#Ohio State Murders | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wintrwinchestr · 1 month

Text

strangers | part 1

summary: following in the footsteps of a girl you once knew, you decide to up and leave home one morning without looking back. when you find yourself to be tired, hungry, and alone in the middle of nowhere, you're thankful when a kind stranger offers you a ride, a warm meal, and a place to sleep for the night. he only tells you about himself in bits and pieces, but he seems trustworthy enough, and what you don't know can't hurt you, right?

!!PLEASE READ WARNINGS, THIS IS A VERY DARK FIC!!

I've tried to label this fic as detailed and as boldly as possible. I will not be held responsible or bullied off the internet if you choose to read this potentially upsetting/triggering work of fiction anyway.

warnings: joel miller x f!reader, 18+, smut, age gap (reader is college-aged, joel is mid-50s), no outbreak au, serial killer!joel, dark!joel, talk of death/murder and blood, mommy & daddy issues, brief talk of domestic violence, lying/gaslighting, manipulation, f-receiving non-con somnophilia (no sex, but groping, fingering, dry humping, kissing, and choking), degrading language toward victims, pet names (baby, darlin', sweetheart), some joel pov, no ellie/sarah but tommy has an unnamed daughter, somewhat inspired by "strangers" by ethel cain, takes place in illinois/ohio/indiana, vaguely set in the 70s/80s, this part is mostly introduction/storytelling/yapping, please respectfully let me know if i missed anything and i will rectify the tags

word count: 9.8k

a/n: i started this as a oneshot way back in november, and then it sat abandoned for a very long time. thank you to my lovely friends @polaroidpascal and @chippedowlmug for encouraging me to finish it, and also bestie kiers who never hesitates to match my freak. also thank you to the many writers who made me feel inspired to write something dark and not give a fuck what people think about it. i hope you enjoy this joel he's a freak and i love him and if you say anything mean about him i'll send him after you <3

divider by @saradika

series masterlist/moodboard

read this chapter on ao3

part 2

Ruby Carpenter.

You had spent all day trying to remember her name without really knowing why. Maybe it’s because as the sun sets on what would be the first day of your junior year at the nearby state school, you wonder if she ever made it to one of the fancy ivy leagues she had always aspired to attend. You wonder if she’s even still alive.

Ruby had disappeared a few years ago now, the summer after your senior year of high school. For nearly a year afterwards, her missing posters remained stapled onto every telephone pole and stuck onto every store window around town, until the paper began to disintegrate and the ink began to fade. In that time, you couldn’t even make a quick run to the grocery store without being confronted by dozens of replicas of her yearbook photo printed onto the sides of all the milk cartons. Despite all of the efforts to find her, including several search parties and a decent amount of statewide media coverage, everyone had just stopped looking for her, eventually. Even the police. Even her parents.

It was decided that she had probably just run away, and you can’t entirely blame her, but you can’t imagine why she would, either. You remember her perfect head of blonde ringlet curls that shone a yellow gold in the sun, and her bright blue eyes that turned fiery in her more passionate moments during classroom debates. She had every boy in your grade wrapped around her finger, was the teacher’s pet in every class, and it wasn’t even a question whether she would win prom queen your senior year. She was always sweet to you, always complimented your outfits or your makeup or your art projects with a genuine lilt in her voice and a kind smile, so you could never bring yourself to hate her even though it would’ve been so easy to. You figured she was going to cure cancer or become the president after you had all graduated, which is why you never really stopped wondering whatever happened to her that summer. She was beautiful, with boundless potential and a bright future ahead of her, why would she have just given it all up?

Everyone around town knew Ruby, or at least it seemed that way. But maybe nobody ever really knew her as well as they thought. Maybe she’d had a secret boyfriend all that time who whisked her away that summer, maybe she had decided to try drugs and fell down a rabbit hole that she couldn’t claw her way out of, maybe she had finally figured out that the only thing this town would ever be good for is holding people back. Maybe she did just wake up one day and decide to run without ever looking behind her.

Maybe you should do the same.

With your dad long gone now and your step-father doing a piss poor job of filling in the hole he left, following in Ruby’s footsteps has sounded like a better idea with each passing day. Rob isn’t even really your step-father, anyway, just your mom’s sorry fucking excuse for a boyfriend. The guy’s already been married upwards of three times before, why try for another one? He’s a lazy son of a bitch who can’t hold down a job at a fast food joint for more than a couple of weeks at a time, who sleeps every second of the day that he’s not chugging through a six pack, and who leaves marks on your mother uglier than his fucking face.

She doesn’t deserve to be treated that way, of course, but it’s not like she’s winning the “mom of the year” award any time soon, either. She’s never even been nominated. She’s forgotten just about every one of your birthdays, been the reason you’ve never had any friends come over, and in her most recent offense, blew all the savings you had put away for your last two years of college. Which is why you’re not spending tonight celebrating being one year closer to at least having an official-looking piece of paper to show for yourself. Instead, you’re using the rattling of your bedroom window unit and the booming bass of your radio to drown out yet another drunken screaming match between your mother and the guy she lets live in your house now, watching the world outside pass you by and knowing that if you don’t do anything about it now, you’ll never make it out of here. You’re thinking about Ruby Carpenter, hoping she found somewhere greener and more promising and was able to make something of herself, far away from here. And you’re thinking that this rusted orange sunset is the last one you’ll ever see from your bedroom window.

It’s decided, then. You’re leaving, first thing tomorrow.

—

You’ve only gotten a few hours of sleep by the time your alarm clock chimes to life at five o’clock on the dot. You’re quick to silence the shrill beeping with a swift swat of your hand, careful not to wake anyone else in the house. The sun has just barely begun to stream in through the blinds of your bedroom window, but it illuminates the room just enough for your eyes to land on the backpack you had stuffed full of a few changes of clothes last night, waiting for you by the door.

You don’t waste any time stripping off your pajamas and pulling on just about the only clothes left in your room that aren’t in your bag. You’ve got your teeth brushed, face washed, and hair tamed in all of about ten minutes, too anxious to spend even one more unnecessary second in this house. You swing your backpack over your shoulder, pull your bedroom door open at just the right speed so that the hinges don’t squeak too loud, and tiptoe delicately down the stairs, careful to avoid the creaky floorboards that you know like the back of your hand—the one three steps from the top, the one at the landing about halfway down, and the very bottom one.

You land softly when you leap over that tattletale bottom step, successful in the most difficult part of your escape plan so far. Rob is passed out on the living room couch in typical fashion, his mouth full of crooked teeth hanging open as his grating snores permeate the calm morning air. He’s still got a death grip around an empty beer can, even in his sleep, and your mother will likely be the one to toss it into the trash for him, useless fucker that he is. You aren’t going to miss either of them, and you imagine they’ll just skip trying to replicate the first half of the aftermath of Ruby’s disappearance altogether—no posters, no search parties, no police. You’ll just be gone, one less mouth for your mother to feed. Though, you’d been mostly feeding yourself since you were tall enough to slide a couple of bills across the counter at the corner store down the street, anyway. You’re ready to disappear, the same as candle wax when it burns, the same as the end of a rainbow, the same as Ruby Carpenter.

You don’t bother looking back when you shut the door behind you, content to leave it all behind just as the sun begins to rise and set the sky ablaze. By the time it sets again tonight, you hope to be in a different county, in a different state, anywhere that isn’t here. The rest, you’ll just have to figure out when you get there, wherever “there” may be.

—

You had only realized about an hour ago that you’d forgotten your cheap digital watch in the drawer of your bedside table, where it’s laid unused for the past couple of months, because who needs to tell time during the summer? You never had anywhere to be, never had to get to class or turn in a paper by a certain time, so it’s just been collecting dust since you had unclipped it from your wrist on the last day of spring semester. It sure would have come in handy right about now, when you have no fucking clue what time it is. The sun had disappeared behind the hills several mile markers back, so it must be… eight o’clock? Ten o’clock? Fucking midnight? You have no idea. What you do know is that you’re exhausted, hungry, and your feet hurt like hell. You aren’t really sure what you expected, the reality only just now setting in that you don’t even have ten bucks to your name anymore, thanks to your narcissist of a mother. The crumpled up bills you do have in your pocket are hardly enough for a goddamn sandwich, let alone a motel room. The cool night breeze raises goosebumps on your skin, and you swear you can see your fucking breath, even in the middle of August. You wrap your arms around yourself just as tears begin to prick at your waterlines, and you let them fall as you collapse onto the scratchy patch of dead grass on the side of the freeway, not a park bench or a bus stop or even a gas station in sight for God knows how many more miles.

You sit cross-legged, elbows propped up on your knees so that your hands can support your weary head, the skin of your palms becoming slippery with salty tears as your crying just doesn’t seem to stop. The road you’ve found yourself on seems relatively low-trafficked, the heaving sounds of your sobs accompanied by more cricket chirps and rustling wheat than rumbling tires. But a few high beams do streak across your vision every once in a while, coloring the backs of your eyelids a flaming scarlet.

After several minutes, your tears seem to dry up on their own, your body likely too dehydrated now to produce any more. You wipe the moisture from under your eyes with the back of your hand, sniffling as you gnaw at the skin of your bottom lip and debate if you should just turn back now, give up on your stupid little plan (or lack thereof) and just call the whole thing a loss, pretend it never even happened. Your mother and Rob won’t have even noticed you’d left.

Just as you pull yourself back up to your feet, set on at least finding somewhere that isn’t the hard ground to sleep on tonight before you make your way back home tomorrow, the warm headlights of an old pickup truck are shining bright in your eyes. You put your arm up to block them as the truck slowly squeals to a halt in front of where you’re standing, and you squint your eyes at the driver as your vision adjusts.

“You need a ride, sweetheart?” A man asks in a gravelly voice, and you can still hardly make out what he looks like. Based on the southern accent you pick up on, he doesn’t sound like he’s from around here.

“N-no, thank you. I’m okay,” you respond shakily, taking a nervous step back from the stranger and his rusted pickup.

“You sure? Looked like you were cryin’ over here, like you might be lost or somethin’.”

“‘M not lost, I know where I’m going.”

“Oh yeah? Where’s that?”

Shit.

You take a guess.

“Um… the motel down the road,” you reply, tilting your head in the direction you had been walking in.

“There ain’t a motel down there, sweetheart. Ain’t nothin’ in either direction for miles, ‘s all just farmland out here. Reckon you’ve already figured that out, though.”

You pause, unsure of what your next move should be. He knows you’re lying, knows you’re alone with no fucking idea where you are or where you’re going. You could run, but even that shitty truck of his could catch up to you in a matter of seconds. You take another step back, swiveling your head around to look up and down the road as you try to figure your best way out of this.

“Just lemme give you a ride somewhere, darlin’. There’s a diner just off the exit, ‘bout twenty miles up ahead. Could take you that far, at least, get you somethin’ to eat,” he offers. A warm meal does sound pretty good right now, and you suppose you aren’t exactly in a position to refuse his help.

You think on it for a second. “What’s it called? The diner.”

The stranger huffs. “Moody’s.”

“What do they have?” you challenge.

He sighs. “It’s a fuckin’ diner off the side of the freeway, darlin’. They got greasy food and black coffee, ‘s about all you need.”

You don’t say anything.

Then, after a beat—“They got some kinda sloppy mess they call the Thunder Burger. ‘S got onion rings and shit on it. Ain’t half bad.”

You have to admit, he’s passing your pop quiz with flying colors. His answers have been too quick, too specific for him to be lying to you. There’s a pretty solid chance this diner does exist, and that he’s been there before. The man hasn’t said anything that’s indicated he wants more to do with you than to offer you a ride and some dinner. He’s probably just somebody’s harmless grandfather, anyway, judging by his motheaten flannel and gray-stricken beard you can see now that you’ve approached his truck a few paces closer.

“Okay,” you concede, your stomach growling loudly as the man leans over the bench seat to pop open the passenger side door for you. You shrug off your backpack and climb into the cabin, clicking your seatbelt into place as you situate yourself on the cracked leather seat.

“All set?” the stranger asks.

“Mhm,” you hum, finally getting a better look at the man you might just owe the rest of your life to after tonight. For being somebody’s grandfather, he’s… kinda handsome. Really fucking handsome, actually, in a rugged sort of way. He’s got warm amber eyes that sparkle even in the dark of night, a kind smile that completely disarms you in an instant, and a splintering scar across the bridge of his nose that somehow only adds to his good looks. You try to suppress your own grin as you look away from him quickly, opting to focus on fidgeting with one of the fraying edges of your denim shorts instead. Even in your peripheral vision, you don’t miss how his eyes shift from your own to the exposed skin of your thighs. He doesn’t say anything, just clears his throat as he shifts gears and steers his truck back onto the road again.

He lets the next few minutes pass in comfortable silence before asking, “You got a name, sweetheart?”

You tell him, and he flashes another charming smile at you. “I like that, ‘s pretty… Well, I’m Joel. Sure you were wonderin’. Now you ain’t gettin’ a ride from a stranger no more, are ya?”

“Yeah, I guess I’m not,” you giggle, and you’re surprised at how comfortable you feel with him. “So… you’ve been to Moody’s before?”

“Handful of times, yeah. When I’m passin’ through.”

You nod. “So you come up here, like… for work or somethin’?”

Joel chuckles. “Or somethin’. You never even heard of the damn place, so… reckon you don’t find yourself out here very often, do ya?”

“No… ‘M not even really sure where ‘here’ is, to be honest. I just kinda… started walking.”

“Ah… a runaway, then, are ya?” Joel asks, with an appreciated amount of understanding in his tone rather than judgment. “‘M sure your folks are missin’ ya right about now, must have your boyfriend worried sick.”

