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mega2mind · 10 days ago

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# — calling mark grayson "small."

got fried as fuck and this shit came to me like a prophecy. a dream. i know i have my to-do list, but it’s hard for me to write stuff i’m no longer in the exact headspace for. like, i need to wait until i can get into it enough to feel it the way i did when i first thought of it. anyways, this is set in a universe that’s pretty canon-compliant: mark and amber broke up, but he hasn’t dropped out of college (yet) or ended up with eve. you also have no clue he’s invincible, just that he’s had a glow up and your cute, dorky friend from high school is now fine as shit. i also listened to “party favors” by leon thomas and big sean the entire time i worked on this.

lastly, i'd like to give a humongous shoutout to @omniphilic for beta-reading this monster for me! much love, sunshine, and godspeed, my children. enjoy! | wc: 7.9k words.

cw: nsfw mdni (18+), afab!reader, a lot of porn with a lot of plot, light angst, confessions, banter, friends-to-lovers, mentions of amber (i love you girl but it’s so easy to use you as a plot device </3), oral sex (f!recieving), explicit sex (p in v), missionary, squirting, dirty talk, praise, soft!dom mark, consider this my apology for the hurt/very little comfort v!card mark x reader fic <3

thinking about you joking around with mark grayson and calling him… small. you know where.

it sounds like such a silly scenario, but walk w/ me: you and mark have an… odd friendship. looking back on it, you two were an unlikelier pair than winning the lottery. you’re from completely different worlds– you were more on the straight and narrow: the academic side of things. all you did was bust your ass, and you had plenty to show for it– friends, awards, this air of recognition that followed you from classroom to classroom.

and mark? well, he fell more into the category of incredibly average. average grades, average social life, even an average reputation amongst the student body– the kind that makes you easy to remember and always gets you labeled as a “pretty cool guy,” but keeps you out of any real trouble. maybe that’s part of his charm– the fact that everything about him is initially so unassuming, so run of the mill that you don’t even think twice. not until you start to get to know him.

there’s plenty that sticks out once you get to know him.

then, somehow, at the start of your senior year, you two ended up partnered together for a project in the same upper-level english class. y’know, the college freshman one everyone takes because it’s a cheap credit, regardless of if they’re going to harvard to study law, or to the local community college to save a bit of money. neither of you had many expectations, but you and mark became fast friends. mark’s awkward charm grew on you, and he already had a decent opinion of you from seeing you around, but finally being in a situation where he could talk to you and not feel like a nuisance only made him think of you more highly than before. you were cool as shit; he has no idea how you two hadn’t spoken sooner.

but it’s no surprise that you two absolutely nailed the project. with your smarts and mark’s willingness to learn, the grade on it ended up being so good that it made you jump into mark’s arms out of pure excitement. mark caught you effortlessly, spinning you around and giggling alongside you without a second thought. the intimacy of such a reaction didn’t dawn on you two until long after he set you down, you grinning giddily in his face, while he could do nothing but grin back.

that’s how you ended up here– lying in mark’s bed, long after graduation, and visiting home from campus on a long weekend. you’re wearing one of his t-shirts and reading one of his copies of seance dog as he works on a paper. when you found out you two would be attending the same university, you were more than stoked. mark was stoked too, but he was so sure you could’ve gotten into one of chicago’s finest, or, better yet, move away from illinois entirely, rather than attend upstate university. he gave you a hesitant look when you said you were more than content with your choice, saying that a degree is a degree no matter where you went and that as long as you could be with mark, it would be worth it. deep down, though, mark swore something bloomed in his chest that day. he doesn’t really know what that feeling was– is, to be more accurate, because he still feels it sometimes– but that’s the least of his worries.

his main worry is getting this paper in by 11:59 pm tonight.

and just like that, the rhythmic clacking of mark’s fingers against the keyboard fills the silence and leaves you to bask in this comforting sensation of warmth. you’re so relaxed that you can’t bring yourself to move. not that you would have wanted to, anyway.

it’s peaceful. so, of course, you have to ruin it.

“you ever want to fuck a cartoon character?” you suddenly say, the copy of seance dog in your hand and your foot crossed over your knee. you hear the way mark’s typing pauses for a moment, and imagining his reaction forces you to bite back a snicker. a pregnant silence fills the room before the typing begins again, just as rhythmic and hypnotic as before.

“i know you’re not saying that about seance dog,” mark finally quips back, his voice dripping with an absurd amount of mirth. you can hear his smile in his voice– you always can, because mark rarely doesn’t smile. it’s one of your favorite things about him.

you can’t help but take the bait.

