ben is a stubborn asshole. Fine. 

Good. I love you. I’d tell you that first, until you got it. Then I’d kneel at the side of the bed, and pull you right onto my face. You fit real well on my face, Sunshine, like you were fucking made for it. Then I’m going to prep you. I’m not fucking small, beautiful, and I’ve felt how damn tight you are. I’m going to have to tongue-fuck and finger you until I decide you’ll take me easy. If it takes a whole goddamn day, that’s a whole day you get to cum for. A whole day I make you feel fucking good. 

You almost fall over, because his voice is everywhere. Sitting around you and in your body, warm and deep and hungry. He sounds so fucking hungry, and he’s everywhere. Ben’s not even here but he’s everywhere. The whole room smells like him, and his voice is living somewhere in your skull, and every time you touch yourself—squeeze your breast or shove a finger into your cunt—it’s so easy to imagine it’s Ben.

If you get tired or need a break, you can suck my cock until you’re ready again. But once I get you in bed, we’re not leaving until I fuck you right. If you need to stop you’ll tell me, and I’ll take care of you, because I fucking love you, but if you’re just fucking sensitive we’re riding it out. We’re going until you’re ready, and once you are I’m fucking you until the bed breaks. Until you’re screaming so loud the suits downstairs hear you begging for me and saying my name.

Ben- 

Just like that. Over and over again until I’ve fucked you so good you can’t even speak. All you’ll be able to do is make those pretty moans and whines, and I’m going to fucking eat them. The first time it’s going to be fucking romantic, because I’m a gentleman and I love you, and we’re going to do goddamn boring ass missionary so I can watch your face when you cum on my cock and devour all your pretty fucking sounds.

You swallow, and give up on standing. This is your apartment, your bedroom, and you’re allowed to fall backwards onto your bed and imagine your… Ben telling you how he’d want to fuck you. You’re allowed to slide a hand into your underwear and up your shirt—Ben’s shirt—and indulge this. The first time? How, being speechless in just a fantasy does not bode well for when this is real. How else do you want to fuck me?

Every fucking way.

Can you be a little more fucking specific-

After we’re romantic, you’re getting on your stomach and I’m fucking you from behind until you can’t hold yourself up anymore. You’re going to fall forwards, and I’m going to have to hold your perfect fucking ass in the air until you cum again and I finish on your back.

That’s specific. That’s really specific. Is that it?

It’s a taunt, a bait for the phantom to keep going until you manage to cum in real life. He takes it, because he’s a figment of Ben and that idiot doesn’t know how to shut up. You love him so fucking much.

Of course that’s not fucking it, brat. I think I’ll let you ride me, see how long you can keep yourself upright before you need me to take over and fuck up into you. Then you’re going to sit in my lap and I’ll fuck you and finger you until you’re fucking putty in my arms. We’ll try to clean up, but I’ll fuck you in to shower as well. You’ll probably suck my dick after, and then I’ll bend you over the table downstairs when we try to get food. We’re defiantly fucking doing it against the wall, and if Butcher tries to cockblock me again we’re not stopping. He’ll just have to watch me fuck you until you try to bite me again. That was real fucking hot. I want to see if that’s just a wall thing, or if it’s just something you do whenever I throw you around.

You’re so close. He sounds like he’s talking right in your ear, and you hear every wet sound your fingers are making as you go faster. 

I’m going to throw you around, Sunshine. I’m going to get real fucking rough with you, because you like it. I know you fucking like it. And I love you, so every time I leave bruises on you I’ll kiss them away then fuck you slow to make up for it.

You can’t bruise me, Ben. It’ll heal.

Who gives a fuck. I’ll still fuck you until you’re scratching my back and bursting into flame then fuck you until you’re begging and dizzy. The, when this shit is over, we’re going to travel the whole goddamn world together until there’s not a corner of I haven’t fucked you in.

Even as you start to grind into your hand and your eyes start to flutter, you scoff. Romantic.

Only for you, beautiful. By the time I’m done with you, everyone will always be able to fucking smell me on you. Know how fucking good you are, how goddamn addictive and perfect you are, because I won’t be able to stop fucking cumming all over you. Fuck, I’ll never be done with you. The world will go to shit and I’ll just keep fucking you, Sunshine. I fucking love you. 

That’s enough. That’s all the right things to say, said in Ben’s deep, firm voice, and you let out a small whine that he can never know about when you cum. It’s silent for a second, Ben’s Thing is still humming a beat in your body that carries you back down, and you smile into the air. Pull out method guy, huh?

Condoms don’t fucking work on supe jizz, Sunshine. It’s like trying to block a bullet with a damn window. 

Did they not offer sex ed in the 1930s? Pull out method doesn’t work, Pretty Boy.

I don’t give a fuck. I’ll cum in you all I want, until you’re fucking full of me. And I’ve slept around my whole damn life, never knocked anyone up.

As far as you know. 

You can almost see his scowl. That’s not funny.

What, don’t like the idea of a bunch of tiny Benjamin’s, running around telling their stuffed animals to shove it up their fucking ballsacks? 

There’s a long pause, and when Ben speaks again his voice low. Low and careful and rough. 

I like whatever the fuck you like. If you want an army of kids in a white picket fucking house, then you get that. If you never want to look at baby again, I’ll kick all of them into the fucking sun. But that’s a bridge we’ll cross after I fuck you like you deserve. Got it? 

You don’t get to respond to the Phantom—remind it that it’s not real, and can’t really offer you anything—because the door opens downstairs and real Ben is home. He’s not talking or making any real noise except for heavy footsteps, but his Thing in your body flares and you know it’s him. 

When you exit the bedroom he’s outside the door, frowning down at you. You’re about to ask him where the hell he went—your mouth already open and eyes narrowed at his stupid, handsome face—but he moves first. Pulls you against him and kisses you, long and heavy until your knees are weak and you can’t stop the moan escaping your throat. He takes it, mouth curling in a smirk against yours, and your blood is hot. Burning in your body and trying to push out of you, into Ben. Everywhere you’re connected to him you can feel his hunger, and when his arm wraps around your hips and squeezes your whole body almost caves in with an effort to keep all your love for him in you. You’re still a little high from your orgasm, and he’s kneading at your skin and dropping his head to suck on your neck, and it’s almost impossible to just push him away. Take an unsteady step back—keeping your fists in a tight grip on his shirt because you’re not that strong—and watch him carefully.

“Good morning to you too, Benjamin.”

“It’s fucking not,” he grumbles, hands covering yours against his chest, holding you there. “Better now, but still not good.”

You have to focus on the not good part, so that your heart doesn’t pound right through your ribs and out of your chest at the better now part. “What happened?”

Ben sighs, eyes scanning over your face, pulling you apart until he finds whatever it was needed. You let him. It always makes you feel safe, known, and a little more alive because Ben can look at you like that, so you let him. You sit in the concrete resolve wrapping around you, in the rumble of his Thing around your body, and wait.

“You’re hungry.” 

You are hungry. You haven’t eaten since yesterday, unless you count whatever Frenchie had been hiding in the Kitchen that had gotten you drunk and the tiny pill in your system, still not kicked it. But Ben says it and suddenly you’re starving, and your stomach makes a bubbling, rolling sound. Ben hears it—of course he does, stupid asshole with stupid supe ears—and smirks at you.

“Shut up.”

His smirk widens. “I didn’t say shit.” 

“It was a preemptive shut up.” You take a step further down the loft strip, and Ben follows, folding his fingers between yours as you walk down the stairs. “To keep you from saying something fucking dumb.” 

He snorts, and you can feel his shrug jostle your arm. “Preemptive warfare is a crime, Sunshine.” 

“I know that.” You turn with a frown, waiting for him to join you at the bottom of the stairs. “How do you know that?” 

“I’m not a fucking idiot-“ 

“I don’t think you’re a fucking idiot.” You tilt your head at him, feeling that odd glow start to hum inside Ben’s body as his glare softens. “But when I tried to explain Bill Clintion’s impeachment, you started shouting about how fucking should never be a crime. I’m just never sure what you do and don’t know.”

Ben sighs. “I was there when the UN Charter was signed. I remember all the fucking peace-pussies arguing about that shit for three days.” 

You grin at him. “Old-“

“Shut the fuck up and eat.” Ben starts to tug you toward the table, where he’s poured the coffee into your mug and set out a plate with a muffin that definitely hadn’t been in your apartment before. 

“Where-“ 

Ben pulls out your chair, and all but shoves you into it before walking around to his own seat, dropping across from you with a glare. “Dining hall.” 

“Why-“

“You like those muffins. And you need to fucking eat.”

You sigh. “No, I’ve got that. Why were you in the dining hall?”

Ben’s jaw tightens, and he glares between you and the muffin. “Working before I got kicked out. Eat.”

“Kicked-“ 

“Eat, and I’ll fucking tell you.”

You wrinkle your nose at him and take an exaggerated bite of the muffin. Ben nods, staring at your chewing as he answers.

“Got a boner. MM saw it. Fucking prude asshole kicked me out.”

“Out of-“ You swallow, covering your mouth with a hand. “Out of what?”

“Work.”

“Why were you working in the dining hall?”

“You’re not allowed to flip your shit.”

You glare at him. “No.”

Ben grunts your name. “You’ve got to swear you won’t fucking lose it-“

“If you don’t want me to lose it, dumb dumb, don’t lead with asking me not to. Why were you working in the dining hall?” 

He sighs. “We had a meeting.”

“About?”

“You.”

He’s still looking at you. Watching you carefully, a foot pressed against yours under the table. There’s something sick in his body, made of that stone protection but wrapped in toxin. Worry. Ben’s worried.

You take a long breath. “What about me.”

“If you’re okay.”

“I’m fine-“ 

“No, you’re fucking not. You got drunk,” He snaps your name, but it’s not angry. It’s strained, and the sickness starts to wrap around his throat. “And you’re still throwing yourself in front of trains when you need to rest.” 

“That’s not for you to decide,” you glare at the muffin on the plate, because you can’t look at Ben. If you look at Ben, you might start crying. “I’m here, Ben. I’m okay, it’s just a lot-“ 

“It doesn’t fucking have to be a lot. This doesn’t have to be your job-“

“Yes, it does.” You sigh, feeling blood draw in your mouth as you bite through your cheek. Blood. So much blood. “I have to fix this.”

He mutters your name, and when you look up he just looks sad. The toxin has settled into something that aches, and Ben’s eyes on yours are just tired and sad. “This is fucking killing you. You’ve done enough, you’ve fucking scarified all your goddamn privacy and peace for this shit, just rest-“ 

“No,” you give him a small, sad smile that you know doesn’t reach your eyes. “I’ve bought us time, but we have to finish this soon. I’ll rest when we finish this.”

Ben shakes his head, the ache growing, but sighs. “Fine.”

“Fine?”

“Is anything I say going to make you, for once in your damn life, listen to me?”

“No,” you mumble, and it’s a half lie. The only thing that would make you listen is the one thing Ben won’t say, so, technically, the answer is no. “It won’t. I have to-“

“You have to fix this.” Ben mutters. “I know. But,” he narrows his eyes at you. “No more fighting Homelander and Sage by yourself. No more risky, shit fucking plans that put you in the line of fire or make you afraid.”