You scoff at that. “Fuck no. They probably don’t even know I’m gone, won’t even bother trying to come look for me. And I don’t have a boyfriend, so…”

“Damn shame. ‘M sorry about that, sweetheart,” Joel comforts, placing a large calloused hand on your thigh. It makes your breath hitch, but his touch isn’t entirely unwelcome. You let him squeeze once at the plush of your leg before he replaces his hand on the wheel, and your cunt spasms out a little fluttering pulse against the seam of your shorts, despite yourself.

The rest of the drive to Moody’s is relatively quiet, save for the gentle crooning of an old country singer emanating from the cassette player on the dash. The soft singing and steady strumming of a banjo combined with the muffled chugging of the truck’s engine is enough to lull you to sleep, especially after the day you’ve had. You know that just about every mental alarm bell you have should be screaming at you to jump out of the car, to run, that sleeping alone in the dirt would’ve been a better decision than getting into this strange man’s—Joel’s—truck, but you’re too tired to hear them. He smells good, like woodsmoke and pine and cinnamon, and if he wanted to do something awful to you, he probably would’ve done it by now. So you trust him, for now at least, and let your lashes fan out against your cheeks as your head falls back against the cushioned headrest, coaxed into sleep by the lullaby of tires against pavement and fingertips against guitar strings.

—

You only rouse when you feel the truck come to a stop about half an hour or so later, slowly blinking your eyes open against the bright neon sign that reads “MOODY’S” in bold capital letters. Your jaw stretches wide as a yawn overtakes the muscles, and you hear Joel’s southern drawl replace the one from the cassette as he shuts the engine off.

“Mornin’, sleepyhead. Not too tired to eat somethin’ now, are ya?”

Another unpleasant-sounding rumble from your empty stomach answers for you, loud enough for both of you to hear this time. The air puffing out of the diner’s kitchen smells strongly of fatty bacon and rich coffee, just like Joel had promised you the place would offer. Although the digital clock on the dash read just after 10:30 before you fell asleep, you’ve never craved breakfast quite like you do right now. You absentmindedly lick your lips as you imagine the sweet and savory—and more importantly free—meal that could be waiting for you beyond that blinding beacon of a sign.

“Well, alright then. Let’s get some food in ya before you keel over, hm?” Joel says as he exits the truck, landing on his feet in the dirt parking lot with a soft groan. He waits by the hood for you to meet up with him, and you walk up the couple of steps to the entrance together. He holds the door open for you, and you offer him a shy ‘thank you’, to which he responds with a soft spoken ‘welcome, sweetheart’. You stand shyly behind his broad form as he asks the hostess for a table for two, and she leads you to a green leather booth tucked into the corner of the diner. She hands each of you a sticky laminated menu, the pages a charming mess of clashing colors and faded pictures and retro-looking fonts, then departs with a promise that your waitress will bring the two of you some water as you take your time deciding on what you might like.

You light up upon reading that Moody’s serves breakfast all day, and that they can make you exactly what you were hoping for—a stack of chocolate chip pancakes with sides of bacon and hashbrowns. You can’t help but smile to yourself as you wiggle in your seat, excitedly anticipating the waitress to come back around so you can order.

“Whatcha so excited about over there?” Joel asks, eyeing you from across the table as he glances up from his own menu.

“Nothin’, I was just hoping I could get some pancakes, and they have ‘em on the menu,” you explain giddily. “I’ll probably get some coffee, too, really complete the whole ‘breakfast for dinner’ thing.”

Joel huffs through his nose. “Decaf, I hope. ‘S the middle of the goddamn night, sweetheart. Gonna be bouncin’ off the walls in the room later, hardly get any sleep.”

He’s right, you suppose. But wait—“What room?”

Joel shrugs casually. “There’s a decent motel another exit or two down, figured they could probably get us a couple o’ beds for the night. But, ‘m sorry, shouldn’t have assumed—”

“No! No, it’s okay.”

Is it? You only met the man less than an hour ago, and you already agreed to let him give you a ride before you even knew his name. You suppose you hadn’t really thought about what would happen after he bought you dinner, but not thinking ahead seems to have been a theme today, hasn’t it? You remind yourself that he’s only been kind and respectful to you so far, save for that placement of his hand on your upper thigh soon after he picked you up. But that could’ve just been a friendly, paternal gesture, right? And he said a couple of beds, when he mentioned the motel, which seemed to imply that he plans on the two of you sleeping in separate beds, maybe even separate rooms. You’ve found yourself having to make yet another somewhat reckless decision tonight, but one that would be in your best interest to say ‘yes’ to, at this point. What other option would you have if you declined his offer?

“Don’t really have anywhere else to go, so… yeah, okay. Motel sounds good. And decaf it is, I guess.”

Joel’s apologetic expression quickly morphs into a satisfied smirk. “Good girl,” he praises. You like how the words sound coated in his thick drawl, even though you probably shouldn’t. You shift where you sit as that familiar fluttering sensation returns to the seat of your panties, just for a moment. You’re grateful that the waitress arrives at the booth not a second later, cheerily introducing herself as she sets down a glass of water for each of you. When she asks if you’re ready to order, Joel gestures to you as if to say ‘ladies first’, and you politely prattle off your request. You make sure to emphasize that you’d like your coffee decaf, and ask if she could please bring some more of the little cups of vanilla creamer to the table. “Not a problem, honey,” she replies, and Joel winks at you as she asks what she can get for him. He orders the Thunder Burger he had told you about earlier, and a black coffee, which he doesn’t request to be decaf. The waitress leaves the two of you alone again with an ‘I’ll have that right out for ya,’ and you let your eyes follow the calming baby blue color of her dress as she glides her way back to the kitchen. When she disappears around the corner of the bar, you take the opportunity to study Moody’s other patrons. There isn’t another young person in sight, mostly just men around Joel’s age with similarly heavy bags under their eyes, likely truck drivers indulging in their first hot meal of the day within the diner’s comforting wood-paneled walls. You wonder if that’s how Joel knows about this place, because he “passes through” this area on long hauls across the midwest. You open your mouth to ask him if your assumption is correct, but he cuts you off before you can say anything.

“I gotta admit, sweetheart, I’m curious… The hell was a pretty thing like you doin’ out in the middle of goddamn nowhere tonight? I mean, I know you’re a runaway ‘n all, but… shouldn’t you be one o’ those college party girls or somethin’? ‘M sure you got plenty of friends wonderin’ where you are.”

You sigh, shaking your head as you distractedly pick at a splintered piece of wood at the edge of the table.

“I was in college. Was supposed to be going back again this year, but… my mom spent all the fucking savings I had left for the rest of it on fixing up her dumb boyfriend’s car. It’s just been sitting in the fucking lawn all summer, sure as hell not being used for something useful like going to the job he doesn’t have. That bastard…” You say the last part under your breath through gritted teeth.

“Shit… Tha’s a tough deal, baby, ‘m real sorry to hear that,” Joel comforts. “But y’know, everybody’s got mommy ‘n daddy issues, don’t mean you just up and start walkin’ all by your lonesome, not even have any idea where you’re goin’.”

“Well, it wasn’t just that. There was… nevermind, it’s stupid.” You slump into the cushioned booth, silently cursing yourself for even bringing it up.

“What is it?” Joel pushes, sitting up straighter to show you that he wants to listen, wants to get to know you. And God dammit, he might be the first person you’ve met in a long time who actually seems to care about what you have to say, as strange as it is. You flick your eyes up to his face, and he’s wearing a sincere gaze that convinces you to continue.

“There was this girl I went to high school with. She disappeared a couple of years ago, nobody ever found out what happened to her. People figured she probably just ran away, and I thought… I dunno. That maybe she had the right idea, leaving that place behind. I always held onto this hope that maybe she was still out there somewhere actually doing something with her life, that maybe she just changed her name or something and disappeared on purpose.” You pause. “I guess I just thought I might be able to do the same, if I left.”

“I see…” Joel muses sympathetically. “Maybe I oughta give you a lil’ more credit, then. Must’a been tough losin’ a friend like that, not knowin’ where she ended up.”

“I mean, Ruby wasn’t really my friend. She just—”

“Hang on. Ruby, you said?” Joel interrupts, his eyes suddenly looking a little wild.

“...Yeah. Her name was Ruby. Ruby Carpenter.”

—

Fuck.

Joel has to adjust himself under the table, his dick now hardening uncomfortably in his jeans at just the mention of her name. He remembers Ruby, remembers chuckling to himself when he realized the irony of her name matching the color of her blood, remembers watching the news coverage of her disappearance in this very same diner, those handful of years ago. She was a sweet thing, he remembers this, too. It was a shame she had ended up being such a fighter, that she had to get put down the way she did. But she shouldn’t have thrown that fucking rock at his face, called him a sick fuck and a freak as she made her pitiful little escape attempt. Joel is lucky that all he came away from it with is that ugly little scar that mars the bridge of his nose. He can’t say the same for her.

“Why? You heard her name before?” You ask him, an unfortunate little twinkle of hope in your eyes.

“Maybe.” Yes. “Sounds a lil’ familiar, might remember hearin’ about it on the news or somethin’.”

That goddamn news coverage sure as hell taught him a lesson. Joel had spent months trying to keep the cops off his fucking tail after he had dumped her body on some forgettable patch of land behind an old decaying barn. He had even gotten pulled in for a fucking interview at the station in what he now presumes to be your hometown, where they had questioned him for an hour or so about her disappearance. He still isn’t sure how he talked his way out of that one. Ruby might not have been good for much else, other than pissing him the hell off with all of her pathetic crying and begging to just please, please let me go back home, but she did help him perfect his craft, he can give her that much. It’s because of her that Joel makes certain now that any girl he picks up doesn’t have anybody who will miss her or plaster her face on every local channel or send out goddamn search parties to find her. Girls like you.

You’re just so perfect, it would be so fucking easy for him to make you disappear for good, it’s almost comical. It had hardly taken any convincing at all to get you to climb into his truck, had taken even less to get you to agree to go to some seedy ass motel with him that might not even exist, for all you know. It does, but you didn’t even try to test him about it this time, just put all of your trust in him like a stray puppy would to the first person to pick it up off the street. That is just about what you are, he supposes. So far, you seem like the perfect candidate to become his little captive pet. If you keep it up, maybe you won’t meet the same fate as the rest of them. He’d told himself he’d be done after the last one, anyway, his body too old and achy and slow now to chase after the ones who put up a little more fight, like she had. She’d nearly escaped, made it a decent way through the woods and almost reached the main road before tripping on an exposed root and snapping her ankle. He remembers how weak and scared she’d looked before he’d used his knife to put her out of her misery, and it makes his dick twitch. Joel doesn’t plan on snuffing you out, not right now at least, since you haven’t given him a reason to. But his fingers still twitch where they rest on the table, moving out of instinct as he can’t help but imagine what they’d look like wrapped so tightly around your little throat. Would you cry? Would you beg? Would you pray? Would he have to glide his blade across your vocal chords just to get you to stop screaming so fucking loud? He wonders.

“Oh… Was that one of the times you were just ‘passin’ through’ for whatever reason you haven’t told me yet?”

Joel hadn’t realized that his eyes had been unfocused for so long, or that he’d been holding his breath, or that his hand had been squeezing his glass of water so hard he’s glad it hadn’t shattered. The airy sound of your voice brings him back to reality, and he huffs a light chuckle as he fixes his face into a more pleasant expression.

“Yeah, ‘spose it was.”

You roll your eyes at him playfully. “Come on, Joel. I just told you, like, my whole sob story. I feel like I deserve to know at least one thing about you now.”

You have a point.

He gives in. “Fine. I got a brother, used to come through this area when I’d pay him a visit. That good enough for ya?”

You cross your arms. “No. What’s his name?”

“Tommy.”

“What’s he look like?”

“Like me. Little younger. Little uglier.”

You laugh at that.

It makes Joel smile.

Maybe you could be the one he’s been looking for all this time. Too bad he had to waste so many others before he finally got to you.

—

The waitress comes back to your table soon after that, with your steaming plates of delicious-smelling food and hot mugs of coffee balanced expertly on a large plastic tray. She sets them down in front of the pair of you with a cheery smile, and you thank her happily when she doesn’t forget the extra sickeningly sweet cups of creamer you had requested. Joel doesn’t take his eyes off you once during the interaction, not even to feast his eyes upon the monstrous burger now sitting before him, not even as he thanks the waitress for delivering it to him. His lingering gaze makes you feel a little warm, but it could just be from the heat radiating off of your plates.

“What? You’re not getting a bite of mine, if that’s why you’re looking at me,” you tease, already getting to work putting the sugary creamer to good use.

Joel just shakes his head, his caramel colored eyes still never leaving you as your coffee begins to resemble their hue. “No, ‘s not why.”

“Whatever,” you reply through a giggle, making a poor attempt to hide your girlish grin behind the lip of your white ceramic mug.

The two of you eat your meals in relative silence, mostly enjoying each other’s company and basking in the relaxing ambience created by silverware tapping against porcelain, hushed conversations, and the local country station playing through the old radio sitting on the counter. The reception is a little spotty way out here in wherever the hell you are, so you can’t quite tell what song it is. But Joel seems to know, judging by the rhythmic bouncing of his knee under the table that creates little circular ripples in your coffee. Maybe you’ll ask him what it is later, how he knows it, if you can listen to it again in the truck together. He doesn’t seem to be as much of an open book as you’ve already given yourself away to be, and you respect that about him. It doesn’t make you any less curious, but you resign yourself to getting to know him better in the small doses he’s willing to offer you.

