#Blood in My Ledger

[gryfflepuffinthetardis]

Blood in My Ledger (Alec Hardy): Season/Series One, Episode Two

Word Count: 6065 Words

Warnings: Flirting with Alec Hardy; Alec Hardy being socially awkward; Alec Hardy's accent; Mentions of trauma; Using sarcasm as a coping mechanism; Child murder statistics; Mention of sister's death; Mention of trauma involving sister's death; Vague mentions of something the reader blames herself for; Mention of rough aftermath of sister's death; Panic attack; Method on dealing with a panic attack; Mention of murder of a relative

"Losing a sister is like losing the moon and stars. No words can describe the void in your heart."

When Y/n entered the station the next day and walked up to Hardy's office through the precinct that was filled with overflowing phone calls, where he was talking to Ellie, she said, "Does anyone know why there's an irritating journalist I'd very much like to punch in the face hovering outside or should I taze her now?"

"Don't taze her." Hardy said, rather dryly like this was a normal occurrence for him. "You didn't tell her anything, did you?

"Only that I'd taze her in the face and she wouldn't be so pretty anymore if she didn't shut the fuck up and get the hell out of my way." She deadpanned.

"Mmm. Very violent." He said, dryly, and then turned to Ellie, "How're we doing on the house to house?"

"We've got five uniforms allocated, two probationers, one who can't drive, and one who'd never taken a statement before last night." Ellie said.

"That's all they've given us?"

"It's a summer weekend." Ellie explained, "You've got three music festivals and two sporting events within a hundred miles, so all the officers are attached to them until Monday."

"Don't tell the family." Hardy said, "Uniform are moaning they're having to take calls."

"We're getting more phone lines put in." Ellie said.

"Clear desk policy end of the day, yeah?" Hardy said and walked off the whiteboard.

"You drink coffee?" Ellie offered the coffee cup she had gotten Hardy to Y/n.

"I hate coffee." She shook her head. "I live in London and have an addiction to chocolate, I drink tea or hot chocolate." She went to join Hardy at the whiteboard.

"SOCO are at work on the beach, it's gonna be a long one." Ellie continued, putting down the coffee that no one apparently wanted, "Oh, we're still going through the Latimer house." Hardy was staring intently at the board. "Sorry, are you listening?" You couldn't say he wasn't dedicated. A rather handsome at it too.

"Danny's skateboard. Danny's mobile. Priority. Also, main suspects. You know this town, who's the most likely?" Hardy asked, and Ellie looked like she didn't know what to say while Hardy turned to the map. "If the boy was killed before he was left on the beach, where's the murder scene?" He looked at the map as if expecting an arrow to say: Danny Latimer was killed here. He turned to Ellie, "What are you doing now?"

"We've managed to find a Family Liaison Officer. I'm gonna take him over to the Latimers. Oh, and Jack Marshall, owns the paper show, rang in. He said he'd remember something." Ellie said, holding out a note.

Hardy took it without a word of thanks. "Right, Officer L/n, with me," Hardy said, and then he added sarcastically, "Gotta make sure you don't taze anyone."

"Like you could stop me. And are you sure you aren't just using that as an excuse to spend time with me?" She teased.

Hardy looked at her, his brain starting to short-circuit again as his mouth gaped open like a fish out of water, "Shut up." Was all he could manage and walked off.

—————————————————————————

Y/n and Hardy met back up with Jack Marshall, "Couldn't stop thinking about him... all last night. I help run the Seas Brigade."

"What's that, like, Boy Scouts?" Y/n asked.

"Sort of, but on the water. Danny had been coming about eighteen months, on and off. Cheeky lad, but a good heart. It matters, a good heart."

A twitch on Hardy's face suggested he found something ironic in Jack's words and he did not find them funny in the slightest

"Yes, it does." Y/n agreed. "You don't see it much these days in my experience."

Hardy glanced at Y/n, his bitterness of the irony of Jack's words fading with the mystery that was Y/n, and then he turned back to Jack and said, "You said you remembered something about seeing Danny."

"Must have been end of last month. Around a quarter to eight on a Wednesday morning on the road to the cliff tops on the way to Linton Hill. I saw him."

"And what was he doing?" Hardy asked.

"Talking to the postman. Well..." Jack Marshall said as he picked up a newspaper, "not talking, more like arguing. He was quite a way away, but the body language was pretty clear. Then Danny stormed off. The postman was calling after him."

They walked in the shop with Jack, and Hardy said, "You're certain it was the postman?"

"Well, he had a bag and one of those high-visibility jackets. Who else is going to be out that time in the morning?" Jack said.

"Can you describe him for me?" Hardy asked.

"He was a long way off. Medium height, short brown hair, I think. It was only after you were in yesterday that I remembered. I should've mentioned."

—————————————————————————

Ellie had gone to the Latimers' to bring Pete, the Family Liason officer there and to take the family's fingerprints to eliminate them from the prints they'd find around the house. They had given her a list of people who could've killed Danny and she was shocked to find that it was all their friends. SOCO Brain found five hundred pounds in cash taped under Danny's bed frame and cocaine in Chloe's room. 

When Ellie questioned her, Chloe claimed that Becca Fisher from the hotel gave it to her.

Hardy, Ellie, and Y/n went to question her.

"Chloe Latimer says you supplied her with a wrap of cocaine."

"What? You're kidding!?" Becca gasped.

"Why would she say that if it's not true?" Ellie asked.

Becca hesitated but admitted, "There was this couple down from London for a long weekend, in a suite, spending money, they asked me if I could get them some coke." She sighed and continued, "Chloe was working for me that weekend, I asked her if she knew where I might find some. She took so bloody long, the couple had gone, I gave it back to her." A maid knocked on the door. "Not now—thanks, Emily." Emily apologized and closed the door.

"Where did Chloe get it from?" Ellie asked.

"She said a friend. She didn't tell me his name. She said he didn't deal, but he knew where to get stuff." Becca said.

"Did her brother have anything to do with it?" Hardy asked.

"It's... it's nothing to do with that." Becca said, "Do I get arrested?"

"We will have to process the offense." Ellie said.

"Is there any way we can keep this quiet? I could lose my license." Becca pleaded.

"Fix a time to come down to the station, make a formal statement." Hardy said.

"Just make sure, none of that stuff gets near my girls or you'll lose more than your license," Y/n said as they left with a smile that held a threat behind it.

"You do know you don't have to threaten everyone." Ellie said.

"Oh, but it's such fun." Y/n said, sarcastically. 

—————————————————————————

Hardy poured himself a cup of tea as Ellie said, "Cocaine, though. It must be a one-off. They're not that type of family. Chloe's not that type of girl."

"Nobody ever is." Hardy drawled.

"No, I live here. We don't have these problems. A couple of arrests for possession every month on the estate but no more than that." Ellie said.

"Yeah, but that's what everyone thinks. That this stuff doesn't happen to them until it does. I can't tell you how many times I've heard that." Y/n said.

"This is different."

"No, it's not. Everyone has secrets, Ellie. It's one of the reasons my job exists."

"What, you come in and snark at everyone?" Ellie snapped at her.

"No, that's just my defense and coping mechanism." She said blankly. 

"For what?"

A twitch twinged on Y/n's face as she narrowed her eyes at Ellie. Ellie seemed to forget because of Y/n's age, but trauma happened no matter how young you were. "Buy me a drink first, and maybe I'll give you a hint." She snarked with a cold bite to her words and walked off before Ellie could push any further.

Hardy turned, picking up his tea and he watched Y/n walk away. She was fiddling with her silver bracelet that he hadn't noticed before now due to her always wearing her jacket.

"I can't tell when she's being serious." Ellie said and then she rounded on Hardy, "Are you just making one for yourself?" He just stared at her.

Then another officer said, "Ellie, you might want to take this one." Ellie walked off.

Y/n watched Ellie walk past her before she looked back at Hardy from where she had sat down. He stared at his cup of tea and... his face faltered. He looked dizzy, he clenched his fists, and she watched him hurriedly make his way to the bathroom. Like she said, everyone had secrets.

—————————————————————————

Hardy, Ellie, and Y/n went to speak to the postman that Danny had been seen arguing with, Kevin.

"Yeah, that's my round up past Briar Cliff." He answered them.

"And did you work the route last month?" Ellie asked him.

"I've done every delivery out there for the past eight or nine weeks, I'd say." Kevin said.

"Did you ever see Danny Latimer?" Ellie asked.

"Yeah, all the time. He used to deliver papers up there to a couple of houses, including the hut. When I heard, I thought, I've only seen him a couple of days previous."

"And did you ever talk to him? Particularly the last week in June?"

"I might've waved and maybe said 'hello'. I didn't really know him to talk to."

"That's it? Just hello?" Ellie asked.

"What else would I say?" Kevin asked, almost nervously.

"You didn't ever have a conversation with him?"

"No."

"Or an argument?" Hardy asked.

"What am I gonna be arguing with a paper lad about?" Kevin asked but they didn't answer.

"I don't know? Mail?" Y/n drawled.

"And where were you Thursday night?"

"Thursday, I'd have been with the boys. We got hammered. Six of us, there was. Finished at four. My missus woke me up at seven, I was out cold."

"Well, we're gonna need the names of all those you were with." Ellie said.

"But, I mean, you don't think I had anything to do with it?"

"I don't know. Did you?" Y/n asked.

"No."

"Ignore her." Ellie said, and Y/n gave her a sharp side look. "It's just to rule things out. Nothing to worry about." Hardy looked at her as Ellie smiled politely and warmly. "All right, thanks, Kevin. Bye."

They walked off. "Don't say that." Hardy said once they were a little ways away.

"Don't say what?" Ellie asked him.

"No need to worry."

"Why not?"

"Don't reassure people. Let them talk." Hardy said, which enraged Ellie.

"Can I just say, you can't just rock up here and try to mold me. I know what I'm doing and I know how to handle people. And you can keep your broody bullshit schtick to yourself," Then she turned to Y/n, "and your sarcastic and joking flirts to yourself. We're investigating a child's murder."

"Miller." Y/n said, sharply, she was tired of Ellie judging her based on her age, she had been silent until earlier "Don't think that just because you have more years in law enforcement, that you can understand even a fraction of what I've seen and been through. I do not need to explain my trauma to you. I hunt serial killers and serial rapists and human traffickers who think they could break me because I tend to be their type—young and a single woman—only to be mistaken on a colossal level and I have done so for the past six years and my trauma started before I even started. So, yes, everyone has secrets, and you need to understand that if you want to make it through this investigation, because I had to learn the hard way, bleeding and broken. I cope the way I cope. If I didn't I would have killed myself by now. Just because I try to make a little light in the darkness that is my life, does not mean I am not serious about this investigation. I don't have to stay here but I am so I can help get Danny justice because a lot of boys like Danny go under the radar. You don't know people as well as you think you do. That's why my job exists. I am trained to see what most don't notice. I'll walk back to the station." And she walked past them away from the car.

"We're four miles away and a child was just murdered." Hardy called after her. 

"Yeah, well, I'm not nine hundred years old like you. I've been through worse than walking five miles. I think I'll survive." Y/n shouted back.

"You just got here not forty-eight hours ago! You don't know your way around this place!" Hardy shouted.

"Just leave me alone and let me walk. Good for your mental state. You should try it!" She shouted back. Taking a walk. Something she was forced to do for a little less than a decade now.

—————————————————————————

Y/n had gotten back to the station perfectly fine, imagine that. 

She was going over something with Hardy with her dinner in a Tupperware container when Ellie came back with two wrapped dinners. She put one on Hardy's desk.

"What's that?" Hardy asked.

"Thai place was closed. Chippy was the only place open." Ellie said. 

"I can't eat that." He shook his head.

"You don't eat fish and chips?" Ellie asked, "What kind of a Scot are you?"

A grumpy one with a sexy accent. Y/n thought as Hardy looked at her before taking off his glasses and sitting down. She could easily become obsessed with Hardy's accent and the way he pronounced certain words.

"You eat chips?" Ellie asked Y/n.

Y/n's eyes flickered to the unwrapped fried food. She used to love chips, but she didn't eat them as much as she used to. Not since she was fifteen, well, twelve.

"No. I don't eat much fried food anymore." She said, shaking her head.

Hardy unwrapped the fried dinner and Ellie said, "That's all there is. Eat or be hungry." He stared at it but didn't eat it. "What's wrong with you two? Don't drink coffee and don't eat fish and chips." 

"Oh, I hate fish." Y/n shook her head and nodded at the barely eaten homemade variation of a Mediterranean salad in her lap. "I have this salad." She didn't seem particularly hungry, given she didn't have lunch.

"I hate salad."

"Oh, I do too. That's why there's no lettuce in this." She said.

"Then why do you eat it, if you don't mind me asking?" Ellie asked.

Y/n stared blankly at her for a few seconds. Much like how Hardy tended to do. "The postman, Kevin's alibi checks out." Y/n ignored the question. Apparently, she did mind her asking. "Four times." Then she stabbed at her salad.

"He was with his mates all night, the night Danny was killed." Hardy said.

"Jack Marhall got it wrong then?" Ellie asked.

"Or it's unrelated." Y/n said, "He could still be lying that he didn't have an argument with Danny."

"Do you think everyone is lying?" Ellie asked.

"Most people I talk to are trying to lie to me." Y/n said. "You have a heated argument with a child and that child ends up dead a few weeks later. Not ideal."

"She's right. Do we have any reason to disbelieve the postman? How's Marshall's eyesight? Does he have any reason to lie? And do we think that the money and the drugs found at the house are connected? Is that cash for the supply of cocaine?" Hardy asked.

"You do know you do this incessant list of questions thing?" Ellie asked, "Bam-bam-bam-bam, so no one's got a chance to reply. It's like you really enjoy it?"

"Do I?"

"Yeah, can I eat my dinner please?" Ellie asked, and she continued to eat.

After a few moments, Hardy asked her, "First murder. How you finding it?"

He was checking up on her. He wanted her to understand that people did have secrets as much as Y/n did but he didn't want Ellie to be traumatized and jaded like he was.

"Grim." Ellie said as Hardy picked up a single chip to eat. First time in forty-eight hours either of them had seen him eat.

"What do you make of Mark and Beth's list?"

"Heartbreaking." Ellie admitted, "Some of their best friends, Danny's teachers, baby-sitters, neighbors. They're traumatized, not thinking straight."

"Or smart. We never asked for a list." Hardy said, shaking another fry to get the grease off. "Maybe they're trying to direct where we look." He said a brief goodbye to somebody leaving before continuing. "Taking focus away from their household."

"They didn't kill Danny." Ellie said.

"You have to learn not to trust." Hardy said.

"Oh, do I? Of right. That's what you've been sent to teach me—the benefit of your experience..." Ellie said, getting frustrated again.

"You have to look at your community from the outside now."

"I can't be outside it and I don't want to be." Ellie argued.

"If you can't be objective, you're not the right fit." Hardy said and this seemed to hit the sore subject that he got the job that had been promised to her.

"No, I am the right fit. It's you who's not the right fit. Swanning in here and taking promotions meant for other people. Not being able to accept a cup of coffee or a bloody bag of chips without a great big sigh!" Ellie snapped and Hardy stared blankly at her with grumpy half-lidded eyes. "Sorry... sir."

"You need to understand, Miller, anybody's capable of this murder, given the right circumstances." Hardy said.

"Most people have a moral compass."

"Compasses break. And murder gnaws at the soul. Whoever did it will reveal themselves sooner or later." 

"No killer behaves normally over time, especially one like this. Danny was left out in the open. His killer wanted him to be found. This was their first kill and he's right, it isn't impossible that Danny's family didn't have anything to do with it. The statistics say that seventy-three percent of homicide victims knew their killers, and twenty-four-point-nine percent of them were done by a family member."

"That... can't be accurate." Ellie said, shocked at how high the number was.

"It is. I specialize in crimes against children, I'm required to know the statistics as mind-numbingly as the paperwork is. However, it's a bit harder to pinpoint the exact percentage that happens to children. But for kids who were murdered from ages zero to twelve, the most common perpetrators are family members."

"You know what people are like here already. You have to look for behavior out of the ordinary, even just a little bit. Follow your instincts." Hardy said.

"My instincts tell me the Latimers did not kill their son." Ellie said.

"Just make sure that's your instincts talking and not your judgment," Y/n said.

—————————————————————————

The next day, some time after lunch, Y/n went into Hardy's office, "The CCTV footage from the car park below the hut, I just sent it to you."

When Hardy noticed Ellie had returned from lunch, he shouted for her, "Miller!"

"What is it?" She asked after she entered.

"CCTV from the car park below the hut." He clicked the mouse to pause the video as a man walked around the hood of a car. "Mark Latimer."

"When is this?"

"The night Danny snuck out of his bedroom." Y/n said.

"He said he was out of a call. What's he doing?" Ellie asked.

"Waiting for someone." Y/n said.

"How do you mean?" Ellie said.

"His body language."  Y/n said.

Then the video continued until the screen was filled with static.

"Tape's run out. Is there another one?" Hardy asked, and Ellie started to look.

"No. Apparently, they just use the one tape and rerecord over it to save money." Ellie said.

"Bollocks!" Hardy cursed.

Then there was a hesitant knock at the door and it was the guy who was installing more phone lines. "Sorry." 

"Are you done?" Ellie asked as Hardy glanced at him, vaguely wondering who he was and why he was bothering them.

"No, no, it's not that." He said, "It's Danny Latimer you're doing, isn't it?"

This made Hardy look up at him and Y/n furrowed her brows.

"Why? " Ellie asked

"It's something to do with water." The man said.

"What?" Y/n asked. 

"What are you saying?" Hardy asked. 

"I've been told it's something to do with water." The man said.

"Told by who?" Ellie asked. 

I-I have, um... I have this thing where I... I get... I get messages." He stammered, leaving Ellie and Hardy still confused. Y/n's body language shifted and she sighed, heavily having gathered what this was about. "Psychic messages." 

"Oh, for God's sake, who let you in?" Hardy complained.

"No, the thing about the water, that's important. Don't just ignore it." The man tried to protest. 

"Oh, come on, out." Ellie sighed, trying to escort the man out. 

"It's something that I'm supposed to tell you." He continued, "Erm... like, he was... he was in a boat. Like he was... he was put in a boat. Yeah, yeah. I don't... I don't know why."

Y/n ran her hand over her face and asked, "You said it was a message. Who... told you this?"

"Danny."

—————————————————————————

They escorted the man, Steve Connelly, to the interrogation room. Hardy and Ellie sitting while Y/n stood behind them, leaning against the wall next to the door.

"And state your address for the tape." Ellie said.

"57 Whitney Road, Lewiston."

"Where is that?" Hardy asked.

"Um... it's about thirty miles from here." He said, pointing in a direction. "I cover the full region.

"And you're saying Danny Latimer wants us to know that he was put in a boat before he died?" Hardy asked, glaring at Steve.

"Yes."

"And I want you to know that nothing offends me more... than cranks wasting police time." Hardy growled. That must be quite the achievement. Y/n got the impression that a lot of things offended Hardy.

"I receive messages. I don't... I don't ask for them. I don't question them." Steve said.

"Did the message happen before or after you were allocated by your company to install extra phone lines here?" Y/n asked.

"After."

"Amazing. I love this." Hardy said, sarcastically, "The phone engineer who hears voices from the dead."

"I don't want this. It comes to me." Steve said and he held up his hands, "Look, you don't want to listen, that's fine."

"Oh, you're a reluctant psychic!?" Hardy spat out, "A child has died, and you come in with this self-indulgent horseshit!"

"Did you ever meet Danny Latimer?" Ellie asked.

"No, never."

"Do you know the family?" Ellie asked.

"No, I don't think so."

"Do you have any concrete evidence relating to the death of Danny Latimer?"

"No."

"Interview terminated at 6:17 PM." Ellie said as she turned off the recorder next to her.

"Do you know what happens around a murder, Mister Connelly?" Hardy asked, "A whole industry grows up, of groupies and rubberneckers, and people who want to touch the case. You're just the first. Don't let me see you 'round here again." He got up and started for the door.

"She says she forgives you." Steve said, and Hardy turned to him, "About the pendant." Hardy stared at him, a vacant yet traumatized look filled those chocolate brown eyes that usually only conveyed the exhausion and cynicism that his trauma had caused him. "And Officer L/N, she says it's not your fault."

"What?" Y/n asked, sharply.

"Your sister." Steve said, "She says that her death isn't your fault and neither are the things that happened before it." 

Y/n's face was paling and her breathing was growing more and more shallow. As he spoke, his face went in and out of focus as she felt like her axis was tipping and the world kept half swirling from one side to the other, almost like swaying... now that she mentioned it, the world was also swaying. Her sister's eyes and her smile swimming in and out of her vision.

"Stop talking." She said, a sharp plea, but there was a notable quiver in her voice.

"And she's sorry she wasn't there for you when you needed her after she died."

Images flashed behind her eyes, the white hosptial room, the doctors' faces, her aunt's face, the grainy black and white hospital pictures.

Y/n couldn't take it anymore; she fumbled for the door that Hardy had stepped back from to get out of her way, tore it open, and ran out, closing the door behind her.

"Miller, get him the hell out of here." Hardy said, sharply, pointing aggressively at Steve, and he opened the door to go after Y/n.

Hardy found Y/n across the hall, against the wall, sinking down it as she grabbed at her chest.

"L/n." He said, recognizing that this was a panic attack but that was only the to of the iceberg, he moved quickly in front of her. Hardy crouched down in front of her, trying to get her to focus on her.

"I can't... I can't breathe." She said, clawing at her chest and throat, pulling the fabric away from her throat but he grabbed her hands when she started to claw marks into her skin and he forced them away from her throat and by her sides.

"You're having a panic attack, you need to calm down and slow down your breathing." He said, rationally. "You're hyperventilating, you're making it harder for you to breathe."

"Oh, there are a lot of things making this worse right now." She said with a weak, disingenuous chuckle.

"Y/n." He said her first name, making her look at him, but only just barely to be really looking at him, he grasped her hands tightly in his in an effort to help ground her back to reality. "You're okay. You're in the police station in Broadchurch in Wessex, England. It is July twenty-first, 2013. Your name is Officer Y/n L/n with the Serious Crime Analysis Section in the National Crime Agency in London. You are twenty-four years old. You have two nieces that you have adopted as your own." He was describing their surroundings and what he knew about her to ground her back to reality. It was two of the techniques recommended if you're having a panic attack. "I need you to focus on me and only me. Listen to my voice. Breathe with me. Slowly. Breathe in... and breathe out." 

Her breathing was shaky as she attempted to do, copying his own deep breaths, but it slowly steadied and the fear slowly faded from her eyes. She looked at him and he looked at her. After a long time, she pulled her hands from his and wiped her eyes, wiping away her tears.

"Are you okay?" Hardy asked, "Do..." He didn't really know what to do now that it was over. "Do you need me to ring your girls?"

"No!" She said, quickly. "No. They don't... I don't like it when they get involved with... my issues. They worry. I don't like to worry them." He could relate. He hadn't told anyone about his heart problems. Not even his own daughter. Y/n couldn't seem to be able to keep his eye contact, he kept looking down, feeling embarrassed and then she said, "I'm sorry. This was unprofessional of me."

Was she actually apologizing for having a panic attack?

"You can't control your trauma, L/n." He said.

Ellie had returned now, looking concerned at Y/n's teary eyes and the tear stains around her eyes; the rest of her face was still quite pale. "Are you okay?"

"Okay is a relative term." She said. "I... I wasn't expecting... him to say that."

"What was he..." Ellie asked.

"Please, don't." Y/n said, and she cleared her throat, "There's no one who's old enough to remember that time besides me. No one ever talks about it to me anymore. It'd... triggered a... panic attack."

Hardy eyed her. That was more than a panic attack; that was a PTSD panic attack. She hadn't been kidding when she said she had trauma, and it was clear that it was about her sister's death, which, based on her reaction, she blamed herself for.

"Stop that." She said.

"Stop what?"

"Stop looking at me like that. Like you pity me. Stop it." She said.

"But what was he talking about? He said something about a pendant." Hardy didn't answer. "And your-your sister..."

"My sister was murdered." Y/n interrupted, sharply.

That... actually explained a lot. Her overprotectiveness of her girls and based off the chemical burns on her hands... she may not have been unscathed either.

"You said she died in labor."  Ellie said.

"Yeah, she was in labor when she was murdered." Y/n said, "I didn't lie, I just left out something. I... I was there when it happened."

Hardy's eyes flickered at her hands. The chemical burns. Hardy suspected she had gone unscathed from the incident.

"You're too close to me." She suddenly said to Hardy and he stood up, holding out a hand but she ignored it but she didn't get up, she just looked away from it as pain continued to throb in her body. She didn't seem to like touching.

Hardy turned to Ellie and continued on, respecting Y/n's obvious wishes to stop focusing on what just happened. "Every big case, these people come crawling out of the woodwork."

"What did he mean about the pendant?" Ellie asked, "Do you know?

"He has the bloody nerve to come in our office!" Hardy said, furiously. "Check his details, find out who he is. Rule him out, just to be sure." Then he turned to Y/n, who was still on the ground. "Are you going to stay down there?"

"Maybe." She said, the pain had dulled but didn't completely go away. It never did. She forced herself through it as she always did and got up. "Happy?"

"No." He said and he started to walk off.

Ellie and Y/n followed him into the bullpen and he entered his office.

"What are you going to do now?" Ellie asked.

"Mark Latimer lied to us about where he was that night." Hardy said.

"Danny's social network profiles from his hard drive. They've just come through, all his posts." Ellie said and she read Danny's posts out loud, "Third of May: going to get a lock on my door, keep all this crap out. Seventh May: she's totally having sex with Dean. Twelfth of May: Dear Dad, remember me? I'm the one you used to play with. Twelfth of May: I know what he's doing."

"See you later."

"Hey, where are you going. I'm coming with."

"You just had a panic attack." Hardy said, continuing to walk as Y/n followed him. "I'm not bringing you along. Go home."

"No. I'm not going 'hoome'." She mimicked the way he pronounced the word with his accent. Honestly, she had been tempted to do for the past two days, it was amazing it had taken this long to do so for her. "It was a shock, that's all."

"It was PTSD. I'm sure you, being a forensic psychologist, can recognize that." Hardy said.

"Recognize it?" She scoffed. "I live with it. And like you're any different!" Hardy stopped and turned to her, his eyes intense. "I read the Sandbrook case. I know what happened."

"No, you don't." He promised.

"I know enough. I read the lines on the file and in between the lines as a profiler. I know that you're not the same as you were before it. You've got PTSD too. I could see it on the beach when you saw Danny's body and I know why you took his job."

"Why, if you know so much about me?" He challenged.

"You're punishing yourself for what happened on that case and you took this job as penance. You don't want to let Danny down like you feel you did in Sandbrook. You're not the only one."

"What does that mean?"

"What happened to my sister was my fault. That's why I do what I do now. My PTSD won't interfere with my abilities in this case. You have my word on that." She promised.

Hardy searched her face for any deception but all he saw was stubborn determination—not unlike his own. "Fine. But you're going home early and if I get the idea that it is, I'm calling your boss."

—————————————————————————

Hardy and Y/n took Mark out to the backyard, closing the sliding door for some privacy while Beth watched them through the glass.

"Um, Thursday night... the night Danny went missing," They had clokced by now that Mark had a bit of a temper, apparently the local preist had gone on TV to offer condolences and sharing belief in the church that they will support everyone in the wake of the tragedy and Mark had stormed over there and practically throttled him in rage. "Where were you?

"On a call-out. Call came through... I dunno, early evening, about half six. Whole family's system had packed in, you know?" Mark said, even though they knew he was lying to them. 

"How long did that take?" 

"Most of the night. It was a nightmare boiler, so I was there pretty late." Mark continued to lie.

"No." Hardy said.

"Why are you lying to us, Mister Latimer?" Y/n asked.

"There was no call out." Hardy said and Mark stared at them. "We have CCTV footage of the car park at the top of Briar Cliff. You were there at seven-thirty."

"Uh..." He glanced at the house before turning back to them, "so you're snooping on me now?"

"No. We just checked the CCTV in the area where Danny was found, and we saw you." Y/n said.

"Now, what did you do that night?" Hardy asked.

"What am I, a suspect?" Mark asked.

"The first thing we do is eliminate people from the investigation. You tell me where you were, who you were with, how long for, I can eliminate you from suspicion. It's entirely methodical. You don't give me those facts, I can't eliminate you. And if I can't eliminate you, you're a person of interest." Hardy explained.

"In the murder of my own son?" Mark said, looking past them.

"I'm sure this is all very straightforward," Hardy said, looking down.

"Mister Latimer, most cases of kids who were Danny's age were killed by a family member. I can tell you love Danny, his death hasn't changed that. But we need look at every angle, that includes his family and you were the only one not in the house. You tell us where you were and we can get closer to finding out who really did this and they will pay for what they did." Y/n explained.

"I, uh... I met a mate. You know, we drove off together, and then he dropped me back at the car park and er... I came home." He said, still being evasive.

"What time?" Hardy asked.

"Three or four in the morning, maybe." He said.

"What's your mate's name?" Hardy asked.

"I can't remember."

"Sorry? You can't remember the name of your friend?" Hardy asked. "Where did you go?"

"I think we just had a drive around. Bite to eat. Bit of a drink."

You think?  This was three days ago." Hardy said.

"Yeah, and a lot's happened since then." Mark pointed out.

"And is there any reason you wouldn't want to tell me the name of your mate?" Hardy asked, glancing at Beth through the window, he had a suspiscion. "This is only about who killed Danny. Nothing else."

"Um... It'll come back to me. I'm just knackered. I haven't been sleeping, you know, all the stuff on the news. Head's not straight."

"Yeah, we heard about that." Y/n said and Mark looked at her.

"When you came in, you went straight to bed?" Hardy asked.

"Yeah."

"Can your wife confirm what time you came back?"

"No. She was asleep." He said.

"Mark, who you met... it's a big gap in your recollection." Hardy said and then his phone rang.

"Sorry." He stepped away, "What?" His body language shifted and he turned to Y/n, "L/n. You should hear this." 

"Excuse me, Mark." Y/n smiled and went to Hardy. "What's up?"

"Miller's at the hut. They think that's where Danny was killed." He said as they moved even further away from Mark so they could put Hardy's phone on speaker phone. "Miller, go on. Anything else?"

"Yeah, the whole place has been cleaned. But we've also found another set of prints by the sink. I messaged them through to run a match against elimination prints. They belong to Mark Latimer."

[hopeinthebox]

tagged by the one true tastemaker @cordiallyfuturedwight for the receipts <3 thanks for keeping me in the loop my darling happy fuckin pride

tagging the wonderful: @thvinyl @visionsofgideontheninth @hoseeok @eoieopda @myork @monismochi @aprylynn and you too if you'd like <33

[koshka-sova]

i will no longer be mediating in civilian affairs <3

[spikedfearn]

Mercy Made Flesh

one-shot

Remmick x fem!reader

summary: In the heat-choked hush of the Mississippi Delta, you answer a knock you swore would never come. Remmick—unaging, unholy, unforgettable—returns to collect what was promised. What follows is not romance, but ritual. A slow, sensual surrender to a hunger older than the Trinity itself.

wc: 13.1k

a/n: Listen. I didn’t mean to simp for Vampire Jack O’Connell—but here we are. I make no apologies for letting Remmick bite first and ask questions never. Thank you to my bestie Nat (@kayharrisons) for beta reading and hyping me up, without her this fic wouldn't exist, everyone say thank you Nat!

warnings: vampirism, southern gothic erotica, blood drinking as intimacy, canon-typical violence, explicit sexual content, oral sex (f!receiving), first time, bloodplay, biting, marking, monsterfucking (soft edition), religious imagery, devotion as obsession, gothic horror vibes, worship kink, consent affirmed, begging, dirty talk, gentle ruin, haunting eroticism, power imbalance, slow seduction, soul-binding, immortal x mortal, he wants to keep her forever, she lets him, fem!reader, second person pov, 1930s mississippi delta, house that breathes, you will be fed upon emotionally & literally

tags: @xhoneymoonx134

likes, comments, and reblogs appreciated! please enjoy

Mississippi Delta, 1938

The heat hadn’t broken in days.

Not even after sunset, when the sky turned the color of old bruises and the crickets started singing like they were being paid to. It was the kind of heat that soaked into the floorboards, that crept beneath your thin cotton slip and clung to your back like sweat-slicked hands. The air was syrupy, heavy with magnolia and something murkier—soil, maybe. River water. Something that made you itch beneath your skin.

Your cottage sat just outside the edge of town, past the schoolhouse where you spent your days sorting through ledgers and lesson plans that no one but you ever really seemed to care about. It was modest—two rooms and a porch, set back behind a crumbling white-picket fence and swallowed by trees that whispered in the dark. A little sanctuary tucked into the Delta, surrounded by cornfields, creeks, and ghosts.

The kind of place a person could disappear if they wanted to. The kind of place someone could find you…if they were patient enough.

You stood in front of the sink, rinsing out a chipped enamel cup, your hands moving automatically. The oil lamp on the kitchen table flickered with each breath of wind slipping through the cracks in the warped window frame. A cicada screamed in the distance, then another, and then the whole world was humming in chorus.