“you think i could be?” you ask, tone scandalized and brows raised. neither of you move to face each other just yet– you don’t need to. you can tell exactly what face mark’s making from the sound of his voice, and mark can do the same for you. it’s how he knows that you’ve stopped biting back that smug smile of yours– the one that creeps across your face when you’re clearly up to something, but he doesn’t know what. you’re a troublemaker; it’s one of his favorite things about you.

“yeah,” he replies without missing a beat, “i clearly know nothing about you. i was once dumb enough to think you were intimidating.”

“i’m still intimidating!”

“yeah, maybe on occasion,” mark teases, his typing ceasing completely so that he can spin around in his chair. he leans against it with his head tossed back and his arms on the armrests, eying you gleefully as you put the comic face down on the bed. “most of the time i forget because you’re too busy saying shit that’s uncomfortably close to ‘i wanna fuck seance dog.’”

“eat shit and die, mark.”

“i don’t wanna.”

“then shut the fuck up and answer the question!”

“fine, fine!” mark laughs and lifts his hands up lazily off the chair in mock-surrender. “‘course i’ve wanted to fuck a cartoon character. who hasn’t? i’m not a nun.”

something flashes in your eyes, and you shift to lean forward towards where mark’s sitting, propping up on your elbows on the bed. you grin mischievously; it’s clear you’re up to nothing remotely good.

“who?” you ask.

mark replies immediately. “koriand’r.”

“wha– from the titans?”

“no, from the avengers. yes, from the titans. who else would i be talking about?”

“alright, down, boy,” you say amusedly, making mark roll his eyes. “i was just checking. but you obviously can’t handle that.”

mark raises an eyebrow. “says who?”

“uhh, says me?"

the two of you are still for a moment, and you start to fear you said something wrong until you see mark’s eyes darken in that telltale way they do when he starts to feel challenged. then, as if that wasn’t enough to give you goosebumps, he does that stupid, mindless thing he does with his tongue, where he runs it along the inside of his cheek. your breath stills in your chest when mark pushes up off the back of his chair and leans forward towards where you lie on the bed, elbows resting on his knees and hands clasped between his thighs.

it’s hard to keep your gaze from dropping to the veins in his hands.

“oh yeah?” mark asks incredulously, tilting his head. you were joking about being the intimidating one earlier, but the real intimidator is mark. when he gets serious, you swear you can feel something in the air shift. maybe that’s why it feels like the hairs on the back of your neck are standing up right now.

“why not?”

the question, in its simple nature, catches you off guard, and in a brief moment of confusion, you tilt your head. “why not what?” “why couldn’t i handle her?”

you stare at mark as if he’s joking, but instead of him laughing and waving you off, mark stares back at you expectantly, brow arched and lips quirked up at the corners. it’s like he wants to smile, but he can’t. won’t.

this dickhead must have a death wish.

“what do you mean ‘why couldn’t you handle her?’” you say casually– like what you’re saying is most obvious thing in the world. “it’s koriand’r, mark. she’d chew you up and spit you out before you even had time to undo your belt.”

you swipe up your copy of seance dog and busy yourself with trying to find where on the page you last left off. honestly, it doesn’t matter where you start reading. you’re willing to do anything to help get your mind off the weight of mark’s eyes boring into you.

“besides,” you huff, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible, “koriand’r has standards, and you probably have a small dick, anyway.”

the second those words leave your mouth, the room falls deathly silent, and you swear it’s as if the air has been sucked out of the room. you fall still where you’re at, hoping that somehow, someway, you not moving will make mark want to kill you less. you really don’t know what possessed you to say that– it was a poor attempt at deflection, considering the growing amount of tension you began feeling in that room– but you don’t mean it. didn’t mean it. not one bit.

you’re doing mental gymnastics to figure out how you can take it back without sounding like a total loser before mark starts laughing, and the joyous and boisterous sound gives you pause.

he couldn’t have found that funny… could he?

okay, yeah, after a little bit of consideration, he very well could have. this is mark grayson, you’re talking about– not one of the insecure guys you were used to dealing with, who were more likely to blow a blood vessel than a load at the idea of being perceived as “unmanly.” mark’s the type of guy to wear one of your crop tops because he knows you’ll whine about him stretching them out, or wear a maid dress as a punishment for losing a bet, masking his embarrassment with quips about how good his legs look. you also know mark enough to know he’s not a virgin, nor is he a prude, but not well enough to know intimate details about his sex life. sure, jokes are fine, but a play-by-play on how he screwed his ex feels… invasive. beyond the scope of your shared comfort. it was just something you never thought of asking.

well, more like something you could never bring yourself to ask.

you set the comic back down on the bed just in time to watch mark wipe some tears from his eyes, twisting around to face his laptop with a smile on his face. he resumes typing like nothing happened, like you didn’t just obliterate his manhood and leave it in pieces for him to pick up off the floor. it’s hard not to gawk at him in disbelief, blinking rapidly for a few moments before speaking.