You decide to begin a mental list of all the things you want to ask him later, knowing that by the time you make it to the motel tonight, you’ll be far too exhausted to do anything more than just collapse onto the springy mattress and sleep until you get kicked out of the room the next morning. You almost wish you hadn’t listened to Joel’s request for you to take your coffee decaffeinated tonight, and you still aren’t quite sure why you did. It just feels so strangely easy to give into him, to trust him, to let him make decisions for you. You suppose that’s what you’ve been needing all this time, someone to guide you and understand you and at least pretend like they care about you. Joel has shown you more concern and care and protection in the last hour or so than either of your parents have pretty much your whole life. And he’s good at this, making you feel wanted, making you feel like somebody, even in subtle ways, just by looking at you.

“A’right, why don’t you finish up, darlin’, ‘n we’ll hit the road again. Practically usin’ your pancakes as a pillow over there.”

“Oh, sorry,” you apologize sleepily, waking yourself up enough to make quick work finishing off your plate and your last few sips of coffee.

“Nothin’ to be sorry ‘bout, sweetheart. Lord knows you need some rest, won’t be too much longer now,” Joel assures, fishing a few tens out of his faded leather wallet and placing them on the table. He slides to the edge of the booth and stands himself up with only a few pained noises as he straightens out his back, then offers his hand for you to take. You use it as leverage to pull yourself upright, and your hands linger in each other’s hold for a few seconds longer than they need to. The hostess thanks the two of you for stopping in when you pass her by, and Joel opens the door for you again as you leave Moody’s. He opens the truck door for you, too, and promises you that the motel is just another couple of minutes down the freeway. You make an effort to stay awake in your seat this time as Joel begins the drive, opting to gaze out the window and focus on trying to make out the sparkling constellations above the treeline. You smile privately at the moon when you find that she’s following closely behind you just as she always does, bright and full.

She doesn’t leave your side until you reach the unassuming little roadside motel, which to your gratitude, proudly displays their vacancy on the flickering sign in the parking lot. It doesn’t look like a five star joint by any means, but you know it will serve its purpose just fine. Joel instructs you to stay in the truck while he goes about getting a room for the two of you, and you don’t object. He’d insisted that you didn’t need to be on your feet any longer than you already had been today, and you were too tired to argue with him even if you wanted to. When he returns, he taps lightly on the passenger side window so as not to startle you from the half-asleep, half-awake state you’ve found yourself in, and swings your backpack over his shoulder as he helps you out of the truck. He leads you to the room at the end of the row, and the door takes some finessing of the key and a shove of his shoulder to open. Joel flicks on the light, and you let out a disappointed-sounding ‘oh…’ when it reveals your accommodations.

There aren’t two beds like you had assumed Joel was going to request. There’s only one.

Joel catches your reaction. “‘S this gonna be alright? I know it ain’t the Ritz Carlton, but—”

“No, the room’s fine, it’s not that. I just thought… I just assumed that… I didn’t know it was gonna be, like… just the one bed.” You try to explain your discomfort as gently as possible, without seeming ungrateful for everything Joel has done for you tonight.

He looks at you sympathetically. “I know, I ain’t tryin’ anythin’, I swear. Guy told me it was the last room they had, jus’ figured it was better than nothin’.”

You offer him a soft smile, but your eyes must still look a little wide as you begin to nervously pick at your fingernails. Joel continues, “I can take the chair if you want, darlin’. Get the bed all to yourself, how’s that sound?”

You visibly relax at that, your shoulders deflating as your smile becomes a little more genuine. “Okay, that’s good. Thank you.”

“‘Course, sweetheart. How’s about you take a nice hot shower, rinse off some o’ that dirt you picked up from walkin’ all day… Don’t suppose you got some suitable clothes in here for sleepin’ in?” Joel asks, handing your backpack off to you.

You shake your head. “Just some jeans and t-shirts, and another pair of shoes. And… y’know, some underwear, and stuff.”

Joel pinches the bridge of his nose, then rubs his fingers across his forehead exasperatedly. “I swear… it’s like you didn’t think there’d be a tomorrow or somethin’, girl. Christ.” Joel looks out the window to his truck parked just outside. “Tell you what, think I got somethin’ in the truck you can wear. Why don’t you see if they got anythin’ on the TV tha’s worth a damn, ‘n I’ll be back, alright?”

You nod, “Okay,” then set your backpack down on the drab carpet in favor of picking up the remote perched in front of the small square television. You sit yourself down on the edge of the bed as Joel leaves the room, and begin to flick through the few channels that aren’t just a screen full of snowy static.

Local news. Commercial. Game show. Commercial. Documentary. Commercial.

Eventually, you land on what seems to be one of those old black-and-white western shows that you can never remember the name of. You only know that the reruns used to play on Sundays around lunchtime, because Rob would always be half paying attention to it with a beer in his hand when you and your mom would get home from church. For how adamant she was that you attend every weekend, she sure never called him a harlot and a sinner for not wanting to go with her. You’re not sure she had ever even tried to get him to go, but he probably didn’t own anything decent enough to wear, anyway. Whatever, fuck them. The show seems like the kind of thing Joel would like, so you let it keep playing.

He comes back a moment later with a small stack of folded up clothes, tossing them over to where you sit on the bed. You unfold what he’s given you and examine them—a pair of simple pink cotton shorts, and a white tank top with a ditsy floral pattern scattered across the fabric. The clothing is a little more revealing than you’d like, but you figure you’d be a hell of a lot more comfortable wearing them to sleep than the denim shorts you have on now.

“These are… great. Thank you, Joel. But…” you snicker. “Should I be concerned that you have a very convenient supply of girls’ clothes in your truck?” Joel scoffs. “‘S for when I got Tommy’s kid with me, smartass. He’s got a daughter, few years younger ‘n you.”

“Okay, well, I dunno how I was supposed to know that, but… as long as you don’t have a girlfriend who’s gonna come after me for wearing her clothes.”

Joel only chuckles in response, his attention suddenly pulled to the TV.

“Gunsmoke, huh? ‘S a good choice, definitely what I’d classify as ‘worth a damn’.”

You smile to yourself, and his approval makes that warm fluttery feeling return to your belly. “I didn’t even know what it was called, just seemed like something you’d like.”

He turns back to you. “That obvious, huh? ‘S just ‘cause I’m old and southern, ain’t it?”

“Maybe a little,” you admit, making a pinching gesture with your hand.

Joel nods as he makes his way over to the armchair on the corner of the room, collapsing onto it with a groan. “Well, why don’t you go ‘n get yourself all changed and cleaned up, ‘n if you’re quick enough maybe we can finish the episode together and then get some shuteye, hm?”

You swiftly unzip your backpack to retrieve one of your clean pairs of underwear, then bound over to the small bathroom with them and your new change of clothes in hand. It’s not the most spotless one you’ve ever had to use, but you’ve honestly seen much worse. You rinse off quickly in the steaming shower, using the scratchy motel-provided washcloth to scrub the dirt from your legs, stuck to you with the sweat you worked up from God knows how many miles of walking today.

Today. You can hardly believe it hasn’t even been a full 24 hours since you left home yet. It seems like you’ve already known Joel for days, maybe even years, as silly as it sounds. You wonder if he might just take you in after this, or if he’ll have had enough of providing for you after just one night. He seems like a man of limited means, and he’s already given you so much. If you’re brave enough, maybe you’ll ask him tomorrow, when you get to the ‘so… what now?’ part of your time together.

For now, you step out of the shower and dry yourself off with an impossibly scratchier towel, then pull on your panties and the tank top and shorts Joel provided you with.

Jesus, how much younger is Tommy’s daughter?

The shorts just barely cover your ass, and there’s a sizable gap between their waistband and the bottom hem of your top. The thin, white material of the shirt only serves to accentuate the way your nipples poke through the fabric, but you suppose there isn’t anything you can do about that.

You quietly crack open the bathroom door, and are somewhat relieved to find that Joel’s already fallen asleep in the chair. You do wish you could’ve finished the episode of Gunsmoke with him, but the end credits seem to be rolling already anyway, and you’d rather avoid being seen in your very ill-fitting pajamas. Although, you do wonder if he’d say anything, or if he’d just let his hungry gaze linger in silence again, holding himself back from touching you beyond a comforting pat on the thigh.

You pick the remote up off the bed and use it to make the TV screen sizzle to black, then tip toe over to the lightswitch by the door and turn it off, the room now completely shrouded in darkness. Joel snores softly from the chair as you blindly feel your way back over to the bed, pulling the covers back and nestling yourself underneath them. The bed is surprisingly comfortable, considering, and it doesn’t take long for your exhaustion to catch up with you. Your thoughts become slower and slower along with your breathing, and you’re asleep not even five minutes after your head hits the pillow.

—

The last room they had, yeah, right. You’re just the most pathetic little thing, aren’t you? You’ll believe just about anything that comes out of his mouth if he turns up the ‘southern charm’ dial a few ticks, throws in a feigned apologetic-looking expression for good measure. It’s sad, really. For you, anyway.

Joel fakes his snoring for another thirty minutes or so, until he’s certain you’re sound asleep. He had heard your breath even out almost immediately after you had tucked yourself in, but he had chosen to lay in wait for a little while longer, just to make sure you wouldn’t put up too much of a fight when he made his move. You don’t seem like the type, considering how you’d hardly argued with him at all tonight, like when he had convinced you to forgo the caffeine with your dinner. There’s a reason he wanted you sleepy and subdued tonight, but you didn’t know that. Joel likes how well you listen to him, how easily you do as he asks.

He also likes how warm you are, how small your body is compared to his own, the difference in size especially prominent now that he’s laying snugly against you, his front pressing firmly into the back of you. You don’t wake from his lumbering movement, only coming to slightly when you feel his arm slide underneath your body, his warm hand snaking its way beneath your tiny shirt to squeeze at your plush tits.

You mumble out a little “Hm?”, which he’s quick to quiet with, “Sorry, darlin’. Chair was too hard on my damn back. Just go back to sleep, ‘kay?” That chair felt like laying on a goddamn cloud compared to some of the other surfaces he’s found himself having to sleep on before, but again, you don’t know that, and what you don’t know won’t hurt you. You probably won’t even remember this in the morning, how his hard cock is slotted so perfectly against your ass, especially without the confines of his thick jeans holding him back. They’re discarded onto the floor now in front of the armchair, along with his flannel shirt and jacket. Joel holds you tightly against his bare, hairy chest as he circles a roughened pad of his finger around one of your nipples, smirking to himself at how quickly the bud hardens from his touch. He knew you wanted this, and the wet spot that the fingers of his other hand are teasing in the gusset of your panties is proof of it. How long have you been leaking for him like this? Had you been soaking the seat of his truck earlier today? Filthy thing.

You still don’t rouse when he pulls your panties aside and slips a finger inside your slick cunt, or when his grip on your tit loosens in favor of sliding up higher under your tank top, his hand coming to a rest around the base of your throat as he pumps his finger in and out of your tight heat. It would be so fucking easy…

But he can’t, he won’t, because you’re not like the others. You want to get to know him, you let him take care of you, you seem to like his company, and you don’t leap out of bed and call him a fucking perv and a dirty old man for what he’s doing to you. That’s what the others would have done. It’s what they have done. And they faced the consequences.

But you’re different. You’re not like them. You’re like him. A lost soul, that’s what you are. Nowhere to call home, no one who misses you or loves you or gives a damn what happens to you. Joel’s mouth had tasted bitter when he had told you about Tommy, or rather, lied about him. Joel hasn’t seen the fucker in years, certainly doesn’t pay him any visits or watch his brat, not since Tommy had learned the truth. You better not show your goddamn face around here ever again, you understand me? Tommy had spat at him. You’re fuckin’ sick. Only reason I don’t turn your ass in myself is ‘cause you’re my goddamn brother. But if I ever fuckin’ see you again, I won’t hesitate. Better make yourself pretty fuckin’ scarce ‘fore I change my mind. That might’ve been about the only time Joel had ever taken orders from his little brother.

That bitter flavor is cut by the sweet tang of you that he tastes on his finger now, so young and eager and fresh. The hand around your throat squeezes a little tighter, and Joel’s hips begin to move against your ass as he allows himself to suck wet kisses onto the skin under the hinge of your jaw. Softly, gently, so as not to wake you. He could come just like this, using your pliant body in your sleep, rutting himself against your still form with the taste of your pussy on his tongue and his fingers pressed against your pulse points.

He’s close when you stir again, making broken hiccuping sounds as you choke on your breath.

“Shh, shh,” Joel soothes. “You’re alright, sweetheart. ‘S just me. Just—fuck—hold still, go back to sleep, baby.” You let out a quiet whimper, squirming against him just a little bit, but return to your unmoving and silent state a second later. Joel finishes himself off quickly with another couple of shallow thrusts against you, his large hand still gripped around the column of your neck, trying to stifle his groans as he spills into his briefs. He removes his suffocating hand and keeps you pressed tightly against him for a while after that, tanned arms wrapped around your waist and breathing in your scent as he waits for you to settle back down.

When he’s sure he won’t disturb you again, Joel releases you from his hold and pads quietly back over to the armchair, redressing himself and resuming the position you had left him in. In the morning, if you do remember any of it, you’ll just chalk it up to a very strange dream, one fueled by the desire he knows you’ve felt towards him since he picked you up. You’ll be left with a strange assuredness that he feels the same way about you, without really knowing why.

But Joel will always know.

—

The digital clock on the nightstand only reads around 8:00 when you’re awoken by a beam of sunlight shining brightly against the backs of your eyelids, streaming in from the window’s lopsided blinds. You had gone to sleep with your back to Joel, but you find yourself facing him now. He looks kind of peaceful when he’s asleep, that permanent furrow etched between his brows finally smoothed out as he dozes. A small smile tugs at the corners of your lips, but they fall quickly when you adjust your legs and feel the cool dampness against your core, the sensation bringing back the memory of the dream you’d had last night.