And beneath it—beneath the cicadas, and the wind, and the nightbirds—you felt something shift.

A quiet. Too quiet.

You turned your head. Listened harder.

Nothing.

Not even the frogs.

Your hand paused in the dishwater. Fingers trembling just a little. It wasn’t like you to be spooked by the dark. You’d grown up in it. Learned to make friends with shadows. Learned not to flinch when things moved just out of sight.

But this?

This was different.

It was as if the night was holding its breath.

And then—

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Not loud. Not frantic. But final.

Your body went stiff. The cup slipped beneath the water and bumped the side of the basin with a hollow clink.

No one ever came this far out after sundown. No one but—

You shook your head, almost hard enough to rattle something loose.

No.

He was gone. That part of your life was buried.

You made sure of it.

Still, your bare feet moved toward the door like they weren’t yours. Soft against the creaky wood. Slow. You reached for the small revolver you kept in the drawer beside the door frame, thumbed the hammer back.

Your hand rested on the knob.

Another knock. This time, softer.

Almost...polite.

The porch light had been dead for weeks, so you couldn’t see who was waiting on the other side. But the air—something in the air—told you.

It was him.

You didn’t answer. Not right away.

You stood there with your palm flat against the rough wood, your forehead nearly touching it too—eyes shut, breath shallow. The air on the other side didn’t stir like it should’ve. No footfalls creaking the porch. No shuffle of boots on sun-bleached planks. Just stillness. Waiting.

And underneath your ribs, something began to ache. Something you hadn’t let yourself feel in years.

You didn’t know his name, not back then. You only knew his eyes—gold in the shadows. Red when caught in the light. Like a firelight in the dark. Like a blood red moon through stained-glass windows.

And his voice. Low. Dragging vowels like syrup. A Southern accent that didn’t come from any map you’d ever seen—older than towns, older than state lines. A voice that had told you, seven years ago, with impossible calm:

"You’ll know when it’s time."

You knew. Your hands trembled against your sides. But you didn’t back away. Some part of you knew how useless running would be.

The knob beneath your hand felt cold. Too cold for Mississippi in August.

You turned it.

The door opened slow, hinges whining like they were trying to warn you. You stepped back instinctively—just one step—and then he was there.

Remmick.

Still tall, still lean in that devastating way—like his body was carved from something hard and mean, but shaped to tempt. He wore a crisp white shirt rolled to the elbows, suspenders hanging loose from his hips, and trousers that looked far too clean for a man who walked through the dirt. His hair was messy in that intentional way, brown and swept back like he’d been running hands through it all night. Stubble lined his sharp jaw, catching the lamplight just so.

But it was his face that rooted you to the floor. That hollowed out your breath.

Still young. Still wrong.

Not a wrinkle, not a scar. Not a mark of time. He hadn’t aged a day.

And his eyes—oh, God, his eyes.

They caught the lamp behind you and lit up red, bright and glinting, like the embers of a dying fire. Not human. Not even pretending.

"Hello, dove."

His voice curled into your bones like cigarette smoke. You didn’t answer. You couldn’t.

You hated how your body reacted.

Hated that you could still feel it—like something old and molten stirring between your thighs, a flicker of the same heat you’d felt that night in the alley, back when you were too desperate to care what kind of creature answered your prayer.

He looked you over once. Not with hunger. With certainty. Like he already knew how this would end. Like he already owned you.

"You remember, don’t you?" he asked.

"I came to collect."

And your voice—when it finally came—was little more than a whisper.

"You can’t be real."

That smile. That slight twitch at the corner of his mouth. Wolfish. Slow.

"You promised."

You wanted to shut the door. Slam it. Deadbolt it. But your hand didn’t move.

Remmick didn’t step forward, not yet. He stood just outside the threshold, framed by night and cypress trees and the distant flicker of heat lightning beyond the fields. The air around him pulsed with something old—older than the land, older than you, older than anything you could name.

He tilted his head the way animals do, watching you, letting the silence thicken like molasses between you.

"Still living out here all on your own," he murmured, gaze drifting over your shoulders, into the small, tidy kitchen behind you. "Hung your laundry on the line this morning. Blue dress, lace hem. Favorite one, ain’t it?"

Your stomach clenched. That dress hadn’t seen a neighbor’s eye all week.

"You've been watching me," you said, your voice low, unsure if it was accusation or realization.

"I’ve been waiting," he said. "Not the same thing."

You swallowed hard. Your breath caught in your throat like a thorn. The wind shifted, and you caught the faintest trace of something—dried tobacco, smoke, rain-soaked dirt, and beneath it, the iron-sweet tinge of blood.

Not fresh. Not violent. Just…present. Like it lived in him.

"I paid my debt," you whispered.

"No, you survived it," he said, stepping up onto the first board of the porch. The wood didn’t creak beneath his weight. "And that’s only half the bargain."

He still hadn’t crossed the threshold.

The stories came back to you, the ones whispered by old women with trembling hands and ash crosses pressed to their doorways—vampires couldn’t enter unless invited. But you hadn’t invited him, not this time.

"You don’t have permission," you said.

He smiled, eyes flashing red again.

"You gave it, seven years ago."

Your breath hitched.

"I was a girl," you said.

"You were desperate," he corrected. "And honest. Desperation makes people honest in ways they can’t be twice. You knew what you were offering me, even if you didn’t understand it. Your promise had teeth."

The wind pushed against your back, as if urging you forward.

Remmick stepped closer, just enough for the shadows to kiss the line of his throat, the hollow of his collarbone. His voice dropped, intimate now—dragging across your skin like a fingertip behind the ear.

"You asked for a miracle. I gave it to you. And now I’m here for what’s mine."

Your heart thudded violently in your chest.

"I didn’t think you’d come."

"That’s the thing about monsters, dove." He leaned down, lips almost grazing the curve of your jaw. "We always do."

And then—

He stepped back.

The wind stopped.

The night fell quiet again, like the world had paused just to watch what you’d do next.

"I’ll wait out here till you’re ready," he said, turning toward the swing on your porch and settling into it like he had all the time in the world. "But don’t make me knock twice. Wouldn’t be polite."

The swing groaned beneath him as it rocked gently, back and forth.

You stood there frozen in the doorway, one bare foot still inside the house, the other brushing the edge of the porch.

You’d made a promise.

And he was here to keep it.

The door stayed open. Just enough for the night to reach inside.

You didn’t move.

Your body stood still but your mind wandered—back to that night in the alley, to the smell of blood and piss and riverwater, your knees soaked in your brother’s lifeblood as you screamed for help that never came. Except it did. It came in the shape of a man who didn’t breathe, didn’t blink, didn’t make promises the way mortals did.

It came in the shape of him.

You thought time would wash it away. That the years would smooth the edges of his voice in your memory, dull the sharpness of his presence. But now, with him just outside your door, it all returned like a fever dream—hot, all-consuming, too real to outrun.

You turned away from the threshold, slowly, carefully, as if the floor might cave in under you. Your hands trembled as you reached for the oil lamp on the table, adjusting the flame lower until it flickered like a dying heartbeat.

The silence behind you dragged, deep and waiting. He didn’t speak again. Didn’t call for you.

He didn’t have to.

You moved through the house in slow circles. Touching things. Straightening them. Folding a dishcloth. Setting a book back on the shelf, even though you’d already read it twice. You tried to pretend you weren’t thinking about the man on your porch. But the heat of him pressed against the back of your mind like a hand.

You could feel him out there. Not just physically—but in you, somehow. Like the air had shifted around his shape, and the longer he lingered, the more your body remembered what it had felt like to stand in front of something not quite human and still want.

You passed the mirror in the hallway and paused.

Your reflection looked undone. Not in the way your hair had fallen from its pin, or the flush across your cheeks, but deeper—like something inside you had been cracked open. You touched your own throat, right where you imagined his mouth might go.

No bite.

Not yet.

But you swore you could feel phantom teeth.

You went back to the door, holding your breath, and looked at him through the screen.

He hadn’t moved. He sat on the swing, one leg stretched out, the other bent lazily beneath him, arms slung across the backrest like he’d always belonged there. A cigarette burned between two fingers, the tip flaring orange as he dragged from it. The scent of it hit you—rich, earthy, and somehow foreign, like something imported from a place no longer on the map.

He didn’t look at you right away.

Then, slowly, he did.

Red eyes caught yours.

He smiled, small and slow, like he was reading a page of you he’d already memorized.

"Thought you’d shut the door by now," he said.

"I should have," you answered.

"But you didn’t."

His voice curled into the quiet.

You stepped out onto the porch, barefoot, the boards warm beneath your soles. He didn’t move to greet you. He didn’t rise. He just watched you walk toward him like he’d been watching in dreams you never remembered having.

The swing groaned as you sat down beside him, a careful space between you.

His shoulder brushed yours.

You stared straight ahead, out into the night. A mist was beginning to rise off the distant fields. The moon hung low and orange like a wound in the sky.

Somewhere in the bayou, a whippoorwill called, long and mournful.

"How long have you been watching me?" you asked.

"Since before you knew to look."

"Why now?"

He turned toward you. His voice was velvet-wrapped iron.

"Because now…you’re ripe for the pickin’.”

You didn’t remember falling asleep.

One moment you were on the porch beside him, listening to the slow groan of the swing and the way the crickets held their breath when he exhaled, the next you were waking in your bed, the sheets tangled around your legs like they were trying to hold you down.

The house was too quiet.

No birdsong. No creak of the windmill out back. No rustle of the sycamores that scraped against your bedroom window on stormy nights.

Just stillness.

And scent.

It clung to the cotton of your nightdress. Tobacco smoke, sweat, rain. Him.

You sat up slowly, pressing your hand to your chest. Your heart thudded like it was trying to remember who it belonged to. The lamp beside your bed had burned down to a stub. A trickle of wax curled like a vein down the side of the glass.

Your mouth tasted like smoke and guilt. Your thighs ached in that low, humming way—though you couldn’t say why. Nothing had happened. Not really.

But something had changed.

You felt it under your skin, in the place where blood meets breath.

The floor was cool under your feet as you moved. You didn’t dress. Just pulled a robe over your slip and stepped into the hallway. The house felt heavier than usual, thick with the ghost of his presence. Every corner held a whisper. Every shadow a shape.

You opened the front door.

The porch was empty.

The swing still rocked gently, as if someone had only just stood up from it.

A folded piece of paper lay on the top step, weighted down by a smooth river stone.

You picked it up with trembling hands.

Come.

That was all it said. One word. But it rang through your bones like gospel. Like a vow.

You looked out across the field. A narrow dirt road stretched beyond the tree line, overgrown but clear. You’d never dared follow it. That road didn’t belong to you.

It belonged to him.

And now…so did you.

You didn’t bring anything with you.

Not a suitcase. Not a shawl. Not a Bible tucked under your arm for comfort.

Just yourself.

And the road.

The hem of your slip was already damp by the time you reached the edge of the field. Dew clung to your ankles like cold fingers, and the earth was soft beneath your feet—fresh from last night’s storm, the kind that never really breaks the heat, only deepens it. The moon had gone down, but the sky was beginning to bruise with that blue-black ink that comes before sunrise. Everything smelled like wet grass, magnolia, and the faint rot of old wood.

The path curved, narrowing as it passed through trees that leaned in too close. Their branches kissed above you like they were whispering secrets into each other’s leaves. Spanish moss hung like veils from the oaks, dripping silver in the fading dark. It made the world feel smaller. Quieter. As if you were walking into something sacred—or something doomed.

A crow cawed once in the distance. Sharp. Hollow. You didn’t flinch.

There was no sound of wheels. No car waiting. Just the road and the fog and the promise you'd made.

And then you saw it.

The house.

Tucked deep in the grove, half-swallowed by vines and time, it rose like a memory from the earth. A decaying plantation, left to rot in the wet belly of the Delta. Its bones were still beautiful—white columns streaked with black mildew, a grand porch that sagged like a mouth missing teeth, shuttered windows with iron latches rusted shut. Ivy grew up the sides like it was trying to strangle the place. Or maybe protect it.

You stood there at the edge of the clearing, breath caught in your throat.

He’d brought you here.

Or maybe he’d always been here. Waiting. Dreaming of the moment you’d return to him without even knowing it.

A shape moved behind one of the upstairs curtains. Quick. Barely there.

You didn’t run.

Your bare foot found the first step.

It groaned like it recognized you.

The door was already open.

Not wide—just enough for you to know it had been waiting.

And you stepped inside.

The air inside was colder.

Not the kind of cold that came from breeze or shade—but from stillness, from the absence of sun and time. A hush so thick it felt like you were walking underwater. Like the house had held its breath for decades and only now began to exhale.

Dust spiraled in the faint light seeping through fractured windows, casting soft halos through the dark. The wooden floor beneath your feet was warped and groaning, but clean. Not in any natural sense—there was no broom that had touched these boards. No polish or soap.

But it had been kept.

The air didn’t smell like rot or mildew. It smelled like cedar. Like old leather. And deeper beneath that, like him.

He hadn’t lit any lamps.

Just the fireplace, burning low, glowing embers pulsing orange-red at the back of a cavernous hearth. The flame danced shadows across the faded wallpaper, peeling in long strips like dead skin. A high-backed chair faced the fire, velvet blackened from age, its silhouette looming like something alive.

You swallowed, lips dry, and stepped further in.

Your voice didn’t carry. It didn’t even try.

Remmick was nowhere in sight.

But he was here.

You could feel him in the walls, in the way the house seemed to lean closer with every step you took.

You passed through the parlor, past a dusty grand piano with one ivory key cracked down the middle. Past oil portraits too old to make out, their eyes blurred with time. Past a single vase of dried wildflowers, colorless now, but carefully arranged.

You paused in the doorway to the drawing room, your hand resting lightly on the frame.

A whisper of air moved behind you.

Then—

A hand.

Not grabbing. Not harsh. Just the light press of fingers against the small of your back, palm flat and warm through the thin cotton of your slip.

You froze.

He was behind you.

So close you could feel his breath at your neck. Not warm, not cold—just present. Like wind through a crack in the door. Like the memory of a touch before it lands.

His voice was low, close to your ear.

"You came."

You didn’t answer.

"You always would have."

You wanted to say no. Wanted to deny it. But you stood there trembling under his hand, your heartbeat so loud you were sure he could hear it.

Maybe that was why he smiled.

He stepped around you slowly, letting his fingers graze the side of your waist as he moved. His eyes glinted red in the firelight, catching on you like a flame drawn to dry kindling.

He looked at you like he was already undressing you.

Not your clothes—your will.

And it was already unraveling.

You’d suspected he wasn’t born of this soil.

Not just because of the way he moved—like he didn’t quite belong to gravity—but because of the way he spoke. Like time hadn’t worn the edges off his words the way it had with everyone else. His voice curled around vowels like smoke curling through keyholes. Rich and low, but laced with something older. Something foreign. Something that made the hair at the nape of your neck rise when he spoke too softly, too close.

He didn’t speak like a man from the Delta.

He spoke like something older than it.

Older than the country. Maybe older than God.

Remmick stopped in front of you, lit only by firelight.

His eyes had dulled from red to something deeper—like old garnet held to a candle. His shirt was open at the collar now, suspenders hanging slack, the buttons on his sleeves rolled to his elbows. His forearms were dusted with faint scars that looked like they had stories. His skin was pale in the glow, but not lifeless. He looked like marble warmed by touch.

He studied you for a long time.

You weren’t sure if it was your face he was reading, or something beneath it. Something you couldn’t hide.

"You look just like your mother," he said finally.

Your breath caught.

"You knew her?"

A soft smirk curled at the corner of his mouth.

"I’ve known a lot of people, dove. I just never forget the ones with your blood."

You didn’t ask what he meant. Not yet.

There was something heavy in his tone—something laced with memory that stretched back far further than it should. You had guessed, years ago, in the sleepless weeks after that alleyway miracle, that he was not new to this world. That his youth was a trick of the skin. A lie worn like a mask.

You’d read every folklore book you could get your hands on. Every whisper of vampire lore scratched into the margins of ledgers, stuffed between church hymnals, scribbled on the backs of newspapers.

Some said they aged. Slowly. Elegantly.

Others said they didn’t age at all. That they existed outside time. Beyond it.

You didn’t know how old Remmick was.

But something in your bones told you the truth.

Five hundred. Six hundred, maybe more.

A man who remembered empires. A man who had watched cities rise and burn. Who had danced in plague-slick ballrooms and kissed queens before they were beheaded. A man who had lived so long that names no longer mattered. Only debts. And blood.

And you’d given him both.

He stepped closer now, slow and deliberate.

"Yer heart’s gallopin’ like it thinks I’m here to take it."

You flinched. Not because he was wrong. But because he was right.

"You said you didn’t want my blood," you whispered.

"I don’t." He tilted his head. "Not yet."

"Then what do you want?"

His smile didn’t reach his eyes.

"You."

He said it like it was a simple thing. Like the rain wanting the river. Like the grave wanting the body.

You swallowed hard.

"Why me?"

His gaze dragged down your frame, unhurried, like a man admiring a painting he’d stolen once and hidden from the world.

"Because you belong to me. You gave yourself freely. No bargain’s ever tasted so sweet."

Your throat tightened.

"I didn’t know what I was agreeing to."

"You did," he said, softly now, stepping close enough that his chest nearly brushed yours. "You knew. Your soul knew. Even if your head didn’t catch up."

You opened your mouth to protest, to say something, anything that would push back this slow suffocation of certainty—

But his hand came up to your jaw. Fingers feather-light. Not forcing. Just holding. Just there.

"And you’ve been thinkin’ about me ever since," he said.

Not a question. A statement.

You didn’t answer.

He leaned in, his breath ghosting over your cheek, his voice a rasp against your ear.

"You dream of me, don’t you?"

Your hands trembled at your sides.

"I don’t—"

"You wake wet. Ache in your belly. You don’t know why. But I do."

You let your eyes fall shut, shame burning behind them like fire.

"Fuckin’ knew it," he murmured, almost reverent. "You smell like want, dove. You always have.”

His hand didn’t move. It just stayed there at your jaw, thumb ghosting slow along the hollow beneath your cheekbone. A touch so gentle it made your knees ache. Because it wasn’t the roughness that undid you—it was the restraint.

He could’ve taken.

He didn’t.

Not yet.

His gaze held yours, slow and unblinking, red still smoldering in the center of his irises like the dying core of a flame that refused to go out.

"Say it," he murmured.

Your lips parted, but nothing came.

"I can smell it," he said, voice low, rich as molasses. "Your shame. Your want. You’ve been livin’ like a nun with a beast inside her, and no one knows but me."

You hated how your breath stuttered. Hated more that your thighs pressed together when he said it.

"Why do you talk like that," you whispered, barely able to get the words out, "like you already know what I’m feeling?"

His fingers slid down, grazing the side of your neck, stopping just before the pulse thudding there.

"Because I do."

"That’s not fair."

He smiled, slow and crooked, nothing kind in it.

"No, dove. It ain’t."

You hated him.

You hated how beautiful he was in this light, sleeves rolled, veins prominent in his arms, shirt hanging open just enough to show the faint line of a scar that trailed beneath his collarbone. A body shaped by time, not by vanity. Not perfect. Just true. Like someone carved him for a purpose and let the flaws stay because they made him real.

He looked like sin and the sermon that came after.

Remmick moved closer. You didn’t retreat.

His hand flattened over your sternum now, right above your heartbeat, the warmth of him pressing through the cotton of your slip like it meant to seep in. He leaned down, mouth near yours, not kissing, just breathing.

"You gave yourself to me once," he said. "I’m only here to collect the rest."

"You saved my brother."

"I saved you. You just didn’t know it yet."

A shiver rippled down your spine.

His hand moved lower, skimming the curve of your ribs, hovering just at the soft flare of your waist. You could feel the heat rolling off him like smoke from a coalbed. His body didn’t radiate warmth the way a man’s should—but something older. Wilder. Like the earth’s own breath in summer. Like the hush of a storm right before it split the sky.

"And if I tell you no?" you asked, barely more than a breath.

His eyes flicked to yours, unreadable.

"I’ll wait."

You weren’t expecting that.

He smiled again, this time softer, almost cruel in its patience.

"I’ve waited centuries for sweeter things than you. But that don’t mean I won’t keep my hands on you ‘til you change your mind."

"You think I will?"

"You already have."

Your chest rose sharply, breath stung with heat.

"You think this is love?"

He laughed, low and dangerous, the sound curling around your ribs.

"No," he said. "This is hunger. Love comes later."

Then his mouth brushed your jaw—not a kiss, just the graze of lips against skin—and every nerve in your body arched to meet it.

Your knees buckled, barely.

He caught your waist in one hand, steadying you with maddening ease.

"I’m gonna ruin you," he whispered against your throat, his nose dragging lightly along your skin. "But I’ll be so gentle the first time you’ll beg me to do it again."

And God help you—

You wanted him to.

The house didn’t sleep.

Not the way houses were meant to.

It breathed.

The walls exhaled heat and memory, the floors creaked even when no one stepped, and somewhere in the rafters above your room, something paced slowly back and forth, back and forth, like a beast too restless to settle. The kind of place built with its own pulse.

You’d spent the rest of the night—if you could call it that—in a room that wasn’t yours, wearing nothing but a cotton shift and your silence. You hadn’t asked for anything. He hadn’t offered.

The room was spare but not cruel. A basin with a water pitcher. A four-poster bed draped in a netting veil to keep out the bugs—or the ghosts. The mattress was soft. The sheets smelled faintly of cedar, firewood, and something else you didn’t recognize.

Him.

You didn’t undress. You lay on top of the blanket, fingers threaded together over your belly, the thrum of your heartbeat like a second mouth behind your ribs.

Your door had no lock. Just a handle that squeaked if turned. And you hated how many times your eyes flicked toward it. Waiting. Wanting.

But he never came.

And somehow, that was worse.

Morning broke soft and gray through the slatted shutters. The sun didn’t quite reach the corners of the room, and the light that filtered in was the color of dust and river fog.

When you finally stepped out barefoot into the hall, the house was already awake.

There was a scent in the air—coffee. Burned sugar. The faintest curl of cinnamon. Something sizzling in a skillet somewhere.

You followed it.

The kitchen was enormous, all brick hearth and cast iron and a long scarred table in the center with mismatched chairs pushed in unevenly. A window hung open, letting in a breath of swamp air that rustled the lace curtain and kissed your ankles.

Remmick stood at the stove with his back to you, sleeves still rolled to the elbow, suspenders crossed low over his back. His shirt was half-unbuttoned and clung to his sides with the cling of heat and skin. He moved like he didn’t hear you enter.

You knew he had.

He reached for the pan with a towel over his palm and flipped something in the cast iron with a deft flick of the wrist.

"Hope you like sweet," he said, voice thick with morning. "Ain’t got much else."

You didn’t speak. Just stood there in the doorway like a ghost he’d conjured and forgotten about.

He turned.

God help you.

Even like this, barefoot, collar open, hair mussed from sleep or maybe just time—he looked unreal. Like a sin someone had tried to scrub out of scripture but couldn’t quite forget.

"Sleep alright?" he asked.

You gave a small nod.

He looked at you a moment longer. Then—

"Sit down, dove."

You moved toward the table.

His voice followed you, lazy but pointed.

"That’s the wrong chair."

You paused.

He nodded to one at the head of the table—old, high-backed, carved with curling vines and symbols you didn’t recognize.

"That one’s yours now."

You hesitated, then lowered yourself into it slowly. The wood groaned under your weight. The air in the kitchen felt thicker now, tighter.

He brought the plate to you himself.

Two slices of skillet cornbread, golden and glistening with syrup. A few wild strawberries sliced and sugared. A smear of butter melting slow at the center like a pulse.

He set the plate in front of you with a quiet care that felt almost obscene.

"You ain’t gotta eat," he said, leaning against the table beside your chair. "But I like watchin’ you do it."

You picked up the fork.

His eyes stayed on your mouth.

The cornbread was still warm.

Steam curled from it like breath from parted lips. The syrup pooled thick at the edges, dripping off the edge of your fork in slow, amber ribbons. It stuck to your fingers when you touched it. Sweet. Sticky. Sensual.

You brought the first bite to your mouth, slow.

Remmick didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. His eyes tracked the motion like a starving man watching someone else’s feast.

The bite landed soft on your tongue—golden crisp on the outside, warm and tender in the middle, butter melting into every pore. It was perfect. Unreasonably so. And somehow you hated that even more. Because nothing about this should’ve tasted good. Not with him watching you like that. Not with your body still humming from the memory of his voice against your skin.

But you swallowed.

And he smiled.

"Good girl," he murmured.

You froze. The fork paused just above the plate.

"You don’t get to say things like that," you whispered.

"Why not?"

Your fingers tightened around the handle.

"Because it sounds like you earned it."

He chuckled, low and easy. A slow roll of thunder in his chest.

"Think I did. Think I earned every fuckin’ word after draggin’ you out that night and lettin’ you walk away without layin’ a hand on you."

You looked up sharply, heat crawling up your neck.

"You shouldn’t have touched me."

"I didn’t," he said. "But I wanted to. Still do."

Your breath caught.

His knuckles brushed the edge of your plate, slow, casual, like he had all the time in the world to make you squirm.

"And I know you want me to," he added, voice low enough that it coiled under your ribs and settled somewhere molten in your belly.

You pushed the plate away.

He didn’t flinch. Just reached forward and dragged it back in front of you like you hadn’t moved it at all.

"You eat," he said, gentler now. "You need it. House takes more from you than it gives."

You glanced around the kitchen, suddenly uneasy.

"You talk about it like it’s alive."

He gave a slow nod.

"It is. In a way."

"How?"

He looked down at your plate, then back at you.

"You’ll see."

You pushed another bite past your lips, slower this time, aware of the weight of his gaze with every chew, every swallow. You didn’t know why you obeyed. Maybe it was easier than defying him. Maybe it was because some part of you wanted him to keep watching.

When the plate was clean, he reached out and caught your wrist before you could stand.

Not hard. Not even firm. Just…inevitable.

"You full?" he asked, his voice all smoke and sin.

You nodded.

His eyes darkened.

"Then I’ll have my taste next."

Your breath lodged sharp in your throat.

He said it like it meant nothing. Like asking for your pulse was no more intimate than asking for your hand. But there was a glint in his eye—red barely flickering now, but still there—and it told you everything.

He was done pretending.

You didn’t move. Not right away.

His fingers were still wrapped around your wrist, light but unyielding, the pad of his thumb grazing the fragile skin where your pulse drummed loud and frantic. Like it wanted to leap out of your veins and spill into his mouth.

You swallowed hard.

"You said you didn’t want blood."

"I don’t."

"Then what do you want?"

"You."

You watched him now, trying to make sense of what you wanted.

And what terrified you was this—

You didn’t want to run.

You wanted to know how it would feel.

To give something he couldn’t take without permission.

To see if your body could handle the worship of a mouth like his.

Remmick’s other hand came up slow, brushing hair from your cheek, his knuckles rough and reverent.

"You said I smelled like want," you whispered.

"You do."

"What do you smell like?"

He leaned in, mouth near your throat again, his nose dragging along your skin, slow, as if he were drawing in the scent of your soul.

"Rot. Hunger. Regret," he said. "Old things that don’t die right."

You shivered.

"And still I want you," you breathed.

He pulled back just enough to look you in the eyes.

"That’s the worst part, ain’t it?"

You didn’t answer.

Because he was right.

His hand slid down to your elbow, then lower, tracing the curve of your waist through the thin fabric. His touch was warm now, or maybe your body had just given up trying to tell the difference between threat and thrill.

He guided you up from the chair.

Didn’t yank. Didn’t drag.

Just stood and took your hand like a dance was beginning.

"Come with me," he said.

"Where?"

"Somewhere I can kneel."

Your heart stuttered.

He led you through the house, down the long hallway past doorways that watched like eyes. The floor groaned underfoot, the air thickening around your shoulders as he brought you deeper into the home’s belly. You passed portraits whose paint had faded to shadows, velvet drapes drawn tight, mirrors that refused to hold your reflection quite right.

The door at the end of the hall was already open.

Inside, the room was dark.

Just one candle lit, flickering low in a glass jar, its light catching the edges of something silver beside the bed. An old bowl. A cloth. A pair of gloves, yellowed from time.

A ritual.

Not violent.

Intimate.

Remmick turned toward you, his face bare in the soft light. He looked younger. More human. And somehow more dangerous for it.

"Sit," he said.

You sat.

He knelt.

And then his hands found your knees.

His hands rested on your knees like they belonged there. Not demanding. Not prying. Just there. Anchored. Reverent.

The candlelight licked up his jaw, catching in the hollows of his cheeks, the deep shadow beneath his throat. He didn’t look like a man. He looked like a story told by firelight—half-worshipped, half-feared. A sinner in the shape of a saint. Or maybe the other way around.

His thumbs made a slow pass over the inside of your thighs, just above the knee. Barely pressure. Barely touch. The kind of contact that made your breath feel too loud in your chest.

"Yer too quiet," he murmured.

"I don’t know what to say," you whispered back.

His gaze lifted, locking with yours, and in that moment the whole room seemed to still.

"Ya ain’t gotta say a damn thing," he said. "You just need to stay right there and let me show ya what I mean when I say I don’t want yer blood."

Your lips parted, but no sound came.

He leaned in, slow as honey in the heat, until his mouth hovered just above your knee. Then lower. His breath ghosted over your skin, warm and maddening.

You didn’t realize you were holding your breath until he pressed a single kiss just above the bone.

Your lungs stuttered.

His lips trailed higher.

Another kiss.

Then another.

Each one higher than the last, until your legs opened on instinct, until you felt the hem of your slip being eased upward by hands that moved with worshipful patience. Like he wasn’t just undressing you—he was peeling back a veil. Unwrapping something sacred.

"You ever had someone kneel for ya?" he asked, voice rough now. Thicker.

You shook your head.

He smiled like he already knew the answer.

"Good. Let me be the first."

He kissed the inside of your thigh like it meant something. Like you meant something. Like your skin wasn’t just skin, but a prayer he intended to answer with his mouth.

The air was too hot. Your thoughts slid loose from the edges of your mind. All you could do was breathe and feel.

He looked up at you once more, red eyes burning low, and said—

"You gave yerself to me. Let me taste what I already own."

And then he bowed his head, mouth meeting the softest part of you, and the rest of the world disappeared.

His mouth touched you like he’d been dreaming of it for years. Like he’d earned it.

No rush. No hunger. Just that first velvet press of his lips against the tender center of you, reverent and slow, like a kiss to a wound or a confession. He moaned, low and guttural, into your skin—and the sound of it vibrated up through your spine.

He parted you with his thumbs, just enough to taste you deeper. His tongue slipped between folds already slick and aching, and he groaned again, this time with something like gratitude.

"Sweet as I fuckin’ knew you’d be," he rasped, voice hot against your core.

Your hands gripped the edge of the chair. Wood bit into your palms. Your head tipped back, eyes fluttering shut as your thighs trembled around his shoulders.

He didn’t stop.

He licked you with patience, with purpose, like he was reading scripture written between your legs—each flick of his tongue slow and deliberate, every pass perfectly placed, building pressure inside you with maddening precision.

And all the while, he watched you.

When your head dropped forward, you found him staring up at you. Red eyes glowing low, heavy-lidded, mouth glistening, jaw tense with restraint. He looked ruined by the taste of you.

"Look at me," he said. "Wanna see you fall apart on my tongue."

Your breath hitched, hips rocking forward on instinct, chasing his mouth. He growled low and deep in his chest, gripping your thighs tighter.

"That’s it, dove," he murmured. "Don’t run from it. Give it to me."

He flattened his tongue and dragged it slow, then circled the swollen peak of your clit with the tip, teasing you to the edge and pulling back just before it broke.

You whined. Desperate.

He smirked against your cunt.

"You want it?" he asked, voice thick. "Say it."

Your lips barely formed the word—"Please."

He hummed in approval.

Then he devoured you.

No more teasing. No more pacing. Just his mouth fully locked on you, tongue relentless now, lips sealing around your clit while two fingers slid into you with that obscene, perfect pressure that made your body jolt.

You cried out, gasping, your thighs tightening around his head as the world tipped sideways.

"That’s it," he groaned, curling his fingers just right. "Cum f’r me, girl. Let me taste what’s mine."

And when it hit—

It hit like a fever. Like lightning. Like your soul cracked in half and bled straight into his mouth.

You broke with a cry, hips bucking, your fingers tangled in his hair as wave after wave crashed through you.

He didn’t stop. Not until your thighs twitched and your breath came in ragged little sobs, not until your body went limp in his hands.

Then, finally—finally—he pulled back.

His lips were wet. His eyes were feral. And he looked at you like a man who’d just fed.

"You’re fuckin’ divine," he whispered. "And I ain’t even started ruinin’ you yet."

The room pulsed with quiet. The candle flickered low, flame swaying as if it too had held its breath through your unraveling.

Your body felt boneless. Glazed in sweat. Your pulse echoed everywhere—in your wrists, your throat, between your legs where he’d buried his mouth like a man sent to worship. You weren’t sure how long it had been since you’d spoken. Since you’d breathed without shaking.