“that– didn’t upset you?” you say tentatively, voice a lot meeker than initially intended. mark huffs out a laugh and spins around, hands back to resting on the armrests.

“why would it have?” he says bemusedly, still smiling from before. “we joke like that all the time. honestly, i’m surprised you hadn’t said something like that sooner.”

you can only stare at him blankly, brows knitting in confusion as mark continues to regard you patiently. then, you sit up, pushing up off your elbows to swing around and upright, one leg dangling off the bed while the other stays bent in front of you.

“why didn’t you get mad?”

mark pauses, eyes narrowing as he tilts his head. “...is this a trick question? why would i? you were joking around.”

“most guys would’ve gotten mad about me saying something like that.”

“yeah, well, most guys aren’t exactly confident about what they’re packing downstairs.”

“and you are?”

mark’s lips part for a second, but no words come out. he quickly shuts his mouth and stares at you, but you stare back, ignoring the way your cheeks start to burn with red-hot embarrassment.

“well, yeah,” mark finally says, eyes flickering nervously to the side. he looks everywhere– the alarm clock on the dresser, his posters on the wall, everywhere but where you are, sitting prettily on his bed– but his eyes have no choice but to finally lock back onto yours, teeth gnawing at the inside of his cheek. “‘course i’m confident about it.”

“...‘cause it’s not small.”

he pauses. “yeah. ‘cause it’s not small.”

your brain short-circuits right then and there.

you aren’t sure why you’re so surprised by this. it wouldn’t have taken a rocket scientist to arrive to this conclusion. you were around when mark started dating his ex-girlfriend, amber– around long enough to have seen the exact point in their relationship where they shed the last of their inhibitions and began interacting with each other much more comfortably. you were also around long enough to watch mark come into himself– to lose that dweebish, unsure aura around him and become more confident. muscled. tall. even if he was still pretty dorky most of the time.

perhaps that’s when the thoughts started: when you started to think of mark less as a boy, and more as a man. when you began wondering things about him that you desperately wanted to know, but were much too scared to ask.

at least you have an answer to one of them now.

“hey,” mark says suddenly, voice sharp enough to cut through all your overthinking and analyses. mark’s closer to you now– right next to you, actually, the scent of his cologne filling your nose– and he has your hand in his, thumb rubbing soothing circles into the back. “you okay? should i not have said that–?”

you frantically shake your head. “no–! i mean, yes– god, fuck, no, mark, it’s okay.” you take a deep breath, letting your eyes fall shut. “i’m the one who asked. you just answered.”

you take in a shaky breath and let your eyes flutter open to find mark watching you adeptly, his eyes trained on your face. the expression he’s wearing is one of worry, those dark brows of his pinched in the middle to form a wrinkle you so desperately want to smooth out with your thumb. his plush, pink lips are parted, and in an attempt not to stare at them, your eyes fall to the floor, but not before momentarily catching on how his biceps strain against his sleeves.

for fuck’s sake, this is not the time to be focusing on how attractive you find your best friend.

“i wanted to know,” you finally say, voice soft and a little frayed around the edges. your eyes flutter shut again– something to give you a bit of extra courage to say what you need to say, and not cave under the pressure of your nerves. “i wanted the answer to that question. it sounds weird as fuck, and i totally understand if you want me to leave and never show my face around here again, but i’d be lying if i said i didn’t want to know.”

you open your eyes again to find mark still staring at you, eyes jumping all over your face, while sporting an unreadable expression. you find yourself swallowing hard as you steel yourself for what you want to say next, adjusting to sit and face mark completely. “i wanna know a lot of things about you, actually. and none of them are all that appropriate for two people who are supposed to be ‘best friends.’”

it’s mark’s turn to short-circuit.

“w–what?” mark stutters out, staring at you with a dumbfounded expression as his eyebrows shoot up in suprise. his mouth falls agape, opening and closing fruitlessly as he tries to figure out what to say. “i– jesus christ, i don’t think you understand what you’re saying–”

“i know exactly what i’m saying.” your interjection is quick and firm, your expression void of your previous nervousness and now completely serious. “and you know it. don’t insult me like that again.”

mark’s protests die in his throat.

“i want to know you,” you start. “honestly. intimately. fuck, to be honest, i want to see you– naked, in my bed– but i didn’t wanna make things weird, and then you had that whole thing with amber, and then i thought you were gonna date eve, so i kinda just kept it to myself, but–”

“you can know me.”

you freeze. “what–?”

“you can know me,” mark says again, his hand squeezing the one that he has wrapped in his. “you can know me. and see me. and i’ll answer every other question you’ve had about me, ‘cause i wanna know you too.”

you can’t help but stare at mark , absolutely and completely dumbfounded. if he notices, he doesn’t judge. doesn’t acknowledge it at all, actually. he just continues to steamroll ahead.