It had felt so real, but it couldn’t have been, could it? There’s no evidence that Joel had really laid next to you last night, that he’d really touched you like that, that you’d wanted him to keep going. It must just be some kind of strange side effect of the affection you feel toward the man who had rescued you, more or less. You’ll likely just part ways after today, anyway, so it’s probably best to just try and forget about the whole thing, put on a fresh pair of underwear and pretend it never happened.

Joel is awake by the time you’re done freshening up in the bathroom, and he greets you with a raspy ‘Mornin’, sweetheart’ as you retrieve your backpack from next to the bed and shove your ruined underwear into the bottom of it. “You get some good sleep last night?” He asks, rubbing a hand over his eye.

“Mhm, the bed was nice, more comfortable than the one I had at home, honestly.” You finish zipping your backpack closed and sit back down on the bed, pulling on some socks and the lace up sneakers you had been wearing yesterday. “I hope the chair was okay, like, for your back and everything.”

“What makes you say that, baby?”

You pause in the middle of tying one of your shoelaces, turning to look at him with a confused pout. “Didn’t you…? I thought you had told me something about how the chair would be hard on your back. Like, last night.”

Joel frowns, shaking his head. “Don’t think so, darlin’. Chair was just fine.”

“Oh… Well, that’s good.”

Maybe it had just been a dream, then.

Joel hands you a few bills from his wallet, and tasks you with getting the two of you some breakfast from the gas station across the street while he cleans himself up. He tells you that he doesn’t eat much in the mornings, but that you can get yourself whatever you want, as long as you bring him back a carton of cigarettes and a black coffee. You obey eagerly, retrieving what he asked for and getting a pack of miniature powdered donuts and an equally as sugary coffee for yourself.

He’s just stepped out of the bathroom when you return to the room, and your face feels hot when you see him with his dark hair slicked back and wet from the shower. The few strands that fall onto his forehead as he laces up his boots almost make him look a little boyish, despite his whitened temples.

“Such a good girl, thank you,” Joel praises when you hand him his items.

You respond with a shy ‘You’re welcome’, but he doesn’t miss how you seem to light up at his words. You plop yourself down onto the worn-in chair that Joel had used as a bed last night, happily munching on your gas station donuts and sipping on your coffee. It all makes you feel warm from the inside out.

But you figure you should find out what the rest of today might look like before you let yourself enjoy the beginnings of it too much.

“So, um… We’re just gonna check out this morning and then… what?”

“Whaddya mean, baby?”

“I mean… are you just gonna, like… take me to the nearest bus station or something?”

Joel’s confusion is written all over his face, embedded deep into those lines between his brows. You could swear he almost looks a little hurt. “Why would I do that? ‘S that what you want?” He asks softly.

You try to backpedal a little, afraid you might’ve offended him or seemed ungrateful in your question. “I just thought it might be what you want. That you probably have somewhere else you need to be, like Tommy’s or—”

“No, I don’t,” Joel says definitively.

You pause. “Okay, so—”

“You ever been to California?”

His question stumps you for a moment, seeming so random in its nature. “No.”

“You want to?”

You shrug. “I mean… sure. Maybe someday—”

“Why don’t you come with me then, baby?”

You let out an awkward giggle. “...Come with you where?”

“To California. Come with me.” Joel’s tone is genuine but firm.

“Like, today? Are you sure?”

“I mean, we ain’t gettin’ there today, darlin’. But yeah, I’m sure. We both got nowhere else to be, do we? So let’s just go, we’ll see it together.”

You beam up at him, realizing that he’s being serious. Joel does want you, wants you to be his companion, maybe even something more that you’ll discover on familiar-looking back roads and in cities you’ve only ever seen pictures of.

“Okay,” you agree excitedly.

Joel nods. “Okay, then. Lemme go check us out ‘n we’ll get back on the road again. Burnin’ daylight already,” he jokes. He carries your backpack out to the truck for you, setting it down between your feet after he opens the door and helps you inside with a stable hand. It only takes a few minutes for Joel to hand in the room key and pay for the night, and then he’s back at your side. You begin to feel like that’s where you always want him to stay.

“So, where to first, baby? California ain’t goin’ anywhere, can take as long to get there as we wanna. We’ll go wherever you like, take your pick.” Joel leans across your body to dig a folded up map out of the glove compartment, handing it to you.

You examine it, your eyes darting across the dozens of dots with the names of cities next to them, some you’ve never even heard of. You point to one that you have heard of, but have never been to, because you’ve never even left the state you grew up in before.

“Um… how about Detroit? I’ve heard it’s nice, I think.”

Joel belly laughs at that. “It ain’t, but sure. You wanna go to Detroit, that’s where we’ll go. Buckle up, baby,” he instructs, patting your thigh. You oblige, and it feels good to finally know where you’re going, and that you’re going there with someone who cares about you, who feels safe, who wants you around. You also feel a little hopeful that maybe you were right about Ruby, after all. That you didn’t start walking for nothing, that you weren’t following some childish delusion, that if something as good as Joel had happened to you when you left, that maybe she had found herself on a similar path, ran into somebody good who took her wherever she wanted to go and helped her find someplace she belonged. Maybe she found her way out to California, eventually. What you are certain of is that neither of you ever have to go back to that town ever again, and that feels good, too.

And if it feels good, then it can’t be bad.

tag list: tag list: @beefrobeefcal @iamasaddie @rebel-held @dilfgestivo @zliteraturehoe @joeldjarin @kamcrazy123 @hellowoolf @rexamongthestars @stevie75 @luxurychristmaspudding @noisynightmarepoetry @mewantpeepaw @pedritoferg @alex-does-art-things @evolnoomym @annoyingmarvelreader @k1l4ni @joelsdagger (if your name is crossed out, it won’t let me tag you!!)

#my writing #joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x you #the last of us fanfiction #tlou fanfiction #joel miller smut #dark!joel miller #dark!joel x reader

520 notes · View notes

wilwheaton · 5 days

Quote

In 2016, Trump bellowed to a rabid crowd on his scorched earth campaign trail that if “She (Hillary Clinton) gets to pick her judges, there’s nothing you can do, folks.” When the crowd booed he added this: “Although the Second Amendment people — maybe there is, I don’t know ...” I could spend an hour citing more examples of repulsive threats like these, but the point is this: Putting people’s lives in danger through violent rhetoric is a Republican-made atrocity. They see “fine people” in murdering racists, and violent attackers who mean to end our country as “victims” and “tourists.” While the story in West Palm Beach is still developing, we know for sure that there have been at least 33 confirmed bomb threats in Springfield, Ohio, that have led to the evacuations of schools and city buildings in yet another American city that didn’t deserve this. State troopers have descended on Springfield, because people are on edge and living in fear thanks to the leaders of the Republican Party who want it this way. This is the America THEY have created, because these ghastly people see it as their only way to win in November. They actually WANT us living in fear.

Let's call Springfield what it is: Republican-made terrorism

633 notes · View notes

zacharialend · 2 years

Link

#America #Human rights #Ohio #Murder by state

0 notes

mariacallous · 3 months

Text

Some prominent conservative lawmakers and commentators are advocating for ending no-fault divorce, laws that exist in all 50 US states and allow a person to end a marriage without having to prove a spouse did something wrong, like commit adultery or domestic violence.

The socially conservative, and often religious, rightwing opponents of such divorce laws are arguing that the practice deprives people – mostly men – of due process and hurt families, and by extension, society. Republican lawmakers in Louisiana, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Texas have discussed eliminating or increasing restrictions on no-fault marriage laws.

Defenders of the laws, which states started passing a half-century ago, see legislation and arguments to repeal them as the latest effort to restrict women’s rights – following the overturning of Roe v Wade and passage of abortion bans around the country – and say that without such protections, the country would return to an earlier era when women were often trapped in abusive marriages.

“No-fault divorce is critical to the ability, particularly the ability of women, to be able to exercise autonomy in their own relationships, in their own lives,” said Denise Lieberman, an adjunct professor at the Washington University School of Law in St Louis, who has a specialty in policies concerning gender, sexuality and sexual violence.

Before 1969, when then California Republican governor Ronald Reagan, who had been divorced, approved the country’s first no-fault divorce law, women, who are more likely to experience violence from an intimate partner, were often forced to stay in marriages. If they could not prove that their husband had been abusive or persuade him to grant a divorce, they would not be able to take any assets from the marriage or remarry, according to a study in the Quarterly Journal of Economics.

States around America gradually followed suit and passed similar laws allowing unilateral divorce until 2010, when New York became the last state to approve the practice.

Between 1976 and 1985, states that passed the laws saw their domestic violence rates against men and women fall by about 30%; the number of women murdered by an intimate partner declined by 10%; and female suicide rates declined by 8 to 16%.

Without such laws, “it’s hard to prove anything in court relating to a family because you don’t have any witnesses”, said Kimberly Wehle, professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law. “It’s very difficult to get evidence to show abuse of children. How do you do it? Do you put your kids on the stand?”

Conservative commentators such as Matt Walsh, Steven Crowder and lawmakers such as the Republican senator JD Vance of Ohio have argued that the laws are unfair to men and hurt society because they lead to more divorces.

The divorce rate in the United States increased significantly from 1960, when it was 9.2 per 1,000 married women, to 22.6 in 1980. But by 2022, the rate had fallen to 14.5.

On the increase in divorces, Vance said in 2021: “One of the great tricks that I think the sexual revolution pulled on the American populace” is the idea that “these marriages were fundamentally, you know, they were maybe even violent, but certainly they were unhappy, and so getting rid of them and making it easier for people to shift spouses like they change their underwear, that’s going to make people happier in the long term”.

Beverly Willett, a writer and attorney, argues that unilateral no-fault divorce is also unconstitutional because it violates a person’s 14th amendment right to due process.

The defendant “has absolutely no recourse to say, ‘Wait a minute. I don’t want to be divorced, and I don’t think that there are grounds for divorce. I would like to be heard. I would like to call witnesses,’” said Willett, who experienced a divorce she didn’t want because she thought her marriage could be saved. “I believed in my vows” and “didn’t want to give up”.

But Willett’s argument relies on the idea that “women are either property or that somehow men’s liberty is restrained by not allowing them to stay in a marriage with someone who does not want to be married”, said Wehle, who also wrote about it in the Atlantic. “I disagree with the idea that women are somehow property interests of their husbands. That is an arcane relic of law that has no place in modern society.”

Willett responded to Wehle’s critique by writing that “nobody has suggested a return to antiquated laws of the 18th and 19th century. Considerable reform that protects women and ensures their equality in family court has been enacted since then.”

On the argument that no-fault divorce reduces domestic violence, Willett points to data that most domestic violence occurs between unmarried couples and says regardless, with “any contract, any lawsuit, you still have to follow the constitution”.

But without such laws, victims of domestic violence would then have to navigate a court system that can be time-consuming, “very adversarial and very costly” because the plaintiff often must then pay for child care and transportation, said Marium Durrani, vice-president of policy for the National Domestic Violence Hotline.

“Any sort of additional barrier that we add to the ease of legal proceeding is, frankly, a nightmare and an enormous burden for survivors,” said Durrani. “I’m not trying to be an alarmist, but it can increase death [if] a survivor of domestic violence has to prove that they are being abused in a divorce proceeding.”

Still, Lieberman does not think Republicans will succeed in their efforts to make it more difficult for people to get divorced.

“I do believe that that train has left the station. I mean, we have had no-fault divorce now for 50 years,” Lieberman said. But “I didn’t think the supreme court would overturn Roe v Wade, which we had for 50 years, so I suppose we will see.”

150 notes · View notes

inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 5 months

Text

1968 [Chapter 6: Athena, Goddess Of Wisdom]

Series Summary: Aemond is embroiled in a fierce battle to secure the Democratic Party nomination and defeat his archnemesis, Richard Nixon, in the presidential election. You are his wife of two years and wholeheartedly indoctrinated into the Targaryen political dynasty. But you have an archnemesis of your own: Aemond’s chronically delinquent brother Aegon.

Series Warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), violence, bodily injury, character deaths, New Jersey, age-gap relationships, drinking, smoking, drugs, pregnancy and childbirth, kids with weird Greek names, historical topics including war and discrimination, math.

Word Count: 5.2k

Let me know if you’d like to be tagged! 🥰

💜 All of my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Here at the midway point in our journey—like Dante stumbling upon the gates of the Inferno—would it be the right moment to review what’s at stake? Let’s begin.

It’s the end of August. The delegates of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago officially vote to name Aemond the party’s presidential candidate. His ascension is aided by 10,000 antiwar demonstrators who flood into the city and threaten to set it ablaze if Hubert Humphrey is chosen instead. At the end—in his death rattle—Humphrey begs to be Aemond’s running mate, one last humiliation he cannot resist. Humphrey is denied. Eugene McCarthy, dignity intact, boards a commercial flight to his home state of Minnesota without looking back.

Aemond selects U.S. Ambassador to France, Sargent Shriver, to be his vice president. Shriver is a Kennedy by marriage—his wife, JFK’s younger sister Eunice, just founded the Special Olympics—and has previously headed the Office of Economic Opportunity, the Peace Corps, and the Chicago Board of Education. He also served as the architect of the president’s “War on Poverty” before distancing himself from the imploding Johnson administration. Shriver is not a concession to fence-sitting moderates or Southern Dixiecrats, but an embodiment of Aemond’s commitment to unapologetic progressivism. Richard Nixon spends the weekend campaigning in his native California, a gold vein of votes like the mines settlers rushed to in 1848. George Wallace announces that he will run as an Independent. Racists everywhere rejoice.