“Okay,” you whisper. You don’t really want to fight Homelander and Sage by yourself again. Ever. You don’t want to see blood on your hands for the rest of your life, and agreeing to this makes something loosen around Ben’s throat, so it’s so fucking easy to agree. “Deal.”

Ben’s hand finds yours on the table, squeezing once. “Deal.”

“Ben?”

He repeats your name back to you with a frown, and you smile at him. This one’s real, and born from how he didn’t yell. You didn’t yell. He’s still here, and worried about you, and you love him, so it’s perfectly natural and easy to smile at Ben.

“You smell like shit.”

Ben scowls, but his amusement sparks in your chest and your smile widens. “Shut the fuck up. I didn’t get to shower last night, because someone was climbing all over me and wouldn’t let me fucking move.”

You feel the heat rush to your face. “Sorry.”

“Don’t-

“Apologize.” You sigh, poking at your muffin. “I know. I’m still sorry. I was out of it, I know you’re my friend, but it was, um, weird to see what everyone was saying-”

Ben grunts your name, and his Thing is aching. “You’re my best friend. I was fucking serious when I said you’re my best friend.”

“I know-“

“You clearly don’t,” he glares at you, and you can’t look away from him. His thumb is running over your knuckles, there’s a heat in his eyes that starts to make the fire push under your skin, makes something in your gut ignite. “I fucking adore you. Not some fake, plastic, marketable version of you. Nothing any sort of fucking Hollywood pussies and vultures say about you, nothing Vought says, and nothing fucking Homelander says matters, because I adore you, and know you better than fucking anyone. You’re not a liar, or a whore. You are mean, but I usually deserve it, and you’re also beautiful and kind. Got it?”

It’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done to not launch yourself across the table and kiss Ben, tell him you love him, and that you know that. That any fear or doubt festering in your head is in the form of a cold, cruel voice calling you weak, and what pushes it away is an ardor and love and certainty that Ben will catch you. You manage to stop yourself. Bite your tongue and choking down the words, give Ben a smile that says thank you.

He sighs, scooting back from the table. “Come here.”

The muffin is forgotten as you stand and move around the table, falling into Ben’s lap and just holding him. Wrapping your arms around his neck and pressing your head into his shoulder. You can feel his every breath moving his body, and it makes an even harmony with his Thing in your chest.

“The media is full of idiot pussies,” he mutters in your ear, hands drawing circles on your back. “In the 60s, they said I couldn’t really shoot a gun. I can shoot a fucking gun.”

You smile against him. “I know. I’ve seen you do it.” 

“And I hit the mark every goddamn time.” 

“Sure.”

He pulls back, glaring at you. “I fucking do.”

“I believe you, Ben.” You grin at the adorable, frustrated frown and knit of his brow. “What am I supposed to say?”

Ben narrows his eyes at you. “I don’t know, something fucking encouraging. With Ryan you kept telling him he was strong-“

“Ryan is twelve. You’re a grown man.” You pull yourself further up his chest until your lips are brushing against his when you speak. “You know you’re a good shot, Ryan didn’t think he could hold more than three tons. What do you want me to say.” 

He’s glaring at you, and his words are low and tense. “Shut up.”

“I’ll say it,” you mumble, falling further forward as that glow deep in Ben’s body returns, still not fully kissing him. It’s hard to keep teasing him, because his invading all your senses in the best way possible, but you manage. “I’ll tell you you’re stupid fucking handsome, and strong, and my, Benjamin, what nice hands you have-”

His Thing roars inside of you, and suddenly he’s moving. Picking you up and slamming you down onto the table, leaning over you and smirking against your lips without ever just fucking kissing you.

“Brat.” His words are a growl, and you can just watch him. Feel the hunger sweeping through your body, drowning out all the lingering fear and tension until it’s just Ben. Ben, I love you. “You’ve got a smart, pretty fucking mouth, Sunshine. You want me to touch it, all you have to do is damn ask.”

You don’t bother. Your nails are digging into the skin of Ben’s neck, and his grin is so fucking cocky, and the groan he lets out when you tug him down—pull his mouth onto yours—is the best thing you’ve ever heard. He doesn’t push it further—his hips pinning yours to the table so you can’t buck up into him—but it’s still too much. Your love is starting to get away from you. But you can hold it in a little longer, hopefully long enough long enough for Frenchie’s stupid fucking pill to do its job so Ben can just fuck you. He can’t keep looking at you and touching you like this—hungry and reverent and devoted—and expecting you not to fuck him. He needs to feel how much you love him, even if it’s just with hands and teeth and moans instead of soft confessions and whispers of Ben. Ben, I love you. 

It doesn’t kick in though. Your blood is starting to burn in your body, and Ben’s thing is rioting in the spaces between your ribs. So you have to lean your head away and take a heavy long breath as Ben drops his head to your neck, kissing and sucking a wet, heavy trail up to and along your jaw, across your face, and stopping on your lips, pressing his brow to yours. 

“Ben?”

He grunts, and you move your hands to hold his face, pulling him back to meet your eyes. 

“You still smell like shit.” 

He scoffs. “You didn’t seem to fucking mind.” 

“I am capable of being distracted.” You grin up at him, running a hand up, into his hair. “Are you going to distract MM or Annie at dinner by making out with them when they say you smell?” 

“Smartass.”

“You love it.”

Ben sighs, dropping his full weight back onto your body, pressing his head into your neck. “I do.”

That doesn’t mean anything. He means the words—Ben means everything he says, it’s one of the reasons why you love him—but they don’t mean anything. His breath is warm on your skin, and his hands tracing across your body like you’re sacred, but it doesn’t mean anything. His thing in your chest is pounding and roaring and trying to carve something crucial into you, but it doesn’t mean a single thing. Your blood is starting to leak out of your body, and that’s why he’s acting like this. It’s your love, crawling away from you, making you a liar. A weak, horrible liar.

You pray he can’t hear the strain of your voice when you mumble in his ear. “Go shower, Pretty Boy.” 

He nods, hauling himself off your body with a strange expression that you can’t read, kissing you one last time. Slow and gentle, letting your hand curl into his hair before standing up—tugging you upright as he does—with a glare.

“Finish your muffin.”

“Don’t tell me what to do.”

You see his mouth twitch up, and can’t stop your own smile crossing your face as he rolls his eyes, and kisses you one last time before he walks away—up the stairs and into your bedroom—and you love him. You need this stupid pill to kick in now, because you love Ben and the longer you draw this out the harder it is to keep holding your ground. The more you walk right up to the line, the harder it is not to cross it. That had been too close, far too close, but it had still been impossible to stop it.

Because you’re weak. The words are bored, obvious, and crude in your head. You’re a weak, manipulative, lying bitch. Useless. Weak and useless. 

You’re not useless. You can’t be useless. You might be weak—too soft, too kind, too forgiving—but you won’t allow yourself to be useless. Once your empathy is severed, you will be useless. You’ll have your fire—sitting comfortably under your skin—but if you have to face Homelander again it might go dormant, and you still don’t trust your singing enough to work in your favor.

You’d promised not to face Homelander alone again. And you’ll never go looking for it. But there will always be a chance. A single, hollow sliver of a possibility that no matter what you—or Ben—do, Homelander will find you again. You can’t be useless if that happens. You won’t be useless if that happens again.

The phone Frenchie gave you is already half set-up. The benefit of your phone being destroyed last time is that—unlike when Homelander had found it—you could just port in all your old data. Nothing’s been lost, nothing has to be redone. Ben’s contact is still pinned at the top of your messages, and your heart breaks a little when you see the last text he’d sent you.

Benjamin: Handsome Fucking Dumbass Cunt

If Butcher gives u shit for going off bok, tell me and Ill rip his face of

He texts like a child with two broken thumbs. The longer he’d had a phone, the more his grammar and sentence structure had regressed. You’d made the mistake of turning his autocorrect in the hope it would make him try harder, then the bigger mistake of explaining texting abbreviations, and now every single text he sent looked like that one. He’s an idiot, and you love him so much it might kill you. 

I’m going to Annie and Hughie’s. I love you.

You type it without thinking, and barely catch it the second before you hit send.

I’m going to Annie and Hughie’s. I’ll see you in a few hours.

Ben’s phone lights up on the table next to you when you hit send, and you smile when you see your own photo, still his lock screen.

You can’t lose this again. It’s what carries your feet out the door and down the hall, makes you knock on the door of Annie and Huhgie’s apartment. You can’t lose Ben again, and if you’re useless, you might. I might be wiser to ask Ben to do this for you, but you don’t have the strength to explain to him why you need it. To see his face fall and feel his worry when you tell him that you’re still weak and afraid, that he’s your best friend and you adore and trust him, but you’re still weak and afraid. That his word means more than anyone’s, but it can only do so much to combat Homelander’s cold and the screams of the world that you’re a liar. A weak, useless, liar.

Hughie answers, and says your name in surprise. “Hi, are you-“ 

“I need you to help me.” 

“Me?” Hughie blinks. “Um, with what?” 

You take a deep breath, crossing your arms over your chest. “Teach me how to shoot a gun.” 

Hughie stares at you, mouth slack, shaking his head and stumbling over words. “What? I mean, why? Why are you asking me, and not MM or Butcher or, uh, Soldier Boy-” 

“Because you’re the only one who I trust to not be a dick about it.” That’s true. MM will try to be patient, but you’ll get frustrated with yourself and it will end up making you both tense and angry. Butcher will probably end up shooting you to make a point, and—on top of not wanting to explain to Ben why you need this—he’ll be a cocky fucking showoff about it, and you’ll get horny, and nothing will get done. “Please, Hughie. I don’t need to be an expert sniper, I’m just the last person left on the team who doesn’t know how.”

“But I’m, I’m a terrible shot. Butcher says I might as well be blind-“ 

“You know how to use a gun?” 

“I mean, I guess yeah. I kind of have to, for this shit-“ 

“Then teach me.” You sigh. “Please.” 

“Are you really-“ 

“I’m sure.” 

“Then yeah,” Hughie takes a step back, pausing with a nervous smile. “Okay. Just, give me a sec.” 

He’s only gone for a minute, and when he reappears with shoes on and his phone in his hand, Hughie closes the door and leads you down the hall. 

You walk in silence for a while, before he clears his throat and frowns at you. “You’re really okay?” 

“I’m tired,” you mumble, looking down at the floor. “But I’m okay.” 

“And Soldier Boy-“ 

“He’s good.” You smile to yourself, because you’re a lovesick dummy. “He’s really good. He brought me a muffin.” 

“A muffin?” When you look at Hughie, he’s frowning. “That’s, that’s kind of sweet.” 

You nod, shrugging. “He’s a lot more like a puppy than you’d expect. I mean, I know you met him before I did and he was a dick-“ 

“I don’t judge you,” Hughie interrupts you with almost frantic words, and you blink at him. “I mean, he’s still a dick, and you know that, but, fuck, he’s isn’t calling me cocksucker anymore, and even Annie thinks he’s nicer-“ Hughie shakes his head, and you start to get a little worried he’s going make himself pass out. “Not nicer. But less, um, mean? Like he’s still a dick but more of a soft dick? That’s horrible, I-“ 

“Hughie,” you almost nudge his shoulder, but manage to catch yourself. “I get it. And I don’t think you judge me.” 