“god, fuck, i really wanna know you like that, too,” he sighs. “always have– like, all the way back in high school. i’d see you in the halls with your friends and think, ‘man, they’re hot,’ then move on with my life because i thought there was no way i’d ever have a chance with you. then, we got partnered up for that project, and i learned that you were so much cooler and more approachable than i had ever imagined, and i wanted to make a move on you so bad, but i still thought there was no way you could ever like me. william can testify to this– i was talking his ear off about you 24/7. still do. he is seriously getting sick of it.”

the way mark talks is fast– so much so that all his words bleed together, voice full of excitement and sincerity. it make your eyes sting. after he finishes, his quick way of talking tapers off into a hefty bout of silence, his beautiful brown eyes flickering down to your joint hands.

“and then came amber.”

the quiet that follows drapes over the two of you like a blanket, heavy with the weight of everything you two are thinking, but ultimately remains unsaid. the fact of the matter is that it doesn’t need to be said. you and mark just… know– understand– that amber was the first person, aside from you, to treat mark as less of an expendable, and more like somebody worth knowing. she took the opportunities you were too afraid to– penciled her name in where yours was meant to be and slipped right on into that “partner” position, wearing it as if it was custom-fitted. it may as well have been, because it sure looked good on her.

he looked good on her. that’s why you couldn’t bring yourself to be mad.

“i never would’ve gone out with her if i knew you wanted me even half as much as i wanted you,” mark says quietly, reaching up to rub a tear from your cheek that you didn’t even know you shed. “but i didn’t. and we dated, and i slept with her, and i loved her, but i feel all of that for you too, y’know.” he cradles your face delicately as he climbs up onto his knees, his movements slow, as if moving too quickly would scare you off. moving too quickly would remind you that this is real; remind you that you probably shouldn’t be doing this, causing you to hop off the bed and run down the hall, flying down the stairs, past debbie, and out the front door.

but you don’t have to worry. never have, actually, because the way mark treats you is careful. cautious. he’s kneeling on the bed and easing you onto your back with such rapt attention that it makes your cheeks warm, head turning to the side to shield it from him before he turns your head right back to where it was.

“i want you to ask your questions,” mark says slowly, large hands pushing your knees apart to make room for him between your legs. you can’t help but stare at him helplessly, any and all words dying in your throat, but mark moves with a confidence that makes it clear you don’t need to speak. not when he’s hovering over you like this.

“i want to answer your questions, and i want you to do the same for mine. ‘cause i’ve thought about you. a lot. and not all of it was decent. actually, most of it probably wasn’t.”

mark lets himself laugh softly at the admission, but you can only look up at him in awe, the muscles of your brows twitching from the urge to knit in confusion. mark’s eyes catch this, and he reaches down to smooth his thumb over the spot right between your eyebrows– the same way you wanted to do for him earlier.

“so tell me that this is okay.”

mark trails his fingers across your skin, skimming over your cheek, then your neck, then your shoulder, and all the way down your arm until reaching your hand. he tangles your fingers together and brings your wrist to his lips, a soft kiss being pressed to your pulse, which makes your heart stutter in your chest. mark doesn’t tease you for how vulnerably you stare at him, or for how red his actions make your face. he only looks down at you with a soft smile, peppering kisses to your palm.

“holy shit, mark, this is more than okay.”

mark’s grin is blinding when you surge forward to kiss him.

the thing that surprises you most about it isn’t how good of a kisser mark is, or how nice it feels for his big hands to come up and cradle your jaw. it’s how easy all of this is– how uncomplicated it is to be making out with mark, how your lips slot together as if it’s always meant to be this way, how raw his groan is when you tangle your fingers into his hair and tug. he has you pressed against the bed in seconds, one hand slowly slipping beneath your t-shirt as the other squeezes at your outer thigh. you feel dizzy when your lips part and he ducks his head down into your neck, sucking bruises into the skin with a fervor that makes you squirm.

“i– fuck, mark, not where people can see–!”

“does it matter if it’s visible? ‘s not like you’re fucking anyone else right now besides me.”

you hit mark hard against his back, but it only makes him chuckle, sitting up to look at you with messy hair and blown pupils. “what? you haven’t slept with anybody in a while, and you’re about to sleep with me. i didn’t say anything wrong.”

“how do you even know that, asshole?”

mark grins, sitting back on his haunches as he hooks the hem of your shirt on his index finger. he tugs it up enough to reveal your stomach. “‘cause you’re lying here in my bed, wearing my shirt, with me sitting between your legs. if i was the person you’ve been fucking, i’d definitely feel some type of way about that.”

you scoff, moving one of your legs to try and kick at mark’s chest. like the little shit he is, he catches it easily and presses a kiss to your ankle, setting it on one of his shoulders. “that doesn’t mean anything. i could have casual sex if i wanted to.”