Remmick still knelt.

His hands were on your thighs, thumbs drawing idle circles into your skin like he couldn’t bear to stop touching you. His head was bowed slightly, but his eyes were on you—watchful, reverent, hungry in a way that had nothing to do with the softness between your legs and everything to do with something older. Something darker.

He looked drunk on you.

You opened your mouth to speak, but your voice caught on the edge of a sigh.

He beat you to it.

"Reckon you know what’s comin’ next," he murmured.

You didn’t answer.

He rose from his knees in one slow, unhurried motion. There was a heaviness to him now, a tension rolling just beneath his skin, like a dam about to split. He reached up with one hand and wiped the corner of his mouth with the back of it—then licked the taste from his thumb like it was honey off the comb.

You watched, breath held tight in your chest.

He stepped closer. You stayed seated, knees still parted, your slip pushed up indecently high, but you didn’t fix it. Didn’t move at all. The heat between your legs hadn’t faded. If anything, it curled deeper now, thicker, laced with something close to fear but not quite.

He stopped in front of you.

Tilted his head slightly.

"How’s yer heart?"

You blinked.

"It’s…fast," you whispered.

He smiled slow. Not mocking. Not soft either.

"Good. I want it fast."

Your throat tightened.

"Why?"

He leaned in, hands bracing on either side of your chair, body boxing you in without touching.

"‘Cause I want yer blood screamin’ for me when I take it."

Your breath caught somewhere between your ribs.

He didn’t touch you yet—didn’t need to. The weight of his body, caging you in without a single finger laid, made your skin flush from your chest to your knees. Every inch of you throbbed with awareness. Of him. Of your own pulse. Of the air cooling the places he’d worshiped with his mouth not moments before.

You swallowed.

"You said you’d wait," you whispered.

He nodded once, slowly, his eyes never leaving yours.

"I did. And I have. But yer body’s already beggin’ for me. Ain’t it?"

You hated that he was right. That he could feel it somehow. Not just see the tremble in your thighs or the way your lips parted when he leaned closer—but that he could feel it in the air, like scent, like vibration.

You lifted your chin, barely.

"I’m not scared."

He chuckled low, and it rumbled through your bones.

"Good. But I don’t need ya scared, dove. I need ya open."

He raised one hand then, slow as scripture, and brushed his knuckles along the column of your throat. Just a whisper of contact, a ghost’s touch. Your head tilted for him without thinking, baring your neck.

"Right here," he murmured. "Right where it beats loudest. That’s where I wanna taste ya."

You shivered.

He bent down, mouth near your pulse. His breath was warm, slow, drawn in like he was savoring you already.

"I ain’t gonna hurt ya," he said. "Not unless you want it."

Your fingers twisted in your lap.

"Will it—" you started, but the question got tangled.

He smiled against your skin.

"Will it feel good?"

You said nothing.

"You already know."

You did.

Because everything with him did. Every word. Every look. Every touch. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t holy. But it was real. It lived under your skin like rot and root and ruin.

You nodded once.

"Then take it."

Remmick stilled.

And then his lips pressed to your throat. Not with hunger. With reverence. Like a blessing.

"That’s my girl," he breathed.

And then he bit.

It wasn’t pain.

It was pressure, first.

A deep, aching pull that bloomed just beneath the skin, right where his mouth latched onto you. His lips sealed tight around your throat, and then—sharpness. Two points sinking in like teeth through silk. Like sin through flesh.

You gasped.

Not from fear. Not even from the sting. But from the rush.

Heat burst behind your eyes, white and sudden and dizzying. Your hands flew to his shoulders, clinging, grounding, anchoring you to something real while your mind drifted into something else—something otherworldly.

The pull came next.

A steady rhythm, slow and patient, like he was sipping you instead of drinking. Like he had all the time in the world. You could feel it, the way your blood left you in waves, not violent, not greedy—just…intimate. Like giving. Like surrender.

He groaned low against your neck, the sound vibrating through your bones.

"Fuck, you taste like sunlight," he rasped against your skin, voice thick with hunger and awe. "Like everythin’ warm I thought I’d forgotten."

Your head tipped further, offering him more.

You didn’t know when your legs opened wider, or when your hips rocked forward just to feel more of him. But his body shifted instinctively, meeting yours with a growl, his hand gripping your thigh now, possessive and unrelenting.

Your pulse faltered. Not from weakness, but from pleasure. From the unbearable knowing that he was inside you now, in the most ancient way. That your body had opened to him, and your blood had welcomed him.

Your moan was breathless.

"Remmick—"

He shushed you, mouth never leaving your throat.

"Don’t speak, dove. Just feel."

And you did.

You felt every lick. Every pull. Every sacred claim. You felt his tongue soothe where his fangs pierced, his hand slide higher along your thigh, his knee pushing between your legs until your breath stuttered out of you in something like a sob.

It was too much. It was not enough.

And when he finally pulled back, slow and reluctant, your blood on his lips like a mark, like a vow, he stared at you like you were holy.

Like he hadn’t fed on you.

Like he’d prayed.

The room was quiet, but your body wasn’t.

You felt every beat of your heart echo in the hollow where his mouth had been. A slow, reverent throb that pulsed through your neck, your chest, your thighs. It was like something had been lit beneath your skin, and now it smoldered there—glowing, aching, changed.

Remmick’s breath was uneven. His lips were stained red, parted just slightly, his jaw slack with something like awe. The burn of your blood still shimmered in his eyes, brighter now. Alive.

He looked undone.

And yet his hands were steady as he reached up, cupped your jaw in both palms, and tilted your face toward him. His thumb swept across your cheekbone like you might vanish if he didn’t touch you just right.

"You alright?" he asked, voice quieter now, roughened at the edges like a match just struck.

You nodded, though your limbs still trembled.

"I feel…" you swallowed, the word too small for what bloomed in your chest, "…warm."

He laughed, soft and almost bitter, and leaned his forehead against yours.

"You should. You’re inside me now. Every drop of you."

The words rooted somewhere deep. You didn’t flinch. Didn’t pull away. You could still feel the heat of his mouth, the bite, the pleasure that followed. It wasn’t just lust. It wasn’t just surrender. It was something older. Something binding.

"Does it hurt?" you asked, your fingers brushing the side of his neck, the line of his collarbone slick with sweat.

He looked at you like you’d asked the wrong question.

"Hurt?" he echoed. "Dove, it’s ecstasy."

You stared at him.

"You mean for you?"

He shook his head once.

"For us."

Then he pulled back just enough to look at you—really look. His gaze swept your features like he was committing them to memory. As if this moment, this very breath, was something sacred. His fingers moved to your throat again, this time to the place just above the bite, and he pressed lightly.

"You’ll bruise here," he said. "Won’t fade for a while."

"Will it heal?"

"Eventually."

"Do you want it to?"

His mouth curved, slow and wicked.

"No," he said. "I want the world to see what’s mine."

And before you could reply—before the heat in your belly could cool or your mind could gather itself—he kissed you.

Not soft.

Not careful.

His mouth claimed you like he’d already been inside you a thousand times and wanted to do it a thousand more. He kissed you like a man starving. Like a creature who’d gone too long without flesh, and now that he had it, he wasn’t letting go.

You tasted your own blood on his tongue.

And it tasted like forever.

The house knew.

It breathed deeper now. Its wood swelled, its walls sighed, its floorboards creaked in time with your heartbeat—as though it had taken you in too, accepted your offering, and now it wanted to keep you just like he did. Not as a guest. Not as a lover.

As a belonging.

Remmick hadn’t let you go.

Not when the kiss ended. Not when your blood slowed in his mouth. Not when your knees gave and your body folded forward into him. His arms had caught you like he knew the shape of your collapse. Like he’d been waiting for it. Like he’d never let you fall anywhere but into him.

He carried you now, one arm beneath your legs, the other braced around your back, his chest solid against yours.

"Don’t reckon you’re walkin’ after all that," he muttered, gaze fixed ahead, voice gone syrup-slow and thick with something possessive.

You didn’t argue. You couldn’t.

Your head rested against the place where his heart should’ve beat. But it was quiet there. Not lifeless—just other.

He carried you past rooms you hadn’t seen. A library, long abandoned, lined with crooked books and a grandfather clock that had no hands. A parlor soaked in velvet and silence. A door nailed shut from the outside, something heavy breathing behind it.

You didn’t ask.

He didn’t explain.

The room he took you to was nothing like the others.

It wasn’t grand.

It was personal.

The windows here were narrow and high, soft light slanting through the dusty glass in thin gold ribbons. The bed was simple but large, the sheets dark, the frame iron-wrought and worn smooth by time. A single cross hung above the headboard—but it had been turned upside down.

He set you down like you were breakable. Sat you on the edge of the bed, knelt once more to remove the slip still clinging to your body, inch by inch, as if undressing you were a sacrament.

"Y’ever wonder why I picked you?" he asked, voice low as the hush between thunderclaps.

Your breath stilled.

"I thought it was the blood."

He shook his head, his hands pausing at your hips.

"Nah, dove. Blood’s blood. Yours sings, sure. But it ain’t why I chose."

He looked up then, red eyes gleaming in the half-light.

"You remind me of the last thing I ever loved before I died."

The words landed like a stone in still water.

They rippled outward. Slow. Wide. Deep.

You stared at him, breath shallow, your skin bare under his hands, your throat still warm from where he’d fed. The room held its silence like breath behind gritted teeth. Outside, somewhere beyond the high windows, something moved through the trees—branches bending, wind pushing low and humid across the land—but in here, it was only the two of you.

Only his voice.

Only your blood between his teeth.

"What…what was she like?" you asked.

His thumbs drew circles at your hips, but his eyes drifted, not unfocused—just distant. Remembering.

"She had a mouth like yours. Sharp. Didn’t know when to shut it. Always speakin’ when she should’ve stayed quiet." A smile ghosted across his lips. "God, I loved that. I loved that she ain’t feared me even when she should’ve."

He exhaled through his nose, slow.

"But she didn’t get to finish bein’ mine."

Your brows pulled.

"What happened to her?"

He looked back at you then, and the heat in his gaze returned—not hunger, not even desire, but something deeper. Possessive. Terrifying in its tenderness.

"They tore her from me. Burned her in a chapel. Said she was a witch on account’a what I’d given her."

Your heart dropped into your stomach.

"Remmick—"

"She didn’t scream," he said, voice rough. "Didn’t cry. Just looked at me like she knew I’d find her again. And I have."

You froze.

His hands slid higher, up your ribs, his palms reverent.

"I don’t believe in fate. Not really. But you—" he leaned in, lips brushing your jaw, voice low like a spell, "you make me wanna believe in things I ain’t allowed to have."

You whispered against the curl of his mouth.

"And what do you think I am?"

He kissed the hinge of your jaw.

"My penance," he said. "And my reward."

You shivered.

"You said you saved me."

He nodded.

"I did."

"Why?"

He pulled back just enough to meet your eyes, and his voice dropped to a near whisper.

"‘Cause I ain’t lettin’ another thing I love burn."

You didn’t realize you were crying until he touched your face.

Not with hunger, not with heat, but with the kind of softness that had no business living in a man like him. His thumb caught a tear on your cheek like he’d been waiting for it, like it meant something sacred.

"You ain’t her," he murmured. "But you feel like the same song in a different key."

His voice cracked a little at the edges, not enough to ruin the shape of it, just enough to prove that something in him still bled.

You reached up, fingers trembling, and cupped the side of his neck. The skin there was warmer now. Still inhuman, still not quite alive, but it held your heat like it didn’t want to give it back. You felt the ridges of old scars beneath your palm. The echo of stories not told.

"I don’t know what I’m becoming," you said.

He leaned into your hand, eyes half-lidded.

"You’re becomin’ mine."

Then he kissed you again—not like before. Not full of fire. But slow, like he had all the time in the world to learn the shape of your mouth. His lips moved over yours with a kind of tenderness that made your bones ache. A kind of reverence that said this is where I end and begin again.

When he pulled back, your breath followed him.

The room shifted.

You felt it. Like the house had exhaled too.

"Lie down," he said, voice softer than it had ever been. "Let me hold what I almost lost."

You obeyed.

You lay back against the sheets that smelled like him, like dust and dark and something unnameable. The iron bed creaked softly beneath you, and the candlelight trembled with the movement. He undressed with quiet purpose, shirt sliding from his shoulders, buttons undone by slow fingers, trousers falling away to bare the sharp planes of his body.

And when he climbed over you, it wasn’t to take.

It was to be taken.

Remmick hovered above you, breath warm at your lips, hands braced on either side of your head. He looked down at you like he was staring through time. Like you were something he'd pulled from the fire and decided to keep even if it burned him too.

You’re mine, he whispered, but didn’t say it aloud.

He didn’t have to.

His body said it.

His mouth said it.

And when he finally eased inside you, slow and steady, filling you inch by trembling inch—your soul said it too.

His body hovered just above yours, every inch of him trembling with a control you didn’t quite understand—until you looked into his eyes.

That red glow was dimmer now. No less powerful, but softened by something raw. Something reverent.

Not hunger.

Not lust.

Not even possession.

Devotion.

The kind that didn’t speak. The kind that buried itself in the bones and never left.

His hand slid down the side of your face, tracing the curve of your cheek, then the line of your jaw, calloused fingers lingering in the hollow of your throat where your heartbeat thudded wild and uneven.

"Still fast," he murmured, half to himself.

"You’re heavy," you whispered, not in protest, but in awe. Every breath you took was filled with him.

He smirked, the corner of his mouth twitching in that crooked, wicked way of his.

"Ain’t even layin’ on you yet."

You didn’t laugh. Couldn’t. Your body was stretched too tight, strung out with anticipation and need. Every inch of you burned.

He leaned down then, not to kiss you, but to breathe you in. His nose skimmed your cheek, the edge of your ear, the curve of your throat already marked by his bite. His hands traced your ribs, the sides of your waist, slow and steady, like he was trying to learn you by touch alone.

"You’re shakin'," he whispered, voice low, thick with something close to worship.

"So are you."

A pause.

Then softer—truthfully,

"Yeah."

He kissed the inside of your wrist, then the space between your breasts, then lower still—his lips reverent as they moved over your belly, your hipbone, the softest parts of you.

"You ever had someone take their time with you?" he asked, mouth against your skin.

You didn’t speak.

"Didn’t think so," he muttered. "Shame."

His hand slid between your thighs, spreading you again—not rushed, not greedy, just gentle. Like he knew he’d already had the taste of you and now he wanted the feel.

"Tell me if it’s too much," he said.

"It already is."

He looked up at you then, his face half-shadowed, half-lit, and something flickered in his eyes.

"Good."

His cock brushed against your entrance, hot and heavy, and you nearly arched off the bed at the first contact. Not even inside. Just there. Teasing. Pressed to the slick mess he'd made of you earlier with his mouth.

He groaned deep.

"Fuck, you feel like sin."

You reached for him, pulled him down by the back of his neck until your mouths were inches apart.

"Then sin with me."

He didn’t hesitate.

He began to press in—slow. Devastatingly slow. The head of his cock stretching you open with a care that felt like madness. His hands gripped your hips as if holding himself back took more strength than killing ever had.

He moved in inch by inch, his breath hitched, jaw tight, sweat beginning to bead at his temple.

"Shit—ya takin’ me so good, dove. Just like that."

You moaned. Your fingers dug into his back. You were full of him and not even halfway there.

"Remmick—"

"I gotcha," he whispered. "Ain’t gonna let you break."

But he was already breaking you. Gently. Thoroughly. Beautifully.

He filled you like he’d been made for the task.

No sharp thrusts. No hurried rhythm. Just the unbearable slowness of it. The stretch. The burn. The drag of his cock as he sank deeper, deeper, deeper into you until there was nothing left untouched. Until your body stopped bracing and started opening.

You clung to him—hands fisted in the fabric of his shirt that still clung to his back, damp with sweat. He hadn’t even undressed all the way. There was something obscene about it, something holy, too—the way he kept his shirt on like this wasn’t about bareness, it was about belonging.

"That’s it," he rasped against your throat. "There she is."

Your moan was caught between breath and prayer.

He buried himself to the hilt.

And still—he didn’t move.

His hips pressed flush to yours, his breath shaky against your skin as he held himself there, nestled so deep inside you it felt like you’d never known emptiness before now. Like everything that came before this moment had just been the ache of waiting to be filled.

"You feel that?" he whispered, voice thick, almost reverent. "Where I am inside ya?"

You nodded. Couldn’t find your voice.

His lips brushed the shell of your ear.

"Ain’t no leavin’ now. I’ll always be in ya. Even when I ain’t."

You whimpered.

Not from pain. From how true it felt.

He moved then—barely. Just a slow roll of his hips, a gentle retreat and return. It was enough to make your breath hitch, your body arch, your legs wrap tighter around him without thinking.

"That’s right, dove. Let me in. Let me have it."

You didn’t even know what it was anymore.

Your body?

Your blood?

Your soul?

You’d already given them all.

And still, he took more.

But not cruelly.

Like a man kissing the mouth of a well after years of thirst. Like a thief who knew how to make you feel grateful for the stealing.

He found a rhythm that made the air vanish from your lungs.

Slow. Deep. Measured. His hips grinding just right, dragging his cock against every place inside you that had never known such touch. Every stroke sang with heat. Every breath he took turned your name into something more than a sound.

"Fuck, I could stay in you forever," he groaned. "Like this. Warm. Tight. Mine."

You dug your nails into his shoulders, legs trembling.

"Please," you whispered, though you didn’t know what you were asking for.

He did.

"Beg me," he said, dragging his mouth down your neck, over the bite he’d left. "Beg me to make you come with my cock in you."

"Remmick—"

"Say it."

You were already gone. Already shaking. Already his.

"Make me come," you breathed. "Please—God, please—"

His smile was sinful.

And then he fucked you.

His rhythm shifted—no longer slow, no longer sacred.

It was worship in the way fire worships a forest. The kind that devours. The kind that remakes.

Remmick braced a hand behind your thigh, hitching your leg higher as he thrust harder, deeper, dragging guttural sounds from his chest that you felt before you heard. The bed groaned beneath you, iron frame clanging soft against the wall in time with his hips. But it was your body that made the noise that filled the room—the gasps, the breaking sighs, the high whimper of his name torn raw from your throat.

He kissed your jaw, your collarbone, your shoulder, not like he was trying to be sweet but like he needed to taste every inch he claimed.

"You feel me in your belly yet?" he growled, words hot against your skin.

You nodded frantically, tears pricking the corners of your eyes from the sheer force of sensation.

"Say it," he panted, each thrust brutal and beautiful.

"Yes—yes, I feel you, Remmick, I—"

"You gonna come f’r me like a good girl?"

"Yes."

"Say my fuckin’ name when you do."

His hand slid between your bodies, finding your clit like he’d owned it in another life, and the moment his fingers circled that aching bundle of nerves, your vision went white.

Your body seized around him.

The sound you made was raw, wrecked, something no one but him should ever hear.

He kept fucking you through it, hissing curses through his teeth, chasing his own high with the rhythm of a man who’d waited centuries for the perfect fit.

And then he broke.

With your name groaned low and reverent in your ear, he came deep inside you, hips stuttering, breath ragged, body shuddering with the force of it. You felt every throb of his cock inside you, every spill of heat, every ounce of him taking root.

For a long, suspended moment, he didn’t move.

Only the sound of your breaths tangled together.

Your sweat mixing.

Your bodies still joined.

"That’s it," he whispered hoarsely, pressing his forehead to yours. "That’s how I know you’re mine."

The house exhaled around you.

The candle sputtered in its jar, flame dancing low and crooked, like even it had been made breathless by what it had witnessed. Somewhere in the walls, the wood groaned—settling. Sighing. Accepting.

You didn’t move. Couldn’t.

Your body was a temple razed and rebuilt in a single night, still pulsing with the memory of his mouth, his weight, the stretch of him inside you like a secret only your bones would remember. Every nerve hummed low and soft beneath your skin, like your blood hadn’t figured out how to move without his rhythm guiding it.

Remmick stayed inside you.

His body was heavy atop yours, but not crushing. His head tucked into the curve of your neck, the same place he’d bitten, the same place he’d worshipped like it held some holy truth. His breath came slow and ragged, the rise and fall of his chest matching yours as if your lungs had struck the same pace without meaning to.

"Don’t move yet," he muttered, voice wrecked and hoarse. "Wanna stay here just a minute longer."

You let your hand drift through his hair, damp with sweat, curls sticking to his forehead. You carded through them lazily, mind blank, heart full.

He pressed a kiss to your throat. Then another, just above your collarbone.

"You still with me?" he asked, quieter now.

You nodded.

"Good," he murmured. "Didn’t mean to fuck the soul outta ya. Just…couldn’t help it."

You let out the softest laugh, and he smiled into your skin.

His hand slid down your side, tracing the curve of your waist, your hip, the spot where your thigh met his. His fingers moved slowly, not with lust, but with a kind of quiet awe.

"Y’know what you feel like?" he whispered.

"What?"

"Home."

The word struck something inside you. Something tender. Something deep.

He lifted his head then, just enough to look down at you. His eyes had faded from red to something darker, something richer—garnet in low light. The kind of color only seen in blood and wine and promises too old to be remembered by name.

"You still think this is just hunger?" he asked.

You blinked at him, dazed.

"It was never just hunger," he said. "Not with you."

The silence between you was warm now.

Not empty. Not tense. Just quiet, the kind that comes after thunder, when the storm’s rolled through and the trees are still deciding whether to stand or kneel.

You felt it in your limbs—heavy, humming, holy. The afterglow of something you didn’t have language for.

Remmick hadn’t moved far.

He still blanketed your body like a second skin, one arm braced beneath your shoulders, the other tracing idle shapes across your hip as if he were still mapping the terrain of you. His cock, softening but still nestled inside, pulsed faintly with the last of what he’d given you.

And he had given you something. Not just release. Not just blood. Something older. Something that whispered now in the place between your ribs.

You turned your head to look at him.

His gaze was already on you.

"What happens now?" you asked, barely above a whisper.

He didn’t answer right away.

Instead, he ran the back of his fingers along your cheekbone, down the side of your neck, pausing over the place where his mark had already begun to bruise.

"You askin’ what happens tonight," he murmured, "or what happens after?"

You blinked slowly. "Both."

He let out a breath through his nose, the sound tired but not cold.

"Tonight, I’ll hold you. Long as you’ll let me. Won’t leave this bed unless you beg me to. Might even make ya cry again, if you keep lookin’ at me like that."

You flushed, and he smiled.

"As for after…"

He looked past you then, toward the ceiling, like the truth was written in the beams.

"Ain’t never planned that far. Not with anyone. Just fed. Fucked. Moved on."

"But not with me."

His eyes snapped back to yours. Serious now.

"No, dove. Not with you."

You swallowed the knot rising in your throat.

"Why?"

His jaw flexed, tongue darting briefly across his lower lip before he answered.

"‘Cause I been alone too long. Lived too long. Thought I was too far gone to want anythin’ that didn’t bleed beneath me."

He leaned closer, forehead resting against yours, his next words no louder than a ghost’s sigh.

"But you—you made me want somethin’ tender. Somethin’ breakable."

"That doesn’t make sense."

"Don’t gotta. Nothin’ about you ever has. And yet here you are."

You let your eyes drift shut, just for a moment, and whispered into the stillness between your mouths.

"So I stay?"

He didn’t hesitate.

"You stay."

The candle had burned low.

Its glow flickered long shadows across the walls—your bodies painted in gold and blood-tinged bronze, limbs tangled in sheets that still clung with sweat and want. The house had quieted again, the way an animal settles when it knows its master is content. Outside, the wind threaded through the trees in soft moans, like the Delta herself was eavesdropping.

Neither of you spoke for a while. You didn’t need to.

Your fingers traced lazy patterns across Remmick’s chest—over his scars, the slope of muscle, the faint rise and fall beneath your palm. You still half-expected no heartbeat, but it was there, slow and stubborn, like he’d stolen it back just for you.

He watched you. One arm draped across your waist, his thumb stroking your bare back like you might fade if he stopped.

"You still ain’t askin’ the question you really wanna ask," he said, voice rough from silence and sleep.

You paused.

"What question is that?"

He tipped his head toward you, resting his chin on his knuckles.

"You wanna know if I turned you."

Your heart gave a traitorous flutter.

"And did you?"

He shook his head.

"Nah. Not yet."

"Why not?"

His fingers stilled. Then resumed.

"’Cause you ain’t asked me to."

You looked up at him sharply.

"Would you?"

A long beat passed. Then he nodded once.

"If it was you askin’. If it was real."

Your breath caught.

"And if I don’t?"

His gaze didn’t waver.

"Then I’ll stay with you. ‘Til you’re old. ‘Til your hands shake and your bones ache and your eyes stop lookin’ at me like I’m the only thing that ever made you feel alive."

Your throat tightened.

"That sounds awful."

He smiled, slow and aching.

"It sounds human."

You looked at him for a long time. At the man who had killed, who had bled you, who had tasted every part of you—body and soul—and still asked nothing unless you gave it.

"Would it hurt?"

His hand slid up, fingers curling beneath your jaw, tilting your face to his.

"It’d hurt," he said. "But not more than bein’ without you would."

The quiet stretched long and low.

His words hung in the space between your mouths like smoke—something sweet and terrible, something tasted before it was fully breathed in.

Your chest rose and fell against his slowly, and for a long time, you said nothing. You just listened. To the house settling around you. To the wind curling past the windows. To the steady thrum of blood still echoing faintly in your ears.

And beneath it all—

You heard memory.

It came soft at first. A shape, not a sound. The slick thud of your knees hitting the alley pavement. The scream you didn’t recognize as your own. Your brother’s blood, warm and fast, pumping between your fingers like water from a broken pipe. His mouth slack. His eyes wide.

You remembered screaming to the sky. Not to God.

Just up.

Because you knew He’d stopped listening.

And then—

He came.

Out of nothing. Out of dark.

You remembered the slow scrape of his boots on the gravel. The silhouette of him under the weak yellow glow of a flickering streetlamp. You remembered the quiet way he spoke.

"You want him to live?"

You didn’t answer with words. You just nodded, crying so hard you couldn’t breathe. And he’d knelt—right there in the blood—and laid his hand flat against your brother’s chest.

You never saw what he did. Only saw your brother’s eyes flutter. Only heard his breath return, sudden and wet.

And then he looked at you.

Not your brother.

Remmick.

He looked at you like he’d already taken something.

And he had.

Now, years later, lying in the hush of his house, your body still joined to his, you could still feel that moment thrumming beneath your skin. The moment when everything shifted. When your life became borrowed.

You looked up at him now, breathing steady, lips parted like a prayer just barely forming.

"I’ve already given you everything."

He shook his head.

"Not this."

He pressed two fingers to your chest, right over your heart.

"This is still yours."

"And you want it?"

He didn’t smile. Didn’t look away.

"I want it to keep beatin’. Forever. With mine."

You stared at him.

You thought about that alley. About your brother’s eyes opening again.

About how no one else came.

And you made your choice.

"Then take it."

Remmick stilled.

"Don’t say it unless you mean it, dove."

"I do."

His voice was barely more than a breath.

"You sure?"

You reached up, touched his face, fingers tracing the sharp line of his jaw.

"I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life."

His eyes shimmered—deep red now, alive with something wild and tender.

"Then I’ll make you eternal," he whispered. "And I’ll never let the world take you from me."

He didn’t rush.

Not now. Not with this.

Remmick looked at you like you were something rare—something holy—like he couldn’t believe you’d said it, even as your voice still echoed between the walls.

Then he moved.

Not with hunger. Not with heat.

With purpose.

He sat up, kneeling beside you on the bed, and pulled the sheet slowly down your body. His eyes drank you in again, but this time there was no heat in them. Just reverence. As if you were the altar, and he the sinner who’d finally been granted absolution.

"You sure you want this?" he asked one last time, voice soft, like the hush of water in a cathedral.

You nodded, throat tight.

"I want forever."

His jaw clenched. A tremble passed through him like he’d heard those words in another life and lost them before they were ever his.

He leaned down.

His hand cupped the back of your head, the other settled flat on your chest, palm over your heart.

"Close your eyes, dove."

You did.

And then—

You felt him.

His breath. His lips. The soft, cool press of his mouth against your neck. But he didn’t bite.

Not yet.

He kissed the mark he’d already left. Then higher. Then lower. Slow. Measured. Your body melted beneath him, your hands curling into the sheets.

And then—

A whisper against your skin.

"I’ll be gentle. But you’ll remember this forever."

And he sank his fangs in.

It wasn’t like the first time.

It wasn’t lust.

It wasn’t climax.

It was rebirth.

Pain bloomed sharp and bright—but only for a heartbeat. Then the warmth flooded in. Then the cold. Then the ache. Your pulse stuttered once, then surged. It was like drowning and being pulled to the surface at once. Like everything you’d ever been burned away and something older moved in to take its place.

He held you as it happened.

Cradled you like something delicate.

His mouth sealed over the wound, drinking slow, but not to feed. To anchor you. To tether you to him.

You felt yourself go limp. The world turned strange. Light and dark bled into each other. Your breath faded. Your heartbeat fluttered like wings against glass.

And then—

It stopped.

Silence.

Stillness.

And in the space where your heart had once beat…

You heard his.

Then—

Your eyes opened.

The world looked different.

Sharper.

Brighter.

Every shadow deeper. Every color richer. The candlelight burned gold-red and alive. The scent of the night air was so thick it choked you—smoke, soil, blood, him.

Remmick hovered above you, lips stained crimson, breathing hard like he’d just returned from war.

And when he looked at you—

You saw yourself reflected in his eyes.

He smiled.

"Welcome home, darlin’."

[cygnusposts]

i think it's really funny when people try to assign batfam characters their own colors or whatever but refuse to use duplicates. could not be me. the inherent tragedy in using red for both jason and tim is something i will never get over

[meerawrites]

WODTober 14: Lines drawn in blood

Julian of clan Toreador.

Drink from me and live forever. — Anne Rice

[gryfflepuffinthetardis]

Blood in My Ledger (Alec Hardy): Season/Series One, Episode One

Word Count: 8966 Words

Warnings: Canon child's death; Canon child's body; Mention of a mother dying in labor; Reader has grief over sister's death; Canon family in grief; Alec Hardy being socially awkward; Chemical burn scars

"No one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear." — C.S. Lewis

Officer Y/n L/N arrived in Broadchurch and made it to the crime scene before Alec Hardy and Ellie Miller. She traveled with her nieces who she had adopted as her daughters as soon as she was legally allowed to, so she had to set them up at the hotel before she traveled to the crime scene on the beach.

By the time Alec Hardy arrived, Y/n was already crouched over the young boy's body. He was just a young boy, barely more than ten years old.

Alec Hardy arrived, not really noticing the young woman with the h/c and e/c at first, only the body that was prompting a small panic attack to surge through him. She looked remorsefully at the body of the boy.

"Oh, God, don't do this to me." He muttered to himself.

 Y/n's eyes flickered up from the boy's body to see a man who was at least a decade older than her, but his tired eyes made him seem older. The man stopped, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, he was gathering his strength. The man was handsome, very handsome, but he didn't look very well-cared for; his hair looked like it wanted to curl but was just as tired as the rest of the man so it just didn't and drooped. It barely looked combed. The man looked professional but drained... more than that, he looked like the definition of depression. And Y/n would know. The man was muttering to himself. If she didn't know what one looked like, she'd say he was fighting through a panic attack. 

He wasn't moving and his breathing was so heavy that his shoulder kept rising and falling. He looked like he was overwhelmed by all the senses around him. Y/n knew who he was. She had kept tabs on the Sandbrook case. "Come on." He breathed to himself and forced himself to walk. One foot in front of the other.

"What do we got here?" Alec Hardy asked. He had a Scottish accent, so he likely wasn't from around here. Somewhere around Paisley, maybe?

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Y/n asked, standing up to her full height. He looked familiar, and it wasn't like he was a face you'd forget and she wouldn't be forgetting that accent any time soon.

"DI Alec Hardy, and this is my crime scene. Who the hell are you?" Alec asked.

"I'm a new transfer, sort of. Officer Y/n L/n from the SCAS in the NCA. I'm a forensic psychologist."

"A what?" He deadpanned.

"I'm a profiler. I analyze the behavior of criminals based on their crimes and use that to find them. I specialize in crimes against children so I was called when the boy's body was reported."

"Oh." Alec groaned in annoyance. "You're too young."

"I am twenty-four years old, old man." She retorted back, making Alec give her an offended look, and looked at the body, scanning it, "He didn't fall. There's no bruising consistent with blunt trauma. But..." She crouched down, "He might've been strangled. There is bruising consistent with manual strangulation. I'd wager the attacker was male. Most likely an adult but it's hard to tell. He was placed here with care. The killer was remorseful, he may have known the killer. It's entirely possible the killer cared for the boy, his murder may have been entirely accidental."

Hardy stared at the woman, but the skepticism had disappeared from his eyes. Something mingled with that tired sadness... he was impressed.