“Oh. Good.” As you reach a door labelled Shooting Range—Ben was right, they don’t tell you fucking shit—Hughie stops in the hall, giving you an awkward smile. “Is there, uh, a reason you don’t want him to teach you?” 

You breathe out a small laugh. “Not any you’d want to hear.” 

“I don’t think that’s true, I mean you’re my friend-“ 

“We wouldn’t get through a lesson without being, um, less than PG-13.” 

Hughie’s eyes widen, and his face grows red. “Uh, gross.” 

You shrug. “I told you. Should’ve believed me.” 

Hughie opens the door, and his smile is still embarrassed, but less awkward. “Learned that lesson, I guess.” 

You grin, and follow Hughie inside. 

The shooting “range” is more of a shooting hall. It’s not small—there’s at least five or six booths—but it’s narrow and tight, with the guns being kept in a large gray trunk that Hughie kneels down to unlock. 

“This can’t be safe,” you mutter, watching him shift through the hopefully unloaded firearms. “You’d think a government building would have stricter gun codes.” 

“They do.” Hughie stands back up, handing you a pistol similar to the one Ben had taken from the agent in February. The one you’d shot Sage with. “These are all ours. I don’t think we’re technically supposed to have them here, but nobody seems to really give a shit that we do.” 

You hum an agreement, glancing down at the gun. “Now what?” 

“Uh,” Hughie looks around the hall. “I guess you chose a booth, and I figure out where MM would’ve put the ammo?” 

All the booths look the same. Headphone mufflers you won’t need provided, targets set up behind a steel counter that runs the length of the hall, floor to ceiling dividers between each area. The dividers have full length mirrors for some reason—though it is pretty easy to imagine Frenchie flexing into them to try and show off to Kimiko, or Butcher winking at himself when he makes a shot—and there’s a panel of buttons to adjust the targets. You chose the closest one, and watch Hughie shuffle around the area until he finds a small box at the booth closest to the door, filled with neatly sorted bullets.

He returns to your side, swallowing and giving you one last apprehensive look. “Ready?” 

You nod. “Born it.”

The first thing you learn is how to load the gun. Hughie does it once for himself, then again to walk you through it, and you manage to do it yourself in one try. The moment the bullet is locked in the chamber, Hughie freezes. 

“We probably should’ve done gun safety stuff before the bullet went in.”

“I think I’ll be okay,” you shrug, keeping the barrel pointed at the floor. “No pointing it at anyone, myself included, safety on until I shoot, finger off the trigger, don’t be a dumbass. Right?”

Hughie nods, and from there it’s all about how to shoot the gun. Logistically, it’s simple. In practice less so. Guns are loud. You don’t wear the earmuffs—your eardrums can’t shatter, so you hand them to Hughie—but the bang still echoes through the room and the blast makes you stumble back slightly. Over the hour you figure out how to plant your feet so you don’t fall backwards, Hughie gives you nervous, hesitant tips about aiming and stance and hand positioning, and you get better. You’re not good at it, not by a mile, but you’re hitting the target and stop flinching every time you fire. 

“You want to try and move it back?” Hughie leans forward, frowning at ten foot space between you and the target. “I think you could manage fifteen-“

You feel Ben right before someone knocks on the door. His Thing in your chest spikes up along your spine, and you sigh as Hughie jumps. “Shit.”

He’s shouting your name, and the wall is barely muffling it. “Open the damn door!”

“Do it yourself, drama queen!” You yell back, and the banging on the door stops.

“I can’t, you took the fucking keycard!”

You had done that. It’s sitting on the counter, right in front of you, next to your phone. When you open the door to a glowering Ben—hair still damp, scanning you up and down—you sigh. “I forgot, sorry-“

“Shut up.” He marches past you, glaring around the room, eyes settling on Hughie. “Why the fuck didn’t you pussies tell me we had a gun range.”

“Uh, I don’t-“

“And what the fuck are you,” Ben turns back to you with a scowl. “Doing in it?”

You give him a flat look. “Guess.”

“Brat.”

“Cunt. Why are you here.” 

“I went looking for you, and Annie said you and Hughie went to the gun range that nobody fucking told me we had.”

“We didn’t think-“ 

Hughie’s mumble is cut off by a sharp glare from Ben. “Shut the fuck up. What have you taught her.”

“Ben, I asked him to-“

“Why him?” Ben’s Thing in you is aching and sour, and his face looks almost lost. “Why didn’t you fucking ask me?”

You don’t have a good answer that doesn’t either start or end with Ben. Ben, I love you, so you just give a lame, guilty shrug. “I didn’t want to bother you-“

“You never fucking bother me.” He snaps, and you feel the heat rush into your face. “I’m sure as hell going to be a better fucking teacher than he is.” Ben jerks his head at Hughie, and you frown. 

“Hughie’s been fine, Ben, don’t be an ass.”

Ben scoffs. “I’d be fucking better.”

“I actually agree with Soldier Boy-“

You raise a hand, and Hughie falls silent as you hold Ben’s glare. “I’m not try to join the fucking army, Benjamin, just shoot well enough to get by. And we’re doing fine.”

Ben steps to the side, gesturing back to the booth. “Prove it.”

Hughie all but stumbles back as you march to the counter—shoving past Ben and ignoring the heat rolling off his body into yours—and pick up the gun. You can feel his eyes on you, his Thing starting to scorch your lungs and heart, you pull the trigger. Hughie yelps—you hadn’t given him enough time to put the earmuffs back on, you give him an apologetic look when you turn—but Ben is silent. Stalking over and glaring at where you’d hit the target. A small, smoking hole right over the heart. You’d been aiming for the head. Ben didn’t need to know that.

“Good,” he grunts, leaning past you and picking up the gun. Loading it with rough, careful movements. “Do it again.”

“Do I, uh,” Hughie’s looking between where Ben is standing over you, glaring at the gun, and where you’re staring at Ben’s hands, trying not to drool, clinging to even a fake anger at him. “Do I have be here?”

“No.” Ben snaps, glancing up at you with a smirk flashing across his face. “Fuck off, kid.” 

Hughie doesn’t wait to be told twice. He gives you a small nod, Ben an anxious look, and the door closes behind him.

“That was mean, Ben-“ 

“I don’t give a fuck.” Ben passes the gun back into your hands, taking a large step back. “Again. Knees further apart.”

You frown. “Why?”

“You won’t have to tense as much to stay up.”

“But-“

“Just fucking do it, Sunshine.”

You stick your tongue out at him, and turn back to the target. Knees further apart, raise the gun, shoot.

It’s really annoying when Ben is right. His handsome face gets all smug, and his eyes get all taunting, and the cocky grins that always pulls at his lips never goes away until you kiss it. “You going to admit I was right?”

“Fuck you.”

He snorts. “Do it again, and I might. You look fucking hot.” 

You flip off, but do it again anyway. This time the recoil barely even shakes your body, and Ben’s grin grows.

“Arms higher up.”

“What?” 

“Your arms.” You don’t get to turn to glare at him before you feel Ben behind you, wrapping around your body and moving your arms to level with your shoulders. “There. Again.”

You have to take a shaky breath before you fire, because even after Ben steps back his Thing keeps bellowing in your chest.

It goes like this for another hour. Ben adjusting you, muttering orders and standing behind you as you fire. His Thing in you becomes almost violent—clawing against you, making your blood rush and burn and try to reach Ben—but you push on. You won’t be useless. 

“Even footing,” Ben grunts from behind you as you glance back at him, reloading the gun. “You’re putting more weight on your left. They need to be even.” 

“Can you say please?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

You grins at him. “So you can’t say please.”

Ben lets out a long, labored sigh, and his Thing makes a long, feral sound, and pushes at the top of your chest. “Please. Brat.”

“Well,” you hum. “If it’s that’s important to you-“

“Shoot the damn gun, Sunshine.”

You wrinkle your nose at him. “Asshole.”’ 

When you turn back around and raise the gun, you freeze. 

You can’t feel Ben.

He’s behind you, a foot away and watching you silently, and you can’t feel him. His Thing in your chest is gone. Not dormant, not quiet. Vanished. Frenchie’s pill had worked. You weren’t dead, and you can’t feel Ben.

You lower the gun and turn around, taking a deep breath when you find Ben staring at you, scanning your face with a frown.

“Are you-“

“I’m done,” your words are quick, frantic, and you rush past him. Unloading the gun, shoving it back into the trunk and dropping the bullets in MM’s box, and turning back to Ben. “Let’s go-“

“What's wrong with you.” He cuts you off with a glare, crossing the hall until he’s towering over you. His arms are brushing yours, and you can’t feel if he’s angry or annoyed or worried. You can tell he’s worried—he’s still studying your face, wrapping around you without touching you so he can block you from any possible threats—but you can’t feel it. He grunts your name, low and gruff and Ben, he’s saying your name and looking at you and he’s warm and- Fuck it.

You surge up, crashing your mouth into Ben’s and yanking him down by his shirt to meet you halfway. His hesitation barely lasts a second—a long, painful second of him tensing under your hands—before he makes a low, rumbling sound from deep in his chest and spurs into action. Hands grabbing your face, angling it so he can deepen the kiss with his tongue down your throat, biting your lip as he presses his body against yours and walks you back into the wall. Groaning when you start to tug at his hair, dropping his head into your neck and sucking that one spot until you moan. A loud, desperate moan that makes Ben grin as he moves a hand up to support himself against the wall, dropping the other grab your hips. 

He says your name again, and you can hear the hunger. It’s not in you, but Ben’s voice is deep and hoarse—his hand starting to squeeze and rub your skin as he nips near your ear—and you know he’s hungry. “You’re okay.” 

“I’m okay-“ You cut your own words off with a high, breathless sound when Ben starts to leave sloppy, open kisses along your jaw. “Fuck, I’m good. I’m really good, Ben, please-“

“You’re good.” He pulls all the way back, his fist curling on the wall near your head as he watches you with dark eyes. “You want this.”

You nod, not even bothering to pretend that you’re not desperate. That if Ben doesn’t touch you right fucking now you might die, or at least start crying. “Yes, please.”

He nods, but still doesn’t just move. “Say it.” 

“Benjamin, please fuck me-“

You don’t get to finish your sentence before he’s back on you. Bruising your mouth with his, growling your name down your throat as you start to try and climb up his chest with desperate hands scraping at his shoulders. Hands Ben grabs and moves around his neck, muttering an order against your lips that rumbles through your body and makes your knees almost buckle. 

“Hold on.”

Ben’s knee pushes between your thighs before you’ve even had a chance to listen, and when you roll your hips onto it his hands hold you down. Stopping any movement, pressing your core right against him as his arms drop to hook under your knees. He pauses, rubbing circles on your thighs as he adjusts his grip and watches at you, still trying to grind down onto him.

“Please-“

“Tell me you want me. Fucking mean it.”