Phase III of the Tet Offensive is underway in Vietnam; 700 American soldiers have been killed this month alone. Riots break out in military prisons where the U.S. Army is keeping their deserters. The North Vietnamese refuse to allow Pope Paul VI to visit Hanoi on a peace mission. President Johnson calls both Aemond and Nixon to personally inform them of this latest evidence of the communists’ unwillingness to negotiate in good faith. Daeron and John McCain remain in Hỏa Lò Prison. The draft swallows men like the titan Cronus devoured his own children.

In Eastern Europe, the Russians are crushing pro-democracy protests in the largest military operation since World War II as half a million troops roll into Czechoslovakia. In Caswell County, North Carolina, the last remaining segregated school district in the nation is ordered by a federal judge to integrate after years of stalling. On the Fangataufa Atoll in the South Pacific, France becomes the fifth nation to successfully explode a hydrogen bomb. In Mexico City, 300,000 students gather to protest the authoritarian regime of President Diaz Ordaz. In Guatemala, American ambassador John Gordon Mein is murdered by a Marxist guerilla organization called the Rebel Armed Forces. In Columbus, Ohio, nine guards are held hostage during a prison riot; after 30 hours, they’re rescued by a SWAT team.

The latest issue of Life magazine brings worldwide attention to catastrophic industrial pollution in the Great Lakes. The first successful multiorgan transplant is carried out at Houston Methodist Hospital. The Beatles release Hey Jude, the best-selling single of 1968 in the U.S., U.K., Australia, and Canada. NASA’s Apollo lunar landing program plans to launch a crewed shuttle next year, just in time to fulfill John F. Kennedy’s 1962 promise to put a man on the moon “before the end of the decade.” If this is successful, the United States will win the Space Race and prove the superiority of capitalism. If it fails, the martyred astronauts will join all the other ghosts of this apocalyptic age, an epoch born under bad stars.

The night sky glows with the ancient debris of the Aurigid meteor shower. From down here on Earth, Jupiter is a radiant white gleam, visible with the naked eye and admired since humans were making cave paintings and Stonehenge. But Io is a mystery. With a telescope, she becomes a dust mote entrapped by Jupiter’s gravity; to the casual observer, she doesn’t exist at all.

~~~~~~~~~~

What was it like, that very first time? It’s strange to remember. You’re both different people now.

It’s May, 1966. You and Aemond are engaged, due to be married in three short weeks, and if you get pregnant then it’s no harm, no foul. In reality, it will end up taking you over a year to conceive, but no one knows that yet; you are living in the liminal space between what you imagine your life will be and the cold blade of the truth. Aemond has brought you to Asteria for the weekend, an increasingly common occurrence. The Targaryens—minus one, that holdout prodigal son, always glowering from behind swigs of rum and clouds of smoke—have already begun to treat you like a member of the family. The flock of Alopekis yap excitedly and lick your shins. Eudoxia learns your favorite snacks so she can have them ready when you arrive.

One night Aemond takes your hand and leads you to Helaena’s garden, darkness turned to twilight in the artificial luminance of the main house. You can hear distant voices, chatter and laughter, and the Beatles’ Rubber Soul spinning on the record player in the living room like a black hole, gravity that not even light can escape when it is wrenched over the event horizon.

You’re giggling as Aemond pulls you along, faster and faster, weaving through pathways lined with roses and sunflowers and butterfly bushes. Your high heels sink into soft, fertile earth; the air in your lungs is cool and infinite. “Where are we going?”

And Aemond grins back at you as he replies: “To Olympus.”

In the circle of hedges guarded by thirteen gods of stone, Aemond unzips your modest pink sundress and slips your heels off your feet, kneeling like he’s proposing to you again. When you are bare and secretless, he draws you down onto the grass and opens you, claims you, fills you to the brim as the crystalline water of the fountain patters and Zeus hurls his lightning bolts, an eternal storm, unending war. It’s intense in a way it never was with your first boyfriend, a sweet polite boy who talked about feminist theory and followed his enlightened conscience all the way to Vietnam. This isn’t just a pleasant way to pass a Friday night, something to look forward to between differential equations textbooks and calculus proofs. With Aemond it’s a ritual; it’s something so overpowering it almost scares you.

“Aphrodite,” Aemond murmurs against your throat, and when you try to get on top he stops you, pins you to the ground, thrusts hard and deep, and you try not to moan too loudly as you surrender, his weight on you like a prophesy. This is how he wants you. This is where you belong.

Has someone ever stitched you to their side, pushing the needle through your skin again and again as the fabric latticework takes shape, until their blood spills into your veins and your antibodies can no longer tell the difference? He makes you think you’ve forgotten who you were before. He makes you want to believe in things the world taught you were myths.

But that was over two years ago. Now Aemond is not your spellbinding almost-stranger of a fiancé—shrouded in just the right amount of mystery—but your husband, the father of your dead child, the presidential candidate. You miss when he was a mirage. You miss what it felt like to get high on the idea of him, each taste a hit, each touch a rush of toxins to the bloodstream.

Seven weeks after your emergency c-section, you are healing. Your belly no longer aches, your bleeding stops, you can rejoin the living in this last gasp of summer. Ludwika takes you shopping and you pick out new swimsuits; you’ve gone up a size since the baby, and it shows no signs of vanishing. In the fitting room, Ludwika chain-smokes Camel cigarettes and claps when you show her each outfit, ordering you to spin around, telling you that there’s nothing like Oleg Cassini back in Poland. You plan to buy three swimsuits. Ludwika insists you get five. She pays with Otto’s American Express.

That afternoon at home in your blue bedroom, you get changed to join the rest of the family down by the pool, your first swim since Ari was born. You choose Ludwika’s favorite: a dreamy turquoise two-piece with flowing transparent fabric that drapes your midsection. You can still see the dark vertical line of where the doctors stitched you closed. Now you and Aemond match; he got his scar on the floor of the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach, you earned yours at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan. There are gold chains on your wrist and looped around your neck. Warm sunlight and ocean wind pours in through the open windows.

Aemond appears in the doorway and you turn to show him, proud of how you’ve pulled yourself together, how this past year hasn’t put you in an asylum. His right eye catches on your scar and stays there for a long time. Then at last he says: “You don’t have something else to wear?”

~~~~~~~~~~

It’s Labor Day, and Asteria has been descended upon by guests invited to celebrate Aemond’s nomination. The dining room table is overflowing with champagne, Agiorgitiko wine, platters of mini spanakopitas, lamb gyros, pita bread with hummus and tzatziki, feta cheese and cured meats, grilled octopus, baklava, and kourabiethes. Eudoxia is rushing around sweeping up crumbs and shooing tipsy visitors away from antique vases shipped here from Greece. Aemond’s celebrity endorsers include Sammy Davis Jr., Sonny and Cher, Andy Williams, Bobby Darin, Warren Beatty, Shirley MacLaine, Claudine Longet, and a number of politicians; but the most notable attendee is President Lyndon Baines Johnson, shadowed by Secret Service agents. He won’t be making any surprise appearances on the campaign trail for Aemond—in the present political climate, he would be more of a liability than an asset—but he has travelled to Long Beach Island tonight to offer his well-wishes. From the record player thrums Jimi Hendrix’s All Along The Watchtower.

When you finish getting ready and arrive downstairs, you spot Aegon: slouching in a velvet chair over a century old, hair shagging in his eyes, sipping something out of a chipped mug he clasps with both hands, flirting with a bubbly early-twenties campaign staffer. Aegon smiles and waves when he sees you. You wave back. And you think: When did he become the person I look for when I walk into a room?

Now Aemond is beside you in a blue suit—beaming, confident, his glass eye in place, a hand resting on your waist—and Aegon isn’t smiling anymore. He takes a gulp of what is almost certainly straight rum from his mug and returns his attention to the campaign staffer, his lady of the hour. You picture him undressing her on his shag carpet and feel disorienting, violent envy like a bullet.

Viserys is already fast asleep upstairs, but the rest of the family is out en masse to charm the invitees and pose for photographs. Alicent, Helaena, and Mimi—trying very hard to act sober, blinking too often—are chit-chatting with the other political wives. Otto is complaining about something to Criston; Criston is pretending to listen as he stares at Alicent. Ludwika is smoking her Camels and talking to several young journalists who are ogling her, enraptured. Fosco and Sargent Shriver are entertaining a group of guests with a boisterous, lighthearted debate on the merits of Italian versus French cuisine, though they agree that both are superior to Greek. The nannies have brought the eight children to be paraded around before bedtime. All Cosmo wants to do is clutch your hand and “help” you navigate around the living room, warning you not to step on the small, weaving Alopekis. When Mimi attempts to steal her youngest son away, he ignores her, and as she begins to make a scene you rebuke her with a harsh glare. Mimi retreats meekly. She has never argued with you, not once in over two years. You speak for Aemond, and Aemond is a god.

As the children are herded off to their beds by the nannies, Bobby Kennedy—presently serving as a New York senator despite residing primarily on his family’s compound in Massachusetts—approaches to congratulate Aemond. His wife Ethel is a tiny, nasally, scrappy but not terribly bright woman, five months pregnant with her eleventh child, and you have to get away from her like a hand pulled from a hot stove.

“You know, I was considering running,” Bobby says to Aemond, chuckling, good-natured. “But when I saw you get in the race, I thought better of it! Maybe I’ll give it a go in ’76, huh?”

“Hey, kid, what a tough year you’ve had,” Ethel tells you, patting your forearm. You can’t tear your eyes from her small belly. She has ten living children already. I couldn’t keep one. What kind of sense does that make? “We’re real sorry for your trouble, aren’t we, Bobby?”

Now he is nodding somberly. “We are. We sure are. We’ve been praying for you both.”

Aemond is thanking them, sounding touched but entirely collected. You manage some hurried response and then excuse yourself. Your hands are shaking as you cross the room, not really seeing it. You walk right into Lady Bird Johnson. She takes pity on you; she seems to perceive how rattled you are. “Oh Lyndon, look, it’s just who we were hoping to speak to! The next first lady of the United States. And how beautiful you are, just radiant. How do you keep your hair so perfect? That glamorous updo. You never have a single strand out of place.” Lady Bird lays a palm tenderly on your bare shoulder. She has an unusual, angular face, but a wise sort of compassion that only comes from suffering. Her husband is an unrepentant serial cheater. “I’ll make you a list of everything you need to know about the White House. All the quirks of the property, and the hidden gems too!”

“You’re so kind. We’ll see what happens in November…”

“Good evening, ma’am,” President Johnson says, smiling warmly. He’s an ugly man, but there’s something hypnotic that lives inside him and shines through his eyes like the blaze of a lighthouse. He pulls you in through the dark, through the storm; he promises you answers to questions you haven’t thought of yet. LBJ is 6’4 and known for bullying his political adversaries with the so-called “Johnson Treatment”; he leans in and makes rapid-fire demands until they forget he’s not allowed to hit them. “I have to tell you frankly, I don’t envy anyone who inherits that den of rattlesnakes in Washington D.C.”

“Lyndon, don’t frighten her,” Lady Bird scolds fondly.

“Everyone thinks they know what to do about Vietnam,” LBJ plods onwards. “But it’s a damned if you do, damned if you don’t clusterfuck. If you keep fighting, they call you a murderer. But if you pull the troops out and South Vietnam falls to the communists, every single man lost was for nothing, and you think the families will stand for that? Their kid in a body bag, or his legs blown off, or his brain scrambled? There’s no easy answer. It’s a goddamn bitch of a quagmire.”

Lady Bird offers you a sympathetic smirk. Sorry about all this unpleasantness, she means. When he gets himself worked up, I can’t stop him. But you find yourself feeling sorry for President Johnson. It will be difficult for him to learn how to fade into disgraced obscurity after once being so omnipotent, so beloved. Reinvention hurts like hell: fevers raging, bones mending, healing flesh that itches so ferociously you want to claw it off.

LBJ gives Lady Bird a look, quick but meaningful. She acquiesces. This has happened a thousand times before. “It was so nice talking to you, dear,” she tells you, then crosses the living room to pay her respects to Alicent.

The president steps closer, looming, towering. The Johnson Treatment?? you think, but no; he isn’t trying to intimidate you. He’s just curious.

“Do you know what Aemond’s plan is for ‘Nam?” LBJ asks, eyes urgent, voice low. “I’m sure he has one. He’s sworn to end the draft as soon as he gets into office, but how is he going to make sure the South Vietnamese can fend off the North themselves? We’re trying to train the bastards, but if we left they’d fold in months. It would be the first war the U.S. ever lost. Does he understand that?”

“He doesn’t really discuss it with me.” That’s true; you know his policies, but only because they are a constant subject of conversation within the family, something you all breathe like oxygen.

“We can’t let Nixon win,” LBJ continues. “It’s mass suicide to leave the country in his hands. The man can’t hold his liquor anymore, getting robbed by Kennedy in ’60 broke something in him. He gets sloshed and shoves his aids around, makes up conspiracies in his head. He’s a paranoid little prick. He’ll surveille the American people. He’ll launch a nuke at Moscow.”

You honestly don’t know what he expects you to say. “I’ll pass the message along to Aemond.”

“People love you, Mrs. Targaryen.” LBJ watching you closely. “Believe it or not, they used to love me too. But I still remember how to play the game. You’re the only reason Aemond is leading the polls in Florida. You can get him other states too. Jack needed Jackie. Aemond needs you. And you’ve had tragedies, and that’s a damn shame. But don’t you miss an opportunity. You take every disappointment, every fucked up cruelty of life and find a way to make it work for you. You pin it to your chest like a goddamn medal. Every single scar makes you look more mortal to those people going to the ballot box in November. You want them to be able to see themselves in you. It helps the mansions and the millions go down smoother.”