Y/n's eyes flickered back to Hardy to a woman who was allowed past the tape, and she looked past her to see a middle-aged woman casually smoking and holding a dog leash. Too casually. She balled her fists as a memory throbbed, and she dug her nails into the palms of her hands. As she did this, Hardy crouched down to examine the boy's body.

The woman who was allowed past the tape started to speak in horror. "Oh, God. No, no, no."

Hardy stood up and tried to instruct her while Y/n analyzed the woman's face and voice. Recognition. She knew the boy. 

"Off the beach. This area's off-limits." Hardy ordered.

"No, I'm police." The woman said, taking out her badge and handing it to him, never looking away from the boy's body. "Oh, God, I know him. He lives here. He has tea at my house. He's my boy's best friend. Oh, God, Beth. Does Beth know?"

Y/n stepped to her, "Alright, calm down. Who's Beth?"

"You don't understand! I know that boy!"

"I understand that." Y/n said with calm compassion laced in her professionalism.

"Shut it off." Hardy said, bluntly.

"'Shut it off'!?" The woman exclaimed.

"Be professional. You're working a case now." Hardy said and held his hand out. "Alec Hardy."

"I know. You got my job."

"Really? You wanna do that now?" Hardy asked.

"You don't even know who he is!" 

"Tell me!"

Y/n moved to the two arguing older detectives and she spoke rationally. "I understand this is more than a little jarring, but you need to compartmentalize for the moment. Right now, we need to know as much as we can. And this is not the time nor the place to be bickering over a job, we've got a dead child here."

"Who are you?" The woman asked.

"Officer Y/n L/n. I worked in the Serious Crime Analysis Section in the NCA. I specialize in crimes against children. And you are?"

"D.S. Ellie Miller."

"Now... who was he?" Y/n asked.

"Danny. Daniel Latimer. Eleven-years-old. Goes to school with my boy, Tom. His family live here. Dad's the local plumber."

"Is this a suicide spot?"

"He wouldn't do that."

"Answer the question." Hardy said.

Ellie glared at him and replied, "No. There are others. There's one three miles west. Another one further inland. He's not that type of kid."

"He didn't commit suicide. The bruising and placement of the body's inconsistent." Y/n repeated.

"I need more than the word of a twenty-four-year-old using a pseudoscience." He said. He wasn't disagreeing with her. There was definitely something off about the placement of the body.

"Is it already reminding you of Sandbrook?" She countered, and he looked sharply at her. "Young child murdered near the water. Must be triggering."

Hardy glared at her for a few more moments and said, sharply, "What else can you deduct?"

"Not much else at the moment." She said.

"Great. Find out where SOCO are. We have to move fast. That tide'll be in.

"Who's Beth?" Y/n asked.

"His mother. She'll be devastated."

"Any good mother would." Y/n muttered and then as they covered the body, she looked past them to see a frantic, rapidly approaching woman with the body language she had seen too many times over the course of her career—the body language of a mother who knew that they had outlived their child but needed confirmation of what their mother's intution already told them. "Oh, boy. That her?"

Ellie turned to see a very beautiful woman in her early thirties with auburn hair in a red dress, carrying her shoes to keep them from slowing her down on the loose, sandy terrain of the beach, running and panting as she got closer.

"No, Beth, get off the beach!" Ellie said as Y/n shifted, trying to shield Danny's body from Beth's view.

"What have you found!? Let me see, let me see!" Beth shouted as Hardy and other officers tried to stop her.

"You can't be here!"

Beth caught sight of Danny's shoes before Y/n blocked them.

"Those are his shoes. Those are Danny's trainers." Beth gasped as she grew hysterical, as the officers tried to pull her back. "THOSE ARE DANNY'S TRAINERS! NO! NO!"

Ringing rang in Y/n's ear. No, not ringing. Screaming. Multiple ringing screams that throbbed against her skull.

"DANNY!"

Y/n wished she could say this was an uncommon occurrence. For the memories of the screams to ring in her ears, but they were far from that.

—————————————————————————

Hardy, Ellie, and Y/n walked along the top of the cliff as Hardy criticized," They let people walk along here, no safety barriers?"

"It's the coastal path. People know to be careful."

"Careful or not, people can still trip and be pushed by accident. Cliffs crumble and bring whatever's on top of them with them." Y/n pointed out.

"She's right. It's a death trap." Hardy agreed as they approached the SOCO team.

"Morning, Brian. This is a new transfer, Officer Y/N L/N from NCA." Ellie greeted, and Y/n awkwardly smiled and waved.

 "How's it going?" Hardy said, straight to the point.

"Well, from what we've got up here, sir, it looks like the rock fall around the body was faked." Brian said.

"What do you mean?" Ellie asked.

"The angle of the body was wrong. It was too arranged." Brian said, and Y/n looked at Hardy with a sardonic look, like, imagine that, as she had already told him that twice. "And up here, there's no flattened grass or slippage. No loose rocks. No fibers, no hand marks. No sense of a downward trajectory."

"You mean he didn't fall?" Ellie asked.

"Could he have jumped?" Hardy asked, still not ruling it out.

"That's unlikely, sir, given where he was found and the trajectory of the cliffs."

"See, not Danny."

"Someone tried to make it look like an accident." Y/n said, "It's unlikely he was on the cliff."

—————————————————————————

They walked down the cliff as more cars arrived, including one that didn't look police-issued. 

"Get on to the pathologist. Tell him to hurry up. Even if it is just preliminary." Hardy said.

"He'll have to take his time. What happened to Danny in the hours before his death are just as important as what happened to him." Y/n advised.

"We need to make sure this doesn't happen to anyone else."

"I understand that, sir." Y/n spat it out, turning sharply, "But hurrying results may cause for something to be overlooked. Time isn't always better than efficacy, contrary to what men may widely believe."

Hardy did a double-take at her implication as she walked on as if she hadn't said anything rather cheeky. Ellie raised her eyebrows.

A young man around Y/n's age with brown hair got out of a cheap, hand-me-down-looking red car that pulled up.

"DS Miller!" The man shouted.

"Who is that?" Hardy asked.

"Just keep walking." Ellie sighed.

The man jogged over to them. "Ellie!"

"He seems to know you." Hardy stated the obvious.

"Auntie Ellie!"

Ah, there it was.

Ellie held up a stern finger and reprimanded her nephew, it was more than the sternness of the mother of an eleven-to-twelve-year-old boy. It was lifelong. And her son and her nephew had quite the age gap and based off the state of the car... that told Y/n that Ellie was the responsible sibling while her sibling and nephew's mother was irresponsible, so Ellie grew up scolding and being stern.

"I told you, don't do that!"

"Olly Stevens, Broadchurch Echo." Olly introduced himself to Hardy and Y/n.

"Ugh." Hardy groaned, and Y/n scoffed, her jaw and hands clenching. She detested journalists. They tended to make her job even harder for their own ambition without caring who they hurt with the consequences of their actions. But mostly, she had a personal reason she hated journalists so much.

Olly jogged alongside his aunt, questioning her, "I was down at the other end. They said you'd be here. Why has the beach been closed?"

"Because it's been closed." Y/n answered unhelpfully.

"No statements now." Hardy answered.

"I heard there was a body. Has it been ID'ed?" Olly asked.

To Y/n's surprise, Hardy opened the backseat passenger door for her and looked at her. She blinked in surprise, not used to people acting out of simple kindness for her and especially not from men. She smiled in thanks and ducked inside. He closed it after her and got in the front seat without a word to Olly.

"Please." Olly begged for something.

"There will be a statement, Oliver." Ellie said and got in the seat next to Hardy. Then they drove off. They had to alert the family.

—————————————————————————

They pulled up to the Latimer house and Hardy asked, "Are they all in here?"

"Sir. I can lead with this family." Ellie offered.

"No." 

"I know them." Ellie said.

"How many deaths like this have you worked?" Hardy asked.

"You can't make it better. Don't try."

"You don't know how I work." Ellie said.

"L/n. What are the probabilities of Danny's death?" Hardy said.

"The most likely premise is abduction. Was he taken, and if so, then by whom? The statistics say that it was most likely by someone he knew. You need to watch their movements, their reactions, every single one. I can only do so much, but you know them personally. Any behavior that doesn't make any sense, you should tell DI Hardy or me."

"Okay." Ellie said, and Y/n started to unbuckle as her seatbelt and get out. "I'm sorry, if you don't mind me asking, how many of these have you done?"

"Quite a few. I specialize in crimes like these against children. I may be young, but I've been doing this for six years and I am more than competent for this job." 

"I wasn't questioning your competence." Ellie denied.

"Yes, you were. You're just being polite by not voicing it, but you're thinking it. You're thinking that I can't be this young and be truly competent for this case. But let me tell you that my career was fast-tracked, and there is a reason for that. I am no less capable than an older officer may be, more perhaps."

"Wha-what does that mean?" Ellie asked but Y/n was already getting out of the car.

Hardy raised his eyebrows and got out of the car, soon followed by Ellie.

When they knocked on the door, Danny's father, Mark Latimer, opened the door. Hardy shook his hand while Y/n smiled solemnly and waved awkwardly again.

The whole family was waiting for them, their grief suspended with their uncertainty of who was found on the beach. Beth was standing up, staring out the back door. Danny's older sister, Chloe, sat on the couch with Danny's grandmother, Liz Roper.

"Morning." Hardy said and cut right to the chase. "I'm Detective Inspector Alec Hardy, this is Officer Y/n L/n from the National Crime Agency, and I think, you know DS Miller. Why don't you take a seat? We need to talk about something."

"Yeah." Mark said, hollowly. 

Hardy went to fetch a chair and returned with two, one for him and one for Y/n. She briefly paused again before sitting down in it, glancing at Hardy, momentarily before she turned her attention to the family. She knew these moments. These suspended-in-grief moments where it was Schrodinger's Cat. Danny was both dead and alive until they broke the news and opened the box to reveal that the poison had killed the cat and that it had been Danny's body on the beach.

Liz sat with her arms crossed, leaned forwards with a cross necklace on, Chloe sat back, shrunken back on the couch, her whole world that had previously just been about growing up, school, and boys was about to come crashing down when she learned the brother she had taken for granted was gone. Beth sat literally on the edge of her seat, her hands folded on her lap, axniety written on her face with... maybe just the slightest bit of hope that they would tell her that it wasn't Danny. Mark sat between Beth and Chloe with one arm around his wife and his other arm around his doaughter, looking numb and in shock, just as uncertain how to feel as he was uncertain if it really was Danny and he was hoping so much that it wasn't. 

Hardy sat down in his chair and started, speaking with gentleness and more than just sympathy but empathy. "The body of a young boy was found..."

"It's Danny, isn't it?" Beth interrupted, anxiously. 

"Let him tell us, please." Mark said, breathlessly.

"I saw his shoes!" Beth interjected.

"Plenty of kids have those shoes." Mark tried to reason and nodded to Hardy, "Sorry, you talk."

Hardy nodded and broke the news, still speaking in the gentle tone, "We believe it's Danny's body."

The box was open. The news crushed any hope the family had had that it hadn't been Danny.

Beth struggled not to burst into tears and she looked at Ellie for complete confirmation. "Who is it, Ellie? Was it him?"

When Ellie didn't protest but remained silent with tears in her eyes as she nodded, Beth started to sob and hyperventilate. Mark took her hand, and Chloe and Liz joined in holding their hands as the family grieved at the sudden passing of the young boy. Mark wrapped an arm around Beth and an arm around Chloe as both women started to cry.

Y/n's mind rebelled against her will and forced her to recall when she woke up... her aunt Iris sat by her side with baby Isobel in her arms, just a few months old by the time, Y/n finally got to meet her. Y/n had known... she knew that Jasmine was dead. Iris couldn't get the words out as she choked on the tears, and Y/n just nodded, understanding the horrible news. She had known there would be no saving Jasmine, but because of what she did, Isobel got to live.

Once the grief had settled in, Ellie went to make the family some tea. And Beth asked Hardy, "Was it an accident? Did he fall?"

It wasn't a good idea to confirm this to the family without a proper autopsy.

"We don't know yet. Can you think why he might have been up on the cliffs last night or this morning?" Hardy asked.

"He wouldn't have been." Beth said.

"Well, he obviously was." Mark said.

"He didn't have any reason to be." Beth rephrased

"How was Danny over the past few days?" Y/n asked.

"He didn't kill himself if that's what you're suggesting."

"Ellie said the same thing. I'm a behavioral analyst. I study the behaviors of criminals and..." She hated using the word 'victim'. "The people the crimes have been committed against. I need to know how Danny's been."

"He's been just... normal." Beth said.

"He wouldn't kill himself. He knows he can talk to us about anything." Mark said as Chloe sat beside her father again.

"And you last saw him when?" Hardy asked.

"I looked in on him... about nine o'clock last night." Beth said. "He was laying in bed reading."

"Anyone see Danny this morning?" Hardy asked.

Beth shook her head, "No. He was up and out before anyone else. He's got a paper route... but he didn't turn up for that. Jack, I spoke to him." Beth looked at Hardy and Y/n and explained, "He runs the paper shop."

"Any signs of forced entry or disturbance around the house?" Y/n asked.

"No, nothing." Mark said. "I want to see the body." Nobody replied. "You might be wrong about it being him. So, I want to be sure. I want to see.

—————————————————————————

Ellie took Mark down to the station while Hardy and Y/n searched Danny's room. There was absolutely no sign of any forced entry.

Y/n found Chloe sitting against the wall, hugging her knees.

"You need anything?" Y/n asked, knowing asking if she was okay was stupid. "Water? Chocolate? Ice cream? Pizza?" Chloe gave her a look, "Studies show that fatty foods can make you feel less sad, not that it'll make it go away but that's why it's called comfort food."

"I'm fine."

"No, you're not and it's okay not to be fine." Y/n said as she slid down the wall to sit next to her. She pulled a bag of chocolates out of her bag and offered one to Chloe, she looked at her. "Chocolate is a natural antidepressant, plus it's delicious. What, you don't like chocolate?"

"Who doesn't like chocolate?"

"Only idiots." Y/n joked, and Chloe managed a small twitch of her mouth that hinted at a smile and she took a piece. "They say dark chocolate is better for grief, but it's gross, this-this chocolate's from Belgium. My youngest, she loves chocolate, I mean loves it, she hoards it, I have a hide it. I always give them comfort foods when they're sad."

"You have kids?" Chloe asked, Y/n didn't look too much longer than her, barely a decade.

"Well, they're my nieces. They were my sisters' daughters before... look, I know how you feel, believe it or not." She seemed to be having trouble getting words out. "You know, I lost my sister when I was fifteen too." Y/n said, "She was eighteen. We... I was there and the memory still haunts me and I'm still dealing even eight years later."

"What happened? I-I'm sorry. That was... I'm sorry." Chloe said.

"She... it was a complicated situation, she always tried her hardest to protect me. The big sister and all that. That's what got her killed. She was my best friend, she was always there for me and then suddenly she wasn't and she wouldn't be ever again.

"Does it get better?" Chloe asked.

"I wish I could say it did... but better's not really the word. Easier. More like it. Easier to live with. But I still live with the constant ache that replaced where she used to be. I think about her every day. I've been where you are, Chloe. I used to live in a town like this when my sister was killed, and I feel I should warn you.

"About what?" Chloe asked.

"These following months, in a town like this, I can't promise you it'll be easy, especially when people find out, they'll look at you with pity and they'll expect you to be grateful for it. It'll be hard that all the memories, everything will remind you of him and it won't be easy."

—————————————————————————

Hardy paced in front of a whiteboard with Danny's picture on it.

Y/n and Ellie were the only women in the group that he spoke to. 

"Was Danny Latimer abducted? Did someone gain access to the house?" Hardy questioned. Y/n's memory betrayed her again and ventured off to when she was twelve and was abruptly awoken with a rough hand slamming over her mouth to keep her quiet before she saw that disgusting hunger in his eyes and Jasmine's distant pleas for to leave Y/n alone from the other room. "If so, how? If it wasn't forced entry, who has the key? We need to collect any CCTV from a mile radius around the house." Hardy turned to Ellie and said, "Miller, family. Who are they and where were they?"

"Beth had Chloe, their eldest daughter, when she was fifteen. Uh, Mark was seventeen."

"Beth and Chloe were at home watching the telly." Y/n said, recalling the answers to the questions she had asked the family back at the house. "They say they didn't leave the house until school the next morning. Mark was out on an emergency call-out. Apparently, he's the local plumber. He got in around three in the morning. Neither parent thought to check on Danny. Last time either of them saw him was when Beth checked in on him at nine o'clock. Liz Roper, Beth's mother, lives nearby. She was in all evening and Mark's mum lives in Wales."

"Until we're ready, all of this remains confidential. No gossip. Do you understand? All right. Go on." 

The Chief Super, Jenkinson, waited to pull Hardy aside to talk to him but not before talking to Y/n, "Officer L/N, your boss wants to speak to you. Line three."

Y/n noticed the uneasy look Jenkinson had. She had learned a little about her past. Y/n slid off the desk. She was sitting cross-legged on it as she felt Hardy's eyes on her. She spun in a semi-flourish and sat down, and picked up the phone, "Hello, boss-man. How's Foxley Hall?" As her boss answered, her eyes shifted to Hardy's hard eyes on her. "Uh... It's a bit crowded here, you mind if I give you a ring somewhere else? Thank you, sir. See you in a minute."

—————————————————————————

As Hardy spoke to Jenkinson spoke, Y/n spoke to her own boss about if she thought Danny's death was related.

"No, sir. I don't think so. Well, whoever put Danny there, placed him there with care and remorse... they never have remorse." Her boss asked if she wanted to come back. "No, sir. I think I'll stay. Danny deserves justice."

—————————————————————————

Y/n walked with Hardy and Ellie on the boardwalk.

"What did Jenkinson want?" Ellie asked.

"Jenkinson?" Hardy asked.

"The Chief Super. I saw you walking with her." Ellie clarified.

"No." Was all Hardy replied with.

"I did, you were having 99s," Ellie said.

"I think he meant 'no' as in he's not going to answer your question." Y/n deadpanned.

"What did your boss want?"

"Asked me if I thought it was serial and if I needed more officers or if I was going back to London?"

"Do you?" Hardy asked.

"Too soon to be sure but I don't think so."

"Then why aren't you leaving?" Ellie asked.

Y/n, similarly to Hardy, didn't answer the question.

"Miller, your son went to school with Danny. Does he know yet?"

"No."

"You need to talk to him."

"Tomorrow. I'll tell him tonight." Ellie said, and then she said, "And sir, do you mind not calling me, 'Miller'?"

Hardy looked at her and frowned, "Why?"

"I don't really like the surname thing. I prefer Ellie."

"Ellie." Hardy tried out as though he had never heard the quite common name before and it was foreign to him, "Ellie." Then he decided, "no."

Y/n rolled her eyes and said, "Do you have any other kids, Ellie?"

"Yes. I do. Fred. He's two." 

"Oh." Y/n smiled, warmly.

"Do you have kids?" Ellie mostly meant it as a joke, given her age and the job she had.

"Sort of. Two nieces. I adopted them when... my sister was... " She cleared her throat and looked down, and Ellie's face softened in sympathy while Hardy felt a twinge around his heart. "Thirteen and eight. My sister died when she was in labor with the youngest. Anyways, they're back at the hotel."

"You don't have someone watching them. School's not out yet."

"They get assignments because of my job. We don't have anyone else and I don't tend to trust people enough to let my girls get near them for long, nonetheless, leave them with them when I'm cities away for sometimes weeks at a time." Y/n said with a note of protectiveness in her tone, like anyone dared to would have to get past her first.

Hardy almost let a smile tug at his lips, reminded of how he felt towards Daisy.

—————————————————————————

They stopped at the paper shop to talk to Jack Marshall, who was clearly saddened by the news of Danny's death.

"Jack, we need to ask you a few questions. Danny didn't turn up for his round this morning?" Ellie asked.

"I assumed he was sick."

"Did he often miss his round?" Ellie asked.

"They all do, one time or another."

"How was Danny yesterday?" Y/n asked.

"No different than usual."

"Didn't notice anything on his mind the last few weeks?" Y/n asked.

"He was only in here fifteen minutes first thing. I'm no psychiatrist. Surely, that's your job."

"Yes but I didn't know Danny." Y/n said.

"Are you married?" Hardy asked Jack, suddenly.

"No. Are you?" Jack asked but Hardy didn't answer.

Jack looked back at Ellie and Y/n while Hardy didn't stop staring.

"They brought him in here, Mark and Beth. Three days old, he was. " Jack reminisced and he looked at Hardy, "It's not right."

"No. But sadly, that's how the world is. As tragic as it is, sometimes children die before they can truly become themselves." Y/n mused, heavily, and she felt Hardy examine her. She could tell he was piecing together that her sister must've been young when she died. He wasn't exactly right but he wasn't wrong either.

Jack sympathized... more than that, he empathized, but he didn't let on. 

—————————————————————————

Hardy, Ellie, and Y/n met up with the coroner once he had finished on the preliminary autopsy on Danny's body.

"What do you have?" Hardy asked him.

"Superficial cuts and bruises to the face. Traces of domestic cleaning fluid on the skin. Cause of death was asphyxiation."

Hardy turned to Y/n and dryly said, "You were right."

She didn't react as through she had heard. She was fidgeting with her hands. Hardy's brown eyes fell down to her hands, she was scratching the inside of her palm and... her skin was discolored like... a chemical burn, but it was almost all of her palm. Y/n seemed to notice him looking without even looking at him because she hurriedly pocketed both her hands, hiding them from him.

"He was strangled." The coroner continued, solemnly, clearly the autopsy had been harrowing for him, given Danny's age, "Bruising to the neck and the windpipe, and at the top of the spine." Y/n swore sometimes she could still feel their hands against her throat. "The pattern of bruises suggest large hands."

"Male?" Y/n asked.

"I'd think so." The coroner said, "It, um... it would have been brutal." Y/n lost count of how many times they would choke her until she passed out after the third month. "The angle suggests he would have been facing his attacker. They always liked it when she was facing them as they choked her, so she would never know whether or not they'd be the last thing she saw. "Uh... he would have known."

"Any sexual violence?" Hardy asked.

"Mercifully, no."

Y/n felt some semblance of relief for the young boy... that he hadn't suffered as...

"The time of death?" Hardy asked.

"I'd put it between 10 PM, Thursday night and 4 AM Friday morning."

Hardy closed the file and shook the coroner's hand, "Thank you."

The coroner shook Ellie's hand, but when he reached for Y/n, she stepped away and gave an awkward yet polite nod of thanks.

"We don't get these around here." The coroner said. If Y/n had a nickel for every time, she'd heard that. "Make sure you find them."

As they left, Hardy asked Y/n bluntly, "What happened to your hands?"

"I had a bad day." She said, vaguely.

—————————————————————————

They went back to the Latimers' house, where they were all still grieving the loss of the youngest Latimer, taken violently from them, far too young. They had to let them know what happened.

"We... have some preliminary findings." Hardy told them once they entered, after Beth numbly let them back in. He spoke in the same gentle and understanding voice that told Y/n that he, too, was a parent, "We are treating Danny's death as suspicious." Beth gasped, horrified, as Liz grasped at her heart at the news. "We think he may have been killed."

"I should have checked on him before I went to bed. If I'd checked..." Beth said.

"Beth, this is not your fault." Ellie reassured her. "Whatever happened, this is not down to you."

"You can never predict when these things happen. You'll drive yourself insane with all the 'what if's and the "I should have's." Y/n said in a calm tone but her words were heavy, telling Hardy that she tortured herself with those. "This is no one's fault except for the person who did it."

"I promise... we will find the person responsible." Hardy promised. Beth sobbed as Mark went to her to embrace and comfort her. "You have my word."

"He's a little boy!" Beth sobbed, and Chloe went to her room so she could call her boyfriend; she had to get out of the house.

—————————————————————————

They stopped at a gas station. Hardy looked at Ellie. "You okay?"

"I'll be better once I've eaten something." Ellie said. "You two want anything."

"No." Hardy said.

"I need to call my girls." Y/n said, and she started to unbuckle her seatbelt.

"Do you think other kids are in danger?" Ellie asked, and she turned to look at Y/n, "You said Danny's killer is likely remorseful."

"Just because a killer is remorseful doesn't mean they won't do it again." She sighed. "I don't know if any other kids are in danger. It's just too soon but you should keep your son indoors until we get more information." Then she got out of the car as she called the only non-work contact she had on speed dial.

Hardy's head tilted as his eyes went to the car side mirror, where he could see Y/n where she was leaning against the car, her hair blowing messily in the beach air as she had to keep brushing and irritatedly batting it out of her face. She clearly wasn't used to being in a beach town. She was definitely a city girl. There was something... about her. He had never worked with an NCA officer before but he was pretty sure they weren't supposed to be like her. He could tell there was a trauma behind those E/C eyes, he didn't know if it had happened on the job or not but she had definitely seen things. He could tell in the small things. How she hesitated and looked confused when he held the car door open for her and pulled up a chair for her, something that was just a natural instinct for him to do for another human being, but it had clearly taken her aback as though she wasn't used to common decency. 

He knew that her sister had died in labor, but he could tell there was something about it she wasn't saying, not that he wanted her to go into detail. He noticed that she was not as happy as she pretended to be, not that she had smiled too much, but she wasn't her true self when she talked, or maybe she was, just as much as she was her true self when she thought no one was looking. 

He could chalk all of this up to her being traumatized by her sister's death... except for those burns... they looked like chemical burns. And he knew that she didn't have to be here but she was choosing to stay. 

Hardy got out as Y/n took her phone away from her ear. He needed some air.

Y/n looked up at him and then bent her head down, looking down. She was nervous to be alone with him, he realized. But he wasn't sure if it was because of her trauma or just social anxiety—he got social anxiety, that's for sure.

"How are your girls?" He asked, thinking of Daisy and how we wished he could talk to her every day, not just that but see her.

"Fine. Just making sure, they don't eat chocolate cake for lunch. My youngest, she'd eat chocolate cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner if I didn't stop her."

Hardy's lip betrayed him, and he almost smiled.

Y/n looked up and a teasing smile lit up her face but still it didn't seem to fully reach her eyes, just enough to fool ordinary people who didn't know to look for those subtle microexpressions.

"Was that a smile?" 

"No." Hardy refused to admit.

"You smiled." She sang.

"No, I didn't." He shook his head.

She smiled at him and he tried not to look at it. "Fine. I'll keep your secret." She teased and then she said, "How many do you have?"

"What?" He asked, growing internally socially anxious as this seemed to be crossing into small talk region, and he hated small talk... and social interactions.

"Kids. How many kids you got?" Y/n asked.

"How'd you know I got a kid?" He questioned. He didn't doubt her capabilities, despite her age, she had proven to be on point so far, perhaps that's what made him anxious about her, that she can read what he tries so hard to hide.

"You looked at the Latimers with sympathy only a parent would know. Especially a parent who doubled as a cop. Like you spent every moment since they were born terrified that one of the world's monsters would hurt them."

He hesitantly nodded, uncomfortable. "A daughter. Daisy. She's fifteen. Lives with her mum." There was a great sadness in his words, he clearly he could see her more often.

Y/n searches his face with her eyes, and he anxiously wonders what she's deducing. What she's deducing is that if his daughter was fifteen, then when the Sandbrook case happened, his daughter would've been twelve—exactly the same age as that girl's.

There's something both familiar and foreign about the officer, and it unsettles Hardy. She had a teasing manner not unsimilar to his ex-wife's, who had a way of getting under his skin, but Y/n seemed much kinder than Tess, that was the foreign part. Tess didn't get emotionally involved in the Sandbrook case, not like he did, something that had added to his anger towards her, how could she have been so careless when their daughter was the same age? But he could tell that Y/n was already emotionally involved into Danny's death. She didn't show it, she didn't show much emotion but he could tell she felt it.

"What exactly did you mean earlier, that there was a reason your career was fast-tracked?" He questioned.

He knew he was ruining the moment... whatever this moment was... honestly, even he was shocked at times that he was married and had a kid with his social skills.

Y/n didn't curl into herself, her walls didn't go up. She seemed to know that he was trying to ruin the moment so he could run away from it and hide behind his badge. She maintained a playful, almost mischievous but not malicious glint in her eyes as the stupid, stupid sun shined rays of light behind her.

"If I told you that now how would I maintain my mysterious allure?" She teased.

Hardy was pretty sure his brain was short-circuiting and was actually glad when Ellie came back and he was able to hide behind the case again.

—————————————————————————

When they got back to the station, Y/n's phone rang and she picked it up to see a picture of a very pretty girl in her early teens that you just knew would one day turn into a beautiful woman, but she was making a silly face with her tongue sticking out.

She stepped aside and asked, "Heather? Is something wrong?"

Behind her, Mark had come up to the gate between the street and the station parking lot as Heather explained what she had found on Twitter, with cartoons playing in the background as Isobel watched TV.

"Ellie!" Mark called, making Y/n turn as she continued to listen to Heather on the phone.

"Mark?" Ellie asked.

"You just announced it without even telling us. Is that how it's done?" Mark asked.

"What are you talking about?" Hardy asked.

"Everyone knows now, don't they!?" Mark shouted. "Eh!?"

"Danny's name was released on Twitter." Y/n said, telling him what Heather had just told her.

"Oh." Hardy actually growled and stormed past Y/n, seething.

—————————————————————————

Ten minutes later, after Hardy was chewed out for what he had absolutely no fault in, he stormed into the bullpen, shouting angry Scottish.

"FOR GOD'S SAKE, BLOODY TWITTAH! THESE PEOPLE'S LIVES HAVE BEEN DESTROYED, AND NOW OUR INCOMPETENCE HAS MADE IT WORSE! THINK WHAT WE HAVE TO DO NOW TO REBUILD TRUST THERE!" He glared at the officers with the utmost hate, like they had personally killed Danny themselves, "Who told the journalist?"

Ellie hesitantly raised her hand, willingly taking the brunt of her idiotic nephew's mistake. "I think it might have been me."

Hardy turned towards her and he made a guess. "Your nephew?"

"He saw Danny's sister at the beach. I didn't tell him anything. I told him not to publish. He's a little shit." Ellie said and Hardy shook his head in disappointment. "I'll rad the riot act and I'll explain to the family."

"Go away." Hardy said, softly, and he turned and retreated back into his office.

Y/n walked into another room and rang the Echo's phone number so she could furiously tell the editor what her journalist had done. 

—————————————————————————

Y/n went into Hardy's office twenty minutes later, once she felt he may have run out of steam.

"Uh, there'll be a press statement outside in thirty minutes. Have you done one before?"

"Yes." He said, blankly

"Good. So I don't have to..." She I don't think Ellie told him anything, really. You shouldn't be so hard on her."

"Shouldn't I?" He challenged, raising his eyebrows.

"No, who you should be yelling at is her nephew. I'd like to wring his throat right now."

"Now do you?" He asked in the same Scottish monotone, rather causal, when this NCA officer just threatened to strangle someone.

"This isn't the first time some journalist who thought that violating a... v-victim's family to make a name for themselves without thinking of the consequences, about the lives they could be destroying and... someone ended up killing themselves and driving the rest of the family out of town forever." Hardy noticed how she spat out the word 'victim' like it was poison in her mouth.

"Oh? When was this, now?" Hardy asked, leaning back in the chair, keeping cool and causal, trying to find out more about this mysterious officer. He wasn't very good at cool or casual.

"At some point before now." She deadpanned, vague and unhelpful... and rather sarcastic. She wasn't easy to get information out of. "But Ellie is not at fault. Olly Stevens is determined and didn't leave that beach for hours, and spotted Chloe paying respects to her brother. He's clearly not stupid because he put two and two together and ignored what his aunt said. This is his fault and he should hope he doesn't get sued for this."

She spoke with calm determination and passion that Hardy could tell that under her calm, she was as furious as he was.

—————————————————————————

Thirty minutes later, Hardy gave the press conference, confirming the details.

"This is a short statement to confirm that this morning, the body of an eleven-year-old child was found on Harbour Cliff Beach at Broadchurch. The body was subsequently identified as Daniel Latimer, who lived in the town. We are treating his death as suspicious. Our investigations are continuing and there'll be a full briefing later this evening. We ask that the media respect the family's privacy at this time. Thank you very much."

—————————————————————————

At the end of the work day, Hardy approached Y/n and said, "You're staying at the Traders hotel too." It wasn't a question.

"Yeah."

"Come on. I'm giving you a lift. Don't argue." He said and walked off without another word, leaving Y/n taken aback and confused.

—————————————————————————

The car ride was silent. Hardy wasn't striking up any conversation, and Y/n seemed on edge. He had a feeling it was because he was a man she had just met that morning, and surely in her line of work, she had seen the very worst of men, the kind that made him ashamed to be a man. 

This was the kind of hotel where the room keys were checked out when you left the hotel, to hang behind the front desk until you checked back in. 

This forced both Hardy and Y/n to interact in some non-work-related human socialization. Something neither of them were particularly fond of, funny considering their jobs

"Hello." The owner of the hotel, Becca Fisher, a pretty young blonde woman with an Australian accent, she had to be a few years older than Y/n, and she was pretty enough that even Hardy clocked this, said as Y/n smiled half-heartedly in greeting.

"Hi." Hardy said.

"Long day?"

"Yeah."