You nod, your nails digging into his neck. “I want you. Now, Ben, I want you now-“

This kiss is heavy. All of Ben’s weight is over you, and he’s eating your words, turning them into breathless, needy whines. You're a little dizzy when he pulls back, trying to chase his mouth and squirm higher up his leg, and almost squealing when your shorts are ripped off your body. He’s grinning at you, watching you with almost an amazement, and his chuckle makes you whimper. “You want me so bad you’ll fuck yourself on my knee, Sunshine?” 

“Ben-“

You yelp when he hauls you up and over his body, your legs wrapping around his chest and your head leaning down to try and connect his mouth back to yours. It doesn’t take much effort, because Ben drops you down his chest just enough that you almost slam back into him. His nose is bumping yours, and he tastes like coffee and strawberries, and his beard is scraping the soft skin of your face as he takes more. His hands are squeezing and pulling at your thighs, and he won’t stop making low, deep sounds that cause his chest to vibrate and make you moan into his mouth. 

“So fucking good,” he mutters your name, and you try to roll your hips against him. Try to do something about your whole body feels like it’s on fire, how every time Ben’s big, rough hands move against you, and every time he groans and sucks your tongue into his mouth, you can feel your heartbeat move down, down and the ache grows painful. “And so needy, beautiful. I haven’t even really fucking touched you, and I bet you’re dripping.” 

“Please, Ben, you asshole-“

He pulls back, and looks up at you like you’re the best thing he’s ever. With blown-out eyes, his nostrils flaring and his mouth half-open. “You’re so fucking perfect.” He growls, one hand moving up your thigh, running one, broad finger right over your pussy and sending a shiver through your body. “I’m going fucking ruin you. Fuck your beautiful fucking cunt until you can’t sit down, until you can’t walk for a week. You’re going to fucking soak my cock, I’m going to make you so fucking wet and desperate you’re going to fucking scream.” 

You nod, and if you had any sort of thoughts right now that weren’t Ben. Fuck, Ben, I love you. I love you, please, Ben, I love you, fuck, please- you’d point out that you can’t be fucked enough to get sore, you can’t get sore, but Ben moves to rub your clit in one rough movement and you decided that it doesn’t really fucking matter. If he wants to take up that challenge, who are you to stop him. 

“Words.”

“Do that,” you mumble, your whole body going slack as one of Ben’s fingers runs between your slit over your panties, before rising to flick your clit once. “Fuck, Ben, do that, that’s good-“

Your words turn into a whine when he starts to slide you down his body—an arm moving around your waist to keep you upright and pressed against him—and Ben hisses when you brush against his cock. Hard in his pants, long and thick, pressed against your thigh and so close and big and Ben- 

He’s trying to sit you on one of the booth counters, but you lean your weight forward and keep going down. Ben doesn’t try to stop you, his hand moving up to your face as he watches you drop down onto your knees. Level with his cock, grinning up at his slack face. When he says your name, his voice is rasp. “Are you-”

“Yeah,” you move your hands up his thighs, holding his gaze. He needs to look at you like that forever—like you’re all the stars in the sky and the spaces between them—because combined with the way you can see his cock twitch in his pant and how you his  chest is rising and falling in a heavy, uneven pattern, you might cum without Ben even touching you. “Do you want me to?”

He chuckles, leaning back against the divider and tangling his hand into your hair. “What are you supposed to do if I tell you no.”

“Shoot you,” you start to undo his belt buckle, glancing between your hands and Ben’s face. His jaw is clenched and his free hand has moved to grip the counter, leaving an indent on the metal. “I can do that now. I’m good at it.”

“You’re real goddamn confident for only a day of practice-“

“I have a great teacher,” you smile at him, and Ben swallows, glaring at you. “He’s a cunt, but really hot. I think I might let him fuck my face if he asks nicely.” 

“Brat.”

You hum, pulling down his pants, boxers with them. At this point it’s really not worth fighting the small whine that escapes your throat when you see him, because that cock is yours. And you’re going to suck it, if it's the last fucking thing you do. “That’s not nice, Benjamin-“

He growls your name, and when you look back up his eyes on yours are feral. Pushing right through your body, making you grind mindlessly onto nothing and your nails dig into his skin. “Do you want me to fuck your face.”

“Yeah,” you whisper, glancing back at where he’s only centimeters from your mouth. “I do.”

“Well,” he smirks. “Are you going to ask nicely?”

“You dick-“

“My dick, beautiful,” he keeps glancing over your head, looking between you and something behind you that you can’t see. “Is going to fuck your perfect, pretty fucking mouth. If you can’t take it, squeeze both my knees twice. Got it?”

You nod, and your voice is breathless. “Both knees. Twice.”

“I’m going to start slow,” his hands in your hair curls into a fist, pulling your head back until your eyes meet. “And when I cum-“ 

“Inside.” Your words are a little too fast, because Ben grins.

“You want to fucking swallow, Sunshine?”

“You know I swallow, asshole-“

“I don’t know shit,” Ben winks, and you grind down on to the air again. “But I know you’re going be a goddamn work of art with your lips on my cock. And I know you’re going to fucking prove that you can swallow all of me. Ready?”

“Yes-“

The word has barely left your mouth when he slams forward. His cock pushes into your mouth, the head resting at the top of your throat, and Ben’s hand tightens in your hair as he just sits there. His dick on your tongue and your nose brushing his hips, and a whimper leaving your body when Ben groans and you can feel it.

He pulls you off, keeping the tip right between your lips, and tugs your hair until you look up at him. “Good?”

You squeeze his thigh, hold his gaze, and run your tongue around the head on his cock, grazing it with your teeth. Don’t be a pussy, Benjamin. Fuck my face.

His eyes flash, and you hear the metal of the counter whine under his grip as he takes a deep breath, staring behind you again. When he looks back to you, he looks like an angel again. He’s so handsome, and he looks primal and powerful, and you love him. You can tell him that, in a long, desperate noise when his cock is muffling any real words he could hear. He’s looking at you like you’re the holy one, when he’s everything. He’s the whole world, and when he starts to move, all your thoughts just clear to that. Ben. Ben, I love you. 

He’s not holding back. Ben’s hand is guiding your head up and down his cock at a brutal, unrelenting pace, and his hips keep bucking when he hits the back of your throat to the point that you give up on trying to do anything productive and just focus on keeping your gag reflex from choking on him. There’s smoke starting to curl from your hands and the whole world is growing blurry, but fuck, you don’t care. He tastes so good, and every hiss and groan that leaves him is like music, and he’s everything. 

“You’re, fuck,” you suck on him once, just trying to contain the drool falling out of your mouth, and Ben’s hips jerk. “You’re so fucking good. So fucking good, Sunshine, you’re beautiful and perfect and I fucking-“ His words turn into a long, deep strained sound, and you start to grind onto the air. You can’t let go of his legs to touch yourself, you’ll fall over, so all you can do is whine and hope a pillow somehow appears for you to ride. “Fucking Christ,” Ben’s words are pushed between his teeth, and he somehow goes faster. “God, fuck, you’re beautiful. Your mouth was fucking made for my cock, so fucking soft and warm and perfect and, fuck-“

Ben’s hand flies off the counters, joining his other on your head, and he’s close. You can feel the head of his cock twitch when your throat squeezes around it, and his words are starting to slur.

“Fuck, you’re so good, you’re fucking beautiful, and perfect, and fuck, Sunshine, you’re beautiful, you don’t have a goddamn fucking clue how beautiful you are, how much I, fuck-“

You’re dizzy and your brain is clouded with lust, but you’d manage to move one hand off of Ben’s thigh to squeeze his balls. It works just like you’d hoped, and Ben’s whole body tenses as cum shoots, fast and hot, down your throat. You swallow—you’re not a pussy, and you love him more than anything—and Ben’s hands splay against your scalp and cheek. When you pull back your lips make a popping sound, and you smile up at Ben as he looks down at you, his thumb tracing your cheekbone and his breathing loud and ragged. 

“Fucking Christ,” Ben mutters your name, and the devotion is back in his eyes. Devotion and heat and something else you don’t understand. “You’re… Christ.”

“I’m Christ?” You shift on your knees, trying to ignore how the ache is starting to become painful so you can just look at him. “Wow. Don’t tell Butcher, he’s a big god-hater-“ 

Ben pulls you upwards, leaning down to meet you halfway, kissing you until your knees start to shake again and you have to lean against him to avoid falling over.

“Brat,” his growl is paired with a long suck of your upper lip and squeeze of your waist, and you make a high, needy sound. “Want me to show you something?” 

You have literally no idea what he might want to show you, but you nod because right now if Ben asked you to figure out time travel you’re pretty sure it would take you an hour.

He spins you around, pressing your back to his chest, and you realize what he’s been staring at. The mirrors. On the booths. You’d totally forgotten about the mirrors on the booths.

“See how fucking beautiful you are?” Ben’s muttered in your ear, the hot air of his breath making you shiver and try to push further back into his body. “You’re the most beautiful woman in goddamn history. Fuck, you might be the most beautiful thing in history. I don’t know how you ever expected this to be a fair fucking fight, for us not to end up here. Where I’m going to make you feel fucking good and you’re going to watch.”

“Ben-“

“I liked watching you suck my cock, Sunshine.” One of his hands has moved up to palm your breast, and the other has started to trail down, tracing patterns on your stomach. “You looked real fucking pretty, taking my cock all good and deep in your throat, letting me fuck your face and swallowing my cum. But you’ve got a little bit of a problem, don’t you.”

Ben’s watching you in the mirror, locking your gaze with his, a thumb rubbing over your nipple as his hand slides a little lower, resting right below your abdomen. All you can do to answer him is nod, and try to grind up so that his hand will drop further. 

“You’re so fucking desperate for me to touch your perfect fucking cunt,” Ben says your name, and it rolls through your body and sets you on fire. There’s no smoke rising through your body, but everything smells like pine and the whole room is starting to dance with a misty, green light. “That’s your problem, isn’t it. You need me, need me so bad you’ve fucking ruined your underwear just from sucking my cock. I can fucking smell you, Sunshine, you smell fucking delicious.”

He hates you. You’ve made a grave miscalculation in how much Ben likes you, because this is torture. He won’t stop teasing you and calling you beautiful and good and not just fucking touching you. He must hate you, because you’re whining sounds that are meant to be pleas of his name and humping the air near his hand, and Ben won’t just touch you. Ben’s smirking at you in the reflection, and he’s such a cunt and he’s so handsome and you love him and if he doesn’t start doing something right now you’re going to punch him square in his stupid, smug, handsome face.

“You want me to fix your problem?”

“Ben-“

“I know, beautiful.” His hand moves out from under your shirt, moving up to your chin until you’re looking back at him and he can kiss you. Soft, gentle, deceptively innocent. “I’m going to take care of you. All you have to do is-“

He needs to stop being so sweet and good or you’ll tell him you love him. He needs to shut the fuck up and touch you. “Ben, please. Please-“ 

“Please, what?”