“yeah,” mark agrees, both hands coming to smooth his shirt up the expanse of your body, “you could. if you wanted to. but you don’t, ‘cause you’re not like that.”

“bullshit.”

“is not. here, open your mouth for me.”

“wh–?”

“shut up and open it for a second, would you?”

you shoot mark a withering glare, but he just grins back, pushing your shirt up under your chin and offering the hem for you to bite down on.

“thank you,” he says gleefully, his words a little too airy and sing-songy for you to let slide. you try and kick him again, but he blocks your leg without much of a second thought, eyes laser focused on the sight of your tits in front of him.

“wow, you are so fucking pretty.”

the way he says it is so full of awe– so genuine– that it makes your mouth fall open. the t-shirt in your mouth gets stuck on your bottom lip in the process, and the sight makes mark chuckle, a boyish grin settling on his face. he reaches up to adjust it and pulls it back up so you can bite down on it again.

“i didn’t even say anything crazy yet,” he teases, laughing as you do your best to swear at him from around the fabric. mark ignores it to focus on the sight in front of him instead, though, fingers tracing up your rib cage before cupping the underside of each of your breasts.

your mind goes blank when he takes one of your nipples into his mouth.

“oh, fuck,” you gasp out, back arching off the bed and into his mouth. the t-shirt slips from between your teeth again, and you can feel mark grin around where his tongue swirls around your skin, popping off to look at you and chastise you softly.

“jeez, you really suck at following instructions,” mark playfully says. “and did you forget that my mom is downstairs? i’ve had her knock on the door during sex before, and trust me, it does not help to sustain the mood.”

“god, you sound like such a dork. ‘it does not help to sustain–’”

mark cuts you off with a groan, fingers curling into the waistband of your shorts and panties. “shut up and lift your hips already.”

you giggle. “fine, fine.”

you plant your feet and lift your hips off the bed enough for mark to tug your clothes off, separating your shorts from your underwear so he can tuck the garment into his pocket. You look at him with a flustered expression, mouth dropping open in bewilderment, but mark simply sticks his tongue out at you and flings your shorts to the floor, panties nowhere in sight. you hardly have enough time to process him keeping them for himself before he’s wrapping his hands around your thighs and tugging them onto his shoulders, putting him face to face with your cunt and lifting your lower back completely off the bed.

you knew mark was strong, but you never thought of him using his strength like this.

mark holds you firmly as he busies himself with eating you out like a man starved. those big, brown doe eyes of his look down at you, sometimes lingering on the rise and fall of your chest, and sometimes taking in the sight of your knitted brows and parted lips, both your hands tangled in the pillow behind your head. his eyes do fall shut every once in a while as if he’s savoring the taste of you on his tongue, and he probably is, knowing mark, but you don’t have the wherewithal to tease him. not now, at least. not when he’s got his lips wrapped around your clit, sucking in these sporadic little bursts that make your stomach burn with molten need.

“oh, f-uck,” you gasp, voice cracking on the expletive. in your defense, it’s the only word you currently feel like you know how to say, but mark doesn’t laugh or tease you for it. he just presses a messy kiss to your clit, then slides his tongue down through your folds to circle your hole, slowly and messily pressing inside of you. he pumps it in and out for a few moments, as if he’s trying to fuck you with his tongue, then flattens the muscle and drags it back up to your clit to press into it firmly. you untangle your fingers from the sheets and reach up to swat at mark’s thigh, twisting and turning frantically in his hold.

“oh my fucking god, mark, let go!” your whines are urgent, thighs beginning to quiver on either side of mark’s head. his eyes flutter open enough to look at you through his long, thick lashes, but his firm grip on your waist doesn’t let up in the slightest. his arms tighten around you, keeping your pussy to his lips and your body off the bed as he continues to ravage you like it’s the one thing he was born to do. “mark! ‘m fuckin’ serious– i’m gonna squirt if you don’t let go of m– oh, fuck!”

you realize your warning is a bit late as you feel that knot tighten and snap in your belly, but it would’ve fallen on deaf ears regardless of whether you said it earlier or not. your cunt gushes all over mark’s nose, lips, and chin, soaking the top of his t-shirt and dribbling a bit down onto the bed below. you’d think he’d have a concern of drowning, but mark’s tongue keeps moving as you cum, legs squeezing against his ears so tight that you’re sure he can hear absolutely nothing but his own heartbeat. you know you sure can’t– all you can hear is the distant sound of your own voice, and the way your breathing stutters in your chest, a series of tremors wracking your body so brutally that you’d liken them to an earthquake.