“President Johnson!” Aegon says as he saunters over, huge mocking grin. He thumps a closed fist against the Texan’s broad chest; the Secret Service agents standing ten feet away observe this sternly. “How thoughtful of you to be here, taking time out of your busy schedule, squeezing us in between war crimes.”

“The mayor of Trenton,” LBJ jabs.

“The butcher of Saigon.”

Now the president is no longer amused. “You’ve never accomplished anything in your whole damn life, son. Your obituary will be the size of a postage stamp. I’m looking forward to reading it someday soon.” He leaves, rejoining Lady Bird at the opposite end of the room.

You frown at Aegon, disapproving. You’re dressed in a sparkling, royal blue gown that Aemond chose. “That was unnecessary.”

Aegon is wearing an ill-fitting green shirt—half the buttons undone—khaki pants, and tan moccasins. “I just did you a favor.”

“What happened to your new girlfriend? Shouldn’t she be getting railed in your basement right now? Did she have a prior commitment? Did she have a spelling test to study for? Those can be tricky, such complex words. Juvenile. Inappropriate. Infidelity.”

“You know what he brags about?” Aegon says, meaning LBJ. “That he’s fucked more women by accident than John F. Kennedy ever did on purpose.”

“That sounds…logistically challenging.”

“He’s a lech. He’s a freak. He tells everyone on Capitol Hill how big his cock is. He takes it out and swings it around during meetings.”

“And that’s all far less than admirable, but he’s not going to do something like that around me.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he’s not an idiot,” you say impatiently. “He was perfectly civil. And I was getting interesting advice.”

Aegon rolls his eyes, exasperated. “Yeah, okay, I’m sorry I crashed your cute little pep talk with Lyndon Johnson, the most hated man on the planet.”

“I guess you can’t stop Aemond from touching me, so you have to terrorize LBJ instead.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Aegon hisses, and his venom stuns you. And now you’re both trapped: you loosed the arrow, he proved you hit the mark. He’s flushing a deep, mortified red. Your guts are twisting with remorse.

“Aegon, wait, I didn’t mean—”

He whirls and storms off, shoving his way through the crowd. People glare at him as they clutch their glasses and plates, sighing in that What else do you expect from the worthless son? sort of way. You’re still gaping blankly at the place where Aegon stood when Aemond finds you, snakes a hand around the back of your neck, and whispers through the painstakingly-arranged wisps of hair that fall around your ear: “Follow me.”

It’s not a question. It’s a command. You trail him through the living room, into the foyer, and through the front door, not knowing what he wants. Outside the moon is a sliver; the light from the main house makes the stars hard to see. “Aemond, you’ll never believe the conversation I just had with LBJ. He really unloaded, I think the stress is driving him insane. I have to tell you what he said about—”

“Later.” And this is jarring; Aemond doesn’t put anything before strategy. He grabs your hand as he turns into Helaena’s garden, and only then do you understand what he wants. Instinctively, your legs lock up and your feet stop moving. Aemond tugs you onward. He wants it to be like the very first time. He intends to start over with you, the dawning of a new age in the dead of night.

Hidden in the circle of hedges, he takes your face roughly in his hands and kisses you, drinks you down like a vampire, consumes you like wildfire. But your skull echoes with panic. I don’t want him touching me. I don’t want another child with him. “Aemond…”

He doesn’t hear you, or acts like he doesn’t, or mistakes it for a murmur of desire, or chooses to believe it is. He has you down on the grass under the vengeful gaze of Zeus, the fountain splashing, the sounds of the house a low foreign drone. He yanks off your panties, but he doesn’t want you naked like he always did before. He pushes the hem of your shimmering cobalt gown up to your hips and unbuckles his trousers. And you realize as he’s touching you, as he’s easing himself into you: He doesn’t want to have to look at my scar.

You can’t ignore him, you can’t pretend it’s not happening. He’s too big for that. It’s a biting fullness that demands to be felt. So you kiss him back, and knot your fingers in his short hair like you used to, and try to remember the things you always said to him before. And when Aemond is too absorbed to notice, you look away from him, from the statue of Zeus, and peer up into the stone face of Athena instead: the goddess who never married and who knows the answer to every question.

“I love you,” Aemond says when it’s over, marveling at the slopes of your face in the dim ethereal light. “Everything will be right again soon. Everything will be perfect.”

You conjure up a smile and nod like you believe him.

“What did LBJ say?”

“Can I tell you later tonight? After the party, maybe? I just need a few minutes.”

“Of course.” And now Aemond pretends to be patient. He buckles his belt and returns to the main house, his blood coursing with the possibilities only you can make real, his skin damp with your sweat.

For a while—ten minutes, twenty minutes—you lie there on the cool grass wondering what it was like for all those mortals and nymphs, being pinned down by Zeus and then having Hera try to kill them afterwards, raising ill-fated reviled bastards they couldn’t help but love. What is heaven if the realm of the immortals is so cruel? Why does the god of justice seem so immune to it?

When at last you rise and walk back towards the house, you find Mimi at the edge of the garden. She’s on her knees and retching into a rose bush; she’s cut her face on the thorns, but she hasn’t noticed yet. She’s groaning; she seems lost.

You reach for her, gripping her bony shoulders. “Mimi, here, let’s get you upstairs…”

“No,” she blubbers, tears streaming down her scratched cheeks. “Just go away. Leave me.”

“Mimi—”

“No!” she roars, a mournful hemorrhage as she slaps your hands until you release her.

“You don’t have to be this way,” you tell her, distraught. “You can give up drinking. We’ll help you, me and Fosco and Ludwika. You can start over. You can be healthy and present again, you can live a real life.”

Mimi stares up at you, her grey eyes glassy and bloodshot but with a vicious, piercing honesty. “My husband hates me. My kids don’t know I exist. What the hell do I have to be sober for?”

You weren’t expecting this. You don’t know what to say. “We can help make the world better.”

“The world would be better without me in it.”