“Fucking touch me-“

His hand on your chin pulls your head back down, forcing your eyes back to the mirror right as he tears off your underwear. Ben grins at your reflections, thumb brushing against your lip as his hold on your chin loosens slightly, and his hand drops down, resting right between your thighs without just moving.

“God, you’re fucking wet,” he’s still whispering right into your ear, and it’s making you a little lightheaded. “Is this all for me, beautiful? All for me to take care of?”

You start trying to grind down onto his hand, and Ben’s free arm drops back down to pin your hips against him, muscles rippling when your try to squirm away and he’s kissing your neck and hie won’t move- “Ben-“

“No,” he grunts, hand moving back up  your shirt to brush your tits, face buried into your shoulder where you can’t actually see him. “My turn. You’re going to relax, and I’m going to do this for you.”

“Please-“

He says your name, pulling back to meet your eyes in the mirror. “You trust me.”

Not a question. You both know the answer, and it’s more for Ben to hear it. You know that, because when you glare yes, at him through the mirror, he grins. You’re about him to just do something, anything, whatever he wants as long as he’s touching you, when he moves.

Ben’s finger pushes right into you, pumps once, twice, and then is joined by a second one. “Fucking tight,” he growls in your ear, still watching you. Always watching you. “Look at how fucking beautiful you are, squirming on my fucking fingers. I’ve barely even touched you, Sunshine, and you’re already fucking squeezing me.” 

You make a loud, shameless moan as he starts to move faster, playing with your boobs with his hand up your shirt and muttering pure filth into your ear.

“So fucking good. Look at how fucking good you take me, beautiful, and this is just my hand. Just my goddamn hand that’s making you whine, whine like the perfect fucking brat you are, fucking soaking my fingers, covering me in how much you fucking want me. So goddamn perfect, you’re perfect, it’s not even a fucking contest. So fucking good and perfect, going to cum all over my fingers, look at how fucking beautiful you are with your perfect fucking mouth all swollen and your pretty fucking eyes watching me ruin you-“

He groans, because you’ve figured out that you can grind backwards, into him.

“God, fucking Christ, woman, you’re driving me fucking insane-“

Ben rambles start to turn into just low, deep sounds that roll straight through your body and down into your core. He’s still talking, and you know he’s saying words, but you’re high. Ben’s fingers are big and broad and rough inside of you, and they keep brushing against that one spot deep in your body, and he won’t stop scissoring them when they push all the way in. He keeps driving his fingers into your pussy, curling and twisting them with harsh, fast movements, and yanking them out until you can see them in the mirror. See your need for him falling off his hand, see them disappear back inside you, see his palm start to rise up to press against your clit and rub.

“Ben-“

“So fucking good,” He growls against your skin, half-pulling you off the ground. “I fucking adore you, Sunshine, fuck, see how goddamn perfect you are? Look at you, so fucking beautiful, all wrecked on just my hand-“ 

You do look beautiful. Ben is wrapped around you—he looks almost animalistic as you grind back into him with your head pressed into his shoulder—and you’re not sure if it’s the lights dancing through the room or the way that some sort of soft music seems to be playing in the distance, but you’re beautiful. You think, in the haze, that it might be how Ben’s watching you. That his eyes on yours are full of lust and hunger and affection, and you feel like something better than what you are. You’re barely in control of yourself, grinding back into Ben and countless, wanting sounds leaving your body, and you feel like wildfire. Like a star, burning and burning against the infinite way that Ben exists around you. Beautiful. But you look at Ben, watching you like you’re all the stars and planets and everything through and past the universe, and he’s better. You mold perfectly against him, and his dark hair is falling over his eyes as he ruts up into you. If you could think enough to make yourself move, you’d reach up and brush it away. But your hands are clinging to his arm over your stomach—you can see his muscles flex with every movement and it makes you squirm—and all you can do is meet his eyes in the mirror. He’s watching you whine and moan and writhe against him, and his jaw is slack, and he’s everything. Ben is everything, and he’s looking at you like you’re holy and crucial, so you’re beautiful. Ben doesn’t lie, so you’re beautiful. 

Ben’s palm rubbing circles on your clit start moving in faster, smaller movements right as his fingers press down inside of you and he bucks up into your ass, you almost scream as you cum. He’s still just watching you—eyes blown out and jaw slack—and when your legs give out he scoops you up into his arms, tearing his gaze from the mirror and meeting your eyes. I love you. Ben. Ben, I love you.

“You’re okay.” When you nod, your brain still a little slow, he frowns. “Words-“

“I’m okay, Ben.” You smile at him, reaching a hand up to trace his jawline. “I’m going to have to buy you a thesaurus, but I’m good.”

He snorts, rolling his eyes. “Well, you clearly fucking liked it-“

“I wasn’t of sound mind, Pretty Boy. Corrupt testimony.” You shrug, leaning further into his body. “You need to learn a few more words.”

Ben grins at you. “Someone’s trying to talk herself out of a proper fucking when we get home.”

“That’s blackmail.”

“See if I give a fuck.” He kisses the top of your head, and you wrap your arms around his neck. He’s so warm. You can’t feel him, but Ben’s still so warm. “You want a proper fucking?”

You swallow. “Yes, please.” 

“Then here’s how this is gonna go.” Ben leans back, holding your gaze. “We’re going to put on your shorts, and I’m going to put on my pants. We’re going back home, and cleaning up, then going to dinner because you’re going to need the energy. Then, the moment the door closes behind us, I’m fucking you. In our bed. Deal?”

Your voice is a whisper. “Deal.”

“Good.”

He helps you get dressed. Ben pulls his pants back on—shifting his body to block yours from the door—and let you use his arm as balance while you put your shorts back up your legs.

Your underwear has been effectively destroyed, and when Ben picks it up you think it’s going straight into the trash can, but instead he shoves it into his pockets and winks at you.

“Pervert-“ 

“Shut the fuck up.”

He tries to carry you. Ben bends down, and you have to whack him to stop him from picking you up and carrying you down the hall. He pouts—the grumpy, annoyed pout that means he being a little bitch about something—but settles for slinging his arm over your shoulder and tucking you into his side. He smells good. He’s big and strong and warm and Ben, and you can’t feel him. You’re okay. You can touch him, but not feel him, and you’re okay. 

It’s later than you’d thought it was. Barely twilight—everything cast in a blue-purple glow—and Ben tells you you’re taking the first shower. Demands it, actually. Grumbles about how I fucking showered this morning, and you’re the one covered in cum, Sunshine until you relent, because you’ve lost stupider arguments with him and you are indeed covered in cum. Mostly yours, running a little down your thigh, but some of Ben’s had managed to escape your mouth and dried on your chin and shoulders. Ben walks you upstairs and into the bathroom, drops on the bed with a frown as you start to close the door, and you love him a little too much to leave him looking like a lost puppy dog in the dark. Especially when it’s really not that much effort to cross the room and stand between his legs, to give him one last gentle kiss until his hands relax on your hips and he’s grinning against your mouth. 

Ben. Ben, I love you.

The shower is almost burning. Steam collects on the glass door and your skin is still sensitive from the gun range, the hum of the fan the only sound tangling in with the water.

It’s been coming in waves. It’s important for you to recognize that this is coming in waves. When you tell Ben you’re okay, you really are. You’re okay. Then. In that moment, when you’re smiling and laughing with the people you love and care about, you’re okay. When Ben looks at you—really looks at you, sees you in a way no one else does—you’re okay.

And then you’re not. Then it’s silent, and you’re cold even with the scalding water, and that fan is humming in the same key that ones in Homelander’s apartment did. And you’re so tired.

Something feels wrong in your body. It feels like a limb has been cut off, like something’s been taken out that’s vital to your existence. The longer it’s gone—the longer it’s just you, alone in your body—the worse it gets. The more you can feel that part of you that snapped in Vought tower, and all you can feel it is flailing around in your body, trying to find where it can fit back in. It’s making you sick, it’s making everything cold again. You’re broken, and afraid, and exhausted, and all this fear has to stay in you. All of this pain has to live and fester in your body, and you’re not strong enough to stomp it out. Weak. 

You hate not feeling Ben. He’s not touching you, and you can’t feel that imprint of him in your chest, and you’re alone. You can’t control yourself, keep your shit together and keep your love or panic or pain in your body, so now you’re alone. Ben’s just outside—waiting for you to finish showering—but the fan is humming like you’re back in the tower and they had warm showers there as well. Weak.

Everything is wrong. You’re broken and exhausted and in pain and weak. Ben is staying and you don’t get why, and people aren’t giving up on you but they should. You’re making everything worse for everyone, and you’re so cold, and the whole world can see how weak you are but you’re tricking your friends and lying and you’re weak. Useless, lying, manipulative bitch. Nobody stays, because why would they? Unlovable, better alone, better never being touched or loved because nobody could love you, you’re too weak.

You can’t feel your tears falling, any evidence of them being washed away with the water and the steam, but your eyes hurt and your throat is sore. You can’t breathe, and you’re drowning and alone, and you must have started screaming because the door bangs open and Ben bursts into the room. You think you say his name, but it’s so loud. Your blood is pounding in your ears and it can’t get out, and the fan is suffocating you, and Ben’s here but you can’t feel him. You can’t feel anything but freezing, painful, cold.

He turns off the fan. His fist slams into the wall, the sound stutters off, and you still can’t really breathe but now you can hear him. He’s saying your name, pulling off his shoes and opening the shower door. His hands move to his shirt, but you make a weak, choked sob and he freezes. 

“Fuck it.” 

You hear that. You hear his grunt, and watch as he pushes into the water, let him pull your head against his chest and hold you. You’re shaking and making strangled, weak noises, but he’s holding you up and staying. You don’t know why, but Ben’s really, truly staying. He’s humming in a low, horrible voice that rolls through your body and slowly starts to clear your head, and when he says your name this time you can nod, so he continues.

“What’s wrong.”

“I, I can’t-“

“Breathe,” he mutters, hand running up and down your back. “I’m here, you’re safe, and this is real. We’ve got all the damn time in the world, so fucking breathe.”

It takes another minute, of uneven, heavy inhales and long, sobbing exhales, but you finally manage to whisper the full sentence. “I can’t fight him again.”

You can hear his frown, but he doesn’t ask who. You both know, and Ben doesn’t waste time on clarification. “There’s not a chance in hell-“ 

“There is,” you mumble. “There’s always a chance. And I can’t. If I have to, I won't be strong enough, I can’t fight him again.” Your words are vomiting out of your body, your head shaking against Ben’s chest like you can push the thought—push Homelander’s cruel, callous voice—out of your head forever. “I’ll lose, I can’t lose, I can’t go back-“

Ben snaps your name, and you let out a shaky, weak breath. “Fucking listen to me. You are never fighting that pussy alone again. Ever. That’s fucking it. End of story. You can cry all you goddamn want, as long as you understand that you are never fucking going back there, and as long as I’m fucking alive he will never touch you again.” 

You make another soft sound, and nod. “I’m sorry-“

“No. You’re fucking everything to me, and if you’re burning, it’s not without me. So don’t fucking apologize.”

This time you just let out a breath, and wrap your arms fully around his body. “Thank you.”