Y/n tried to move off, but Becca stopped her.

"Oh, um, Officer L/N..."

"Y/n, please. I'm not on duty at the moment and even then I don't like being called that." She sighed. 

"Y/n," Becca smiled politely, "this came in for you." and she handed Y/n an envelope. She glanced it for a moment and looked away from it at once in exasperation and shoved it into her leather jacket pocket. While she did this, Becca got a key and handed it to Hardy. 

"It's really tragic. Can't bear to think what the family must be going through. We're all in shock." Becca said.

"Well, just... try to let the family have their space, it's already been ripped away from them to some extent. I wouldn't want to taze someone after being in town for less than twenty-four hours. Well, I say 'want'." It wasn't until her lips quirked did Becca realize she was joking, trying to alleviate Becca's sadness, and smiled. "Uh, ahem, my girls didn't cause any trouble, did they? I told them to stay in the room but... they're them."

"Uh, 'Izzie' came into the bar before the other one brought her back to the room but other than that, no." Becca said.

"Looking for sweets?" Y/n drawled, "Yeah, she does that." She had an exasperated tone like she had warned her time and again to stop and would again when she got to the room.

Becca stopped them before they could go further into the hotel, "Actually, um, do you think the beach will be open tomorrow? I... only so I know what to tell the guests."

"I don't know." Hardy said.

"Probably not." Y/n said.

"It's just I've had an early check-out and a cancellation just tonight. So..."

"Yeah, a child death tends to put people off." Y/n deadpanned, morbidly and then she looked through the doorway to the bar and suddenly said in a louder voice, "What in the hell is Ellie's shithead nephew doing here? Trying to tempt fate?"

"Oh, sorry." Becca said, remembering now, "There's two people waiting for you two in the bar.

Y/n was already glowering at Olly with a murderous rage as she and Hardy went in.

Maggie, the editor, looked at her journalist protégé and prompted, "Well, go on." She wasn't going to hold his hand and do it for him.

"I was wrong to post that news. I'm sorry." Olly said.

Something shifted in Y/n's eyes and the rage somewhat dissipated but there was still a lot there. The last journalist never apologized. Just fanned the flames.

"I should hang him by the bollocks from the town hall spire." Maggie said.

"Should? Can't you?" Y/n asked, not breaking eye contact from Olly who couldn't hold it.

"You must be Officer L/n who yelled at me over the phone, and I gave him the talking to I promised. All reporting on this will come through me now. The Echo works with the police. I'll... I'll speak to the Latimer family. Give them our apologies."

"Apologies? He should get on his knees and beg for their forgiveness." Y/n said, "You had no right to do that. Danny was a minor. He was eleven. That gives him the right of anonymity until we're ready to release his name—until his family is ready for the town to know. And you took that away from them. It's disrespectful to the police. It's disrespectful to you. It's disrespectful to your own aunt, DS Miller. And most importantly, it's disrespectful to Danny and his family, who now are going to have to deal with everyone suffocating them with pity."

Olly hung his head in shame, but Y/n wasn't done.

"Ellie's son was Danny's best friend. He eleven too?"

"Tom. Nearly twelve, actually." Olly nodded.

"What if it were Tom on that beach and someone released his name?"

"They wouldn't live when Aunt Ellie got their hands on them?" He guessed, "I... I wouldn't be too happy either. I'm sorry."

"You're lucky, the Latimer family isn't suing you. Not us, not the Creek Echo! You!" She said, and then she said, "Can I make a request? I want him," She pointed at Olly, "To go and personally apologize to the Latimers. I want you to drive down to their house and apologize to this mourning family for making their grief public without their consent. I want you to own up to it. And I want you to tell them that Ellie Miller did not confirm it to you, so they should hold no resentment for the suffocating pity people are going to smother them with on her and to the police, because you very well could've damaged our case in giving Danny the justice he deserves."

Olly seemed genuinely ashamed as he wouldn't make eye contact. When she spoke again, she wasn't speaking in a tone with restrained but potent rage anymore. She spoke in a gentle yet firm tone to get through to him.

"You got rejected today, didn't you? From a newspaper?" She asked.

Olly looked up in surprise and furrowed his brow. "How did you..."

"It's what I do. I analyze behavior, and I know journalists, and I've gotten a read on your aunt in the past twelve hours. She's the responsible sister to your..."

"Mother."

"Your mother is irresponsible, and you're desperate not to be like her. But there are consequences for your actions. This could've not only ruined our investigation,n but it could've ruined your aunt's career, she's already convinced that it is ruined, and if you keep up with that kind of behavior, well, I reckon newspapers don't exactly want a journalist who gets them in trouble with grieving families. You're determined and intelligent, and you clearly got what a lot of journalists don't have—compassion, you're here and you're owning up to your mistake, and I can tell you're genuinely ashamed. A lot of journalists don't have that. They only care about themselves. If you aren't careful, the stories you send out could ruin someone's life or even end it. Do you understand?" 

"Yes, I'm sorry. I won't do it again." He promised.

"I should hope so because if you do, I'll be coming down to the Echo myself. And you haven't even seen the tip of the iceberg of what I'm capable of." Her eyes softened, "Good luck with your applications. Don't let something as foolish as nativity ruin your potential, but don't let it jade you like most others."

Then she turned and walked off. Hardy looked back at them, rather impressed with the wisdom and kindness that had come from that scolding. He looked at Olly and said, "Stay out of my way."

Olly nodded, and Hardy walked off to his room.

—————————————————————————

Later that night, everyone had to go back in. 

Y/n was getting off the phone with Heather. "I should be home before dinner. I'll pick up something. Text me what you two are in the mood for, gotta go. Hey, I love you both. Bye." She hung up and sat beside Ellie. "That the footage from last night?" Her eyes flickered up and eyed Hardy, noticing he was wearing a different suit. A very subtly nicer one. Same black blazer, same black tie. But nicer material. He looked good in it but it still didn't hide the weariness of him.

"Different suit?" She asked.

"Press conference in ten minutes. Jenkinson wants you there. I'll give you a lift." Hardy said and he noticed a slight movement of her brows, furrowing just slightly in confusion.

"Uh, Gallifrey. Look at this." Y/n said and he gave her a bewildered look. "Ellie got the CCTV from, where the hell is this? It all looks the same."

"Town center last night." Ellie said.

Hardy walked over and Ellie pushed play. The jittery footage played, showing a young boy around eleven with dark hair skateboarding down the empty road.

"Is that Danny?"

"It matches his clothes and his height." Ellie said. "It looks like his skateboard. He wasn't abducted."

"He snuck out. Why? Where was he going? Who was he meeting?" 

"And where's his skateboard? Or did I miss that and all your grumbling?" Y/n asked.

"No, you didn't." Ellie said as Hardy gave her an irritated look. "Oh and another thing: I was checking through the list of belongings recovered from Danny's body and at home and there's no mobile phone. He definitely had one because he and Tom, my son, had the same model, virtually identical."

"It isn't there?" Hardy asked.

"No."

"Check with the family." Hardy said, "Come on, L/n." Y/n rolled her eyes and got up to follow before a single-worded praise went to Ellie. "Good."

Y/n got on the phone as she followed him, "Hey, Heath. I'll be a little bit late. Just try to keep your sister from demanding sweets from strangers." They got in the car, and Hardy saw her face fall in a deadpan, "Oh, you'll try? Great. Thanks. Yeah. Yeah, I'll pick up a pizza if this town is big enough for a pizza place."

—————————————————————————

Hardy and Y/n sat down in front of the camera as Jenkinson said, "I'm going to hand over now to our senior investigating officer, DI Alec Hardy."

Hardy looked like he had never smiled in his life.

"What advice do you have for the people in the town, particularly parents?" Maggie asked.

"The crime rate in this area is one of the lowest in the country. Um, this is a terrible anomaly." The door squeaked as it opened, and a pretty woman with dark hair entered and seemed to cause a distraction to Hardy. "Um, we are in the early moments of what might be a complex investigation." He knew that woman. Y/n could tell. "Danny's life touched many people, and we'll be looking at all those connections. If you or someone you know has any information, has noticed anything unusual, please come forward now. Um, I'd urge anyone, don't hide anything. Because we will find out. If a member of your family or a friend or a neighbor has been behaving differently in the past days or weeks. Please tell the police, immediately. There will be no hiding place for Danny's killer. We will catch whoever did this."

[aleese1111]

hii! Could you pleaaase make a baekjin x fem!reader x seongje, i haven’t seen anything like this and ik you’ll write it goooddd 🥹🫶🏻

three wolves, one flame | geum seong je x union!reader x na baek jin

summary: they run the city’s shadows with cold hands and colder eyes—two boys circling the same girl like orbiting wolves, too stubborn to say they care, too loyal to walk away. in smoke, silence, and bruised affection, they protect what they won't name.

warnings: [slow burn] violence, blood, language, implied emotional trauma, smoking,

author's note: i lowkey fell in love with this one. contemplating if i should turn this into a series or just mini chapters because i have no idea on how to continue this.. so please lmk, anyway! requests ,,

✶ ᶻz .ᐟ , one .. two .. ??

the air inside baek jin’s office always smelled like old paper, cigarette smoke, and something faintly metallic—like blood that never quite left the floor. the room was small but efficient. a modest desk sat tucked against the far wall, cluttered with files and an aging laptop baek jin used for both homework and union logistics. behind him, shelves groaned under the weight of ledgers, envelopes, and binders—some labeled, some not. a coat rack stood near the door, his school uniform jacket hanging neatly as always, untouched and ghost-like.

on the couch, which was barely wide enough for two, she sat cross-legged, a thick folder open on her lap. her fingers were stained with ink and nicotine, flipping pages with practiced speed. her brows were drawn tight in concentration, but her mouth was already forming insults.

“you’re breathing too loud. move.”

beside her, seong je let out a long, lazy exhale, smoke trailing from his lips. “it’s my lungs. want me to stop breathing next?” his thumb scrolled absently on his phone.

“you say that like it’s a bad idea.”

“you like having me around. admit it.”

she snorted. “i’d rather put out this cigarette in my eye.”

baek jin didn’t look up from his desk. this was routine. predictable. he only paused for a second when seong je flicked a crumpled receipt at her face, smirking when it bounced off her forehead.

“touch me again, i will rip your ears off and mail them to your mother,” she said, without even flinching.

“joke’s on you, she’s already deaf.”

that earned him a hard jab to the ribs with the sharp edge of a folder. he groaned theatrically, tipping his head back against the couch and blowing smoke toward the ceiling.

“i swear to god, you're like a feral cat with a calculator,” he muttered.

“and you’re a hemorrhoid with a motorcycle license.”

baek jin turned a page. the yelling had escalated, but it was background noise. normal. expected.

the argument died the same way it always did—abruptly and without resolution.

she slammed the folder shut and stood. the air shifted. joon and gyung, who had been waiting outside the office door like loyal shadows, straightened as she stepped out.

“collection day,” she said simply, already moving.

seong je rolled his shoulders and stood with her, but she didn’t wait. joon and gyung fell in line behind her like trained dogs, their footsteps echoing as the group left the safe walls of the bowling alley and stepped into the dusk.

@ . !

they found them behind a school, deep in the alley that smelled like piss and motor oil. it was a place for things that didn’t want to be seen—perfect for business.

a few boys loitered under the flickering light. low-ranking union lackeys, careless with the rules. she stopped a few feet away, her presence slicing through the tension like a box cutter.

“you’ve got my money?” she asked, voice cool, indifferent.

one of the boys stepped forward. too confident. too dumb. “you don’t get to bark orders at us, bitch.”

seong je was sitting nearby, on a low concrete barrier, smoking. he didn’t move. not yet. he was watching, the way a wolf watches another predator test its luck.

she didn’t blink. “you’re two days late.”

the guy stepped closer, nudging her shoulder. once. twice.

“maybe you wait a little longer,” he said with a smirk. “maybe say please.”

behind her, joon and gyung tensed. she didn’t say anything, just gave a lazy glance to her left.

gyung understood the signal.

the jab to the gut was fast and brutal—air left the guy’s lungs like a popped balloon. he stumbled back, wheezing, while the others flinched. two of them ran.

“go,” she said calmly.

joon darted after them.

only two remained: the one bent over in pain, and another who hadn’t moved yet, watching with wide eyes, deciding if he wanted to be stupid or not.

she crouched beside the first guy, lit another cigarette with a flick of her lighter, and exhaled slowly.

“you work for me,” she said. “you pay, or you bleed. got it?”

the second guy tensed—fight won the war in his brain.

he lunged.

he never reached her.

seong je was a blur of violence—one second on the edge of the scene, the next driving a fist into the boy’s face hard enough to drop him instantly. no words. no warning. just pure, sharp brutality.

he didn’t stop.

fists rained down, calculated and furious. blood splattered against the wall. the sound of bone meeting flesh echoed through the alley.

she stood slowly, arms crossed, cigarette glowing.

“enough,” she said.

seong je didn’t look at her right away. his fists paused mid-motion. then he stood, blood staining his knuckles, breathing hard.

she met his eyes for a moment. something silent passed between them. then she turned and walked away.

“get the cash,” she called over her shoulder.

gyung moved without question.

seong je wiped his hand on his shirt and lit a new cigarette. he glanced once at the boy groaning on the ground and then followed her into the dark.

business, as always, was done.

@ . !

the streets were quieter now. the sun had dipped lower, casting long shadows that swallowed the cracks in the pavement. she walked ahead, cigarette still burning between her fingers, the orange tip flaring with every drag. her steps were calm, composed, like she hadn’t just threatened teenagers and watched one get half-pulped into a brick wall.

behind her, seong je followed. blood still clung to the ridges of his knuckles, crusting dry in the creases, but he didn’t care. he never did. he flicked his own cigarette aside and shoved his hands into his jacket pockets.

they walked in silence for a while, their footsteps echoing softly in rhythm. the kind of quiet that buzzed—static thick with unspoken things.

“you know,” seong je finally said, “you could’ve told gyung to handle it before that dumbass even touched you.”

she didn’t look at him. “he barely touched me.”

“he pushed you.”

“and i didn’t fall. so?”

he scoffed, catching up until they walked shoulder to shoulder. “you’re insane.”

“says the guy who beat someone half to death over a shoulder nudge.”

he grinned. “you like it when i get violent.”

she rolled her eyes. “i like it when you shut the fuck up.”

“but you let me handle it.”

“i let you burn calories.”

seong je laughed under his breath, a short, dry sound. “you’re welcome, by the way.”

“for what?”

“for being your unhinged guard dog.”

“you’re not my anything.”

he didn’t answer right away. instead, he glanced sideways at her—at the bruise just barely starting to form on her collarbone where the guy had pushed her, at the cigarette held steady between her fingers, at the calm, calculated cold in her eyes.

he liked her too much. it was a problem he hadn’t figured out how to fix.

“...you patched me up last week,” he muttered. “don’t pretend like you don’t care.”

“i patched you up so you wouldn’t bleed on baek jin’s couch.”

“sure,” he said. “totally believable.”

she slowed a bit, enough that he noticed but didn’t comment. she glanced over, squinting at him through the dimming light.

“you’re bleeding,” she said flatly.

“you always say that like it’s a surprise.”

she stopped walking. so did he.

“you’re an idiot,” she said, stepping in close. her hand reached for his face, thumb brushing a cut on his cheekbone. it was rough, not tender—like everything she did. “you didn’t have to go that far.”

“he was gonna hit you.”

“i had it handled.”

“yeah,” he muttered, not smiling anymore. “but i don’t like watching people touch you.”

her expression didn’t change. not much. maybe a flicker in her eyes. maybe.

she shoved his face gently to the side with the palm of her hand. “possessive freak.”

he grinned again. “you love it.”

“i tolerate it.”

“that’s practically a love confession coming from you.”

she started walking again. “say one more word and i’ll smoke my cigarette out on your forehead.”

he laughed, trailing behind her.

and behind the sarcasm and bruised knuckles, there was something solid between them—twisted, loud, dysfunctional.

@ . !

by the time they reached the back entrance of the bowling alley, the sky had faded to charcoal grey. the neon sign buzzed above them, flickering like it was trying to decide whether to die or hang on another day. she pushed the door open with her shoulder and stepped inside, the familiar scent of oil, dust, and stale air greeting her like a second home.

seong je followed her, hands still in his pockets, quieter now. at the door to baek jin’s office, he hesitated. she paused, looking back at him.

“i’m heading to the internet café,” he said, voice casual, but his eyes lingered on her a little longer than necessary. “need to blow off some steam.”

she shrugged, already reaching for the doorknob. “go waste your brain cells.”

he smirked. “you love me dumb.”

“don’t flatter yourself.”

she pushed the door open and stepped inside. he didn’t follow.

“patch your hand,” she added over her shoulder. “or don’t. maybe it’ll rot off.”

“aw, worried about me,” he teased.

she gave him the finger without turning around.

he chuckled and walked off, footsteps fading down the hall.

inside, baek jin didn’t look up as she entered. he was at his desk, sleeves rolled up, pencil in hand, methodically underlining something in one of the ledgers. the room felt quieter without seong je in it—thicker, somehow.

she dropped her bag beside the couch and sank into it with a tired exhale. the tension hadn’t left her body yet, but it always faded in here. in this space where time moved slower, where baek jin never asked more than she wanted to give.

“you’re back early,” he said after a moment, eyes still on the paper.

“boys ran faster than usual.”

he nodded once. “anyone give you trouble?”

she pulled another cigarette from her pocket. “one tried. he didn’t try again.”

this time, baek jin did look up. his eyes flicked to her shoulder, narrowing slightly. “you’re bruised.”

“occupational hazard,” she muttered, lighting up.

he stared at her a second longer, then stood. she watched him cross the room in that quiet, deliberate way he moved—like he didn’t waste energy on anything that didn’t matter. he disappeared behind her for a moment. when he came back, he tossed his jacket over her.

she stiffened slightly, cigarette hovering near her lips.

“still cold,” he said simply, sitting back down.

“i’m not cold.”

“you always say that.”

she didn’t take it off.

they sat like that for a while. just the two of them. him scribbling quietly. her smoking in silence, baek jin’s jacket draped over her shoulders like it belonged there.

no yelling. no banter.

just stillness.

the only sound for a long while was the scratch of baek jin’s pencil against paper and the occasional soft crackle of her cigarette.

“you let seong je come with you again,” baek jin said eventually, not looking up.

she snorted. “he follows me around like a leech. what am i supposed to do? spray him with bug repellent?”

“he’s loud,” baek jin replied calmly.

“so are you, when you feel like it.”

“not with fists.”

she gave a half-smirk, flicking ash into the tray on the coffee table. “you jealous?”

“no,” he said plainly. “he’s reckless. you’re not.”

“he only steps in when i let him.” she tilted her head against the back of the couch, eyes drifting toward the ceiling. “you know that.”

baek jin hummed, noncommittal, and went back to his work.

for a while, there was nothing but silence again. not awkward. not empty. just their kind of quiet.

“you still live off convenience store food?” she asked after a minute, squinting at him.

“i eat what’s easy.”

“that’s not eating. that’s survival.”

“i survive just fine.”

“could’ve fooled me,” she muttered, stretching out along the couch. “you’re gonna die from sodium poisoning before you even graduate.”

“and you’ll die from chain-smoking before i do.”

“touché,” she murmured, a tired smile curling at the corner of her mouth.

her voice grew softer, like sleep was already tugging at her edges. “...how do you do it?”

baek jin paused, pencil hovering over the paper. “do what?”

“stay calm all the time. even when shit hits the fan. even when everyone’s losing their heads.” her voice had dropped low. “how do you not break?”

he was quiet for a beat.

then, “because if i break, everything else does.”

she didn’t answer. her breathing was slowing now, cigarette burned out in the ashtray. she was curled on her side, one arm under her head, the other tugging baek jin’s jacket closer around her like she hadn’t meant to.

he glanced up, setting his pencil down soundlessly.

she was already asleep.

he stood, walked over with soft steps, and crouched beside the couch. carefully, he pulled the jacket tighter over her frame and adjusted the pillow under her head. for a second, his hand hovered near her temple, like he wanted to brush the hair away from her face—but didn’t.

baek jin’s face didn’t show much. it never did.

but something flickered in his eyes. something quiet. protective.

then he stood, returned to his desk, and went back to work.

behind him, she slept soundly under his jacket, breathing even and steady.

and outside, the world kept turning. dangerous. unforgiving.

but in here, for a little while longer, it was still.

✶ ᶻz .ᐟ , one .. two .. ??

[op1umeyes]

Could you please write an imagine based on the episode where Greg House gives a lecture about the three cases and he's one of them (where we first see Stacy).

Reader is one of the students there, gives the correct answers, therefore grabs his attention and he offers a job and they end up dating

Thanks in advance!

chasing you ✩ gregory house

“What color is your pee?”

You watched House interrogate one of the few students that had been giving input on his three stories.

“Yellow,” she replied with a sharp tone.

“And what color is your blood?”

“Red.”

House nodded. “Yes. And what colors did I use to make this tea color?”

The female student stammers as she replies with “red, yellow, and brown.”

The man clicks his tongue. “And brown. How do we get the brown color?”

“Waste-“

“Thank means the kidneys are shutting down,” House cut in. “Why?”

“Could be damage done by the self injection. He has no history of trauma.

“Treatment?”

House’s rapidfire questions had rattled the woman, but she stiller answered. “Heat and rest-“

“Other possible causes?”

“Infection.”

House nodded. “Start him on antibiotics. What else?”

Silence filled the room. House looked around, expecting an answer. “Come on! What is it?”

“I-I don’t know,” the student admits. She looks away.

House sighs and walks down the steps. The paper with the tea color crumpled in his hand.

“You know, it’s hard to think with you in our faces,” starts the annoying student right up front.

“Yeah?” House scoffs. “You think it’s gonna be any easier with a real patient really dying?”

The guy looked down. Once again, silence reigned over the room as House prepared himself to speak. Until… you opened your mouth.

“The unknown factor would be muscle death.”

House looks up. Near the back of the auditorium by the window on the far left. A student House originally thought was uninterested. Sure, House had seen you around the hospital- practically every wide-eyed intern or student had met the witty man but he had never spoken to you.

Which was odd considering he took a little joy in making the interns and students squirm- especially the pretty ones. House was surprised he’d never even caught your name.

When House’s mouth opened and closed twice, you resumed carefully. “The dying muscle leaks myoglobin which is toxic to the kidneys. There’s your brown, Doctor.”

“Brilliant,” House murmured. He eyed you carefully as he went on. “MRI the leg. See what’s killing it.”

The Heath Ledger dupe spoke up again. “Why is the girl getting the MRI?”

“Because the neck skan revealed nothing and her doctor’s way more obsessive than she thinks she is.”

Heath tilted his head. “But you said the guy needed the MRI.”

“Because the mysteriously smart girl over there said muscle death. Not one of you came up with that. Not one of this guy’s doctors came up with it either,” he replied harshly. “They gave him bed rest and antibiotics- just like you guys would’ve.”

“Does he get better?” The female student from before asked.

House clicks his tongue. “No.”

“How long-“

“Three days.” He looks around the room, stalling when he made eye contact with you. “It is in the nature of medicine that you’re going to screw up. You are going to kill someone. If you can’t handle that reality, pick a new profession. Or finish medical school and teach.”

The female student from before spoke up. “It took three days for them to figure out about the muscle death?”

House shook his head. After heaving a sigh he answers “No, it took three days for the patient to suggest muscle death.”

“What caused the muscle pain?” You asked. “Was it- was it a clot?”

House nodded. “Don’t steal my thunder, young padawan. But… yes. A clotted aneurysm lead to an infarction in the patient’s leg.”

You nodded as House examined you intently as he went on. “After the surgery to remove the clot, the patient went in to wide complex tachycardia… The patient was technically dead for over a minute.”

“Do you think he was dead? Do you think those experiences were real?”

Every head in the room turned to the back. There stood James Wilson, leaning on the door. He looked knowingly at House, like he knew something everyone didn’t.

“Define real,” House shot back. “They were re experiences… What they meant- personally, I choose to believe that the white light people sometimes see, visions this patient saw… They’re all just chemical reactions that happen when the brain shuts down.”

“You ‘choose’ to believe that?” You ask curiously.

House’s eyes dart back over to you. “There’s no conclusive science. My choice has no practical relevance to my life,” he replies. As he starts to pace slowly around the front of the room, he proceeds. “I choose the outcome I find more comforting.”

“You find it comforting to believe that this is it?” Wilson asks accusingly.

House blinks. “I find it more comforting to believe that this isn’t simply a test.”

Everyone sat, listening closely to House’s every word. No other sounds could be heard despite House’s cane movement. He explained how, once the patient was put into a medically induced coma, his trusted proxy had made the decision to remove the dead muscle from his leg.

“Because of the extent of the muscle removed, the utility of the patient’s leg was severely compromised,” he told everyone slowly. “Because of the time delay in making the diagnosis, the patient continues to suffer chronic pain.” He tilted his head up to look at the crowd in front of him and then dropped his head to look at his hands.

“She had no right to do that,” piped up a different female student.

Heath Ledger look-alike scoffed. “She had the proxy.”

The woman argued back, “She knew he didn’t want the surgery!”

“Well, she saved his life,” Heath Ledger responded.

“We don’t know that,” the guy in the front row cut in. “Maybe he would’ve been fine.”

“Still, it’s the patient’s call!”

Heath Ledger shrugged. “Patient’s an idiot.”

“They usually are,” House agreed. “Do you have a buzzer? What time does this class end?”

This time, a mew voice answered House’s question. “20 minutes ago.”

For a moment, House looked at Cuddy with an unreadable expression. Then he clicked his tongue and stood up. “I’m not doing this again,” he informed Cuddy. “And this guy is not the world’s greatest dad- not even ranked. Who the hell let’s their kids play with lead based paint? That’s why he’s always sick. Find him some plastic cups and the class is all his again,” he told Cuddy, placing the yellow hand-painted mug in her hands. He started to walk out, but paused and hobbled back to point his cane directly at you. “Except you. Come with me.”

With haste, you gathered you books and writing utensils and shoved them into your bag. As you followed the limping man out of the classroom, you felt everyone’s eyes on you.

“I have a job for you if you want it,” House tell you finally, stopping in front of a door. “It’s tough, people lie to you every day, and we don’t even have decent coffee.”

You look from him to the door that reads ‘Gregory House M.D. - Head of Diagnostic Medicine’. “I have literally spoken to you three times. How do you know I won’t accept the job, wait until you trust me, and then steal all your money and leave?”

House paused. “Good question. Will you accept the job, wait until I trust you, and then steal all my money and leave?”

“Probably not,” you reply.

“Great!” House exclaims. “You’re hired.”

Over the course of the next few month, you had clicked immediately with Chase. You spoke passionately about different types of literature with Cameron, and joked with Foreman about anything and everything.

Your relationship with House was complicated to say the least. During your first official case, House insisted he followed you everywhere. You more than understood his hesitance to let you do tests completely on your own. But when he limped around, tracking you like a damn dog… you wondered why he still hadn’t trusted you enough.

To your fortune, Wilson had cornered you in the cafeteria as you were getting lunch. “We need to talk,” he had said before plopping down next to you.

You paused, looking up from your cafeteria spaghetti. “About what?”

“House.”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “Why?”

Wilson looked at you with an expectant expression. “Because I want to know what you said. Duh.”

“I think I’m missing something,” you told him. “What was I supposed to say to him? What was he supposed to say to me?”

Wilson dropped his silverware. “Are you serious? He didn’t- You don’t- What?”

“I’m lost here, Wilson,” you tell him.

Wilson looks around suspiciously before licking his lips. “So… you know how the medical gala is coming up?”

Nodding, you shove a forkful of noodles in your mouth. “Chase won’t shut up about seeing ‘all the hot babes in tight dresses’ or something,” you inform Wilson.

After guffawing over your imitation of Chase’s accent, he gets serious. “It’s in a week. Are you sure he hasn’t talked to you?”

You throw your hands up and sigh. “Just spit it out already, Wilson. I feel like a high schooler trying to get my friends tell me who they have a cute little crush on. Tell me or I’m gonna pop a blood vessel!”

Wilson looks away. “I can’t. I’m scared of House.”

With that, he picks up his tray and goes to leave.

“Bye bye, Willie!” You call.

James turns and glares at you before walking out of the room. You chuckle and attempt to finish your meal before your beeper will inevitably go off.

You just start chowing down on the garlic bread (read: bread with butter and garlic) when you hear the dreaded beeping. You bite off a large chunk of the bread and dump your tray before reading the ‘MY OFFICE- EMERGENCY’ that was from House.

When you finally pushed open the door, you saw House facing the window outside.

“Is our patient with the living?” You ask, taking a step towards House.

House doesn’t turn around. “I need you to go to the winter gala thing with me.”

You stiffen up. Throughout your whole body, your muscles tighten as your freeze midstep. Your face drains of blood and your heart feels like it just dropped into your stomach and was dissolved by the acid. Bile had just started rising up your esophagus when House turns.

“Don’t look so excited,” he insists sarcastically. “But seriously. Why are you looking at me like I have a tumor growing out of my eyeball?”

“No,” you mutter raspily. “Take Cameron.”

House’s eyebrows furrow as you turn on your heel and start to leave.

“Why won’t you go with me?”

You gnaw deeply at your lip as you turn. To your surprise, House was standing- watching you leave without his cane in his hand. “Go with Cameron,” you say again. “I don’t- I’m- No. Just no.”

“Y/n, why-“

You practically run out the door before Greg can even say your name. He stands by his desk, staring intently at the ground where you just stood. “Hm,” he hums. He sighs and thinks about what to say to you next.

The next three days consist of House trying and failing to speak to you. To his own surprise, you have completely stopped talking about personal matters with him and have withdrawn any of your own opinions except for facts having to do with the patient.

House had just finished off another bottle of pills when Foreman barged into the room. “What did you say?”

House blinks. “Uhh… to who? Where? When?”

“To y/n, House. What did you say to y/n?”

“I told her that I needed her to go to the winter gala with me,” House answered truthfully. “Why? Has she said anything to you?”

Foreman flops down in the chair facing House. “Do you like her?”

“Well, I hired her, didn’t I?”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it, House,” Foreman snaps. “Answer me. Do you like her?”

A moment of silence fills the air. House thinks back to the first time he interacted with you- how confidently you completely the puzzle that certified doctor’s couldn’t figure out. How you had matched House’s wit on your very first day. How you- despite being babysat- had completed every test and blood swab and every challenge House had put in your way. How your face often spoke before you did, how House unconsciously searched for you in a crowd, how House looked for your input after almost anything is said, how House wants your company.

“No,” he answers. “Yes. Maybe. Why?”

Foreman looks at House like he’s stupid. “Because she likes you! How have you not figured that out?!”

“Uh, maybe because of the fact that she seemed to want to projectile vomit all over me and then sprinted out of the room? Sorry, I was too focused on the horror in her eyes to consider the fact that y/n really wants that enemies to lovers trope in real life,” House rambled.

“She thinks you’re gonna make a fool out of her, House, and I think you are too,” Foreman answers. He stares at House, searching for information he won’t get. “But… you’re less abrasive when she’s around.”

“You’re acting like she’s your precious little baby sister about to be wed to an evil ogre in the woods,” Greg mutters.

Nodding, Foreman quirked his eyebrows. “I feel like I am.”

House looks at Foreman for a long moment. “Why did you come here to tell me this?”

Eric heaves out a sigh heavy enough to know down an elephant. “Because she wants you to mean it. Y/n wants you to want her. To show her that you want her.”

“I see.”

Foreman nodded. “Don’t tell her I conversed with the enemy.”

Greg scoffed. “As if she’d voluntarily talk to me.”

Eric’s face turned sympathetic. “Just talk to her. Show her this isn’t some whim to- I don’t know, win a bet against Cuddy. Show her you feel the same.”

It was the day of the gala when House found you testing a patient’s blood. You whispered lyrics to a song Greg didn’t know as he stealthily approached you.

“Y/n.”

Your breath caught in your throat in a weird choking noise as you leapt back. “Christ, House!”

“Sorry,” House said with a very unapologetic tone. “I want to talk to you.”

“About what?” You ask plainly, looking through the low power lens of the microscope.

House leans on the table as you adjust the stage. “About… the dance. Tonight.”

You adjust the fine adjustment knob slowly, clicking your tongue unconciously. “What do you have to tell me?”

Greg looks around the lab awkwardly. He silently tried to encourage himself, mentally recalling the nights before, thinking about what to say to you. “I want to formally ask you to go to the gala with me.”

You stand at full height, facing him directly. House held his breath. He was so close to you, he thought he felt your breath on his face. “I don’t want to go. With you, Cameron, Chase, or Foreman. I don’t want to go.”

“Why?” House asked immediately.

You shake your head. “I’m-These things never go well for me House. Besides, you could just go with Cameron. I know she’s dying to go with you.”

House watches you watch him. “I don’t want to go to Cameron. I want to go with you,” he admits lowly.

“And why do you want to go with me?”

House pauses to see your eyes flicker from his eyes to his lips- so fast that he almost didn’t notice. “Because I don’t like her the way I like you.’’

You swallow. “How do you like me, House?”