“shit,” you gasp softly, limbs tingling once they regain sensation. you wriggle in mark’s grasp and he pulls back from your pussy with a pop!, lowering your hips down to the bed as he runs his tongue along his lower lip.

“you said you were about to squirt as if that was going to deter me,” mark says breathlessly, a soft laugh punctuating his sentence. his face is covered with your slick all over his lips and chin, the sun from the window catching on it in a way that makes it glisten. you’re embarrassed by his nonchalance, but it’s hard to be mad when mark looks this good. you did this to him– made his perfectly slicked-back hair disheveled, and soaked his lower face and chest in your cum. normally, you would reply to his quip right away, but right now, you don’t. you’re much too focused on watching how mark leans down to reach behind his head and grab at his shirt, shucking it off in one smooth motion to join your discarded shorts on the floor.

“it was supposed to,” you finally say, voice sounding just as breathless as mark’s. his lips quirk up at the corners, but he doesn’t meet your eyes. instead, he leans over you to open his bedside drawer, and you take that as an opportunity to continue. “didn’t realize i was sleeping with superfreak, over here.”

mark snorts. “i’m just a guy who prioritizes my partner’s pleasure over mine.”

“that’s a roundabout way to say you like to eat pussy. and ass. oh god, mark, you don’t eat ass, do you?”

mark wiggles his eyebrows in response, and you look at him with such a horrified expression that a giggle can’t help but escape from his chest. he shuts the bedside table with a soft thud and leans back over you with a strip of two condoms hanging from his mouth. your brows shoot up at the sight, but mark doesn’t see it. he’s much too focused on pushing his sweatpants and boxers down to his thighs, cock slapping lightly against his abs.

oh. you always knew mark looked good, but this? this is something else entirely.

“you’re staring,” mark says wryly, tearing one of the condoms from the strip, then opening up the wrapper with his teeth. you watch as he pinches the tip and rolls the condom onto himself with a level of precision that screams of practice. if you hadn’t just cum your brains out, you might’ve found yourself feeling a little bit jealous.

“‘course i am.” your reply is shameless, and it makes mark bark out a startled laugh. “you said it was big, not that you were carrying a weapon. now here you are, looking like asian adonis with my jizz on your face, rolling a condom on with the ease of a common whore. not to mention that you grabbed two of them.”

a giddy smile spreads across mark’s face in reply, but it’s not one of his usual ones: it’s bashful. it’s the kind of smile where he bites his lip to force it down, but it doesn’t work, so his bottom lip slowly unfurls from between his teeth. your ears burn bright red at the sight, but mark doesn’t comment on it. mark’s never been good at multitasking, and he’s much too focused on tossing the unopened condom to the side, then tugging you against him by your thighs.

“we don’t have to use them both,” mark says softly, the sweetness of his smile bleeding into his voice. it’s a bit jarring for him to be acting so adorably, like he’s not running his cock along the seam of your folds. the tip catches on your clit every so often, making your breath catch in the back of your throat.

“i like how that’s what you chose to comment on.”

he shrugs. “didn’t have much else to say.”

“you’re a dog, you know that, mark?”

mark grins at you wickedly, leaning down to lick a stripe up your cheek.

“mm, yeah. ‘m guilty as charged.”

and just like that, he sinks into you, bottoming out in one smooth thrust that knocks the air from your lungs. your eyes screw shut, but you latch onto him immediately, hand shooting out in search of his. he takes it wordlessly, bringing your hand up so he can kiss your knuckles.

“you okay?” he asks tenderly, lips pressed to the back of your hand. you open your eyes, tears pricking at the corners, then nod slowly as a deep breath leaves your nose.

“yeah,” you say shakily. “just been a while. warn me next time.”

mark nods, doing his best not to get caught up on the fact that you want there to be a next time. “sure,” he answers. “sorry. here– put your legs on my shoulder.”

you lift your legs for mark to take, and he settles both of your feet on one of his shoulders like they belong there. then, he shifts forward, shuffling up so that his thighs bracket your hips, which slots him deeper into you than he has any business being.

it makes you feel crazy. you fucking love it.

once mark feels stable in his position, and any remnants of discomfort bleed from your expression, he starts rocking his hips in and out of you at a pace too quick to be languid, but too slow to be considered harsh. whatever rhythm he’s fallen into, it feels good. you’re clawing at the sheets at your sides and behind your head like a madman, that copy of seance dog he lent you long forgotten on the floor, along with everything else you two have taken off.