He doesn’t push that one. Ben just grunts, and holds you tighter against him, shielding you from the water, still holding you like you’re sacred. Always holding you like you’re sacred. Like you can’t be broken, because the fire in your body will seal the cracks back together, and he’ll be here while it does. Words are coming a little easier, mumbled into his shirt, and you’re still broken but it’s not wrong anymore. “I’m tired, Ben. I’m so tired.”

“I know,” you can feel the heave of his chest as he sighs, and you think you might just fall asleep here. You’re safe, Ben would pick you up, and you’re so tired. “Sleep, Sunshine. I’m here.”

He’s here. Ben’s here, and saying all the right things, so right before you collapse against him, you smile. His heart is right under your head on his chest, and you can’t feel him but he’s real.

“You’re home.” Ben mutters onto the crown of your head. “That’s all that fucking matters.”

This time, when he’s warmer than the water and stronger than all the fear in your body, his heart lulling you to sleep, you believe him.

End Note: Big character centered chapter, I know, but we have to EARN the confession. Who do you guys think is gonna slip up and say I love you first. I know who I’m putting money on, but also that’s insider trading.

Thank you for reading!! If you like this story, reblog, share, or leave a comment! <3

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[taeyongdoyoung]

chase and attract

summary: your best friend decides to fulfil yet another one of your freaky shared fantasies... pairing: chan x reader genre: smut, best friends to ??? warnings: cnc/primal play, chasing in a forest, public indecency but there are no witnesses, fingering, finger-sucking, doggystyle, unprotected sex, praise, degradation, reader wants to use the safeword but doesn't, reader experiences subdrop, insecurities, crying, aftercare, pet names, the word daddy is mentioned but after they're done having sex, discussion of future scenario 👀 author's note: hello hello, this is the second part of my wolf & bunny series, i think i'll write one more to tie up the loose ends 🤍 part one & part three word count: 1.7k

After a number of discussions and precautions, you and Chan are finally ready to embark on your next sexscapade. He's reassured you multiple times that he knows the forest well enough that you won't get lost and as a safety measure, he brought a compass and his phone. You purposefully leave yours in his car to further heighten the feeling of danger you two had in mind.

“Are you ready?” Chan asks you gently.

“Kinda. I'm really nervous, Chris,” you confess, your hands shaking in your lap as you are still sitting in the passenger seat.

“Remember that you can stop this at any moment, right?” he reminds you sweetly.

“I know that,” you sigh. “But I want this, I really do.”

“Okay, then, there's nothing to be nervous about. You know I'll keep you safe. Always, yeah?”

You nod, trusting him completely, despite how insane this whole thing might sound to a stranger. You are fully aware that Chan has your best interest at heart.

“I'll give you a five-minute headstart this time,” he sets the timer on his phone. “Ready, set...go!”

You dash out of his car faster than ever and speed through the forest. You've got this. Last time your stupid legs gave out due to being in a box for too long but now you've trained for this moment for a week and you feel confident enough that you'll have a blast. Sure, you know that the point of this game is for Chan to eventually catch you. And boy, do you look forward to that moment. But the more you run, the more your heart will jump out, the more thrilled you feel.

You begin to lose track of time as you go deeper and deeper into the forest. Have five minutes already passed? You don't hear Chan's footsteps so either he hasn't started chasing you yet or he's going in another direction. Whatever the explanation, you keep running even though you're beginning to lose your breath. How much longer? You still don't hear him and you are in desperate need of a break. You should have brought a bottle of water. But carrying something like that would only slow you down. You're thinking too much again. You just want him to catch you already and fuck you until you can no longer think. Truly the best feeling in the world.

Finally, you hear leaves rustling. You don't hear his voice but you know he's getting near. Shit, what if it's someone else? No, that can't be it. Chan made sure that people rarely walk this path and it would only be the two of you. Still, you're terrified at the thought of someone other than Chan catching you. The mere suggestion of that is enough to send speed to your muscles and make you faster.

But all good things must come to an end (or maybe the good things are just about to begin...) and you are engulfed by a pair of strong arms. Before you can react or try to fight your attacker off, he's pressing his hand against your mouth.

“Shhh, don't scream,” Chan's voice is both a comfort and a threat, sending mixed signals to your core.

“Mmpf,” you struggle to make some kind of noise but it comes out muffled against his rough hand.

“This will all be easier if you don’t fight it,” Chan says soothingly and you shake your head in disagreement.

He momentarily removes his hand from your lip.

“Please, somebody help me!” you scream loud enough to paint the scene more vividly but not loud enough to actually attract attention in case a stranger passes by some forest. Which honestly seems impossible at this point. Chan really picked a very secluded trail.

“No one’s gonna hear you, sweetheart. And even if they did, do you think they’d help you? Silly little bun, you brought this on yourself walking in the forest all alone, wearing this dress…”

Fuck, why is he so good at this? You try not to wonder if he’s had prior experience with such a scenario or he simply just has great imagination to come up with such lines.

“Please, don’t do this,” you pretend to be afraid as your best friend pushes you on your knees and situates himself behind you. “I won’t tell anyone.”

“Why not? I’ll fuck you so good you’ll want to brag about it,” Chan chuckles coldly and sticks his thick fingers inside your pussy unexpectedly.

“Nnghh,” you cry out and are beginning to lose energy of all the running and no longer feel like faking it, letting out moans and whimpers of pleasure.

“See? You’re all wet for me, so obviously you’re enjoying it,” Chan gathers the evidence of your satisfaction with his fingers and pushes them into your mouth.

You don’t need an order to know what to do as you lick them clean of your arousal.

“Fuuuck, good girl,” Chan praises you and briefly breaks character, stroking your hair gently.

Oh, shit. You think you’re falling for your best friend. But such thoughts will only bring complications, especially in the current context, so you push them down as much as you can.

Chan makes sure you’re wet enough by mercilessly stroking your pussy and finally, fuck, sweet finally, enters you from behind with his cock.

“N-no, d-don’t do this,” you scream and try to escape his strong grasp but of course, it’s no use.

“Such a useless slut, only good for fucking and nothing more.”

The degrading words sting but you’re trying not to dwell on it too much.

“So fucking wet for a stranger. Disgusting,” he says.

Fuck, this hurts. Not the cock stretching you out to the fullest but what he’s saying. Is it really true?

You want to say the safeword. But you also don’t. By the time you make up your mind, Chan has already painted your walls white and you are also coming with a shudder, loudly and devastatingly.

You feel broken. Bad broken. You want to go home and cry and sleep and eat ice cream. What went wrong? You were having such a great time. So why are you suddenly having such dark thoughts? And not dark in the sexy way…

Chan picks you up gently and checks up on you.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m okay, I just want to go home,” you respond briefly.

He nods, quietly wondering if he did something wrong or if he’s just imagining the sad, empty look in your pretty eyes.

Chan helps you walk back to his car and makes sure you drink water and cleans you up to the best of his abilities with some tissues he prepared in advance.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asks again as he parks the car in front of you place. “You haven’t said a word during the whole ride. Usually you have funny stories to share and…”

“Gee, sorry for not always being the class clown, I guess,” you snap at him angrily with an eyeroll.

“Okay, don’t give me that attitude,” Chan scolds you gently but firmly. “If we want to do this healthily, you gotta communicate with me. If I did something wrong or if you felt uncomfortable at any point.”

You shake your head, still in denial.

“If you don’t wanna talk, I won’t force you. But you gotta remember that you mean the world to me, yeah? Even if these games end, I need to have my best friend in my life, am I clear?”

You blink and finally gather the courage to look at him.

“I’m sorry, Chris,” you admit and burst into tears.

He pulls you into a hug and pats your back.

“You have nothing to be sorry about.”

“Well, the truth is I wasn’t all that into it when you said that thing about me being useless, only good for fucking and disgusting,” you confess.

“Oh, babygirl, you know I don’t mean these things. I only said them ‘cause you mentioned you’re into degradation.”

“I was, I mean, I am, but for some reason, it really hurt me this time, sorry. I should have said. I just don’t want you to think poorly of me.”

“Alright, first of all, stop saying sorry, it’s completely normal to get caught up in it and feel insecure sometimes. As a dom, I should have been more careful and checked up on you more frequently. And second of all, please, remember that you are very smart, sweet, funny and not to mention incredibly beautiful so there is no way in hell I think lowly of you. Now, did you put that down in your pretty brain of yours?”

“Yes, sir,” you answer enthusiastically and your tears have dried up, instead a bright smile appears on your face. “Thanks for saying that. I guess I really needed to hear it.”

“You don’t have to thank me. Just next time if you happen feel like that, say the safeword and talk to me. About anything, I mean it.”

“You too, Chris. I know that’s particularly hard for you to open up but whatever you tell me, I would never judge you.”

“I know, babygirl,” Chan chuckles softly and does something that further confuses the already blurred lines of your friendship. He kisses you on the lips, deeply and sweetly. Not like how you kiss your best friend but how you kiss a lover.

“Do you want…to come inside?” you offer, not knowing what exactly, considering you just ended a very overwhelming scene.

Actually, you know what you want. You want him to hold you, to watch a dumb movie and eat popcorn together. You want…more than you can have.

“I gotta get some work done,” Chan says with a wince. “I’m really behind on stuff.”

“Is it…my fault?”

“No way. I just can’t stop thinking of…our games even when I’m supposed to be working,” he admits.

Phew. You’re glad he didn’t say he can’t stop thinking of you. If he had, you wouldn’t be able to let him go to work.

“Right. Same here,” you reply dumbly.

“If you need anything and I mean, anything, just give me a call or a text. I’ll keep my phone nearby.”

“You really shouldn’t, I’ll keep annoying you,” you mumble self-consciously.

Chan grips your hand and squeezes it comfortingly.

“You could never annoy me, okay?”

“Okay, daddy,” you say it playfully, eliciting a giggle out of his beautiful mouth.

“Do you have any particular wishes for…you know, next time?”

“I do, but it’s kinda mild compared to what we’ve done already,” you shrug. “Dunno if you’d be into it.”

“Name it and it’s yours,” Chan assures you.

“How do you feel about…fucking me while I’m asleep?”

To be continued…

[vynnyll]

Boyfriend material (ft. Goo Kim)

Other characters in this series: Jake Kim | Samuel Seo | Gun Park

— Featured: Goo Kim x fem!reader

— T.W: none

✮ Would spoil you rotten. Anything his princess wants, his princess gets.

✮ Would happily do silly things with you.

✮ Would make you any dishes that you crave (in exchange for your kisses).

✮ Would drive you around.

✮ Would be goofy and joke around (to make you smile) most of the time but is very serious and trustworthy when you need him the most.

✮ Would be a tremendously clingy boyfriend. Definitely follows you everywhere you go (if he doesn’t have any business to attend to).

✮ Would call you by pet names. His favorites are "princess," "sweetheart," and "cupcake."

✮ A man of physical touch. Loves to cuddle with you, give you back hugs, and place his chin on top of your head. Also loves to receive back hugs from you or rest his head on your lap while let you play with his hair.

✮ Also a man of gift-giving. Always buys you expensive shit (literally to tell everyone that your man is well-off).