Then Mimi curls up on the grass under the rose bush, and stays there until you return with Fosco to drag her upstairs to her empty bed.

~~~~~~~~~~

The next afternoon, you’re lying on a lounge chair by the pool. Tomorrow the family will leave Asteria and embark upon a vigorous campaign schedule that will continue, with very few breaks, until Election Day on Tuesday, November 5th. The children are splashing and shrieking in the pool with Fosco, but you aren’t looking at them. You’re staring across the sun-drenched emerald lawn at the Atlantic Ocean. You’re envisioning all the bones and splinters of sunken ships that must litter the silt of the abyss; you’re thinking that it’s a graveyard with no headstones, no memory. Your swimsuit is a red one-piece. Your eyes are shielded by large black Ray Bans aviator sunglasses. Your gaze flicks up to the cloudless blue sky, where all the stars and planets are invisible.

Jupiter has nearly a hundred moons; the largest four were discovered by Galileo in 1610. Europa is a smooth white cosmic marble with a crust of ice, beautiful, immaculate. Ganymede, the largest moon in our solar system and the only satellite with its own magnetic field, is rumored to have a vast underground saltwater ocean that may contain life. Callisto is dark and indomitable, riddled with impact craters; because of her dynamic atmosphere and location beyond Jupiter’s radiation belts, she is considered the best location for possible future crewed missions to the Jovian system. But Io is a wasteland. She has no water and no oxygen. Her only children are 400 active volcanoes, sulfur plumes and lava flows, mountains of silicate rock higher than Mount Everest, cataclysmic earthquakes as her crust slips around on a mantle of magma. Her daily radiation levels are 36 times the lethal limit for humans. If Hades had a home in our corner of the galaxy, it would be Io. She glows ruby and gold with barren apocalyptic fury. You can feel yourself turning poisonous like she is. You can feel your skin splitting open as the lava spills out.

Aegon trots out of the house—red swim trunks, cheap red plastic sunglasses, no shirt, a beach towel slung around his neck, flip flops—and kicks your chair. “Get up. We’re going sailing.”

“I don’t want to talk to anybody.”

“Great, because I’m not asking you to talk. I’m telling you to get in my boat.”

You don’t reply. You don’t think you can without your voice cracking. Aegon crouches down beside your chair and pushes your sunglasses up into your Brigitte Bardot-inspired hair so he can see your face. Your eyes are pink, wet, desperately sad. Deep troubled grooves appear in his forehead as he studies you. Gently, wordlessly, he pats your cheek twice and lowers your sunglasses back over your eyes. Then he stands up again and offers you his hand.

“Let’s go,” Aegon says, softly this time. You take his hand and follow him down to the boathouse.

Five vessels are currently kept there. Aegon’s sailboat is a 25-foot Wianno Senior sloop, just roomy enough for a few passengers. He’s had it since long before you married into the Targaryen family. It is white with hand-painted gold accents; the name Sunfyre adorns the stern. He unmoors the boat, pushes it out into the open water, and raises the sails.

You glide eastbound over the glittering crests of waves, slowly at first, then faster as the sails catch the wind. Aegon has one hand on the rudder, the other grasping the ropes. And the farther you get from shore, the smaller Asteria seems, and the Targaryen family, and the presidential election, and the United States itself. Now all that exists is this boat: you, Aegon, the squawking gulls, the school of mackerel, the ocean. The sun beats down; the breeze rips strands of your hair free. The battery-powered record player is blasting White Room by Cream. When you are far enough from land that no journalists would be able to get a photo, Aegon takes two joints and his Zippo out of the pocket of his swim trunks. He puts both joints between his lips, lights them, and passes you one. Then he stretches out beside you on the deck, gazing up at the September sky.

You ask as your muscles unravel and your thoughts turn light and easy to share: “Why did you bring me out here?”

“So you can drown yourself,” Aegon says, and you both laugh. “Nah. I used to go sailing all the time when I was a teenager. It always made me feel better. It was the only place where I could really be alone.”

You consider the math. “Wow. You haven’t been a teenager since before I was in kindergarten.”

“It’s weird to think about. You don’t seem that young.”

“Thanks, I guess. You don’t seem that old.”

“Maybe we’re meeting in the middle.” He inhales deeply and then exhales in a rush of smoke. “What do you think, should I get an earring?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“It might shock Otto so bad it kills him.”

“I’ll get two.” And then Aegon says: “It’s not cool for you to mock me.”

You are dismayed; you didn’t mean to hurt him. “I wasn’t.”

“Yes, you were. You were mocking me. You mocked me about the receipt under my ashtray, and then you mocked me again last night. I’m up for a lot of things, but I can’t handle that. Okay?”

“Okay.” You turn your head so you can see him: shaggy blonde hair, stubble, perpetual sunburn, the softness of his belly and his chest, flesh you long to vanish into like rain through parched earth. “Aegon?”

He looks over at you. “Io?”

“I don’t want Aemond to touch me either.”

He’s surprised; not by what you feel, but because you’ve said it aloud, a treason like Prometheus giving mankind the gift of fire. “What are we gonna do about it?”

If you were the goddess of wisdom, maybe you’d know.

#aegon ii targaryen #aegon targaryen #aegon targaryen ii #aegon ii #aegon targaryen x reader #aegon x reader #aegon ii x y/n #aegon ii x you #aegon ii targaryen x reader #aegon ii x reader #aegon ii fanfic #aegon ii fic

249 notes · View notes

boldlyvoid · 1 year

Text

I Can See You | Part One

18+ Aaron Hotchner x Reader | Part Two

Summary: Entering a secret relationship with her boss is something she always imagined, but never something she thought could happen.

Warnings: age gap, boss/subordinate relationship, secret relationship, sneaking around, office sex - Oral (fem receiving), canon typical violence (case mentioning rape and murder) mentions of Foyet, Aarons scars and Haley. Food mention, Smut - oral (mostly male receiving, light female receiving) unprotected p in v, creampies.

Word Count: 10.7k

It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

When she joined the FBI and applied to the behavioural analysis unit, she thought her mind would be plagued with unsubs and victims and heartbreak. She was so sure that seeing horrific images and knowing disgusting details would haunt her in her sleep and eclipse her daydreams. And sure, they do bother her, it is hard to stomach sometimes… but there were upsides to this job. Very handsome, very muscular and very delicious, upsides.

She works in the bullpen, she doesn’t see much action, she just files a bunch of reports. She talks to leads on the phone, she consults on cases that VICAP has marked as ones to watch and once a week she brings a couple boxes worth of files up to her boss to give him a rundown on what’s going on. A lot of this Job used to be JJ’s, back when she was the Media Liaison but now that she’s an SSA, keeping track of requests of assistance from police precincts across the United States has fallen onto her plate.

Talking to Agent Hotchner once a week was both a blessing and a curse. She had her meetings with him Fridays at 4:30PM unless he was away on a case, then it was bumped to the morning after he returned at 8AM. That’s what she has to do this morning. All last week they were in Ohio, they returned around midday on Saturday, had the rest of the weekend off and were scheduled to meet at the round table Monday at 10.

She wakes up extra early, she has the longest shower of her life so she can wash her hair and shave everything. Then she puts on her makeup and does her hair all nice and she picks an outfit that was equally pretty and professional. It’s exhausting, but she’d do absolutely anything to look good for her boss. Even if it’s wrong and she knows nothing will happen, a girl can dream.

And she does dream about him. All the time, both awake and asleep. She imagines him walking past her in the hallway, their knuckles brushing ever so lightly because he’d do anything just for the chance to touch her. She imagines him calling her up to his office but instead of asking her to take a seat in the chairs in front of his desk, he sits her on the desk itself, legs open just wide enough for him to stand between them and look down at her. He’d run his finger along her jaw, to her chin so he can force her to look up at him. He’d talk to her in a mere whisper, asking if she’s been good, if she’s done all her work and if she deserves a reward… she gets lost in her daydreams at her desk and before she knows it, he’s standing at the railing in front of his office, calling her name.

“Are you coming?”

“Yes sir,” she rushes to her feet, soothes out her dress and grabs her things. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” he truly doesn’t mind. He lets her enter his office first, he follows and shuts the door behind himself. “It’s early on a Monday, I’m sure you had fun this weekend?”

“Not really,” she shakes her head and then swallows sharply. “I uh, I have the reports ready for you, I was expecting to do them Friday, I can’t believe that last case went on 6 days.”

“It was a tough one,” Hotch agrees, making his way back over to his desk and taking a seat.

She follows his lead, taking a seat in front of his desk in one of the nice upholstered chairs. She crosses her ankles and sits as straight as she can, her breathing is rigid and she feels so awkward around him all the time. He’s too handsome for a job like this.

“Are you okay?” He asks, knowing by her body language that something is up.

She nods, furrowing her brow, she just keeps nodding, unable to find the words. “Yeah. Yeah, no I’m fine. Sorry. I don’t know why I always do this with you.”

He smirks, leans back in his chair and tries his hardest not to laugh. He’s too good at his job not to know. “I thought you wanted to be a profiler?”

“Okay,” she nervously pushes that comment to the side and cracks open her file. “I’ve gone through all the cases, I assigned the non-urgent ones to our bullpen agents and then I listed the ones you guys should look into by importance. At the top of the list we have what I think is a family annihilator in Utah who has gotten two families so far in the last 3 weeks. There’s a serial killer in Boston, he killed a man on the 4th of May and then again on the 7th of June. I don't suspect he’ll move to 3 until July, but we never know, he could speed up the process. And then there’s a string of rapes at the colleges in California: CalTech, Berkley, Stanford, Cal-State, but the last vic was murdered in her dorm room in Irvine. I’m not sure if it’s because she saw him this time or if he’s just getting braver.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Well, the 4 girls who have come forward so far say he was in a ski mask, so either she saw him this time and he didn’t want her to tell the sketch artist or he just wanted to move to murder. Either way, she’s dead and now that he’s killed he might not be able to stop.”

“Okay. We’ll brief the family annihilator to the team at 10 but if you hear anything more about this college rapest, you call me,” Hotch says as he goes to stand up. He moves around the desk and takes a seat on the corner. “What can you tell me about our next case?”

She sighs, “Not much. First, he killed a mother and her 3 daughters were killed, no sexual assault on any of them but there was semen found at the scene so he clearly got off on what he did… I had it ran through CODIS and we didn’t get any matches so he hasn’t been arrested for prior offences. In the second family there was no DNA on the scene but again, he killed another single mother and her son and daughter this time.”

“Okay. Any connection between the moms?”

She shakes her head, “Not that I could find. I did however notice that the one daughter from the first murder has a cousin on her dad's side and he played t-ball with the son from the second murder. I don’t have anything else. I’m sure Garcia will be able to get deeper than I can.”

“You’ve done a wonderful job,” he compliments. “You’ve been a great asset to the whole floor, we haven’t been this organized since 2009.”

Her body heats up with the smallest of compliments, overjoyed with praise, she smirks and fidgets in her seat. “Thank you, Sir.”

“You don’t have to call me Sir all the time,” he assures her. “Unless you like it.”

Her eyes widen, she’s so sure this is another one of her daydreams. “Excuse me?”

“I see the way you look at me, I’m not oblivious.”

“Sir, I-I-I-” she says it again, going to defend herself but she doesn’t know what else to say.

“You want me.”

She’s quick to stand up, “I don’t know what’s happening here so I’m going to go.”

“Wait,” he stalls her. “Please, I didn’t mean to upset you, I just… I’ve noticed how you always dress the nicest on the days we meet and you wear this perfume that I know is well above your pay grade. You get nervous, your brow sweats and your breathing changes. Those are all the telltale signs of a crush. I’m just less obvious in the way I feel about you.”

“I’m almost positive I’m dreaming right now,” she jokes, unable to believe this is happening.

“You’re not,” he reaches out for her hand and draws her in closer. From where he’s sitting on the desk, he’s just her height now.

She stares into his deep brown eyes and swoons. “Hotch…”

“I want to see where this could go,” he whispers. “We could keep it just between us, no one has to know. I won’t treat you any differently, I promise."

She quickly leans in, taking her chance to kiss him. Their lips touch, his hand comes up to cup her cheek and she can’t help herself from holding his sides, inside his suit jacket. She melts into him. This is everything she’s ever wanted and more. When she pulls back, she stares at him again, “where did this come from?”

“I really don’t know,” he admits. “I’m always excited to meet with you no matter how terrible the cases are, I enjoy getting to see you in the halls and I smile when you text me. I think you’re wonderful.”

“Are you sure you just haven’t been single too long,” she teases. “I hear them talk. You dated a woman named Beth, 3 years ago and haven’t even hinted about going on a date since… are you sure you’re not just lonely?”

“I’m sure,” he nods. “I like you but I don’t want this to ruin how we get our jobs done.”

“It won’t,” she’s quick to assure him. “I can keep a secret. I can do my job and I can meet you where ever you want for whatever you want.”

“Whatever I want, huh?” He teases, brushing her hair behind her ear.

She nods again, more eagerly this time. “Anything, sir.”

He hums, “I do like the sound of that.”

“I knew you would, that’s why I keep saying it,” she teases him right back. “I told you I wanted to be a profiler.”

“So that’s all it takes, huh? I tell you I like you and suddenly you’re comfortable around me?”

“Mhm,” she nods, biting back a smile. “I was afraid of embarrassing myself before… I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do when I have to brief the team on the new case in an hour.”

“Just pretend this was another one of your daydreams, I know you can behave yourself for me, can’t you?”

She nods again, “I’ll be the most professional girl in the world for you.”

“That’s what I like to hear,” he coos. “And maybe when I get home I can give you a reward.”

She tries so hard not to moan then and there, “Sounds good, sir.”

His thumb brushes over her cheekbone, and he tilts his head to the side slightly. She’s never noticed how long his lashes are, but she’s noticing now that he’s staring at her with the biggest puppy dog eyes, “tell me now if you’re 100% sure about this, if you’re not, if this isn’t something you want to do I can back off and I’ll never mention it again. I came on a little too strong, but I’ve been thinking about being with you for a while now. I don’t want you to only say yes because I’m your boss.”

“Aaron,�� she uses his real name so that he knows just how serious she is. “I would love nothing more than to sneak around and be with you at work and maybe have some dates outside of work and to be yours. Even if it’s just something casual and fun and for a little bit of time until you tire of me—

“I won’t,” he cuts her off.

“Either way, I want this,” she says quite firmly. “I want you.”

“Yeah?”

“Oh yeah, god I can’t even tell you how badly I’ve wished this would happen, I can’t believe it is happening,” she admits, the words just falling from her lips.

“Well, it is,” he smirks.

“Can I kiss you again?”

He nods, pulling her in closer once more, pressing his lips to hers gently at first. She wraps her arms around his back, feeling how warm he is under his jacket and how muscley his back is. The kiss heats up a bit, his hand slips around to the nape of her neck and his other hand rests on her lower back. She can tell he wants to go lower, to cup her ass and pull her flush against him. But he doesn’t, he’s got a semblance of control left as his tongue explores hers for the first time.

Months and months of dressing up and looking pretty for him, making sure her work was done perfectly and being as nice as humanly possible to him paid off. It paid off so well. Kissing him like this in his office with the blinds closed was better than winning the lottery, honestly. Having his hands on her, his tongue in her mouth, knowing there would be a lot more where this came from… she felt like the luckiest woman in the world.

And this was just the beginning.

—

She went from dressing up once a week to wearing her prettiest outfits every day. She had no idea what days he’d be in the office, she didn’t know how fast they were going to go with this thing they’ve started. She’s never done this before. Sure, she’s had plenty of boyfriends but she’s never had a casual and secret relationship with her boss… she’s seen it in movies, she’s read about it in books, but in practice? She has no idea what to expect.

Needless to say, she’s been wearing lots of skirts and pretty blouses, she went home that night he came on to her and searched her underwear drawers for her nicest lingerie… but she hated everything she owned. So, she went shopping. She even went as fast as explaining her situation to the sales lady so she could help her out.

“Is this for a date or an anniversary?” She asked, simply wanting to help.

“Uh…” she struggles to find an answer for her. So she just tells her the truth. “My boss admitted he thinks I’m beautiful and wants to start a casual thing and so I want to be prepared if anything… sexy happens in the office.”

“Oh,” she’s surprised by that but by the look on her face, she’s excited for her. “Is he older?”

She nods, “Yeah he’s in his 50s but he’s very handsome you’d have no idea how old he is unless he told you… and we work in a serious field, so like, I have to wear very professional clothes but I want pretty underwear under my suits in case something happens.”

“And do you have a budget?”

“I don’t want to spend more than like 2, 3 hundred,” she confirms. “Can you help me?”

“Gladly,” she smiles, dragging Y/N through the store and tossing her pair after pair of bras and panties as well as lace body suits, garter belts and thigh-high stockings. She has so many things by the time she gets to the dressing room, she’s so overwhelmed but the lady knew exactly what she was doing.

Trying them on, she’s never felt so hot in her whole life. She has no shame opening the curtain and showing the sales assistant, who tightens straps and re-situates her boobs in the bras. “You look hot… hot enough for an affair with your boss.”

“Oh, he’s not married,” she corrects her. “He got divorced in 2007… he’s been single for years, he said he’s never had the confidence to hit on an employee before but apparently because I’m so obvious with my crush on him, he’s confident enough to start something.”

“Mhm, they all say that,” she’s hesitant to believe it.

“No, I think he’s being serious, I mean, in our job its kinda hard to lie to each other—

“What do you do?”

“I consult on criminal cases,” she simplifies it so she doesn’t know she’s an FBI agent.

