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johnwickb1tsch · 16 days ago

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the reason I asked...

(in reference to this poll X) is because I was having a little half-asleep brain rot about bittersweet AUs, like, what if...

reader managed to actually escape John, maybe after Dante attacked the house the first time? you waited for the paramedics to arrive to stabilize him, and then in all the chaos of the 911 response you slip out and steal the RangeRover. ( @sweetwolfcupcake has brilliantly pointed out that Reader would want to escape if for example, John betrayed her trust and followed thru on that spanking 😱😱 Like this version of John is more clinically unhinged)

you drive alllll the way across the country, as far as you can get from New York. surely you can disappear in a huge city like L.A.?

when you try to sell the Rover to a chop shop for cash it backfires on you. you find yourself a captive again. thinking you're a rich kid runaway, they plan to ransom you, but you won't tell them who you are.

lucky you, these bad dudes have been on Tom Ludlow's radar. he raids the shop and kills them alllllllllll. off the books of course. then he's left with the problem of what the hell to do with you?

you wake up at his house, in his bed. at first you're scared of course, but he talks you down, shows you his badge, and explains the tricky situation you're in. he framed the massacre as gang on gang violence. are you going to rat him out?

of course you're not, you're not stupid. you raise him one better when you tell him the situation you just escaped. no, beFORE the gangsters. yes, you really were being held captive [in luxury] by a retired Underworld hitman. no, you don't know if he survived, but if he did you know he'll be looking for you eventually.

Tom does you a solid and offers to get you a new identity. a fresh start. you're floored by his generosity. why would he do that for you? he says he's just trying to do some good in this world that's mostly bad. it's a losing war, but sometimes he wins a small battle, and it keeps him in the fight.

you're so grateful that while you wait for his guy to come through with your new papers, you clean up his messy bachelor pad of a house. you find old photos and lots of empty liquor bottles, and you reason he's either divorced, or a widower.

when he comes home to a clean house and the smell of real food cooking in the kitchen you kind of knock this unflappable man off his feet. he is touched by the gesture, and stunned by how much he likes it, and how much he missed it. maybe towards the end, his wife gave up on trying to have dinner on the table for him because he was never home when he said he would be.

you don't know it, but you've ignited a little fire in Tom, awakening something he thought was long dead. he doesn't act on it. he feels like a piece of shit for even thinking about it. you’re a good kid, and you've been through so much. but a part of him understands why a man who is damned to the darkness would covet a piece of your warmth and your light for himself.

he tells you that you can stay as long as you want. but you feel bad, invading his space. you need a job. a place of your own. to get out of his hair. so he helps you with that too. you find a job at a cute little coffee house in Santa Monica. hey, its what you know. you sublet a room from someone Tom seems to trust. when you move out you kiss Tom on the cheek in thank you. you have no idea how much it kills him to let you go.

you feel like you have a new lease on life. you like your job. you like the warm weather in L.A., and being so close to the beach. Tom still comes in to check on you now and then. This is where you meet a handsome young S.W.A.T. officer named Jack Traven. He comes in sometimes for a flat white and a bran muffin. his smile could stop a woman’s heart at twenty paces. maybe you do flirt with him a little, but you keep it light. then…he starts coming in every morning.

Tom sees the two of you bantering and batting eyes one morning. you cannot know the way it feels like getting shanked between the ribs for him. of course he rolls his eyes with a smirk, putting up his usual front. “Don’t believe a word this guy says, sweetheart, he’s just a meathead from SWAT.” but deep down, Tom realizes he is jealous.

maybe you run into Jack at the bar down the street one night when you're feeling especially lonely. he’s celebrating a successful hostage release. no one died, not even the perp. he invites you to hang out with his friends and fellow officers. you lean on Jack’s [ridiculously muscled] arm, listening to the stories they tell with that devil-may-care bluster cops need to keep going to such a dangerous job day after day. it squeezes your heart, that he risks his life for people he doesn’t even know, because he truly cares. even if deep down you know its a bad idea, you end up going home with him that night.

Jack continues to come see you at the coffee house. he tries to ask you out on a proper date. you can tell he wants you to be his girlfriend, he wants to treat you right. maybe Tom calls him a meathead, but there is not a cell of fuckboy in this man, bless him. he told you about how he just wants the simple things in life. a good woman. healthy kids. a little postage stamp of grass to mow. for a crazy three seconds you allow yourself to think about it. what would it be like, to be the one he comes home to? gentle kisses in the morning. date night trips to dinner and the movies. a little house. a dog. a picket fence. you could take your babies to the beach, and maybe nothing bad would ever happen… you know it’s not possible for you, and the unfairness of it churns as sharply in your belly as if you swallowed a bag full of glass. he's so sweet, so good, but there is a curse on you, and you're afraid something bad might happen to Jack if he gets involved with you.

what would John Wick do, if he found you living happily with another man? he’s still out there, somewhere. Tom checked for death certificates in New York [and how stupid are you, that a part of you is glad he's not dead?]. your only hope is to keep flying under the radar, living like a ghost. it kills you inside to tell him, “I wish I could. But there are things you don't know about me.”

he's not as surprised by this as you thought he might be. “I'm a cop, y/n. I kind of have a sense for when people are in trouble. you can talk to me.” what he doesn’t say is he has a sense for when people are hiding things. this boy has an incurable case of the White Knight Syndrome, and you can tell he's not going to give up easily.