✮ Would smile like a dummy all day if he hears you calling him your man.

✮ Would ensure that you’re doing well by checking up on you regularly.

✮ Would have your sleeping face as his lockscreen.

✮ Would pepper kisses all over your face once he gets home.

✮ Would (sometimes) pretend to be angry during an argument to get you to baby him.

✮ Would be incredibly talkative when he’s with you. Could ramble with you nonstop all day without feeling tired.

✮ Would purposely hurt himself to have you take care of his wounds.

✮ Wouldn’t talk about you with anyone. (Don’t get this man wrong, he just doesn’t want to share you with anyone, lol.)

✮ Wouldn't allow you to do anything dangerous. Ensuring your safety is his top priority.

✮ Wouldn’t stop saying he loves you when he’s needy for your touch.

✮ Wouldn’t hesitate to teleport to your place just to see you when he misses you.

[padfootagain]

Only an Almost (XX)

Chapter 20: Toothaches

Hi! Here is the very last chapter of this series!

Thank you all for reading, and for your reactions to this fic. I won’t lie, I’m very emotional as I say goodbye to this fic. I’ve worked on it for several months, it feels strange to let these two idiots go and live their happy lives now.

The next series I’ll post is my professor!AU, so stay tuned ;)

I hope you’ll like this chapter! Please, tell me what you think!

*************************************

Pairing: Hozier x fem!reader, friends with benefits AU

Warning: No explicit smut or nsfw content, but there are sexual themes and heavy make-out sessions (it’s a friends with benefits AU, I can’t really escape it), so 18+ only!

Summary: Andrew has been in love with you for years, and yet he has never confessed his feelings. But a night out celebrating the engagement of his best friend changes everything. However, you don't seem ready to be with him just yet. You make him an offer that he can't refuse... but will certainly regret.

Word Count : 2054

Masterlist for the series – Hozier’s Masterlist – Main Masterlist

Two years later

You placed back the panel into the hive; gently, delicately, being careful not to harm any insect that might have gotten in the way.

The buzzing sounds around you were loud, but you were used to them by now. Accompanying Andrew once a week to take care of his bees, you had grown more confident around his tiny friends. You were a real pro now. A reassuring thought for him, now that he was about to tour again. He could place their safety in your loving hands.

“Alright, that was the last one,” Andrew spoke, a happy smile on his lips.

“Good job, ladies,” you complimented the bees, making Andrew chuckle fondly at you.

“Good job indeed. And to you, too. Good job, love.”

“Thanks! I am getting good at this!”

Andrew closed the hive, and you both made your way back to your house.

Your house. Andrew still struggled to wrap his mind around the idea that you were sharing a home now, but you did. Even after ten months, he still needed to pinch himself sometimes to believe it.

He helped you out of your beekeeping clothes, and you did the same for him. Teamwork at its finest to repeat movements you were both used to by now.

“You won’t be nervous to take care of the bees alone?” Andrew asked you, voice soft and tender as he brushed a strand of your hair out of your face.

“No, don’t worry! Besides, if I need help, I’ll just call the guys at the brewery!”

“Right. Don’t hesitate to call them if you need help.”

“Don’t worry, baby… I’ll be just fine.”

He nodded, his heart doing its usual little jump at the sound of the pet name. He bent down to drop a peck on the top of your head.

“Let’s eat some of this delicious honey our tiny workers have been making!” he offered, and you enthusiastically nodded, following him through the house and inside the kitchen.

The house had changed quite a bit since you had moved in. Asides from accommodating your belongings, it had gained a few plants, some decorating items, a little bit of your warmth that mingled with his own.

Outside the sun was shining brightly, spreading its beams through the kitchen, while Andrew was cutting some fruits and you were making coffee. You kissed his lips to steal a piece of apple, making him laugh at the mischief shining in your eyes.

“Thief,” he mumbled, still a little stunned after feeling your lips on his.

You merely giggled in response, the sound as sweet as the honey he was adding to the two bowls of fresh fruits.

“I love you too, baby,” you cooed, wrapping your arms around his waist to pull him closer, mischief written all over your features.

“You’re annoying.”

“Don’t I know that already.”

“Unbelievable, that’s what you are…”

“Hmm… Don’t I know that too…”

Slowly, Andrew bent closer and closer to your lips. A fall he longed for, a dive he dreamt about still.

“Insufferable…” he mumbled against your lips, before kissing you properly, hands rising to hold your face in place, to let his fingers disappear into your hair and his thumbs spray across your cheeks.

You tasted so sweet; like the apple you had stolen, like love turned into a flavour.

“Christ… I love you so fucking much,” he whispered as he rested his forehead against yours.

He brushed his knuckles across your cheekbone, gesture infinitely sweet, desperately tender.

You ran your fingers through his hair, and he couldn’t help but lean into your touch.

“I love you too, Andy,” you whispered, your breath fanning over his face. “I love you more than anything.”

He bent lower to wrap you in his embrace, to bury his face into your neck. He inhaled deeply your perfume, until the scent was carved into his lungs. He closed his eyes, shivered as your hand slowly moved from his hair to his chest, to rest right upon his heart.

“I’m going to miss you,” he whispered into your skin.

He listened to the little gasp you let out, he wasn’t certain whether it was because of his breath across your neck or the meaning of his words.

“I’ll miss you too. God… it feels like I miss you already.”

You pulled away, after granting him another minute of the intimate embrace. You turned to the table, grabbed a bowl and a spoon, took a bite. You hummed in satisfaction.

“Our honey really is the best in the world,” you nodded, making him laugh.

“Our honey? These are my hives. That my family gifted to me…”

“We both take care of the bees! It gives me some rights on them!”

“Some rights?”

“I get 51% of the honey.”

“So… the majority of it. Even if those are my hives…”

“Because you love me.”

“Oh, I see,” he couldn’t refrain a loud laugh.

“I’m sleeping with you for two reasons: the honey, and Raine.”

“I knew it. I knew you were using me for something.”

“Of course, I’m heartless.”

“Can’t blame you though… the honey is delicious,” he added a hum of approval, as if to prove his point, while he took another bite of grapes, apples and honey.

You finished eating in silence. It was comfortable, comforting even. Warm and happy and full of love. You sat down after a couple of minutes, and your feet were touching under the table, a mingling of limbs just to make sure that you were always touching.

It was simple, domestic. Andrew caught himself staring at you, at the way the sun embraced your features and got caught in your eyelashes, pearling on their curve.

There was a deep, warm feeling bubbling in his chest, the kind he had felt before, for other women. But never to this extent, never reaching this absolute tenderness that was coursing through his veins as he looked at you. You, sharing a simple snack with him, in his kitchen. You weren’t leaving, you were home. You were his home and he was yours.

As he stared at you nipping on a grape, he was more content with his life than he had ever been.

You started humming, the melody of a song you had heard on the radio that morning, he couldn’t remember the title nor the lyrics. Still, he hummed along, and the sound seemed to make you grin.

“On a scale of ‘being happy to finally be rid of me’ to ‘on the verge of total panic’… how are you feeling about me leaving for tour tomorrow?” Andrew asked softly, his voice almost a whisper, afraid to break the warmth of the moment you were sharing together.

You blinked at him, put down your spoon in your bowl, and reached out across the table for his hand. He held it without a second thought, brushing his thumb across your knuckles.

“I’d say… a strong 5. ‘Sad that you’re leaving, but certain that we’ll make it work’.”

You offered him a reassuring smile, and he let out a long exhale.

“Are you angry against me for leaving?” he asked, but you were quick to shake your head.

“Of course not… that’s your job. And you were meant to be a musician, there is no doubt about it. I’m glad you’re doing what you love… I’ll just miss you.”

“You’ll wait for me, right?” he asked, voice quiet and vulnerable. He brushed his hair away from his face in a hurried and nervous gesture.

But you were calm, perfectly confident and serene as you answered.

“Of course. There is no need to ask that question. We’ve talked about this, we have a plan. We’ll be fine.”

The plan…

A call every day, no matter the time difference. A flight to join him in four weeks, a flight to join you again in nine. Texts whenever you woke up and before going to sleep. Updates on your books. No secrets, no lies, no attempts to hide if something didn’t feel right. And then it would start all over again after his two-weeks break, in eleven weeks. And again, and again, an unbreakable cycle for the foreseeable future. It was alright. Andrew knew he would still love you the same, even from the other side of the globe. But that was the breaking point for all his previous relationships, the distance and the missing and the loneliness that came with him.

And yet, when you tightened your hold on his hand and he focused on your eyes again, there was no trace of hesitation or doubt whatsoever there.

“You didn’t want to date me because of this, at the beginning…” he went on, but you shrugged.

“It was two years ago. I was afraid. I’m not scared anymore.”

“Really?” he asked, raising an eyebrow in surprise.

“No… I’m happy with you. I love you. I know we can do this. I have no doubt about us.”

His lips parted in a somehow shocked smile, and he had to blink to process your words.

“I have no doubt about my love for you either,” Andrew answered. “You’re right, I shouldn’t worry so much.”

You looked down at the bowl before you, it was almost empty already.

“I will burn your collection of Heaney’s books if you miss more than three phone calls, you are warned,” you joked, making him laugh again.

“How cruel! Leave Seamus out of it! He did nothing to you!”

“I don’t have a choice, I know you love him more than me!”

You were laughing, clearly joking, and yet Andrew’s expression softened.

“Now, that would be impossible. I couldn’t love anyone or anything more than I love you.”

You stared at him with an emotional smile on your lips, knowing that he was being serious, that he truly meant it… and he did. The songs he had written for you were proof. He hoped that the things he did for you every day were enough to demonstrate his feelings too.

He was surprised when you stood up, when you circled the table to stand by his side, waiting until he had pushed his chair so you could straddle his laps. You held him tightly against you, arms around his neck and face buried in his hair. He held you with the same affection, the same desperate need to show you how much he loved you.

“You don’t have to worry, Andy. I’ll wait for you,” you whispered in his ear, making his heart stumble and quicken at the same time, his breath catching in his throat. “You’re the love of my life. I want to spend all the time I have left with you.”

Andrew blinked, tightened his hold on you, tried to take in your words and their meaning and what it meant to have you confessing such feelings for him.

You pulled away as he started laughing, still sitting on his laps but frowning at his reaction.

When he looked at you, he wasn’t hiding the adoration he felt for you.

“And I was afraid I was being too cheesy…” he chuckled, making you roll your eyes.

“Eejit…” you mumbled, a fond smile on your lips still.

“I thought I was the one breaking the crazy love confessions quota in this relationship…”

“Don’t make me regret saying it!” you joked, moving closer again.

He brushed a strand of your hair behind your ear, putting all of his love in his gaze and his gesture.

“I feel the same, you know?” he grew more serious again. “You’re the one for me. It was always you, my love.”

You smiled just like he did, a mirror of emotions and love and something close to relief. You rested your forehead against his, closed your eyes.

Andrew thought about the break he would have in nine weeks, about coming home to you. He thought about the next leg of touring, and the break that would follow. And he thought about coming home to you with a ring in his suitcase, and he thought about you in a white dress, about waking up with you every day, going to sleep with your hand in his every night…

When he kissed your lips again, they tasted sweet, like the future they promised.