“Like this,” he tells you before dropping his cane and grabbing your waist. Hearing no complaints from you, Greg pulls you close to him and brings his face close to yours. At this point, House swears his vision is blurred by how fast his heart his pumping. House’s hold on your waist is possessive, protective. He hesitates, hoping you won’t reject him now.

You- thankfully- understand the words House is trying to tell you through his eyes. You carefully let your hand cup the nape of House’s neck and pull his lips down to yours. A breathless moan escapes your lips as Greg pulls you flush against him.

House’s head- for once- is silent. And his leg doesn’t seem to hurt quite so bad with your hands on his body: feeling him like he’s only dreamt about before.

And then- when you do pull back- House keeps his grip on your waist as he looks you in the eyes. “I want to go to the gala with you. If you don’t have a dress, then we can just go home.”

Your flushed lips pull into a dazed smile. “How much cleavage do you want to see?”

House groans and lets his head fall back as his eyes close. “As long as I can take it off tonight and any other day I don’t care.”

“Is that- Are you- Are you hinting at commitment? Who are you and what have you done with Gregory House?”

House guffaws sarcastically. “Careful, there. I could get you fired.”

You just laugh. “Yeah, and have the others bicker like siblings and let patients almost die thrice before diagnosing them? I don’t think so.”

“You know, you have a pretty big ego for someone who hasn’t worked here for a full year, yet,” House chides.

Scoffing, you attempt to return to the blood you were looking at before House interrupted you. “First of all, you would know about egos. Second of all, I’m good. Cuddy has spoken to me… about other positions,” you tell him vaguely.

House is taken so off guard, his arms go limp. “What?”

“Nothing I accepted,” you answer, turning back to the microscope.

House just hums. “Good.”

You murmur a quiet ‘good’ in reply. “I know how to cure this guy,” you breathe quietly. With a growing smile, you take the slide off the stage and turn off the microscope before discarding the bio-waste.

House struggled to keep up with how fast you were walking, but your kiss had definitely left him chasing you- literally and figuratively.

[suhosieun]

I always wondered what suho would have done if sieun were the one who fell into a coma :(

in my opinion, anon, if sieun ended up in a coma, suho wouldn’t fall apart the same way sieun did. he wouldn’t send desperate texts begging for him to wake, nor would he break down visiting with grief in his eyes. he wouldn't stop eating, he wouldn't lose sleep. no, suho’s way is different.

he’d show up every day like clockwork, sliding into sieun's hospital room with a kind of casualness that almost feels like denial. he’d drop his bag, pull up a chair, and start talking—about the cafeteria food, the ridiculous homework, some customer at his delivery job? things he used to talk to sieun about. things that kept the world tethered.

“you're still not talking to me? rude,” he’d say with a mock-annoyed voice, though no one’s there to hear it.

he’d fill the silence with his voice, like they were just hanging out; suho yapping, sieun quiet — their usual dynamic. like nothing’s broken. maybe he’d bring snacks, or games, or books sieun liked, but mostly, he’d just be present. no tears. no desperate pleas. just steady, stubborn presence.

because for suho, absence probably wouldn't be about waiting for a miracle. it’d be about holding the space where sieun used to be, refusing to let it vanish.

HOWEVER, the other side of suho? the side that wants revenge? what would he do? he wouldn’t lose control like sieun did. there’d be no blood trails, no shattered windows, no violent echoes through the halls. no screams, no raging outbursts, no expulsion letters from school. because suho doesn’t erupt like sieun.

think about the last time sieun got hurt? suho didn’t rage. he didn’t scream or flip desks or smash a dumbbell on a foot or stab pens into arms. he gathered names like pieces on a chessboard, lining them up on a rooftop like a teacher calling roll. then he broke them — one by one — methodically, like ticking off errands. when it was done, he took a photo. less of a threat, more of a proof. and sent it to beomseok with one cold line: answer the phone or i’ll kill your friends.

he learned that youngbin hurt sieun’s hand, so suho found him, pinned him down, and crushed his fingers underfoot—not with anger, not with haste, but with a casual quietness, like putting out a cigarette. like procedure.

so if sieun were taken from him — if sieun were lying in a hospital bed, unconscious and unreachable — suho wouldn’t collapse. he’d organize.

a car sliding off a road in the rain. a bottle of pills emptied too suddenly. a missing poster curled at the corners, fluttering on a telephone pole. there would be no pattern. no evidence. just absence. and suho would still be at school—on time, composed, making eye contact in the hallway. like everything's normal.

because this wouldn’t be revenge. it would be removal.

sieun fights like something cornered: raw, furious, desperate to be seen. suho cuts like frostbite. he's silent and precise. by the time you notice, it’s already done.

suho would always say "let's not cross the line," but he would, for sieun. and the most insane part is that suho wouldn’t even think he crossed a line. he’d believe there was no line left to cross.

because sieun was the line.

without him, there’s only silence. and a ledger of names waiting to be crossed out.

[therogueflame]

Raised to Obey

omg hi guys!!

happy easter! this piece is based off this request from my dear friend, @uncoveredsun. she's an aemond girly through and through so ofc i had to make this one extra nasty. love you bye.

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Summary: You return to the court that shaped you, only to find the boy you once commanded grown into something dangerous. He follows you still, but not like he used to.

WC: 7.9k

Warnings: 18+, targcest, power imbalance, dubcon, (light) violcence, degradation, smut, oral (f! receiving), sex (p in v), creampie, a little bit of brat!Aemond

Aemond Targaryen x OlderSister!Reader

MDNI!!!

They say nothing in the letter, but you know what it means.

The seal is plain. The wording neutral. Your presence is requested at the Red Keep, and your escort will arrive within the fortnight. There is no mention of the annulment. No word of House Tyrell or Ser Lyonel’s failure to bed his bride after seven long, silent years of marriage. No accusations. No apologies. Only a summons. Clean and simple and final.

The carriage ride feels longer than the voyage that first took you to Highgarden, but this time there is no veil, no lavender perfume, no bridal nerves tucked into your gloves. You wear your riding leathers beneath a heavy velvet cloak, the color too rich for a woman with no husband and no name. Your hands are bare. Your hair unadorned. Your mouth still set in that same quiet line, the one you learned to hold when the Reach looked at you like a storm they couldn’t contain.

The Red Keep has not changed since you left it. It rises above the city like a red god, towering and unyielding, its shadow spreading from the spiked towers to the streets below. The stones still glisten like blood when the sun hits them, casting an amber glow before dusk. The air still smells of oil and fire, a familiar tang of smoke and iron and promises burnt to ash. The guards still stiffen when you pass, their eyes bright with curiosity, unsure whether they should bow or look away and pretend they’ve not seen you. You catch your reflection in a shield as you walk through the gate, beneath the portcullis where you last saw the glint of sunlight on Aemond’s hair. You look like someone they thought was gone. A hush spreads in your wake, rippling through the corridors, a sweet echo of scandal that follows you like a shadow. Maids pause with linens half-folded. Courtiers shift and whisper as you pass, their conversations frozen. Your mother’s ladies offer faint, artificial smiles, the tilt of their heads betraying their impatience to be the first to tell her. You can hear the murmur before it reaches your ears. She’s back. She’s failed. She’s still childless. She was too proud, they say. Too cold. They say it in whispers, in glances, in silence that is more damning than words. They say the same things in King’s Landing that they said in Highgarden. Like a song passed from one musician to the next, they keep playing the same refrain. You recognize it all.

They know the match was political, a symbol more than a promise, a show of good faith as useless as a gilded parchment. That your wedding was a masterpiece of civility and nothing more. That Ser Lyonel Tyrell—gentle, golden, delicate—never once reached for you in the dark. That the garden never bloomed. That the Tyrells petitioned for annulment with grace and urgency, their letters riddled with concern for your soul. No heir. No bedding. No shame, only regret, tendered with the precision of an accountant’s ledger or a merchant’s bill of sale. And underneath it all, the unspoken truth: you were never meant to be someone’s wife. You were meant to be their burden. Their lesson. Their problem to solve.

When you left King’s Landing, you were Alicent’s daughter. Now you are something less and something more. The one who failed. The one who came back. The one who belongs nowhere except where others don’t want her.

You enter the throne room alone. No handmaid, no brother at your side, no welcoming line of lords eager to claim your favor. You walk with your spine straight, your chin lifted, each step purposeful. You expect to be ignored. Perhaps tolerated. Perhaps pitied.

You are not prepared for Aemond. Not for the way he commands the room like a lord, like a dragon, like something both regal and dangerous. The years have sculpted him into a stranger, one who stands just below the dais and a little apart from the others, his body angled toward the Iron Throne as if it belongs to him. His eye catches yours the moment you appear. You feel it—a burning and intrusive stare, hot and direct and deeply unfamiliar, as if he’s picking you apart, inspecting each piece polished or flawed. He is taller, much taller, than you remember. His shoulders broader, his stance lethal and still. The sapphire gleams cold and pitiless where his eye once was, a bright gem that seems to see everything, to miss nothing. His jaw is sharp now. His mouth cruel and knowing.

He wears the black of the court like armor, as if the velvet and silk could shield him from insurgents and assassins, and the longsword at his hip is heavy, solid, not for show. He watches you like a man appraising a threat, ready to draw blood, and when his lips curl, it is not in welcome.

You pause at the edge of the hall, and the years pause with you. Your gloves remain on. Your expression does not falter. But something inside you stills, freezes, like a river in winter.

Aemond doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. Doesn’t acknowledge you before others can see. He lets the others gather near, shields himself with their presence. Lord Beesbury greets you with a thin, perfunctory smile, obscured by his drooping white mustache. Ser Harrold offers a nod, polite and stiff as his back. The queen smiles and, with effort, makes it convincing. No one mentions the annulment. Not yet. Not in front of Aemond, who watches it all with quiet, simmering amusement.

Then, slowly, with intention and certainty, Aemond steps forward.

He does not bow. He does not smile. “Lady Maidenflower,” he says, just soft enough that only you hear it, enough that it stings.

You turn your head just slightly, exactly enough to make him feel the weight of your reply. “Still clever, I see.”

His eye sweeps over you like a blade. He is not hiding the weight of it, the roughness of the cut. “You returned untouched, then. I’d wondered.”

“Lyonel Tyrell was a poet,” you reply, because you have sharpened your own edges. “Not a fool.”

“Poets rarely have the stomach for conquest.”

You meet his gaze without blinking, without flinching, though your heart still remembers how to race. “And you’ve always had too much of it.”

“I was twelve when you left.”

You tilt your head, and the movement is easy, graceful, scornful. “You still are, most days.”

That earns you a smirk, slow and deliberate, a lord’s smirk. A dragon’s. “Not anymore.”

He takes a single step closer. You don’t move. You let him come.

The pause between you stretches, heavy and hot and alive with unspoken challenges and renegotiated terms. His eye dips to your mouth, and it is not quickly, not politely, not as a brother should. When it rises again, it lingers.

You turn before he can speak again, before he can make you doubt or remember. You offer him no parting glance, no farewell. But you feel it as you walk away—his stare on your back, weighty and hungry. Not a boy’s gaze. Not a brother’s.

Let him look. Let them all.

You did not come back for their sympathy or to stand around, shrinking, while they trample your pride. The thought of wilted and drooping pity is almost amusing, withered and limp like Highgarden’s banner when the wind dies, and you refuse to let it gather at your feet like a folder of discarded marriage contracts. You returned because the summons meant something. Because they wanted you here. Because the annulment meant nothing. Because they are beginning to remember who you are and what you are worth. The realm has no place for a woman like you—a woman with no husband and no duty and no shame to parade—except when it needs one. You are still a dragon’s daughter, flames running molten where other women leave room for fear, and it seems they’re starting to recall the heat of their own blood. They thought a marriage would change you. That the Reach would wear you smooth and pliable. That seven years of silence would make you weak, complacent, eager to return with their leash around your neck. They were fools. You have not softened. You have stripped away everything unnecessary. You have become what you always should have been: scaled, certain, and dangerous. Aemond would be a fool, too, if he still believes he knows the girl who left. If he thinks the same breathless, reckless fool of a girl stands before him, he is welcome to try and find her, to search and search and find nothing at all. He will not.

It’s a few days before you see him again. Long enough that the ache dulls, the whispers shift, the court forgets to look twice. You don’t. You feel him in every corridor. His stare in the back of your skull. The words he didn’t say sitting heavier than the ones he did. You don’t seek him out. Not really. But when the sound of clashing steel drifts through the windows one morning, sharp and furious, your feet carry you there before you can stop them.

The yard is already thick with the sound of clashing steel and barked commands by the time you arrive, drawn not by curiosity but by the unmistakable pitch of Aemond’s voice, rising above the rest. You round the corner and find him standing over a boy barely older than twelve, sword in hand, patience worn thin. The boy is sweating and panting, bleeding lightly from the lip. Aemond says something low enough you can’t catch, but the tone carries and your stomach knots.

"Enough."

Aemond doesn't turn right away. The boy does, blinking at you like he's been thrown a lifeline, desperate and unsure. You step down into the yard without pausing, hands still gloved, shoulders squared, a defiance in each step. You know Aemond sees you, but he remains fixed over the boy, as if your presence is a small interruption. As if you are the one who should wait. As if waiting for the exact moment when his controlled apathy strikes deepest. He finally shifts, looking over his shoulder with slow, deliberate disinterest.

"You are not his commander," you say, your voice sharp and unyielding.

"I am his prince."

You take another step. "And you're still picking fights with boys too small to fight back."

That gets his attention. His eye catches yours and holds. The cut is deep, unrelenting, meant to wound. A quiet breath passes through the onlookers. No one moves. The boy backs away quickly, too smart to stay where the lightning is about to strike. Aemond sheathes his sword, but only halfway. His smirk is faint but not amused, a taunt that is both familiar and new.

"Would you like to teach him, then?"

You tilt your head. "I'd rather teach you."

His smile sharpens. "Then show me."

The court knows you well enough not to question it when you shrug off your cloak and take the spare sword from the rack. Your tunic is laced tight, boots steady, sleeves rolled. You are ready before they realize it, before you realize it yourself. You know the forms, the weight of the steel, the cadence of Aemond's skill. But you don't know the way the court watches now, not with surprise but with certainty, as if expecting exactly this. As if you haven't been gone seven years. Aemond stretches his neck as you step to the center. He doesn't offer the usual salutation. You don't bow.

When you strike, it's without warning. It feels right. Quick. Merciless. He parries fast, steel hissing, and the first clash draws a ripple from the men watching. You dance around him, light on your feet, quicker than he expects. It is a dance you thought you'd forgotten. The rhythm is familiar but off. He's faster now. Stronger. You are sharper. Angry. His blade grazes your shoulder. Yours slices along his side. He doesn't flinch. You don't, either. The heat builds quickly, sweat blooming beneath your collar. He presses harder, with more force, more insistence, more precision than the boy you thought you remembered. You give ground only to take it again. You used to beat him with speed, with patience, with quick, calculated precision. Now he meets you at every turn, matching blow for blow, circling like a predator who knows exactly where to bite.

How much he’s changed. How much he hasn’t.

How much you have.

When he finally gets you on your back, it's not clean. You stumble on loose gravel. He takes advantage, a fierce flicker of triumph in his eye. Your sword hits the dirt. Everything that’s happened since you left King’s Landing—the whispers, the annulment, the letters filled with false concern, the look on his face when you returned—everything that should have made this easy pinches sharp inside your lungs, more painful than his grip. His boot lands between your legs, arm braced against your throat. Not choking. Just holding.

Too close. An echo you can’t outrun.

You expect him to move. He doesn't.

His breathing is rough. So is yours. You can feel the sweat on his wrist, the heat of his body over yours. You look up. His hair is wild. His eye is burning.

"Still think I'm just a boy?"

You don't answer. His grip tightens just slightly. His fingers brush your jaw. He leans in, slow and sure, gaze locked to your mouth like it means something.

You shove him. Hard. He stumbles back, laughter spilling from his chest, not loud but knowing, as if you just gave him the answer he wanted. You roll to your feet before anyone can help you. Your chest is heaving, cheeks flushed, skin hot. You don't look at anyone else as you retrieve your sword and your pride.

"Lesson over?" he calls.

The pause stretches between you. You don’t let it hold. You shrug on your cloak with deliberate ease, the same ease you’ve cultivated since you returned. The hush follows you back into the keep. You feel his eyes like fingers pressing into your skin, a touch that lingers and burns and doesn’t fade when you reach the corridor.

It’s still there at supper. Fresh, insistent. No one else notices the bread you don’t eat, the soup that cools in your bowl, the wine you drink without tasting. You’re the only one who hears the hollow ring of his boot against your sword, echoing through the hall with every half-heard whisper. It doesn’t soften when your mother asks if you’re well, when the maids bring the third course, when the candles burn low. When your mother tells you it was wise to come home, you nod, polite and unconvincing. You take your leave, and the walls feel closer, the halls longer, the air colder.

You don’t think of him. You don’t think of the weight of his body, the feel of his fingers on your jaw. You’re only thinking of the cold when you tighten your laces, only thinking of the chill when you pace the length of your room. The scratch of the quill in the chamber next to yours is louder than you’d like, and the letters on your desk are too frantic and familiar to answer. You are not restless. You are thoughtful.

You think so hard you don’t realize you’ve left your chambers until you find yourself walking without thinking, past the solar, up the stairs, down the hall to the wing where he sleeps. You don't plan it. You don't knock.

You push the door open without a plan, breath quick and shallow from the unguarded walk. He’s there, not surprised, not even questioning your intrusion. Shirtless, lounging in a chair by the hearth, legs spread, as comfortable and confident as if he owned the place. He might as well. The heat of the fire licks the dampness from his hair. A goblet of wine sits comfortably in his hand; his sword rests close by, in easy reach. He looks up at you with an expression that feels both new and old, the same practiced disregard you once swore would never cut you again. Like he expected this. Like he’s been waiting. 

"Come to finish what we started?" 

Your throat tightens. Something in your chest does, too. The echo of it ricochets in your bones, and you shut the door with more force than you mean to. The sound is too loud, too final, but not enough to break the smile on his face. 

"You embarrassed me in the yard," you say. There's a catch in your voice you hope he doesn't hear. You step closer. He hums, not quite a laugh. Almost. 

"You embarrassed yourself." 

You bite back a retort. He watches you try, waiting for the hollow bite of it, waiting for something deeper. 

"You put your hand on me." The words taste more bitter than you expect, and he hears it. You know he does. He shrugs, the carelessness deliberate, and finishes the rest of the wine in a single, slow swallow. 

"You didn't tell me to stop."

Anger and something else lances through you, sharp and unmistakable. A flower blooming violent beneath your skin. "You're not a child anymore," you say. "Fine. But you are still beneath me." There's satisfaction in that. A small thrill. He sets the goblet down with a thin click, the faint trace of red staining the rim. His smile returns, slow and sharp, more a weapon than a jest. 

"Not where it counts."

You don't think, just move, a breathless reckless fool, too sure and too hurt to stop yourself. Your palm cracks across his face and his head turns with the force of it. The wine sloshes in his goblet when you strike him, but he does not drop it. He sets it down on the table carefully, eyes glittering with something you don’t recognize. He looks back at you with a hunger you've never seen before. A hunger that burns like dragon’s blood, searing and inscrutable. Not in him. Not from anyone. 

"Again," he says.

Your breath catches. There's no air in this room, this keep, this entire place. You stare at him. His smile flickers wider when you don't answer. You don’t have to. He knows. He knows. You step closer, and he rises from the chair as you do, caught on the same pull. The distance vanishes faster than you mean it to. Faster than you can stop. Fury frays and threads you together. The space between you disappears quick and final and damning.

"You think you've won something?"

He shrugs, every inch of his body unwound and lithe. "You came here."

"To remind you of your place."

"Remind me, then."

He moves too quickly. Or maybe you move too slow. His hands catch your waist and your spine hits the door hard enough to steal your breath. The night explodes in stars behind your eyes. He doesn't press. Doesn't hurt. Just holds you there with his body, chest against yours, breath hot on your cheek, the heat of him impossible to escape. You grab his wrist, digging in, nails biting soft skin. He holds the wince behind his teeth, gaze fixed on you like he'd die before looking away. 

"Let go of me."

The words are hard. 

"Lyonel never touched you, did he?"

Your hand tightens on his wrist, so hard it shakes. You slap him again, harder this time, and the crack of it splits in the air between you, a current setting stone to fracture. 

He laughs.

"Again," he says. 

You don't. But gods, you want to. You want to and you hate it and you hate him and you turn and leave before you remember how to breathe.

You leave him there with the taste of your own fury still on your tongue. Your hand aches. So does your chest. You don’t look back. You don’t sleep. Not really. You lie awake and stare at the ceiling, the canopy of your bed a cage you can’t escape, can’t untangle. His voice plays over and over in your mind. Lyonel never touched you, did he. The worst part is how softly he said it. Like a secret. Like a truth. Like he knew exactly where to cut, exactly where to let the worst of it bleed.

The candles burn low in your chambers. The chill nips at your windowpanes. You don’t feel it. You feel the ghost of Aemond’s fingers on your hips, his breath on your cheek, the tremor beneath his skin. Everything you thought you buried comes rushing back, rushing through you, rushing until it cleaves the air from your lungs. Why did you return? Why did you think you could stay away? You are not restless. You are not impatient. You are thoughtful, but that thought is wrapped around him like a noose. Like a bruise. Like a bright, sharp hope.

You came to win. You’ve already lost.

By morning, the bruises are already forming beneath the surface of your skin. The memory of Aemond's touch blooms purple and dark, echoes of his fingertips wrought in flesh. You wish the sensation of him would fade as fast. It doesn't. The court is louder now. You feel it in every corridor, every room, every shift in posture when you enter. It clings to you, an invisible murmur that grows teeth. No one says your name, but they don’t need to. You returned without a husband. Without a child. Without a claim worth anything except shame. You were sent to the Reach to secure the realm and came back with nothing but silence. So now they whisper.

She must have refused him.

She must have failed.

She must have been too difficult to want.

The echoes are just as loud as the words. Each clever jab works its way beneath your skin, seeds of doubt taking root and sprouting vines you can't cut through. Even your mother looks at you differently. Her voice is soft, but her eyes are measuring. The warmth she once kept for you has cooled into caution, as if your return might stain her skirts if you stand too close. Her questions come dressed as concern, but you know the shape of judgment. And the ladies at court, the ones who used to play cyvasse and braid your hair, now look through you like you’re made of smoke. They weave tales you can’t quite hear, tales that bleed from one mouth to another, tales whose edges are sharp and cutting.

They don’t ask, but their silence does. What did she do wrong? Was he kind? Did she cry? Did he ever touch her at all? Or did she come back just as she left, proud and unspoiled and completely alone?

You do not answer them. You do not give them the truth they seek, the truth that tugs too close to the center of you. You walk through the halls like nothing has changed, like you are still the same creature you were before. You are not. Aemond says nothing to you in court. He does not look your way unless others are watching, and even then, it is brief. Quick enough to pass as something else. But you can feel it. He lets the rumors curl around you like smoke, never once bothering to stop them. He could silence it. One word from him and the court would fall quiet. But he doesn't. He listens. He watches. He waits.

You find him in the yard again, a few days after the incident in his chambers. He's alone this time. No one dares train with him lately, not since the last sparring match left a knight concussed. He moves with that same quiet precision, that same lethal grace. The sun catches the sweat at his temple, his shirt already discarded and thrown to the side. Your skin prickles at the sight, at the memory of him even more unguarded, even more certain. You should leave. You don't.

You don’t know what you mean to say when you see him there, when you watch him move and remember the way he looked at you, the way he still looks at you. You don’t know what you mean to do when you feel the full weight of his indifference, of the stories he lets the court tell. But you are moving before you can talk yourself out of it. Before the bruises fade, before this second return becomes as hollow as the first. You are moving and it feels like a mistake, but you’ve already made that mistake before, already seen what comes of it. There's no going back. This time, you mean to win.

He sees you before you speak. Of course he does. He always does.

“You following me now?” he says without looking up.

“I could say the same.”

His blade drops slightly. “You never used to lurk.”

“You never used to be worth watching.”

He turns at that, slow and smooth. “Didn’t stop you before.”

You ignore the heat crawling up your neck. “I gave the orders. You followed them.”

“You think that’s still true?”

“You think it’s not?”

“You dragged me through the mud. Screamed at me in front of knights twice my size.”

“And you listened.”

He steps in close. “Try it now. See if I still do.”

Your breath catches. His voice drops, soft and deliberate.

“They say no man ever wanted you. That Tyrell barely looked at you. That you came back untouched because no one could stand the thought.”

You don’t answer. You don’t move.

He tilts his head, close enough to touch. “Is that why you hate me looking?”

“Because you’re not supposed to.”

He smiles, slow and awful. “I can’t stop.”

He steps closer, closing the gap with a slow, sure determination. You don’t move. You don’t even flinch. His face is inches from yours now, and everything about him pulls you in and splits you apart. You can smell the leather of his gloves, the salt on his skin, the faint scent of iron and heat. His hand lifts slowly. You feel the brush of his fingers at your jaw, soft, testing, like he’s taking measure of the space between breath and need and wanting. You could slap him again. You could turn and walk away. You don’t. Your breath is shallow. He watches your mouth. 

You step back. You leave. You don’t speak. You don’t run. You walk away with your back straight and your heart hammering in your ribs like it’s trying to claw out. 

That night, you dream of him. Of course you do. You dream of his mouth, the cut of his lips, the press of his body hot and unrelenting against yours. You dream of his hands, the rough drag of his fingers on your cheek, your skin, your throat. The way his voice dropped low, soft and deliberate. The way his voice dragged low when he said your name. You wake tangled in your sheets, flushed and furious and aching, and you cannot tell whether you want to kill him or keep him. 

It starts with silence. It starts with rooms you pretend not to linger in, corridors you just happen to walk through, doors you pass more slowly than you should. It starts with you lying to yourself—small, careful lies you don’t quite believe. You don’t mean to look for him. That’s what you tell yourself. You don’t mean to, not at first. Not at first, but you find him anyway. 

He’s in the yard. He’s in the hall. He’s at the table, two seats down, eating grapes one by one like they mean something. Every time you look up, he’s already watching. 

You tell yourself it’s nothing. That you are only keeping an eye on him. That someone has to. That it might as well be you. But the lie doesn’t last. Not when the heat flares again behind your ribs every time he speaks. Not when you walk past the training yard and stop to watch. Not when your name comes from his mouth and you have to swallow hard before answering.

You avoid him. Until you don’t.

You find him at the edge of the godswood, on a day when the sun beats down like a curse and the wind is too warm, your thoughts too loud and insistent. He’s leaning against the old heart tree like it belongs to him, as if it's only there to hold him, one hand resting on the hilt of his sword. His head is tilted up to the canopy, eyes closed, jaw sharp. He hears you long before you mean to speak. Even from a distance, you feel the weight of his awareness. As you move closer, he turns slowly, the light catching on the scar beneath his eye, the gleam of the sapphire where it settles. He watches you like he’s been waiting.

"You’ve been restless," he says. "I can tell."

"You don’t know anything about me."

He pushes off the tree and takes a step forward. "I know you come looking for me and pretend you don’t."

You set your jaw. "You think too highly of yourself."

"No," he says, a crooked grin on his lips, closer now. "I think exactly enough."

You take a step back. He follows.

"What do you want?" he asks, voice low.

You hate the question. You hate that he asks it like he knows you don’t have the answer.

"Nothing from you."

He circles you now, slow and deliberate. "You used to look at me like I was a boy. Now you look at me like I might bite."

"Maybe I think you should be put down."

He laughs, a soft huff that barely leaves his throat.

"Do you know what it did to me?" he says. "You left. Married some wilted flower. Let him look at you like a prize he’d never unwrap."

You flinch. He sees it.

"He didn’t even try, did he?"

You snap before you can stop yourself. "No. He didn’t. He was afraid. They all are."

The words hang between you like smoke, pulled from the center of you, unplanned and brutal. You breathe them in and try not to choke. Aemond steps closer. His voice goes quiet.

"I’m not."

You shake your head. You want to run. You don’t. He lifts his hand, not touching you yet, just hovering near your cheek.

"Say the word," he says, "and I’ll make you forget every man who ever disappointed you."

You slap him. His head snaps to the side, but he doesn’t recoil. He lets out a sound that freezes you in place. A moan. A real one. Low and ragged like it was dragged from his chest. When he turns back to you, there’s a flush high on his cheekbone. His lips are parted. His eye burns.

"I knew you liked it rough," he murmurs. "I remember how you used to throw me down."

You stare at him, breath caught halfway between a curse and a gasp. He leans in closer, slow, measured. You don’t move.

"You used to knock the wind out of me. You’d say I was too soft. That I’d never survive the yard unless I learned to take a hit."

"You never did learn."

"That’s not true," he says. "I learned to like it."

You shake your head again, but your fists stay at your sides. Your feet don’t move.

"You think this is a game."

"No," he says. "I think this is exactly what we’ve both been waiting for."

Your pulse roars in your ears. The godswood is quiet, but everything feels too loud. Too close. His breath brushes your cheek.

"Tell me to stop."

You leave him standing in the godswood, breath shallow, palms hot, the trees watching like they know what you almost said. You don’t speak. You don’t run. But you can’t quite breathe either. You walk back through the Keep like you’re sleepwalking, like you might burn through the floor if you stay still.

Night sinks in around you. The walls feel tighter. The fire in your chamber roars too hot. You pace. You pour wine you don’t drink. You open the window and shut it again. You think about sleeping. You think about forgetting. You think about how he looked at you when he said I’m not.

You tell yourself not to go. And then you do.

The hall outside his door is empty. The candlelight flickers low. The door isn’t fully shut. As if he left it waiting.

You don’t knock. You don’t speak. You step inside, and he’s already there. Shirtless, again. Hair damp. Leaning against the table like he hadn’t moved since the godswood. His eye finds yours and doesn’t flinch. You close the door behind you. You don’t lock it. He watches you cross the room without saying a word. He doesn’t ask why you’re here. He knows.

“I didn’t come for this,” you say.

He nods, slow. “Then say no.”

You don’t. He pushes off the table and walks toward you like he already knows how this ends. Like he’s dreamed it a hundred times and every version ends the same. He doesn’t reach for you. Not yet. He waits.

You’re the one who moves. Your hand fists in the collar of his shirt and drags him closer. Your mouth hovers near his, your breath unsteady, your body already too warm. You don’t kiss him. Not yet.

“I hate you,” you whisper.

“I know.”

And then you break. You kiss him like you’re furious. Like he’s the only thing that’s ever made you feel anything and you’d rather drown in it than say it out loud. His hands are everywhere. Yours are worse. There’s nothing careful about it. Nothing sweet. You don’t want sweet. You want to be ruined.

You want to ruin him back. The table knocks over. His back hits the wall. Your boots scatter across the floor. You don’t stop. You don’t think. You don’t ask. When he lifts you up and carries you to the bed, you let him. When he lays you down and looks at you like you’re the first real thing he’s ever wanted, you don’t speak.

He peels back your clothes with a precision that makes you ache, each layer a secret he's uncovering. Your shift falls away, and he stares at you like you're sacred. Like you're something he shouldn't touch but will anyway. His hands are rough, calloused from years of swordplay, but they move across your skin with a reverence that makes your breath catch. You don't want reverence. You want him to hurt. You want to hurt him back.

You flip him beneath you, straddling his hips, hands pinning his wrists above his head. His eye widens, pupils blown, a smile curling at the edge of his mouth. You lean down, hair falling around your face like a curtain, and bite his lower lip hard enough to draw blood. The taste of copper fills your mouth. He moans, hips bucking up against yours.

"Is this what you wanted?" you ask, voice barely above a whisper. "To ruin me?"

His fingers dig into your hips, bruising and possessive. "I wanted to be the one who touched you first."

You laugh, bitter and sharp. "Not everything is yours to claim."

"No," he says, flipping you beneath him with a strength that makes your breath catch. His weight settles between your thighs, delicious and heavy. "But you are."

You should fight. You should push him away. But your body arches into his touch, craving the heat of him, the burn of his skin against yours. His mouth finds your throat, teeth scraping over your pulse, and you gasp, fingers tangling in his hair, pulling hard enough to hurt. He hisses against your skin, the sound vibrating through your bones.

"Tell me to stop," he says again, but this time it's different. It's not a challenge. It's a plea. You can hear the need beneath it, raw and desperate. It would be so easy to tell him no. To walk away. To leave him as broken as you've been. Instead, you pull him closer.

"Don't stop," you whisper against his mouth. "Don't you dare stop."

He trails kisses of fire down your body, spreading your thighs open and bringing his face close to your core. His breath is hot, his mouth everything you expected and nothing like you imagined. You choke on a sound that might be a sob, that might be his name, that might be something you’ve never said to anyone. There is a feeling of novelty between your legs. You don’t know what to do with it, what to call it. You don’t know how to stop it. His tongue traces a path that makes you gasp, your body shuddering beneath him, and every scrape of his teeth sends a shock to places you forgot you had. He pins your hips with his hands. Holds you there until you think you might scream, might call him something you’ll regret. You writhe, helpless and hungry, his mouth pushing you toward something you can't recognize but can't resist. It's new and wild and terrifying. It's more than you were ready for. You feel it building beyond your control, burning through you, breaking you down, and he's relentless. You’ve never been this close to shattering. You’ve never wanted to.