“does this answer one of your questions?” mark asks lowly, eyes half-lidded and jaw tight. he’s got your legs pressed to his chest with one hand, the other splayed across your stomach to hold you in place. you can tell it’s not that simple, though; the firmness with which he presses down against your stomach is as if he’s feeling for something, and the realization makes you clench, cunt squelching lewdly around his cock inside you. “did you wonder how i fuck? if i liked it fast? or did it slow?”

in your day-to-day conversations, mark doesn’t swear all that often– at least, not compared to you– but the mouth he’s got on him in bed is a surprise that makes you flush down to your chest. you look up to see mark gazing at you with eyes that are almost black, a bright blush fanning across his freckled cheeks and nose. when he sees you struggle to answer, the gears clearly turning, but no words coming out, he grips your legs tighter and quickens the snap of his hips. mark’s lips fall open with a breathy moan as he watches the way your eyes roll back, and his abdomen clenches with the need to keep his own pleasure at bay. “c’mon, baby. tell me. tell me how you want it, ‘n’ i promise i’ll do whatever you say.”

“i– god, fuck, mark, yes, i wondered how you fucked!” your reply comes out breathy, whiny, and and rushed– a result of you making an actual effort to focus so it didn’t come out as a jumbled, inaudible mess. “i w-wondered if you’d treat me like glass, or fuck me like i had no self-respect. i don’t care what you do right now– swear t’god i don’t– ‘cause i just wanna cum. don’t fucking stop.”

mark huffs out a laugh at how desperate you sound, lips quirking up in a lopsided smile that shows off the cute little fangs he has in the corners of his mouth. he turns his head to kiss one of your ankles, then takes one to put it on the opposite side, making it so you have one leg on each of his shoulders. large, calloused hands slide down your legs and smooth over your thighs before taking your hands into each of his. you’re about to ask what he’s doing, but there’s no time for the words to come out. he’s already gripping both your wrists and tugging you forward, forcing your ass to smack against his thighs with every brutal snap of his hips.

your brain is about to melt out of your fucking ears.

“did you touch yourself?” mark’s asks breathlessly, dark eyes focused on your face. you try desperately to free your hands from his grasp, but your attempts are pathetically uncoordinated. the way his cock is rearranging your guts makes it impossibly difficult to focus. but despite your lack of success, your writhing makes mark tut at you disapprovingly, and he leans forward to keep you in place by resting a fraction of his body weight on your chest. “quit trying to run ‘n’ tell me. did you touch yourself thinking about me fucking you? imagining how it would be?”

mark leans down to lick a stripe up the side of your neck, voice dropping to a filthy, sultry whisper. “‘cause i did. thought about this all the time, what you’d feel like around me. it’s so much fuckin’ better than i imagined.”

you nod your head frantically, hands clenched into fists, and your nails dig so roughly into your palms that it’s a miracle it hasn’t drawn blood. mark isn’t completely satisfied with your response, but he takes it for what it is and releases both of your wrists in favor of grabbing onto your hips.

“if you touched yourself while thinking of me, then show me. play with it for me, hm?”

you don’t need much more coaxing than that.

your fingers fly to your clit at lightening speed, middle and ring finger rubbing in quick, tight circles that mark finds absolutely hypnotizing. your other hand comes up to palm at your breasts, pinching and tweaking at your nipples in a way that makes you whine. mark damn near growls at the sight, a string of expletives you’ve never heard from him before being let out into the ether as he doubles his efforts to fuck you into the mattress.

“open your eyes,” mark demands, his words oozing with a tone you’re very much not used to being addressed with. his voice is low, gravely, and deeply affected by the way your walls squeeze around him, and you find that you quite like having him like this: wrapped around your finger, barely hanging on, lost in everything pertaining to you. the sentiment is definitely shared, because as you force your eyes open, you feel your features pinch the way they do when you’re trying not to cry. it’s nothing bad– far from it, actually. it’s just that mark is fucking you so good that you feel like you’re losing your mind, and the pleasure is so mindboggling that it makes you wanna sob.

“there y’go, baby,” mark sighs, “just keep lookin’ at me. i wanna see your face when you cum.”

his honest admission shoots straight through you and right to your core, pussy clenching around him tightly, your clit throbbing beneath your fingers. mark moans low and long at the feeling, adam’s apple bobbing in his throat as he swallows hard.

“fuck, i like when y’do that– when you like what i say and you get all tight around me. just– keep touching yourself, pretty. look at me and let it happen.”

all you can do is nod helplessly. mark ducks down to press a kiss to your cheek, fingers pressing what will definitely be bruises tomorrow morning into the skin of your hips. his cock splits you open in a mindbending way, your fingers flicking at your clit so frantically that your hand has become nothing but a blur.

then, the bubble bursts. your orgasm hits you like a truck, your head flying back, and the muscles in your jaw and neck pulling taut. the same goes for your legs– your knees lock up and your thighs pull tight, shaking with violent tremors as you gush again, this time, around mark’s cock. you do your best to keep your eyes open as you cum, but it’s hard. from what you can see, though, mark’s mouth drops open and his eyes flash with something bright– yellow, even– as he takes in the sight of you falling apart. whatever it is, you don’t give it much thought. your brain is much too fried to be trusting everything you see right now.