[jadeiteee]

Sweet Nothings | Break Up?

Pairing/s : Daniel Ricciardo x Max Verstappen x reader

Face claim : non face from pinterest

Summary : idk tbh

Warnings : dark!max, dark!daniel, smut, pet names, noncon elements, manipulation, will be added as the series go

Author’s notes : writing a threesome HUMBLES the shit out of me😔😔 was gonna cry writing this and I know the writing is bad please read it (yes this is a toto wolff reference😁😁) also this was not betaread. And also Daniel scares me here bcs I totally wouldn’t fall if this was Max’s antics but Daniel is just too convincing? His sweet and charming smile is so DANGEROUS because like he is so innocent and sweet looking.

You were always their obedient pet—until you weren’t. They could sense your growing restlessness, the way your eyes flickered before masking it with a smile. But they noticed, they always noticed.

The place you once thought would be your shared home, started feeling like a cage. A glamorous and luxurious one— but still a cage. Every inch of the house is monitored by a camera, every corner of the mansion patrolled by a guard. Every move you made was reported. They tried to keep it a secret, of course, but you could feel the constant stares from everyone around you.

You tried to ignore it at first, their sweet and comforting words assuring you it was just a precaution. They told you it was for your safety, to protect you from the dangers outside. But as the days passed, their reassurances began to ring hollow.

You tried to question them, asking why all these precautions were necessary. They just hushed you, saying it wasn’t worth the headache for you to know. "Just trust us," they would say, their voices dripping with false concern. "It’s all for your safety, princess"

"What's on your mind, princess?" Daniel's voice broke through your thoughts as he approached, nuzzling on your shoulder gently. You blinked, shaking off the fog of your reverie, and turned to face him, forcing a smile.

“Nothing, the view is extra pretty today” you replied, trying to sound casual. “What are we having for dinner tonight?” You asked, trying to change the topic.

Daniel smiled, his concern momentarily set aside. "I was thinking maybe we could try that new Italian place downtown. How does that sound?"

You nodded, grateful for the distraction. "Sounds perfect," you said, thankful that he didn’t ask more about your thoughts. “How about Max?”

"Max will join us later, he's working late," Daniel said casually, nuzzling on your shoulder. His touch was comforting, grounding you in the present moment despite your racing thoughts.

You nod absentmindedly, your mind racing with thoughts— how do you tell them you want to break up?!

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You inadvertently skimmed through the menu, your mind racing with other things. Max glanced at you, sensing your restlessness, before sharing a knowing look with Daniel. 

"Is everything alright, schat?" Max asked, his concern evident in his voice.

You forced a smile and nodded. "Just trying to figure out what to eat," you replied with a strained chuckle, hoping they wouldn't see through your facade.

Daniel and Max exchanged a glance, their concern evident. "You seem distracted," Daniel remarked, squeezing your hand gently. 

"I'm fine, what are you guys having?” You deflected, trying to steer the conversation away from your inner turmoil.

Daniel and Max exchanged another glance, a silent communication passing between them. Daniel leaned back slightly, his expression softening with concern. "I was thinking of trying the seafood risotto," he replied, his voice gentle, but you could sense his suspicions lingering beneath the surface.

You nodded before turning your head to look at Max “what  about you?” you asked, trying to deflect the attention away from yourself.

Max shrugged casually, though his eyes held a glint of curiosity. "I think I might go for the steak," he replied, his tone light but observant.

Daniel nodded in agreement. "Steak sounds good too," he chimed in, sensing your need for a lighter conversation.

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You are in the car on the way back to the mansion, contemplating the right moment to tell them when Daniel glanced at you, his brow furrowed with concern. The soft hum of the engine filled the silence between you.

Finally, Daniel broke the quiet tension. "Is there anything you want to tell us, princess?" His voice was gentle, but you could sense the weight behind his words, the unspoken understanding that something was amiss.

You swallowed, the lump in your throat betraying your nerves. "I-“  you stuttered, "I've been thinking and… I don’t think I am ready for a relationship " you whispered, terrified with their reactions.

“What?” You almost flunked when the car suddenly stop before moving again, Danny mumbled an apology and quickly focused on the road again 

"Is it something we said, princess?" Danny muttered softly. You glanced at the rearview mirror, checking Max's reaction. His face was emotionless, but you could feel the simmering anger beneath the surface.

“I-it’s just… I- I feel trapped,” you whispered, your voice trembling with fear. Despite Daniel's gentle tone, you could sense the undercurrent of his wrath.

He smiled, but there was no warmth in it. “You are just uncomfortable with the new surroundings, princess. Let’s discuss this at home, hmm?” He said softly, his hand resting on your thighs.

You glanced at the rearview mirror again, and this time, Max was staring back at you. His eyes were fixed on yours, silently observing every detail with an intensity that sent a chill down your spine.

Daniel's hand remained on your thigh, his touch gentle yet weighted with expectation. "We'll sort this out," he reassured, his voice calm but tinged with an edge you couldn't ignore.

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Daniel carried you bridal-style through the mansion, gently placing you on the bed, Max was talking with the guards outside before joining you, you attempted to eavesdrop but it was too quiet.

“Is there anything you want to say, princess?” Daniel started, his voice gentle but you could sense the underlying tension on his words.

“I-I just think I am not suitable for this..” you whispered, feeling small compared to them.

“You will get used to it” Daniel hummed, caressing your face. “You trust us, right?” 

As Daniel's hand gently caressed your face, his question hung in the air, demanding an answer that weighed heavily on your mind. You hesitated, torn between the comfort of familiarity and the ache of confinement that had been growing inside you.

"I trust you," you replied softly, your voice wavering with uncertainty. "But I don’t think this life is meant for me." The words slipped out in a whisper, heavy with the weight of your decision.

Daniel's touch tightened briefly, his expression darkening for a moment. His eyes bore into yours with an intensity that sent a shiver down your spine. But just as quickly, he composed himself, his features softening into a mask of gentle concern.

“Why don’t you give yourself some time to adjust, hmm?” He muttered softly, sitting you on his lap. “Don’t you love us?” 

You shifted uncomfortably in his embrace, torn between the love and security they offered and the need for autonomy. "I-i just..," you stuttered, your heart heavy with guilt. "I feel caged..." you whispered.

As you looked up and locked eyes with Max, you could feel how angry he was. There was no attempt to coax or comfort you; but you know that stepping out of this room is not an option.

Daniel's grip tightened imperceptibly, a subtle reminder of the power he held over you. "You're just confused," he insisted gently, his voice coaxing. “Why don’t we remind you how much we love you?” 

You knew what it meant, the subtle manipulation woven into Daniel's soft and gentle words. Yet, despite your resolve, a part of you couldn't help but be swayed by the familiarity and comfort he offered.

He turned you around, towering over you, his dark eyes burning into yours. The faint scent of jasmine and leather filled your senses, a familiar comfort that both soothed and suffocated you.  You knew what was coming, the intoxicating blend of pleasure and control that he wielded with such ease.

Daniel leaned in, his lips brushing against your ear, his voice a low rumble. “We’ll make you remember,” he whispered, his words a promise, a threat.  

Max gently lifted your chin, his gaze locking with yours before he leaned in and kissed you. “You are ours, schat. There is no escaping your fate.” 

The familiar sensation of his lips against yours ignited a spark within you, a flicker of the desire that he knew how to manipulate so expertly. It was a dangerous game, this dance between your need for freedom and the intoxicating pleasure they offered. 

You closed your eyes, trying to fight the pull of his touch, the whispered promises of devotion that danced on your lips. You knew you were trapped, held captive by a love that felt like a cage.

But even as you fought, a part of you craved the warmth of his embrace, the intoxicating sweetness of his touch. It was a poison that coursed through your veins, a sweet addiction that held you hostage.

“Just let go, princess” Daniel grins, his hand slipping onto your panties. “So wet already? We barely touched you” he mocked, his fingers teasing your folds.

Max quickly undo his belt and pants, throwing them onto the floor before guiding you to his shaft. “Suck.”

You slowly get down on him, trying to delay and tease him when he pushes your head onto it. “Don’t tease, schat.” He growls, his voice low. 

You grumble and start sucking him, your hand wraps around the base of his cock, your tongue swirling on the tip.

You gasped around Max’s cock as Daniel unzipped your dress, forgetting that he was there before focusing onto Max’s cock again.

You tried— but what were you supposed to do when Daniel kept rubbing on your clit. You pulled away from Max and looked at Daniel, your hand still stroking Max. “Dan” you whined, bucking your hips onto his fingers “Wanna cum” 

Daniel chuckled softly, “think you deserve it?” He mocked, his hand still rubbing on your bud. 

You were going to protest again when Max pushed your head onto his shaft again. “Focus, schat.” He grumbles

You huffed before sucking him again, focusing on his tip and occasionally bucking your hips on Danny’s fingers.

“Fuck-“ Max groaned, his voice rough “Am coming” he bucked his hips, shooting his load down your throat, forcing you to swallow it. 

“Such a pretty girl,” Max chuckled, “thought you wanted to be free?” He mocked, his tone laced with both amusement and challenge.

You turned your head and looked at Daniel with a pleading look “Can I come now?” You whined, grinding on his fingers, begging for friction.

You could see the apparent smirk on his face “yeah? Think you deserve it?” He chuckled before moving his position, “ride me” He commanded

You whined and complained a little before undoing his pants and sliding it off, slowly sinking on his cock.

He groans as he feels your warm cunt around him, his hands gripping your hips, it surely will bruise tomorrow. 

“Fuck- you feels so good, princess” He groans, bucking his hips up, hitting the places you never know exist

You quickens your pace, desperate to cum “C-can I come, please Danny” you whimper, pleading and begging him, so desperate for release.

“Come with me, princess” He groaned as he started thrusting up, his voice low and husky.

You gasped as Max suddenly kissed you, the world seemed to stop for a moment, leaving only the sensation of his mouth moving against yours. His hand gripping your neck, pulling you closer as the kiss deepened, sending a thrilling shiver down your spine.

You quickly snap out of it when Daniel’s grip on your hips tighten “Am coming-come with me, princess.” He groans, his thrust getting sloppy and desperate. 

You moaned onto Max’s mouth as you came, your body trembling at the intense pleasure. Your body plopped on top of Daniel’s as soon as you felt his warm seed filling you, too tired after the intense sex.

“Fuck-“ you cursed as you try to gasped for air which resulted on a chuckle from both of them. 

“Tired already, princess?” Daniel hummed, his voice laced with confidence.

You ignored his words and quickly dozed off to sleep. The last thing you felt was the warmth of their presence beside you, a fleeting sense of comfort before you drifted into a deep, dreamless slumber. 

“Silly girl, you could never escape us, princess” Daniel chuckled as he tucked your hair behind your ear

“At Least let her have the idea of escaping” Max chuckles, He reached out, caressing your face with a surprisingly gentle touch. "It makes the game more interesting," he added, his eyes sparkling with a mischievous glint.

Will you escape? Or will you fall for the sweet and comfort of your new life?