you really do try to keep him at arm’s length, but it’s humanly impossible to resist the impulse to flirt with that man. of course, Tom would come in on the day Jack saves you from falling backwards off a ladder–with a hand on your ass. they don’t even exchange words, but somehow the tension in the room between these two men is electric.

a week or so later you're returning home at night when you find Tom Ludlow leaning on the wall outside your apartment. you can tell just by the way he's standing that he's a little drunk. “out late with Meathead?” he grumbles, his disheveled hair in his dark eyes.

you stop a little ways from him. you can tell he's in a mood, but maybe underneath that, this man is a little fragile. you have a feeling you might be the only one who gets to see it. “What’s wrong, Tom?” he sighs, shuffles to you, rests his forehead against yours, and you let him. this man saved you when you had no one. this is the least you can do for him–and you have a soft spot for this cranky cop who bends the law to do the right thing.

but maybe you are a little surprised, when he draws back to look at you, those soulful puppy dog eyes fixing on your mouth a moment before he presses his lips to yours. you have to say you definitely don’t hate it, and you're breathless when he pulls away. “shit. y/n…i’m sorry.” “that’s ok.” you reach up to touch his cheek, and he leans into your hand like a needy puppy that doesn’t realize how big he is. you could taste the vodka on his tongue. you’d found the bottles before, of course, but in that short time you’d lived with him he didn’t really drink much. you wonder if he’s slipped backwards again. “where’s your car? I’m going to drive you home.” he grumbles something into the bend of your neck, but in the end he hands over his keys.

driving in L.A. is a lot easier in a muscle car with a lightbar on the roof. people just magically get out of your way. you bundle Tom back into his home with an arm around his waist. as soon as you get through the front door you see his house is in disarray again, since you haven't been here. some men really do revert back to savages, without a woman to keep them accountable. struggling under his weight, you somehow manage to stumble/drag him to his bed, laying him down in the sheets that obviously haven’t been washed since the last time you laundered them. “I missed you, so much,” he groans, half passed out, as you unlace his boots.

“Tom…” it truly breaks your heart, to see him living like this. the impulse to try to save him is as strong as it is misguided. but sometimes…people just need a little help, and that’s ok. He doesn’t ask you to, but you lay down in the bed beside him and wrap your arms around his solid trunk of a torso, moulding your body against his. you know there is something healing in just snuggling with another human being–and you’re lonely too. “Are you sleeping with Meathead?” he slurs, on the edge of sleep. “Why do you call him that?” you counter, trying to keep things light, and not answer direct questions about Jack. “You’re just as built as he is.” you squeeze his bicep appreciatively, winning a sound that suddenly reminds you of a lion in his den. he turns to you, a dark light in those brown eyes that makes your heart stop in your chest. “Yeah?” you have to try twice before you find your voice. “Yeah.” this time, maybe it’s you that cranes your neck for a kiss that curls your toes, and he can’t stop himself from rolling onto you with a moan, his solid weight pressing you down deliciously into the the bed. but then he makes himself stop again, resting his forehead against yours with a sigh. “You don’t owe me anything, babygirl.” “I do,” you counter, “but that’s not what this is about.” “What’s it about, then?” “Well. I kind of like you.” he snorts, that glitter in his eyes that drives you a little crazy inside. is it stupid, that you feel like he isn’t in as much danger as Jack? is he more lethal, or do you callously just feel deep down that he doesn’t have his whole life ahead of him, the way your pretty SWAT hunk does? you’re not really sure, but when Tom’s big hand dips into your jeans you’re not strong enough to say no.

you’re there at the coffee house, the day the bus blows up on the street outside. The news crews swarm, interviewing anyone they can for a sound byte. you try to stay off the cameras, but it’s too late. there are too many before you’re allowed to go home, and you end up on the national news.

hardly a week goes by, before you are at work again, some of the windows boarded up, still broken from the blast. you’ve got your back turned, putting the lid on a café mocha, double checking that it's tight when you sense someone is at the counter. “I’ll be right there,” you call over your shoulder.

a quiet voice from your past sends a chill to the bottom of your soul. “I think I’m in the mood for something sweet.” you jump, spilling the scalding hot mocha all over the counter. slowly you turn to find him, the way you’ve always feared you would, handsome as the devil himself in an all black suit. he doesn’t seem angry, but there is a glint of sharp steel in his black eyes that warns you not to try anything cute. “John,” you whisper, your voice utterly failing you in the face of your doom. With panic in your eyes you look around at all the people in the shop. All the witnesses. “Please…don’t.” “Come quietly, and I won’t.” he sounds so reasonable. you know it’s just a facade.

you’re so filled with fear that you feel like you’re in a daze, like you’re not really in control of your own body, as you nod, wipe your hands, and make your way around the counter to him. he doesn’t grab you. he doesn’t even have to touch you. he just nods at the door, and you follow him out into the bright California sunlight. you know immediately which car is his, the midnight-black ‘69 Mustang parked in the alley on the side of the building.

you’re ten paces from the muscle car when you hear another voice you know all too well behind you. “Freeze, motherfucker! Hands where I can see them!”

No no no no please don’t not for me please God not for me...

the two of you turn slowly and your heart falls to see not only Tom Ludlow with his service pistol drawn, but Jack Traven as well...