“you’re a fucking dream like this,” mark mutters, his tone oozing with awe and disbelief. dutifully, he fucks you through your second orgasm– all the squirming, pulsing, and wetness that’s stained his sheets twice in one night– and holds your unfocused gaze all throughout it before he feels you coming down and abruptly pulls out. your twitching legs drop unceremoniously to the bed, and mark swings his thighs over you to settle over your chest, fingers peeling off the condom and tossing it lamely to the side. all you can see past your wet lashes and teary eyes is mark’s fist moving in an urgent blur before he cums all over your chest, the orgasm hitting him so hard that he has to grip the headboard to stabilize himself. his super strength causes it to splinter just slightly as his legs shake, so much so that he can hardly hold himself up.

his cum paints your tits in hot, thick, pearly white strands, and mark clambers up from over you to lay down on the other side of the bed. you find it unfair, the way that he’s panting and shaking much less than you, but you don’t comment. you just stare up at the ceiling, the sound of your breathing filling the air.

“i hope that was good,” mark says earnestly, rolling lazily onto his side to look at you. you take another deep, grounding breath, then turn your head to look at him. your arm comes out too weakly to swat at his chest.

“there’s no way you just asked me that when your cum is drying on my chest.”

mark stares at you for a moment, then busts out into a fit of laughter, reaching behind his head to take the pillow so he can drop it casually onto your face. you can’t help but laugh too, arms coming up to shield yourself from the pillow, and you toss it back to mark where he catches it, then tucks it back under his head. “fuck me for trying to make sure you’re okay, i guess,” he says dramatically, rolling his eyes.

you flip over onto your stomach and bunch the pillow up under your chin, careful to ignore the wet parts of your chest as you widely grin and quip back. “i just did.”

“more like the other way around. this was me fucking you. into the mattress, might i add.” mark grins mischievously and reaches out to place his hand on your lower back, smoothing over your ass before dipping between your legs to find your folds. he trails his fingers up and down your wet and puffy slit, tongue darting out to wet his lips when he feels you shiver in reply. “but we can go again with you on top if you wanna fuck me. not like i’d ever say no to that. plus, it’d answer one of my questions.”

you’re part your lips to reply, but the sound of feet padding up the stairs, partnered with a soft call of mark’s name, makes you both freeze exactly where you’re at. you look at each other in panic, then scramble to get rid of the proof of what you two just did. mark leaps off the bed and onto his feet with impressive athleticism, tossing you your discarded copy of seance dog that you catch effortlessly with one hand. you tug your t-shirt down over your chest, ignoring the fact that there’s still cum on it you’ve hardly wiped off, and he busies himself with pulling his pants back up and slipping his t-shirt on. the fact that it’s still damp around the collar doesn’t matter– not when there’s much more incriminating evidence like his used condom on the bed, alongside the wrapper and the new one he was about to use on you again ten seconds ago.

you barely manage to get under the covers to hide your lower half by the time debbie opens the door, your shorts haphazardly kicked under the bed, and your panties in mark’s pocket. you double-check to make sure your comic isn’t upside down and open it to a random page, holding it as inconspicuously as possible, right in front of your face. mark’s hands are stuffed into his pants, the condoms and the wrapper fisted tightly in his hands.

“hey, you two,” debbie says sweetly, eyes flickering back and forth between the two of you. you swear, even if you two didn’t look suspicious as hell, debbie would still be looking at you two like she knows you did something wrong. “just came to let you know that dinner is ready. and that you two shouldn’t stay up too late tonight. i’m driving you two back to campus early, so i can get to work on time.”

mark smiles tightly. “okay, mom, thanks,” he says, pulling a hand out of his pocket to wave at her goodbye. debbie eyes him amusedly, taking in both of your disheveled appearances one more time before nodding and moving to close the door.

“oh, and mark? it’s been a long time coming, so i don’t mind if you two are having sex, as long as it’s safe and i don’t have to worry about becoming a grandma.”

the color drains from both of your faces, but debbie only laughs, a smile as sweet as her son’s spreading across her face. “but next time, if you’re gonna try and hide it, make sure the panties are tucked all the way into your pocket. i’m not judging what you’re into, but it’s kind of a dead giveaway when blue lace is halfway hanging out of your sweatpants.”

# — navigation

#— alexis writes ꒰ঌ ໒꒱#mark grayson x reader #mark grayson x reader smut

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mega2mind · 2 months ago

Text

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.

Another knock. This time, softer. Almost...polite.

Your hand rested on the knob.

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’."

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