When it crests, it's like wildfire—unstoppable, consuming, spreading through your limbs until you're arching off the bed, his name torn from your throat. He holds you through it, mouth still working, drinking in every tremor until you push him away, too sensitive to bear it.

He moves up your body like he's been waiting his entire life for this moment. He's like a predator, but one who is starving, respectful, already intoxicated by your essence. His mouth is slick, his eyes are wild, and his hair is tousled from your touch. When he kisses you, you taste yourself on his lips, and it sends a wave of heat through you. It makes you want to hide. It makes you want to be consumed.

He pulls back just enough to truly see you, and something raw and broken flickers across his face. You watch it shatter within him. You feel it cracking beneath your ribs.

His hands tremble as they explore your body. They're not hurried now, not greedy. Just desperately seeking. He wants to discover what makes you gasp, what makes you tremble, what makes you wrap your legs around his waist and dig your nails into his shoulders, calling his name like a curse.

Both of you are frantic, lost in something that has been building since the moment you returned. Since before that. Since before you left. Since forever.

When he finally sinks into you, the sound that tears from your throat is something between a sob and a moan. It hurts. Of course it hurts. But it's the kind of pain that feels like salvation, like something breaking open inside you that's been locked too long. He watches your face as he moves, drinking in every reaction, every gasp, every flicker of pleasure that crosses your features. His pace is relentless, punishing, exactly what you need and nothing like you imagined.

"Look at me," he growls, and you do. You meet his gaze and don't look away, even when it feels too intimate, too raw. His eye burns into yours, the sapphire gleaming in the firelight like a second witness to your surrender. "Say my name."

You bite your lip, refusing at first. His hand slides between your bodies, finding the place where you're most sensitive, and your resolve crumbles.

"Aemond," you gasp, the syllables breaking on your tongue like a prayer. "Aemond," you breathe again, and again, like a confession you can't keep hidden anymore.

His rhythm stutters at the sound of it, his name on your lips like a spell he never thought you’d cast. It tears through him, wild and fierce and reckless, like it can’t be contained. His pulse surges with the rush of possession, with a pride that borders on madness. The moment is electric, charged, impossibly taut. He crushes his mouth to yours, swallowing every moan, every gasp, as if your voice alone could undo him, as if all your protests only fuel him further. The pace is dizzying, the edge razor-sharp, and you’re close, so close to something you've never let yourself feel before. Not like this. Not this blinding. Your body arches into him, desperate and unguarded, and you cry out, nails scoring down his back, leaving trails that scream of violence, of passion, of the pain you both need and the pleasure you can’t tell apart. He hisses at the sting, but the sound is nothing like surrender.

"You're mine," he growls, branding you with his words, his teeth grazing your throat, the promise lethal and soft and everything you’ve ever wanted to deny. "Say it."

You choke out the word, shaking your head as you do, still defiant even as your body says otherwise. Even as it betrays you, traitorous and unrelenting, your resistance splintering like ash before a torch. "No." It's barely a whisper, a last stand against the fire, but even you don’t believe it. You clench around him, pulling him deeper, binding him to you with every shuddering breath. He tightens his grip in your hair, and the pull arches your back, exposing your neck, your pulse, the truth you're trying to hide.

"Lie to me again," he says, his voice fractured with desire, the edges rough, unsteady. "And see what happens."

His eye is locked on yours, shining full of hunger and something else. Something that makes you want to give in just to see what it would do to him. You meet his gaze with a challenge, despite the tremor in your voice, despite the pleasure that is slowly unraveling you. "I am not yours."

His lips curl into a smile that is nothing but teeth and intent. He slows his movements with devastating precision, pulling out so slowly it feels like a loss, thrusting back in to make you pay for every lie, for every second you didn’t admit you were his. The impact shatters your defenses, touching something deep inside that makes you want to come apart. Makes you want to break just so he can put you back together.

"Liar," he breathes, but the word is tangled with awe, with worship, with disbelief that he ever let you go. His hands are brands on your skin, holding you in place as he moves, marking you with fingers as determined as his heart, as his claim, as his promise.

You’re losing. You’re lost. Your resolve crumbles, rushing out of you so quickly you feel dizzy with it. The pleasure winds tight, impossibly tight, spreading through your body faster than you can stop it, faster than you can pretend you don’t want it. You’re on the brink, teetering at the edge, and you can’t pull back. Can’t stop it. Can’t stop any of it.

"Say it," he demands, pushing you to the point of no return, his rhythm pushed to the breaking point as his control slips. As he starts to fall apart with you. "Tell me who you belong to."

You want to fight him. You want him to bleed the way you did. You want to be empty of him. You want him to lose the same way you did. You want to give him nothing. You want to watch him break. You want him to hurt the way you did. You want to give him everything. You want him to know it. You want to ruin him as he's ruined you. And suddenly, you are. The word leaves your throat like it’s tearing you apart, like it’s putting you back together. The admission is pain and salvation. The confession is agony and release. "You." The silence shatters. Your resolve shatters. Something wild and desperate between you shatters. You come undone with it, unable to hold anything back. Your voice, your control, the last of your resistance. "You," you whisper, the sound already gone. "You, Aemond."

It breaks something in both of you. He kisses you then, deep and consuming, and you fall apart beneath him, waves of pleasure wracking through you, your release a storm breaking against the shore. He follows you over the edge, his own release a fierce, primal claim, his body tensing above you, inside you, around you. The sound he makes is raw, unguarded, nothing like the prince who holds his emotions in check. His forehead presses against yours as he shudders, as he spills himself inside you, marking you in the most primitive way. You think he might have forgotten how to breathe, how to hold back, how to be a dragon and not a man. You think you might have forgotten the same.

It leaves you both unmoored, wild and vulnerable, unable to hold anything back. Every moment is a fracture, a split-second proof of his soul laid bare. Every tremor a piece of you given in ways you never thought you could. Never thought you would. The heat of him, the weight of him, it should feel like too much. It should feel like surrender. You should feel conquered, defeated. But for the first time, it feels like exactly what you’ve been wanting. Exactly what you’ve been waiting for.

It takes an eternity for the storm to pass, for the world to settle around you, but you hold fast through it, to him, to each other. You feel it long after the shakes subside, after your bodies run out of breath and fury and will. The truth of it so potent you can’t suppress it. Can’t deny it. Not even to save yourself. For a moment, neither of you move. His breath mingles with yours, ragged and spent. His weight is heavy, but you don't push him away. You can't. Your fingers trace the scars on his back, mapping the history of a boy who became a man you didn't recognize. Who became a man you couldn't resist.

When he finally rolls to the side, you feel the chill of the room rush back, reminding you of where you are. Who you are. What you've done. You lie there, staring at the ceiling, your body humming with remnants of pleasure and something heavier. You should leave. You should get up, gather your clothes, and slip away before the castle wakes. Before reality returns. Before the weight of this settles fully on your shoulders. Instead, you stay.

His fingers trace lazy patterns on your skin, following the curve of your hip, the dip of your waist, like he's memorizing the map of you. Neither of you speak. The silence isn't uncomfortable, but it's heavy with things unsaid. With questions neither of you are ready to answer.

"They’ll know," you whisper, voice ragged from crying out his name.

He doesn’t flinch. Just looks at you—calm, unreadable—as if the words mean nothing at all.

"And?"

You swallow. "You don’t understand what they’ll say."

"I do." His voice is flat, unbothered. "They’ll say what they always do. It changes nothing."

You push his hand away, sitting up fast. "I’m not yours to claim."

His eye flicks to you, sharp and steady. "I never said you were."

That catches you off guard—but before you can speak, he adds, quieter this time:

"You chose this. Just like I did."

[wonderlandwalker]

The promises we cling to | Finnick Odair x reader

thg masterlist / inbox / part two

summary: this is basically just me starting with the "people are watching / then lets give them something to look at" prompt and maybe getting a little lost in the process

word count: 3.6k

tags / content warnings: angst, fluff, violence, blood, injury that whole shebang, I actually proofread this one but that doesn't mean I spotted everything sorry in advance

a/n: apparently the only time I'm capable of writing is when im less than a day away from my constitutional law final and delusional because i've been awake for 38 hours so hopefully this will give me enough dopamine to actually get a passing grade

Finnick knows how this works; he’s known it since he was fourteen years old and first stepped foot in an arena. Since the moment he lost sight of you, since the bloodbath separated you, Snow’s words haunt him with every cannon he hears: "She is just another thing I can take from you."

And yet—

He still dares to believe you’re alive.

Not because the Capitol hasn’t tried. Not because the odds are kind. But because you promised. You swore you’d fight. And Finnick clings to that vow like a prayer, even as the arena’s cannons rattle his bones. Last night, he’d counted the fallen—your name absent from the sky’s grim ledger. But three more cannons have split the air since dawn, and now—

Now he’s not sure what to believe. The rational part of him—the part carved into survival by years of Capitol cruelty—knows the truth: They’re playing with him. But the other part, the raw and bleeding thing behind his ribs, doesn’t care. The rebels’ plan echoe in his head, "Stay put. Wait for extraction." But he’s itching to move, to act, to do something besides sit here and wait. Every muscle in his body is filled with restless energy, his fingers tapping a precise rhythm against his trident. The inaction is worse than any challenge the arena could give him. He wants to run back into the jungle, to tear through the branches until he finds you, but he knows you. That's the cruellest part.

He knows how you think, the way you map escape routes before you even enter a room, the way you always have a back-up plan for your back-up plan. And right now, this beach is your plan. It’s the rendezvous point you had all agreed on before the Games even began, a secret strategy the rebels had managed to lay out. If he leaves, he risks missing you. If he stays, he risks leaving you to die alone. The dilemma claws at his ribs, and around him he can hear the others strategise, but their words blur into static. All he can hear is the phantom echoe of your voice in his head as you tell him it will be okay. Johanna catches his eye from across the beach, her glare sharp enough to cut. “Stop pacing. You’re making me twitchy.” He forces himself to let out a deep breath, focusing on the movement of the water in front of him. He needs to put himself back together; he needs to stay here.

But then—your scream. It tears through the jungle, a sound so visceral his body moves before his mind catches up. He’s already sprinting, the grip on his trident tight as his instincts kick in.

"Finnick, stop—!" Johanna’s voice is lost to him over the rushing of blood in his ears. The trees blur as he runs; he doesn't think about the careers that could be close by, the traps that he could trigger or the fact that he’s doing the exact opposite of what he’s supposed to. The flicker of movement to his right catches his attention, and he’s about to change directions when the jabberjays descend. They’re a swarm of wings and needle-sharp cries as they surround him, their voices stitching together into an illusion of you: your gasps, your sobs, the way you’d whispered his name before being forced apart. He stops moving and staggers to his knees. It’s not real. He knows it’s not real. Knows that Snow’s fingerprints are all over this new form of torture. But logic means nothing when his hands are shaking, when his lungs refuse to work, when every instinct screams to run, find, save—

Johanna grabs his shoulder, her nails biting through his skin. "Breathe, Odair."

The jabberjays' cries fade into the jungle's chorus, leaving Finnick hollowed out and raw. Johanna's grip on his shoulder remains, her fingers digging into muscle like she's the only thing keeping him from splintering apart.

"Get up," she hisses, voice low and urgent. "We need to move before those things lure anyone else here." Finnick's hands still tremble as he pushes himself to his feet. The phantom echoes of your voice cling to him, sticky as blood. He wants to argue, to plunge back into the green hell after you, but Johanna's right—the sound of the jabberjays could be a beacon for every tribute left in the arena.

The walk back to the beach is a blur of snapping branches and Johanna's muttered curses. When they break through the treeline, Beetee's head jerks up from the makeshift radio he's been tinkering with, his glasses flashing in the sunlight. "Did you find—?"

"No," Johanna cuts him off, shoving Finnick toward the water. "Go clean up before I toss you in the water myself.” Finnick's gaze drifts to the treeline, his fingers twitching at his sides. You promised you'd fight. He just needs to believe you're still fighting.

You wake to the taste of copper and dirt. The world swims into focus slowly—first the ache in your ribs, then the sticky warmth of blood matting your hair to your scalp. Somewhere in the chaos of the bloodbath, a blow to the head had sent you sprawling into the undergrowth, separating you from the others. The jungle hums around you, deceptive in its tranquillity. Every rustle of leaves could be a mutation, every snapped twig a Career hunting for stragglers. The beach is your only chance—you know Finnick will be waiting there, even if it kills him. You press your back against a tree, lungs burning, and your ribs scream where a Career’s boot found its mark yesterday, but you know you need to keep moving; too much time has passed already. You know the way his voice cracks when he’s trying not to beg, the way his hands shake after nightmares, you know he’s counting cannons, just like you are—each one a fresh wound. So you bite down on the pain and move.

The arena doesn’t kill you quietly; it creeps in through the cracks—the stench of rotting foliage, the too-sweet tang of tracker jacker venom lingering in the air, the way your own sweat stings the cuts on your palms. So you move in bursts, pausing to listen between steps. The arena's traps are everywhere.

When the jabberjays come, their shrieks weaving together your name in Finnick's voice, you almost believe it's real. Your chest cracks open with want, but you bite your tongue until you taste blood. The jabberjays' voices fade, but their poison lingers in your bones. You press a trembling hand against the rough bark of a tree, counting breaths until the phantom sound of Finnick's screams stops echoing in your skull. Every rustle of leaves sends your pulse skittering. The wound on your ribs throbs in time with your footsteps, a fresh bloom of pain with each misstep. You try to focus on the memory of Finnick's hands steadying you after nightmares – his thumbs brushing your wrists in slow circles. Breathe. Just breathe.

The first hint of salt air cuts through the jungle's rot. Your knees nearly buckle at the scent – it smells like Finnick's skin after swimming, like promises whispered against damp hair. The ground begins to slope downward. Somewhere beyond the trees, waves crash in a rhythm you'd know blind. You're close now. So close. A twig snaps; you freeze, muscles coiled.

Then—a sound. Not a cannon. Not a mutation. A rhythmic tap, too precise to be accidental. You know that sound, like you know the hitch in Finnick’s breath when he wakes from nightmares. Like you know the way his fingers drum against your hip when he’s impatient, when he’s afraid, when he’s trying to pretend he isn’t either. The beach is close. You know that rhythm, the way his hands move when his mind is racing, when the nerves he’d never admit to are fraying his control. And just like that, you’re running; you’re reckless. You can smell the sand now; you can almost hear their hushed voices. But the arena has one last cruelty in store.

You feel it before you see it, that split-second prickle at the back of your neck, the sudden hush of the jungle like the arena itself is holding its breath, and you know the fatal mistake you’ve just made. Memories crash over you like a riptide. The bouncing of his knee under the kitchen table on the morning of the reaping, the way he’d flinched when your fingers brushed his wrist, then clung to you like you were the only anchor in a storm. You remember the Tuesday he’d shattered a teacup at 3 a.m., his breathing coming out in jagged bursts. You hadn't asked him why; it didn't matter why. You had just slid down beside him, pressing your forehead to his temple until his lungs remembered how to work.

And that damned peach pie, the memory of flour dusting his lashes as he’d laughed at your frantic perfectionism, only to turn pale as a ghost when you’d yelped at the oven’s burn. His hands, so careful, always so careful, cradling your blistered palms while his voice stayed as steady as the tide. “Breathe, sweetheart. It’s just pie.” It had been his mother’s recipe, the first thing he trusted you with that hurt to share, and you were more upset over messing it up than the burn on your hands. And that night on the beach, salt air clinging to his lips as he whispered “Promise me” with a desperation that carved itself into your bones. The version of Finnick the Capitol moulded was gone; there was only the raw, trembling truth of him.

It had reminded you of the first time you met. The way Finnick’s laugh had faltered when your eyes locked across the room years ago—like he’d been sucker-punched by his own heartbeat. The Capitol’s golden boy unravelled in an instant. The sun was starting to rise over the water, the soft light showcasing the tension in his shoulders.

You’ve seen Finnick Odair wear a hundred masks, but this—this restless hesitation, his fingers worrying the edge of his sleeve—is new. You open your mouth to ask him, but he speaks first. “I know you like to tease me about the clichés I tell you.” His voice is rough, like he’s been screaming into the tide. “But I need you to know I mean every fucking word.” When he turns, the look on his face steals your breath. This isn’t the polished charmer from your early days or even the fractured man who once sobbed into your collarbone after a Capitol party. This is something rawer. Something terrified.

Your fingers find the nape of his neck on instinct, threading through sweat-damp curls. He shudders, leaning into your touch like a dying man offered water. “I know,” you whisper. “No.” His hand clamps over yours, pressing your palm flat to his pulse. It’s racing. “When I say I’d die for you, I mean it. Let me mean it.” The words are a blade between your ribs. “Finn—”

“We’ve both known what will happen at the reaping, even if we pretend we don’t.” His thumb traces your knuckles—so gentle, so at odds with the fire in his eyes. “You’d walk into that arena alone just to spare a stranger. That stubbornness is why I—" He chokes. “But you have to let me be selfish too.” A tear slips down your cheek, but he catches it before it can fall from your face. “Promise me.” His voice cracks.“Promise you’ll survive, even if I don’t.”

You want to argue. To shake him until his teeth rattle. But the plea in his gaze is a mirror of your own soul. “I promise.” His exhale is a seismic thing, like he’s been drowning for years. You seize his wrist before he can pull away. “Promise me too. That you’ll fight, no matter what.” There’s a flicker of agony in his eyes, but just like you had known, he knows you need to hear him say it. “I promise I’ll try.” There are so many unspoken words as he looks at you. So many more clichés you know he wants to give to you, so many reassurances you wish you could give him, but the one promise you have always shared is louder than ever: you won’t let them have the satisfaction of knowing they can break you.

So maybe this is how it was always meant to be. The thought comes to you with eerie clarity as Brutus enters your line of vision and his fingers crush your windpipe. You’ve kept your promises, you’ve fought like hell, and now—now you’ve made it back to him, even if only for a final heartbeat. Your vision tunnels, and every gasp is like a knife being dragged through your lungs, but you don’t stop moving. Your fingers reach for the blade embedded in your palm — the one you’d taken from another tribute hours ago, the one still slick with your own blood. Brutus snarls as you drive it into his wrist, and for one glorious second, his grip loosens. You suck in a fractured breath, but then his other hand slams you against a tree. “Is that all you’ve got?” His breath is rancid, and stars burst behind your eyes, the world around you fracturing into fragments as he lifts you off the ground, once again stealing your breath from you.

You think of Finnick, the real him, the one who kissed you like he was starving as he trailed a path all over your body, who whispered against your thighs like he was reciting a prayer. Just as you’re about to give in to the memories, throught the static in your ears, you hear it, and Brutus’ head snaps toward the sound.

"Get your fucking hands off her."

The voice is raw with fury, edged with something worse—terror. Brutus actually flinches. It’s a voice you’d recognise anywhere; you’d know it underwater. In a hurricane. At the end of the world. Finnick.

You hit the ground hard, your lungs screaming as they try to reclaim the air you’ve been gifted once more, but all you can process is him. The unmistakably feral look twisting on his face as he slams into Brutus like a tidal wave, the sickening crunch of his fist meeting jawbone—once, twice—each blow precise and vicious, the way his trident lies abandoned behind him; he didn’t even bother using it. This isn’t combat; this is butchery. Your vision swims as you stagger upright, only to collapse again. Every gasp feels like swallowing broken glass, but you have to get to him—

Crack.

The sound isn’t just heard. You feel it in your bones. Brutus’ head snaps sideways, his knees buckling as Finnick drives an elbow into his temple. There’s no finesse, just a boy who’s spent too many years sharpening himself into a weapon, finally cutting loose.

A wet cough wrenches from your throat, and Finnick’s head whips toward you so fast it’s a miracle his neck doesn’t break. For one fractured second, his rage falters. You’ll remember that look forever. How his eyes went wild, how his breath hitched—like he’d just watched you die. The sound of your wheezing seems to snap him out of his trance. Though he’s covered from head to toe in blood spatter—none of it his—he has never looked more fragile to you. He rushes to your side, dropping to his knees as one hand cradles your face while the other takes yours, pressing your palm against his ribcage to help you steady your racing breaths. His thumb strokes your cheek in slow, uneven sweeps—a nervous habit. The blood smearing your skin is thick, still warm, but you can’t bring yourself to care, not when Finnick is looking at you like this, like you���re dawn breaking over the ocean after the longest night of his life.

Despite the ache in your arms, you lift your free hand and catch his—the one that had been tracing restless patterns against your skin—and press his palm to your chest. You know the steadying rhythm of your heartbeat is one of the few things that can anchor him now. A spark flickers to life in his eyes as they roam your face, as if he’s memorising the proof that you’re here, alive.

“I’ve missed you.” The words are too small for the weight in your chest, but they’re the only truth you can grasp. His chuckle is rough, warmth bleeding into the sound, and it reignites the dull ache in your heart—then fans it into a wildfire when he murmurs, “I missed you more.” You can feel the want boiling inside him—the way his adrenaline sings for him to crush you against his ribs, to kiss you like he’s pouring every unsaid vow into your lungs. But he hesitates, fingers twitching against your collarbone. Still afraid, still fragile.

“I’m okay, Finn. I promise.” A smile ghosts his lips, but his next words are barely audible. “Everybody’s watching.” He doesn’t need to say anything else. You remember the first oath you ever swore to each other: Don’t let them in. Don’t let them twist this. Your relationship was never just yours—it was a stage play for all of Panem, a performance where even you sometimes forgot where the script ended and the truth began.

Yet here he is, clinging to another promise—the one where he swore to shield you, even from himself. You see it in the way his jaw tightens, the way his hands hover like he’s afraid touch might shatter the illusion of control. He’s trying so damn hard to be what you need: steady, selfless, safe. But the irony is delicious. His restraint is the proof you crave. It screams what the cameras will never understand—that this, right here, is the most real thing either of you has ever had. So you tilt your chin up, your voice a challenge and a dare as you scan his face: “Then let’s give them something to look at.”

Your words are another whisper, so quiet you fear they might dissolve before they reach him—but then his head snaps up, his gaze scouring your face like a man reading a map in the dark. And then he breaks. He lunges forward, lips crashing into yours with a desperation that steals your breath. It’s overwhelming, it's perfect, the familiarity of his mouth against yours is everything you had been craving since you last saw him. You kiss him back like it’s the only language left to you, pouring every unsaid ‘I love you’ into the press of your lips. His touch is featherlight yet feverish, hands tracing your arms, your spine, as if trying to memorise you through his fingertips. And in this fragile bubble of shared breath and tangled limbs, you find it—the truth you’ve been starving for.

Finnick kisses like it’s his salvation. His teeth catch your lower lip, tugging gently, insatiable, while his arm bands around your waist, hauling you flush against him until not even air separates you. You feel the frantic thudding of his heartbeat where your chest meets his, a wild counterpoint to your own. When he groans into your mouth, it’s a sound you want to bottle. It’s not enough. Even now, with his skin against yours and his pulse thundering under your palms, you’re already aching for more—more of him, more of this, more of the way he makes the world vanish.

A very deliberate cough shatters the daydream you’d been lost in, and the two of you spring apart like kids caught making out behind the gym. “You two never fail to disgust me.” Johanna’s voice is flat, devoid of even her trademark sarcasm, and the heat that floods your cheeks is embarrassingly familiar. “If you’re done trying to swallow each other’s faces, we’ve got shit to do.”

Finnick snaps back to reality first, hauling himself upright before pulling you up with him. His hands linger, like he needs the contact to convince himself you’re really here. Johanna rolls her eyes so hard it’s a miracle they don’t stick, already stalking back toward the clearing—but not before you catch her gaze flickering over you, her lips twitching like she’s fighting a smile. Of course she cares, she's the one who introduced the two of you to begin with.

“I think she might actually be glad I’m not dead.” You murmur, and his laughter is warm against your ear. The sound settles something in your chest, a reminder: You’re here. You’re together. Maybe, against all odds, things will be okay.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he jokes back. “She’s just relieved she won’t have to suffer through my moping anymore.” The lightness in his grin tells you everything—he’s found his footing again. And so have you. But as Finnick’s thumb brushes your wrist, you both hear it: another cannon in the distance. The Games aren’t over yet.

[prequel: The masks we wear]

[bblgeum]

𐔌 not yours, not mine ─  yeon si-eun 𐦯

⟡ ﹒ in which ⌇ hyo-man was an idiot, thinking he could steal you away from si-eun.

⟡ ﹒ content⌇ gn reader, fluff, si-eun gets angry, hyo-man, childhood friends, not dating but they act like it

⟡ ﹒ listen to⌇ i like the way you kiss me - artemas

you still remember the shards of glass that littered the floor. you still remember the once blank, ignorant faces switch to ones of shock as si-eun yelled,

─  "what the fuck do you want?!"

you still remember stumbling along as si-eun, tear-streaked face, white cast, and bloodied uniform dragged you along down the hall with a look in his eyes that resembled a taxidermied animal. innocent. young. sad.

you and si-eun stare up at eujang high school. the only place that would accept you both, after what happened to kang woo-young, beom-seok, and jeon young-bin. si-eun had the usual stoic look on his face. you? you were about to shit your pants. there were students all around you - smoking, fighting, on their phones. they didnt look like normal students, though. there was a certain animalistic glint in their eyes. like they were waiting to pounce on their prey.

─  "si-eun..? homeschool is always an option.."

si-eun looks over at you for a minute, as if he was calculating something in his head. with ghostly cold hands, he gently nudges you along with him as he starts walking.

the teachers slammed the ledger a few times on the podium. the class quiets down, and eyes pierce into the both of you. standing side by side, you and si-un bow.

─  "my name is (last name) (name). i hope we can all get along"

─  "i'm yeon si-eun."

a few quiet snickers are let out by the class. si-eun didnt seem to care - he was in his own space again, staring out. you nudge him to sit. luckily, you were seatmates.

idle chatter is drowned out by your headphones. filling out your planner, you ignore the delinquency around you. si-eun is in a si ilar state of mind. headphones in, ocasional flick towards you, then back at his notebook.

si-eun appreciated the comfortable silence. no awkwardness, no need to be talk 24/7. it was like you two were separated in your own little bubble of tranquility.

during break, si-eun stands up to go the the restroom. you give him a curt nod. back to your notes. back to your bubble of peace.

and that bubble was violently popped as choi hyo-man drags out a chair across from you, a filthy smirk on his face, like he knew something you didnt. flicking your forehead, he slips off uour headphones.

─  "oops! didnt mean to, sweetheart"

your writing stops as hyo-man finish his scentance. sweetheart. a shiver runs down your spine, your blood runs cold. a strange, acidic feeling crawls up your throat. noboyd - not even si-eun, who you knew since the womb- called you sweetheart. hyo-man notices your discomfort and suprise. he smiles.

─  "ah, whats wront? yknow, that uniform looks hot on you, baby!"

you dont get a word out as heyo-man stands up, yanking on your arm. you get dragged along. it was so loud in the classroom that nobody heard your protests. hyo-man sees your mouth moving, and frowns.

─  "yah! what're you complaining about? be thankful i rescued you from that weird, si-eun or whatev-"

hyo-man was abruptly cut off by si-eun, who had just returned from the bathroom. his stoic look was now replaced by a unsettling from and eyes that looked like the void.

─  "shes not yours. let go of her."

the class quiets down. everyones eyes are on you, hyo-man, and si-eun. hyo-man frowns, saying,

─  "shes not yours either, fucker"

hyo-man's lackeys let out a snicker. hyo-man grins at their support, grip loosening on your wrist. si-eun grabs you back, turning to leave the classroom with you. just before the door closes, he says,

─  "shes not mine. but shes definatly not yours."

hyo-man's grip left a bruise on your wrist. sitting out side in the hall, si-eun still didnt look content. moving the hair from his eyes, you look at your reflection as you say,

─  "thanks, si-eun.. but, for the record, im more than okay with being yours."

sieun looks up from the floor. he hid it well, but you can see the slight embarrassment on his face. cheeks dusted slightly pink, he says,

─  "no problem."

author's note: IM DONE WITH EXAMSSS

[hoodzgyal]

my favorite iteration of jason todd is not the blood thirsty, violent zealot of a man who kills because he can, but instead a long-suffering, internally tortured man who was simply pushed beyond the brink.

this jason is a man who takes no pleasure in all the blood on his hands as the red hood; all the bodies on his ledger are simply a means to an end. gotham must be cleaned up, not for his sake, but for the sake of the people.

i love a jason todd that recognizes that crime cannot be stopped, but it can be controlled. a jason todd who cares deeply, so very deeply about gotham. a jason who believes he’s tethered to her, resurrected solely for the purpose of righting her wrongs. a jason who goes after the scum of gotham, the traffickers, the pimps, the controllers of the dark underbelly of the city, and slowly picks them off.

i love a jason todd who is methodical. each kill is incredibly calculated; he doesn’t believe in wasting bullets. i love a jason todd that stands directly on the line that batman cannot cross.

[petertingle-yipyip]

SENSES - JOAQUIN TORRES

(will probably change the gif when i can find a better one of him in that suit. also, testing the waters with a new character bc @fallingfavourites basically dared me to. what do we think?)

Pairing: Joaquin Torres x Reader // Word Count: 2,840

Summary: What was supposed to be a simple in and out ends up with a lot of blood and admissions.

“The gala’s an easy in.” You reasoned.

“It’s a stupid way in.” Sam shook his head.

“It’s not stupid!”

“We can admit it’s a risk, right?” Bucky tried.

You blew out a sigh and leaned further back in your chair. Sam sat in the chair closest, leaning elbows on the table in thought. Bucky was sitting on the edge of the table across from you with the permanent frown he seemed to point in your direction.

“We need the ledger.” You calmly stated. “I have an invitation to their building. They’ve been inviting my family to their events for years trying to win back my mom’s money. I have the best chance at getting in and out.”

“If we go along with this, you’re not going alone.” Sam continued.

“Course not. I’d never go to an event like that without a date.”

“This is serious, Y/N.” Bucky scolded.

“Well aware, thank you.” You rolled your eyes. “I’m not going with either of you. My mom would never let me.”

“Your mom’s not here.”

“But these people know my mother. We went to a couple

of these before she got tired of the ass kissing. I had a date each time with a specific image.”

“What kind of image?” Sam asked though Bucky simply groaned in annoyance.

“Pretty boy.” You shrugged.

“Oh.” Sam scoffed. “I’m not pretty enough for you mom?”

“No.” You laughed. “Neither of you are, but…”

“Don’t say it.” Bucky pointed firmly at you. “He’s not going.”

“I don’t like this anymore than you, Barnes.” You snapped. “You really think I want to take him anywhere?”

“What ever happened between you two anyway?” Sam asked so you turned his way with a fierce glare. “Just asking.” His hands went up in surrender.

“He didn’t tell you?” You stared in suspicion.

“For once, the kid wouldn’t talk.” Bucky answered.

“He’s not a kid.”

“You both are.”

“Buck’s right.” Sam chimed in. “You two used to not be able to stop making eyes at each other then suddenly, you’re avoiding each other like the plague.”

“It doesn’t matter.” You pushed yourself to stand. “I’m bringing him, regardless of anyone’s feelings about it.”

“And if he says no?” Bucky asked.

You frowned at the valid question. If Joaquin said no, you didn’t have a backup plan ready. Instead of confessing that, you spun on your heel and headed to find your former flame.

It wasn’t hard. He was at his computers. You stood beside him and leaned against the edge of his desk. It took a minute for him to register that it was you beside him.

“Hey.” He said carefully. You watched his eyes scan your face quickly before he frowned. “Everything good?”

“You have a suit?” You asked.

“Like a… Like a suit suit?” His voice dropped to a hushed tone.

“No.” You rolled your eyes with a small smile. You quickly shook the expression. “Like a nice suit, for going out.”

“Oh… Yeah, I’ve got one somewhere. Why?”

“We’re going to a gala to take a ledger.” You shrugged.

“Why us?” His brows furrowed but you noticed there was no objection.

“My family has an invite and you clean up nice… You can say no.”

“No!” He said quickly and you raised a brow. “I mean… No, it’s not that I don’t want to. I just kinda figured you’d wanna take someone else.” He explained carefully.

“Unfortunately, no one else fits the bill.” You sighed. 

“You never know.” He shrugged slightly. “Might be fun… Kinda like old times, right?”

“We’ll see… Tomorrow night, be ready by five to head to New York.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He grinned at you, the same damned grin that made your heart beat a little faster.

You had to force your features to remain neutral until you were sure he couldn’t see. You assumed he had seen the flush of your cheeks at the least and you cursed yourself for that.

You hated that you and him didn’t end on necessarily bad terms. You two just couldn’t make it work. Both of you were too focused on other things to truly be present

in your relationship so for all the “moon eyes” Sam swore he saw and the “lost puppy looks” Bucky teased you about, it just hadn’t gone the way you wanted.

But damn it all if you didn’t wish otherwise. Keeping

distance from him was what you thought was best so you both could move on. Your heart, however, didn’t seem to get the memo.

The night of the gala was relatively predictable. Joaquin dawned an all-black ensemble that had you in silent awe when you first saw him. You knew he could dress up when the occasion called for it, but something about the monochrome look hit you hard. You forced yourself

to focus.

Joaquin, however, didn’t hide the way he was blown away by your look. The perfectly tailored gown took his breath away. He couldn’t stop himself from trailing his eyes up and down your figure, tracing the lines of the bodice down to the shape of your hips to that teasingly

high slit in the skirt, which dangerously showed off your legs that looked even longer with the heels you wore.

He didn’t have words for the way the color suited your skin tone, the complimentary tones of your makeup, the delicate pinned style of your hair. He ran a hand over his mouth to hide the smile at the necklace around your throat, the one he had given you for your birthday when you were together.

Sam was waiting with Joaquin and the man let out a long whistle that snapped Joaquin out of his trance.

You laughed slightly before flipping your teammate off.

“Ha ha.” You said sarcastically. “I’ll have you know my mother designed this dress.”

“It’s nice.” Joaquin offered honestly. “You look…” He blew out a breath. “Wow.”

“Thanks.” You nodded slightly, fiddling with the fabric of the skirt. “You look good, too.” You confessed.

He smiled proudly and it was hard not to smile back.

“Alright, alright. Enough of that.” Sam laughed slightly. “Tonight you need to have each others backs, got it? None of this scorned lovers bullshit you pull around here.”

“No one is scorned.” You rolled your eyes. “We’re going to a gala, not infiltrating an enemy stronghold.”

“You kinda are.” Sam countered. “Be quick and be careful. Sooner you guys are back, sooner this is over.”

“Well aware, thank you.” You took hold of Joaquin’s arm and dragged him to the car.

The ride to the event was relatively quiet. The music from the stereo filled the gaps and you were thankful to be driving so you could focus on the road rather than the man in the car with you. Your fingers tapped to the music while Joaquin was playing on his phone.

The gala itself was the same as you remembered. Your arm laced through Joaquin’s, you two fell into an easy stride. You liked the confidence he showed, offering a welcome grin to the people who came to kiss up to you and engaging in conversations when prompted.

“I like this one.” One of the older female investors quietly told you with a sly smile while her husband chatted with Joaquin a few feet away about something you weren’t listening to. “He’s much better than the rest you’ve brought to these things.”

You smiled in agreement and looked over at your date. He waved slightly and you found yourself returning the gesture.

“He’s great.” You agreed, trying unsuccessfully to keep the sadness from your voice.

“Let me guess.” She put a hand over yours. “Mommy doesn’t approve?”

You forced a laugh as if you’d been caught. You hadn’t even considered what your mother would say about Joaquin. She’d probably love him, probably would’ve started dishing out down-payments for your wedding by now.

“My father hated my husband when I brought him home.” The woman laughed. “Destiny used to seem make-believe, but you’re destined for fall. You can’t choose who it is, and neither can your mother.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” You nodded in thanks and made it back to Joaquin. You tucked yourself into his side and looked to the man he spoke with. “I hate to be rude, but I’d like to reclaim my date.”

“By all means.” The man gestured for you to go. “He’s a charming young man. Well done, Ms. Y/L/N.”

You nodded in thanks and pulled Joaquin away.

“You know, I think I’m getting the hang of this whole ‘rich people party’ thing.” Joaquin said proudly, tugging the front of his jacket slightly.

“Cool it, Casanova.” You laughed slightly. “We’re not here to network.”

“Right.” He nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. So… Where do we go now?”

You two managed to sneak away relatively quickly. You searched various offices, going up and up in floors until you nearly gave up. It was practically the last office on the last floor when Joaquin found it wedged behind a bookcase.

“I could kiss you!” You said happily.

He flushed immediately, stammering for a real response, and you had to laugh. You hugged the book and went for the exit.

You had only a split second to regret that decision. Not enough time for you to recognize the threat, to register the flash of silver, to reach for your own blade in your corset.

A sharp pain ignited in a long line down your back. The burning sensation wrapped from your back, around your waist and stopped near your belly button. You looked down in shock and saw the split in your gown, the growing stain of blood.

You wobbled on your feet from the explosion of pain and felt a strong pair of arms catch you. A warm piece of fabric was draped over your shoulders and pulled close. The hand that wasn’t locked on the ledger was wrapped around your midsection, trying to keep the blood inside your body.

That sword almost cut you in half.

You didn’t even register he was talking to you until he shook your shoulders.

“Y/N, we need to move. Can you walk?” He asked firmly.

Any hint of the charming, flirty man you masqueraded with was gone. In his place was the battle trained soldier, looking out for his own. He was looking into your eyes, and your heart sank at the worry reflected.

It really was bad.

“You’re not dying here. Understand?” He insisted.

You managed a weak nod and followed him out. He managed to keep you two in the shadows for the most part, avoiding the brunt of the search for you. You had only encountered three men, thankful they didn’t have swords as well, and you used the ledger to knock one of them out while Joaquin managed against the other two.

When you came back to the gala, Joaquin did the talking. He said you two were heading out for a much funner night but you’d sing their praises to your mother. A few name drops and handshakes later, Joaquin was able to get you into the car and begin the drive back.

Maybe an hour into the drive, you began to slip in and out of consciousness.

He reached over and immediately took your hand in his. He gave it a squeeze and your eyes opened a little wider.

“Stay with me, Y/N… C’mon.” He begged.

“We need to… to stop somewhere.” You said between shallow breaths. The bleeding had slowed but you were left exhausted and cold, despite Joaquin’s jacket still over your shoulders, and you had kicked off your heels at some point. You had half a thought to ask if you had bled through it. “We can’t drive… all the… all the way back…  like this.”

“Where are we gonna stop?” His voice was near desperation and you couldn’t stop the pang of guilt.

“Anywhere.” You gritted your teeth as you shifted in the seat. You took as deep a breath as you could manage and rapidly spoke in one long exhale. “First hotel you see. I don’t care the price or the quality or the size. You find us a room and make sure I live through this night.”

He said nothing but squeezed your hand again.

You didn’t know how long it was until you were pulling into a run down roadside hotel. You rummaged through your purse for your credit card and shoved it at him. He promised he’d be quick before locking you in the car.

True to his word, he was at your door with a room key quickly. He practically carried you to the hotel room.

Once the door closed, you all but collapsed. He was quick to catch you, but he wasn’t able to avoid your injury. You cried out at the pain, gripping his shirt sleeve.

He helped you to the bathroom and you needed his help to get the dress off. You didn’t know if it was his hands shaking or your body. The dress fell with a thud, leaving you in short spandex and a bra. Joaquin ran the tap and used one of the towels to clear the blood away. The friction of the rough fabric against the tender skin had you gripping the sink and wincing sharply.

“Shit, Y/N.” He muttered. You glanced up to meet his eyes in the mirror.

“That bad?” You rasped. Your body weight was mostly supported by the countertop.

“Now would be a great time for some special healing ability.” He flicked his attention to you with a nervous smile. “Any chance?”

“No.” You offered the same smile. “My bag in the trunk… It has a kit if you…”

“Hey.” His hands found your hips and turned you around. “Stay with me.”

“Trying…”

“Try harder.”

You nodded quietly, placing a hand on his arm. He looked down at it, smiled to himself, then focused on the slash across your stomach.

“Keep talking.” Your voice was close to a whisper but somehow, Joaquin heard.

“I, uh…” He began nervously. “I used to think you’d come to your senses, but you never did. You left me alone with all these questions… I didn't have answers but I also couldn’t have given you more.”

He squeezed your hip slightly and you made a noise of acknowledgement.

“I guess I accepted that you wouldn’t be mine again but…”

“But?” You croaked.

“I’ll always be yours, Y/N.”

You chuckled slightly as Joaquin’s eyes met yours.

“Tell me that when I’m coherent.” You smiled slightly.

He laughed a bit and nodded. “Let’s dress these wounds and get you something to eat. The guys’ll be pissed if you don’t make it back.”

You hummed in agreement and leaned into him. He guided you to the bed and sat you on the edge before he scurried off. Within five minutes, he was back with your pack on his shoulders and an arm full of vending machine treats.

He shoved an orange juice bottle and packet of pretzels into your hands while he rummaged in your pack. You lifted your arms while he placed, wrapped, and taped the dressing into place. The pain had dulled since you first got the wound or maybe you were used to it. The dizziness was receding slowly thanks to the snack Joaquin brought, which were both empty by the time he finished.

“Thank you.” You dropped the trash to the end table.

“I’m always here for you, Y/N, whether you want it or not.” He put a hand to your cheek for a moment.

“Joaquin, I…” You began, then found yourself lost for words.

There were things you could apologize for. But should you apologize for breaking up with him? For avoiding him? For getting yourself nearly sliced in half?

“We can talk about it later.” He offered kindly. “You feel okay?”

“All things considered, yeah… I’ll make it.”

“Good.” The relief was palpable in his tone. “You should rest now.”

You nodded quietly and shifted back against the flat pillow. The blanket was thin and scratchy, but the exhaustion overruled the quality of the bedding. You were lucid enough, however, to notice Joaquin wasn’t lying down.

“Joaquin?”

“The couch pulls out.” He reasoned.

“You should have the bed.” You began to push yourself up but his hands were gently forcing you back down. “Let me-“

“You almost bled out tonight. I think you deserve the bed.”

You grabbed one of his hands. “We can share. We’ve done it before.”

“You sure?”

“Please?” You pulled your best pout and he broke almost immediately.

He discarded his dress shirt and slacks before climbing into the bed beside you. You rolled to your other side to face him.

“Maybe it’s the near death experience talking…” You said quietly, as if you two were sharing secrets. “But I think I’ve come to my senses.”

“Yeah?” He brushed some loose hairs off your forehead. “Tell me in the morning.”

[mydearlybeloathed]

── 𝐁𝐄𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐎𝐀𝐓𝐒𝐖𝐀𝐈𝐍

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: without a major, eye catching skill, you attempt to make up for it by doing everything for everyone all at once--the crew only notices when it all comes crashing down.

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: strawhats x sanjissister!reader, minor zoro x reader

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4.6k

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭: reader is sanji's sister, reader is bad at emotions (same), first fic of college! woo!, injuries, stitches, blood, angst and comfort, requested

𝐎𝐏 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓 | 𝐒𝐀𝐍𝐉𝐈'𝐒 𝐒𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐀𝐆𝐀

Being the Strawhat Boatswain was no easy task, but you held it with determination and pride. Even when your crew made the job more than difficult.

You took in a deep breath and let it out slowly; Someone had messed with your inventory. 

Again.

You stood in the storage room, wondering who had the gall to come and move things around. The cannonballs were no longer in the crate by the window, but behind many other crates of lantern oil. The box once full of toothbrushes and toothpaste was down to its last bottle when it should still be half full. And to top it all off, the medical supplies shelf was out of order. The bandages were at the bottom and the disinfectant was next to the gauze!

It was enough to make your skin crawl.

Taking another deep breath, you shook out your shoulders, went through five stages of grief, and accepted the mess at hand, swiping a roll of bandages from the shelf and leaving the room to deal with some other day. 

Inventory was a job you liked. You took your role seriously, always on top of what was needed or wanted, ensuring it was acquired. Day in and day out you thought of everyone else, desperate to be useful.

You took this responsibility so seriously that your own self-care had gotten lost in the mix of Luffy’s food requests, Nami’s financial ledgers, and the weekly task of inventory. You’d lost sleep and skipped meals in the name of keeping order. 

Because if you didn’t, who would?

It didn’t matter anyway. You loved taking care of everyone. It made you feel useful. And as someone not as skilled with a sword or as knowledgeable with maps, that was worth a million hours of (much needed) sleep.

So you yawned and pushed open the door to your and Nami’s shared room, finding her hunched over her makeshift crate desk, squinting through the lamplight. Her forearm was still bleeding, splotches of red seeping through the first bandage. 

“I’ll handle this,” you startled her. “You fix that.”

Nami hadn’t seemed to notice the condition of her injury, chuckling dismissively as she worked at redressing the wound. “Thanks. My eyes needed a rest.”

Your own eyes longed to rest as she said it, straining under stress and overwork to finish doing the math of how many pounds of sugar, flour, and grain you’d need for the next stretch at sea. You picked up the sheet and made to your own desk, plopping down.

You underlined the last calculation as Nami tied off her bandage. Leaning back in your chair, you threw down your pencil and rested your eyes, knowing there was more work to be done despite the dark hour. As if on cue, the potter pattering of small hooves led up to your door, followed by a soft knocking. A smile spread on your face instantly. “Come in, Doc.”

The reindeer peeked his antlers and eyes in first, stepping inside when all was clear. “Is it a bad time?”

Nami swiveled to straddle the back of her desk chair. “Never. What’s up?”

His eyes blinked up at you first. “It’s time for your physical. Do you want to do it now?”

Immediate sirens went off in your head. “Physical?”

“We’ve all had one,” Nami piped in. “It’s just to make sure we’re all healthy. Your turn.”

“Good one,” you chuckled dryly. “I don’t do check ups, Doc. Sorry.”

Chopper’s little brows met instantly, his hooves falling to his sides. You shifted around to avoid his narrowed gaze. “Y/N, it’s important. I need to know where your health is so I can plan for the future.”

“My health is perfeclty fine and if anything changes,” you laughed, “I’ll let you know, Chop. I’m fine.”

But Nami wasn’t giving you a grin when you turned to her for support, her lips downturned. “I dunno. If Chopper thinks he should check you out then—”

“I said I’m good,” you snapped more sharply, going on in a concerningly peppy tone, “If I need help, I’ll ask for it.”

The way Chopper defleated nearly had you taking it all back, but you stood your ground, trying to make him feel better with a smile. His ears only drooped further until Nami said, “Can you help me, actually? I need to redo this bandage.”

She raised a brow over Chopper’s shoulder, silently asking a question you didn’t catch, so you grinned and shrugged it off. Standing, you caled over your shoulder, “I’m seeing if anyone needs anything.”

Chopper heaved a sigh as the door shut behind you. Nami pat his head gently, lips pursed. “She’ll warm up to it. Give ‘er time.”

“I know,” Chopper sighed. “I’m just… getting worried, I guess.”

“What do you mean?”

Chopper thought back to the past few months he’d been on the crew. Overall, you didn’t exhibit any alarming behavior. You worked hard and cared deeply, that was all. But… Chopper couldn’t place it, but he wanted to make sure everything was really all right. “It’s nothing.”

Hopefully, you warmed up to check ups quickly, at least for his own sake.

જ ⁀ ➴

You'd been careless—that’s what you blamed it on, at least.

The opposing pirate crew hadn't exactly caught the Straw Hats off guard. Nami was on watch that early morning, and she had a great record of raising the alarm. So when the enemy ship sidled up to the going merry and the dozen or so pirates jumped aboard, most of the crew was ready.

But you hadn't been at your best for days, maybe even weeks if you really admitted it. Sleep was so far away and your hunger was on this odd anxiety–induced strike. You barely felt real anymore, simply wandering through the ship doing various tasks that presented themselves, but never really taking time to breathe. 

You weren't entirely surprised when a pirate caught you off guard, coming at you from behind and getting a nick at your side—not a nick, actually. His sword had marked a pretty deep gash at your waist, and even when you thought the flow of bleeding was done, you somehow had more to give.

In the aftermath of the fight, as much as you attempted to brush off the concerns of the others, your heaving breath and greenish complexion were giving away everything. Besides, Sanji had known something was up since the first time you'd told him you "weren't hungry enough for dinner."

So as the sun rose above the horizon and the cleaning of the Merry's deck was completed, there was no escaping your fate. The haze of night no longer concealed your wounds.

Usopp was the first to notice. His gaze caught your stuttering breaths and the very obvious grimace you gave when trying to haul a dead pirate over the railing. He took the weight of the body in seconds, tossing it over.

"You don't look too hot," he observed, to which you scoffed and flicked your hands in nonchalance.

"It's nothing I can't fix." But you hadn't realized just how much blood was soaking in the fabric of your shirt, and one turn of your body displayed the vast crimson to him. Usopp's sharp inhale caught your attention, and with a grunted snarl you griped, "What?"

By now, nami had walked past, her own eyes catching your shirt. You glanced down and cursed at the sight. "I'm fine, okay? It's not that bad—"

But Nami already called out, "Sanji!" 

You rolled your eyes, gut bubbling anxiously. "Relax, would you? It's just a scratch. Honestly, we should use supplies for worse wounds—"

The breathy gasp behind you was unmistakably your brother's, and you swiveled to find him staring at your abdomen. "Pip…”

"What?" you snapped, self-conscious as your crossed your arms.

Luffy and Zoro had joined the show as well, causing anxiety to burn a hole in your good sense.

Sanji couldn't move, couldn't say a word. As you fumed up at him, all he saw was his baby sister, her face growing paler by the second, the flutter of your eyes weak, the red staining your clothes growing larger—

And then it hit him: The battle had occurred several hours ago. His eyes snapped to meet yours. "How long have you been bleeding out?"

"Sanji—"

"Stop," he said, and you did, your jaw snapping back up. His eyes skimmed you over with a hundred different thoughts, before he broke the contact and gently approached you. “Let's get this cleaned up, yeah?"

He sounded so soft, so much like how he used to when you were just young enough to still get by not knowing how shit the world was. It made you flinch away from him, not at all fond of the warm feeling of vulnerability welling up inside. "Shove off, Sanji. You're shit at dressing wounds."

"I'll do it then," said Chopper, stepping forward. In the little reindeer’s eyes was far too much concern. It left your skin crawling.

"No." You backed away from them till your back hit the ship's side and tried to ignore how featherlight your head felt. "Don't waste good supplies on me. It's not worth it."

Sanji gaped. "... What?"

You sighed, frustrated, and made to storm back to your cabin to sulk away the pain seeping through your limbs, raising your head to snap at them again.

Immediately, you found Luffy's eyes locked on you, all your words falling flat. He had never been scary—he was Luffy—but right then, well, you were frightened by the look in his eyes; it was something like confusion mulled with frustration.

"Not worth it?" He echoed.

Glancing around for help and finding none, you shrugged.

Luffy blinked, and you felt like apologizing, but he spoke before you could. "It's not waste if it's used on you, Y/N."

"I..."

Sanji sighed like he was suddenly out of breath, catching your eye again. His eyes were shining, and not in the charming way. It was a heartbroken kind of look, and it ate away at your insides. "You didn't tell anyone... because you thought it wasn't worth it?"

"Well," you stammered. "I mean—it's not as bad as it looks."

You felt their stares—how each of them was looking at you with such pity it made you sick—and you cracked, sputtering. "Just back off! It's a little blood and I'll heal. Zoro did!"

The swordsman in question stiffened as you thrust a hand at him, his ever-deathly gaze boring into you. “Yeah, ‘cause I wasn't being a stubborn bitch about it."

You were in the middle of an eye roll when the headache started. Honestly, why did they care? It was you keeping up with their asses half the time. You didn't need the same treatment. You had your own shit handled.

You tried walking away, and you thought you'd had it handled, but then the world started spinning, and your side really did ache, and suddenly you were in sanji's arms as he gritted out your name.

You were tired, very tired, so you blinked up at him, and fell asleep.

As one can assume, the entire crew lost their shit.

જ ⁀ ➴

In the eight hours you were unconscious, nobody sat still. Someone was always pacing, arguing, tapping something—agitation just sat over the whole ship. 

Sanji would say those eight hours were the longest hours of his life. He would say it rivaled the eighty-five days on that damn rock. It rivaled everything, because it was you. His sister. 

He couldn’t bring himself to debrief all that you’d said and what it meant… but him mind brought him there anyway. Sanji beat himself up over and over. If only he’d noticed something was wrong—he should have noticed… which made him realize he hadn’t a clue what was wrong.

He was in the middle of cooking your favorite meal for when you woke up when the image of you fainting in a graceful arc crossed his mind, and how he’d lunged to catch you. Maybe it was just being in the kitchen, but it somewhat reminded him of when you were kids.

You, so much younger and frailer, were prancing atop the counteertops of the Baratie, playing the part of Red Leg Zeff with your boots covered in marinara. The real Zeff, not so Red Legged, battled you with a wooden spoon as he simultaneously fought of his growing fondness. You tripped over your own slimy boot laces and, ever the dramatic, used the opportunity to swan dive to the floor.

Yet you hadn’t made it to the floor, not even close. Sanji had you safe in his arms the second your foot slipped off the counter. When he scolded you for being reckless, you grinned and chirped, “I knew you’d catch me!”

Sanji had caught you again, but not fast enough this time. Lately, he was never fast enough to keep up with your ever-growing mind. Each day you got quicker on your feet, jumping to accomplish task after task after task—Sanji paused as he prepared the food. When was the last time he saw you take a break?

When you woke up, your head was anywhere but in your body, the sensations of the room around you slowly drifting back to you.

Groggy, you shuffled in the sheets, skin sticky with sweat. Your eyes adjusted to the brightness, fluttering open. You sat up groaning, blinking fully awake, only to pause. Sat on the stool across from your bed was Zoro, solemn as ever. He looked half asleep, but the sound of your rustling startled him awake, eyes lazily widening to take you in. 

He made to ask something, but you beat him to it, woozily wondering about the odd tick in his brow. "What's up with your face?"

His brows screwed together, but that look never left his eyes; you couldn't place what it was. "What d’you mean?"

"You look..." Your eyes flickered all over him, and you thought maybe, he looked relieved. "Nothing. Sorry. I feel weird."

“I’ll bet.” He leaned forward to glance you over, and you settled on yes, Zoro was definitely concerned. He'd never looked that way before, and the oddity had you leaning closer subconsciously. Zoro jerked back instantly, blinking quickly. "You feel better, though, right?”

You did a quick check of your body, sensing your limbs and tapping at the bandage covering your abdomen. “I think so.” 

Zoro nodded stiffly, eyes flickering all over the floor. “Want me to get Twirly? I mean—Sanji?"

Typically, you weren’t the transparent type, but your head wasn't where it should be, so all your thoughts suddenly came out as words. "Is he mad? He usually gets mad when I get hurt."

Zoro moved to kneel at your bedside when you started to prop yourself up, eyes glued to your lap. He watched you carefully. "I don't think he's mad at you."

"But I got hurt," you exasperated. "I wasn't watching my back and got—got skewered! He hates it when I get... skewered." You rubbed at your temples and let out a weak laugh, brain fog fading. "Am I making sense?"

You raised your gaze to find a hint of amusement on Zoro’s face, his lips tipped upward. "Barely, but I follow."

You felt at your side, wincing at the pricking pain of the wound and the bruise forming around it. Chopper had done a good job with the bandage, though it was about time to change it.

"Hey," he said, dragging your wandering attention back to him.

"Yeah?"

Zoro's face grew cold. "Don't ever pull that shit again. You get hurt, you tell someone. Even if you think it's a waste."

You averted your eyes. "Yeah. Cross my heart and shit."

He wasn't satisfied, but he leaned back and raked a hand through his hair, leaving it alone for now. That was when the door opened, and you felt his presence before you ever turned your face.

"Oh, God," Sanji gasped. He rushed to your side, falling to his knees and setting a hand on your shoulder, just staring at you like you weren't even real. He passed a hand over your hair and sighed like he had the weight of Atlas on him.

"You're okay," he said, not so much a question, more of a reassurance. Neither of you noticed when Zoro slipped out of the room, nor when he knocked into the doorframe as he went.

"I'm okay," you said.

Sanji's hugs had always been lethal, always too tight for comfort but too sweet to turn away—and this was no different. His arms were careful to avoid your side as he pulled you to him, your head finding a nook against his chest as his chin rested on your head, and he squeezed you tightly.

Silently, you let him hold you, remaining still against him. You felt his tears, but never heard them. You felt his grip on you like a brand, that same old discomfort crawling through your gut the longer the intimacy went on. But you withstood it, an odd kind of burn creeping up your throat.

You choked on a cough—no, you weren't coughing. You couldn't fool yourself into believing such a lie, not when your eyes slammed shut and forced streams of tears down your cheeks. Your hands clawed at his sleeves as a warbled cry claws its way from your lips. 

"You're worth everything," he whispered into your hair. "Oh, God. I really thought..."

"But I didn't." you calmed your ragged breaths. "I'm fine."

He nearly laughed. "Fine? Pipsqueak, you were out half the day!"

You pulled back with a grin. "Eh. Just a scratch."

Sanji shook his head, smiling, before it fell instantaneously. He held you by your shoulders, shaking you slightly. "Why would you... was it something I did? I would never—"

"No! No, it was nothing you did."

"Then why in hell would you try to walk off a wound that needed sixteen stitches!"

"I don't know!" you looked away. "I just... there was too much to do. Everyone would need things done after a battle like that. I wanted to be, I dunno, ready and able."

Sanji still didn't understand. "What things?"

"You know," you started. "Things." He gave you a look. You sighed. "Like... sometimes Zoro lets me polish his swords, and in exchange he'll clean the little nicks he claims won't give him infections. And I think Luffy's hat needed fixing. Usopp never organizes the canon balls right and it makes me nervous, so I always go back and redo it… And on top of all that someone went through my inventory."

He took you in for a moment, and you felt very, very transparent all of a sudden. "None of that is your responsibility alone."

"Yeah, but, who else is gonna do them? Everyone’s so busy doing their things. I don't have a thing, so I do everything, I guess."

Sanji tilted his head, brows knit. "You do too have a thing."

"I really don't, Sanji. I don't cook or kick people like you. I'm not amazing with swords or a slingshot. I can't navigate for shit or heal wounds... so I help. If I don't, I'm pretty much deadweight." In the following silence, you mumbled something you never thought you’d have the courage to say. “Face it. Luffy only invited me because I’m your sister.”

Perhaps you should go back to the Baratie, as much as the thought sickened you. Zeff would never turn you away, and he’d even be happy to have you back. 

“Not true.” You looked up, heart dropping at the sight of luffy in the doorway, the rest of the crew behind him. You shot Zoro an accusatory glare, wiping furiously at your face. Perfect. A waiting audience.

You rasped, “What?”

Luffy moved into the room, face sullen, his hat and curls shadowing his face. “I didn’t invite you because of Sanji.” Luffy ducked down to be eye level with you on the bed. “Honestly, I didn’t know you were related till a few days after you joined.”

“Oh.” Sniffling, you ducked your eyes. “Then why? I… I don’t contribute much of anything, and when I try I wind up passed out for half a day.”

Nami scoffed, “That wasn’t your fault.”

You scoffed right back. “I shouldn’t have left my back unguarded.”

“You shouldn’t have been skipping sleep,” Zoro rebuttled, eyes steely. “And meals.”

Swiping at your cheek again, “Screw you.” You picked at your nails and refused to look up at all costs. It was difficult with Luffy right in your face.

The captain had his brows screwed together. His eyes bore into you till he grew tired of your avoidance and lightly pushed at your shoulder. Your gaze flicked up to meet his, quick to glance at the wall over his shoulder. 

“Y/N,” he muttered, “We care about you. And you worried us.”

And just like that, all your work to keep the tears in crumbled; one rebellious tear escaped, leading a dangerous path down to your chin. “Yeah. I know.”

That got a whisper of a smile back on Luffy’s face, and his hand came to plop down on you shoulder. “You’re part of this crew because we need you.”

“For what?” you dared to scoff. Instantly, Luffy’s eyes narrowed further than you thought possible. 

He echoed your words back to you like they felt weird on his tongue, and gave no further reply, simply staring right through you. You had already shirvled into yourself by the time Sanji stepped in.

“I can never keep track of how much food we go through,” he said, nudging your shoulder, “but somehow you always know exactly what we need and how much. As a chef, you inventory is vital to me.”

“I’m convinced you’re a mind reader,” Usopp added on. “Still no clue how you knew I wanted marshmallows last week.”

You chuckled dryly, gaze still heavy, obviously hesitant to take them serious. Nami sighed deeply.

“Listen,” she started, moving to kneel in front of you. It was times like this Nami felt much older, when her eyes peered into yours and it felt like home (a home so distant you ached to remember it). “It doesn’t matter what you believe. You contribute so much to this crew, more than you need to most days.”

Chopper bobbed up beside her. “Yeah! You do everything and then you never let me look after you!” It was hard to focus on what he said when he was so cute, but somehow when he narrowed his eyes all angry like, he held your rapt attention. “Let me do my job, so you’re able to do yours!”

“On the topic,” Zoro grunted, “quit overworking yourself. When Usopp fucks up the canonballs let him fix it himself.”

“Hey!”

You barely withheld a smile. “But… there’s still so much I can’t do—”

Zoro rolled his eyes. “You wanna learn how to fight? I’ll teach you. Just—quit being stupid and sleep, dammit.” His cheeks dusted pink and his eyes darted to the wall, unable to catch your tentative expression.

Luffy squeezed your shoulder. “You’re our boatswain. Just like Nami is our navigator and Sanji is our cook. The only one questioning your position is you.”

You sniffled, looking right in his eyes, and something in what he said finally broke through. You couldn’t cook or fight or navigate—but you had a damn good memory, you kept the ship organized, you made sure no one ever wanted for anything. You were the Strawhat Boatswain. Surely that held some weight.

“Okay, yeah, I get it,” you muttered, palms pressing against your cheeks as you cleared your throat. Glancing around at them all, you shoved down the creeping feeling in your chest and grinned cheekily. “But whoever’s been screwing with the storage room better knock it off, or I’ll be up all night fixing their mess.”

Silence enveloped you as everyone glanced around for suspicion, when Chopper burst forth with watery eyes. “I’m sorry! Really sorry! I didn’t realize I messed it up, I—I—”

“Slow down,” you smiled. You caught Chopper’s hooves in your hands and squeezed them tight. “It’s okay. I’m not really upset.”

If it was anyone else, maybe the story would be different, but all you felt was warm affection staring down at Chopper. He nodded swiftly. “I’ll help you fix it! Don’t worry.”

“I’ll help too,” offered Nami, none too subtle as she jabbed her elbow in the crook of Luffy’s side. 

“Ow! What—Quit that!” Luffy nursed the sting in his side, brows screwed together. “Me too, I guess…”

“We all will,” Nami declared, eyes scanning the room in search of an objection. She found none, a pleased smile gracing her lips. “See? You don’t even need to ask. We want to help you. Remember that next time you feel like everything is on you.”

“All right,” you conceded warmly. That familiar affection tugged on your heartstrings. You slid your legs off the bed and made to stand when a hand clamped down on your shoulder and nearly knocked you down. “Sanji, let go.”

Your brother’s jaw was set and gaze resolved, scaring the stubbornness right out of you. “You need rest. We can fix the storage room tomorrow, Pipsqueak.”

“But—”

“You’re actively bleeding through your stitches,” he cut you off, grinning when you pouted. “Tomorrow. Your inventory isn’t going anywhere.”

You were left gaping at him, eyes scanning for someone on your side. Nami raised a brow. Zoro’s expression was blank. Usopp avoided your eye. Chopper looked so sure of himself that you didn’t even try. So instead, you puffed out a breath and readjusted yourself on the bed. 

“I expect everyone’s attendance tomorrow morning,” you grumbled.

Usopp gawked at you. “Morning?”

One glare was all it took and his jaw snapped back up. Your temples began to throb fiercely, the gradual increase in pressure suddenly erupting into a full ache. The base of your neck was sore too and your lash line weighed down in gentle flutters. Sanji’s hand on your shoulder kept you from floating away into the delirium, your gaze searching as it swept over all your friends.

That tight tendril of awkward affection curled around your heart, as it often did, and it felt as undesirable as always. But no one pressed for any outward expression of it; your friends simply stood in your midst, wearing there hearts on sleeves of various vulnerability, not a hint of expectation anywhere on their faces. 

Times like this, you thought maybe you could bare to ditch your fears. Then again, maybe not, but you dismissed the hope fondly. 

“All right,” Chopper grunted, cheeks puffed. “Everyone out. She needs lots of rest—starting now!”

You chuckled dryly as the little doctor shooed everyone away. Nami shot you a quick little wave and disapeared into the hall, Sanji squeezed your hand, and Usopp gave a brief thumbs up. Zoro was left holding the door, solemn as ever, and paused int he act of closing the door. He appeared between the door and the frame, not quite in yet not quite out either.

“I was serious,” he said lowly.

You tilted your head. “About overowkring myself?”

“Well, yeah, that,” he stammered. “I mean about learning to fight. I’ll teach you.”

You’re sure your eyes glimmered, heart thrumming unexpectedly. “Really?” He nodded, crossing his arms. “Sanji won’t like it.”

“He doesn’t like a lot of things.”

“Primarily you.”

A scant smirk, one born of mischief and misdeed, crept up his face. “Primarily me, yeah.”

You shook your head and fought back a smile. “I don’t have a sword.”

He paused long enough for you to notice. “I’ve got three.”

“I couldn’t,” you said instantly, jaw falling open. “Those’re important.”

Zoro rolled a shoulder and combed at his hair. “I trust you.”

He was gone before you’d finished gasping, eyes wide as the door swung shut in his wake, and unsure when a sudden heatwave had flooded the room.

𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: @100520s @murnsondock @kryscent