“Oh, oooh,” she’s really surprised. “Do you have darker dress shirts that these pieces won’t be seen underneath?”

“Yeah, I have a lot of darker blouses and dresses, I mostly wear black and grey,” she shares. Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror, she turns to the side, admiring herself. “I love this.”

“You’ve looked amazing in everything.”

“I’ll take them all,” she gives in, not caring how much she’s about to spend if the end result is Aaron Hotchner being unable to resist her. She wants to render him speechless, have him wanting to rip everything off her and even put on a little show when she eventually has to redress.

This was going to be fun.

—

He texts her work phone in the middle of the night on Thursday.

“We finished the case. Can you meet with me in the morning to talk about California?”

She sees it when she wakes up. Anxiety bubbles in her stomach, seeing him again was going to be interesting. She has just enough time to shower, moisturize, do her makeup, and get all dressed up in a new lingerie set and thigh-high stockings and slips a dress over top. She goes over the case on her subway ride into Quantico and she sits in his office promptly at 8am, before Hotch even arrives.

When he gets in she knows it because the bullpen goes quiet. The morning mingling dies down as he climbs the few sets leading to his office and then picks up again once his door is shut. He drops his suitcase on the couch by his filing cabinet, shakes off his coat and starts unbuttoning his cuffs to push his sleeves up his forearms. “Good morning.”

“Morning… how are you?”

“Tired,” he admits, already reaching for the blinds to twist them closed. “How are you?”

“I’m okay,” she says, hoping he believes her. “I don’t really have any updates on the case in California, we haven’t had any more college campus rapes or murders, he normally takes a week or 2 off between victims.”

“You know that’s not why I invited you in here,” he teases, already at the last blind. Once he’s done he turns to her, “Come here.”

She puts the file down on the other chair and stands carefully, making sure her dress is still neatly laying against her body. “I know… I just, I don’t know what to expect from you anymore, that’s all.”

He places his hands on her shoulders and soothes down her arms, holding her by her elbows and staring into her eyes, “I want to see you when I get back from my cases, that’s all.”

“It’s too bad I can’t come with you,” she teases with a smile. “I’d be able to keep you company and help you destress.”

He laughs, “Everyone would catch on to us if we did that.”

“I know,” she sighs. A girl can dream, though. “Was it a hard case?”

He shakes his head, “Not necessarily.”

“That’s good, at least,” she tries so hard to keep the conversation going but she doesn’t know what else to say other than asking him questions.

“Have any other cases popped up that you think we should look into?” He asks.

She shakes her head, “it’s been a pretty tame week, I’ve referred a couple cases to agents around the office and they’re all handling them well. I’ve had a few phone calls from different precincts asking for advice so I helped where I could and sent them up the chain of command where I couldn't. Nothing to worry about.”

“You take such good care of this place while I’m away,” he compliments, his hands now on her waist, travelling lower. “do you remember what I said on Monday?”

She nods, “that I’d be rewarded for my good work… but I have a question.”

“Okay?” He smirks, amused.

“What happens if I do a terrible job?”

“Oh,” he wasn’t expecting that. “Well, then you’d be punished.”

She hums, thinking about it. “Good to know.”

“Is that something you’d want?”

She shrugs, “I’m not sure, I haven’t seen what it’s like to be rewarded for my good behaviour yet, sir.”

“You’re a bit of a brat, aren’t you?”

“Mhm,” she has no shame in it. “I have no idea what to expect with all of this, I might as well have some fun while it lasts.”

“Do you want to discuss expectations and limits, would that ease your mind?”

She nods, “very much so.”

“You’re allowed to say no, encouraged to, even. This isn’t all about me. Yes, I want you, yes I’d love to take you right here on my desk but I care about you feeling safe and secure. If you rather only mess around at hotels or your apartment, I’m okay with that, too. On nights my son is with his aunt or a friend, you can come to my house, if he’s home I can’t do anything with you. Unless, maybe on the phone but even then, I have to be quiet.”

“That’s understandable.”

“What we do together should be fun,” he reminds her. “A lot of this job isn’t. If you need to destress, I’m willing to take whichever role you need from me—

“Aaron Hotchner’s a switch?” She can’t help cutting him off, she’s too surprised.

He nods. “Giving my power away is sometimes the best way for me to feel normal and okay again.”

She’s quick to touch his face, dragging her hands down his neck and resting them on his chest, she stares between his lips and his eyes repeatedly. “You let me know when you need that, I want to be just as accommodating to you as you want to be for me.”

“Thank you,” he says, leaning in to share a sweet kiss with her, he rests his forehead on hers. “I’ve always known you’d be special to me, I just didn’t know to what extent we’d take this, if ever.”

She smiles, “I wished something would happen so often that it finally did.”

He pulls her in even closer so their bodies are flush together, “tell me… how should I reward you?”

“Do I have options, sir?”

He groans, knowing just how fun this is going to be for him. “You could pleasure me, I could pleasure you… what do you consider a reward?”

“You’re gonna make me say it?” She suddenly feels bashful, shy even.

He nods, “I need to know, pretty girl, what do you consider a reward?”

“Anything you’re willing to give me, sir.”

He backs away from her then, “On the desk,” he orders.

She walks around him, pushes his laptop and files further up the cherry wood and sits on the edge of his desk, awaiting further instruction. He moves back to the door, locking it as quietly as humanly possible, so as not to alert anyone outside. When he returns to her, he places his hands on her knees, tracing along her inner thighs to get her to spread her legs just enough for him to stand between them. His fingers reach the lace at the top of her stockings and he smirks, “Are you wearing a garter belt?”

“You tell me,” she teases.

He pushes the hem of her dress up, and she leans to each side allowing him to push the dress all the way up to her hips so he can see the black little number she put on just for him. “Well, aren’t you pretty.”

“You like, sir?”

He looks at her with so much hunger in his eyes, he takes a seat in his chair and takes a better look between her legs. He reaches under his seat, dropping it as low as it can go until he’s at eye level with her pussy, he traces his fingers along the inside of her thighs and then hooks his arms around them, hauling her to the very edge of the desk. He kisses from her right knee all the way down to the seam of her panties, over her underwear and up to her left knee. “Is this what you wanted?”

She nods, “Please?”

“please what?”

“Please, sir.”

He hums against her, loops his finger under her panties and pulls them to the side. He kisses her bare pussy first before spreading her lips with his fingers and licks at her. She tosses her head back, holding in a moan but fuck, it feels so good.

“Can I— oh my god, can I touch, can I—

“Spit it out,” he looks up at her, brow raised, wondering what she wants.

“Your hair, can I grip your hair or will I mess it up for the rest of the day?”

“I don’t care how my hair looks,” he laughs. “Do your worst.”

As soon as he returns, she wastes no time running her fingers through his hair. His tongue flicks back and forth on her clit impossibly fast, then he drags his tongue along her folds as if he was making out with her cunt. It felt way too good for her to be this quiet but with the number of people just past the glass windows of his office, she had no other choice.

She makes little gasps and sighs, she grips his hair tighter and grinds against his face, enjoying her reward to the fullest. She was going to be the best damn Media Liaison the team had ever fucking seen if this is what she gets out of it. She could feel the electricity coursing through her veins, she was becoming addicted to each and every motion he made with his tongue and then he added a finger.

She stared at his hands long enough, imagined in a hundred different ways how good it would feel to ride them, suck on them, interlock their hands while he held them over her head and fucked her 6 ways to Sunday.

This was more than she ever imagined.

He knows exactly what he’s doing either through previous practice or a natural-born talent, either way, she’s right on the edge of orgasm with the curl of his middle finger. She starts to squeeze her legs closed when she gets close, his free hand comes up to grip her thigh in an attempt to push them open again. He looks up at her through his lashes, watching her reach her peak.

Her breathing picks up right then, she’s so careful not to be loud but god, she wants to scream it feels so good. It comes rushing over her all at once, he keeps going as she rides it out and then it all feels like too much. She grips his hair tighter and pulls him back, “holy fuck?” She pants.

He smirks. “You’re so pretty when you cum,” he teases, retracting his finger from inside her, he places it inside his mouth and sucks her juices off with a groan. “Taste good too, sweet thing.”

“Thank you,” she manages to say while still catching her breath. Her head spinning, and her legs feel wobbly, too.

He moves her panties back over her, making sure she’s just as put together now as she was when she arrived. “Now you know what I mean by rewarding your good behaviour.”

Her hand is still in his hair, she moves to cup his cheek instead, “Yes, sir, I’m going to be so good for you.”

“I don’t doubt it,” he says, slowly standing. That’s when she notices how hard he is. Her hand trails down his chest, towards his belt, “you don’t have to deal with that.”

“I want to,” she practically begs with her eyes. “How can I help?”

“If I cum now I’m going to be useless for the rest of the day,” he admits, “we can handle it later.”

“Okay,” she doesn’t push, respecting his boundary. “You call me in here when you need me.”

“I will… now if anyone asks, you filed something wrong and I gave you trouble for it, that’s what you say if they ask,” he orders, having thought of everything.

She nods, agreeing with the story. He backs up a bit, giving her the room to hop off his desk and stand again. She doesn’t feel totally secure on her feet yet but luckily her desk wasn’t too far away. He cups her cheek and quickly pulls her in for a kiss, she can taste herself on his tongue. It gets hot and heavy quite quick, she pulls him flush against herself and he absentmindedly grinds against her before he pulls back, he can’t go any further right now.

He sighs, resting his forehead against hers, “I want to, believe me, but I can’t. We’ll figure out a way to get together later, I promise.”

“Alright,” she believes him. “I should get back to my desk now.”

He nods and lets her slip past him. She gives him the smallest smile before opening the door and heading out of the room. Back to her desk, she goes.

—

Back at her desk now, she works on her files and answers the phone a million times while the main team drinks coffee and jokes around with each other. Hotch has a few more visitors to his office, he keeps the door open the whole time and he stares at her through his now-opened blinds. She feels like she’s on fire every time she catches his glances, she always catches them too, like now that they’ve hooked up she has a stronger radar and can tell exactly when he’s looking.

She wanders over to the little kitchenette, makes herself a coffee and is about to head back to her desk when Anderson pops up with a shit-eating grin, blocking her way out.

“What was with you being in there for an hour with the blinds closed?”Anderson asks in a whisper.

“Oh, I filed something wrong and he’s not having a good day so he went off on me,” she lies, pretty convincingly. “I might have to stay back and refile a few things tonight.”

“Boo,” Anderson sulks, “I was going to see if you wanted to come out with the office gang?”

She sighs, she would really love to but she can’t. Not if Hotch is home. “I’d really love to, but I can’t. Maybe sometime this weekend?”

“Yeah, I’ll text you,” he agrees, backing up and out of her way, about to skip away. “Have fun with your files.”

“You know I won’t,” she cheerfully calls back to him.

Just as she arrives back at her desk, Hotch comes out of his office, file in hand, and walks down the steps towards her. He drops the file on her desk, “can you go over this one again, please?”

“Absolutely, sir,” she nods, giving him a small smile. “Sorry again for messing them up, I don’t know what was going through my head this week.”

“It’s fine, just don’t let it happen again,” he orders, playing the role perfectly.

She swallows sharply, nodding along, “It won’t.”

He walks past her, on his way over to make a coffee for himself. She opens the file and there’s a blue sticky note stuck to the inside of the file. “Meet me tonight” and the address to a hotel, room number and instructions to check in under the name “Lewis”

She’s quick to take it out of the file, fold it up and tuck it into her bra for safekeeping.

—

She stays late that night, she doesn’t leave the office until 7:30 when she sees Hotch through his office window, putting his suit jacket back on. She grabs her purse, her phone and her badge and she heads out first, knowing she won’t beat him there.

She takes a taxi to the hotel, makes her way to the front desk and asks, “I’m checking in, the name on the account is Lewis? Should be a queen or king bed, my partner might’ve already checked in as well?”

“Yes, Mrs. Lewis, he has… you’re in room 902, penthouse,” the concierge confirms. She runs the plastic key through the reader, activating it and then hands it to her. “Have a good evening.”

“Thank you, you too,” she can’t help but smile.

She heads up the elevator to the top floor, gobsmacked that this is really happening. He booked the best room in the hotel for them just to fuck… she was sure she’s just been in one long dream where everything good happens to her.

When the elevator doors open, Aaron is down the hall from her, leaning against the doorframe. “You made it.”

She laughs, shaking her head with a smile, she’s so overwhelmed with feelings for him. She quickly walks to him, watches him stand up straight and engulf her in his arms before bringing her in for a heated kiss. He wastes no time now that they’re free from the confines of the FBI, he pushes her up against the door, trails kisses down the side of her neck and lightly sucks at the pulse point, making her moan.

She has the room key in her hand still, she reaches back and slams it against the card reader and he quickly pushes the door open. Walking backwards is tough, but he gets her into the room, she throws her purse to the side and then it’s her turn to push him against the door and kiss his neck. She pushes his suit jacket off his shoulders and he lets it fall to the floor, she starts unbuttoning his shirt and he unzips her dress all the way.

She’s able to undo all the buttons and tug his shirt out of his pants, “What are you going to do to me tonight?” She teases, running her hands down his bare chest, towards his belt.

“Ruin you,” he growls, his voice so low and dark it makes her whole body tingle. “Make it so you can’t even touch yourself without thinking of me.”

“You accomplished that a long time ago,” she admits, taking a step back from him, he attempts to pull her back in but she pushes back. She needs the space to let her dress drop to the floor. She steps out of it and kicks it to the side, now she’s just in her new lingerie and her heels.

He pulls his arms out of his shirt, tossing it to the floor too. She steps back in closer, unfastening his belt and working on his zipper. “I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve wished this would happen, Sir.”

“You can call me Aaron, you know?”

She looks up at him and lightly tips her head to the side, “You don’t really want that, do you, Sir?”

“You’re a mouthy little thing,” He teases before he reaches out for her and tosses her over his shoulder, making her squeal in surprise. He smacks her ass lightly before walking her into the room and throwing her down on the bed.

She has a chance to look around the room to see just how big and cool it is. She’s never been in a penthouse suite before… he’s clearly already been in the room seeing as the lights are dimmed and the fireplace is on and there’s a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket on the ottoman at the foot of the bed. “Holy shit?”

“What? Can’t I treat my best girl to a good view?”

She looks back at him, watching him kick out of his shoe and slip his dress pants all the way down. She sucks in a shaky breath and her mouth opens to speak but words escape her. He’s the view. He has the softest sprinting of chest hair, he’s muscled but he also has a bit of a tummy cause he eats mostly fast food when on a case and spends a lot of his time in the air or in a car. He doesn’t work out as much as he wants to, but that didn’t matter because his arms are still jacked and his thighs are thick… he looks delicious.

She gets to her knees and kneels on the edge of the bed, pulling him closer she runs her hands down his chest, avoiding eye contact while she takes him all in. He has scars littered around his chest down to his underwear line and it breaks her heart a little. She knew the story. Everyone knew it. He was attacked by The Reaper in 2009, just months before his ex-wife was murdered and he then killed the guy with his own bare hands… she sighs, looking up into his eyes, “You’re so handsome, you know that, right?”

He gives her a little smile. “Thank you.”

“I mean it,” she cups his face gently with one hand. “Is this why you haven’t dated?”

He nods, “Explaining it to Beth was really hard… I kept my shirt on most of the time.”

“You don’t have to explain anything to me,” she says. Not because she already knows but because it doesn’t affect anything between them, going forward.

He leans in and kisses her again, helping her lay back against the bed he crawls between her legs and lightly rests his chest against hers. She instantly loves this. Feeling him everywhere, his tongue on hers, his big hand cradling her head and the pressure of his body pressed against her own. She wraps her legs around him, holding him there and he grinds down on her. She always thought he’d be well endowed and from the feeling of his budge against her, she knew she was right. She runs her hands over his shoulders, gripping at his skin, she traces her nails down his back.

He nips at her lip, pulling gently and then he places his hand beside her head, pushing himself up so he hovers over her. “Are you on any kind of birth control?”

“Uh, yeah… what time is it?” She asks, turning her head to see his Rolex on his wrist. It’s almost 8:30 now. “I need to take it in half an hour actually.”

“You can take it earlier, it doesn’t affect you if you’re within 5 hours before or after but it’s better to do it before,” he explains as he pulls away from her.

“Okay, I didn’t realize I was hooking up with Reid,” she teases. “Can you get me my purse?”

“I can,” he gets off the bed and retrieves her purse from where it was flung by the door. Before he brings it over to her he stops by the mini bar and grabs her a tiny bottle of water.

He hands her the purse and watches her dig out the little blister pack, she pops out a tiny red-ish pill and he cracks open the bottle of water for her. “Thank you,” she gives him a little smile before she takes it. She swallows it down and then hands him back the bottle. “I also haven’t had sex in a while, so, if you don’t want to use a condom I’m completely safe and very willing.”

He moves her purse back to the floor with a smirk, “very willing…” he teases her. “You keep mentioning all these dreams you had about me, are you ever going to tell me one so I can make it come true.”

“You already did this morning,” she smiles, pulling him back onto the bed so they’re both kneeling, facing each other. She wraps her arms loosely around his neck, resting her forearms on his shoulders and she sighs. “All I wanted was you.”

he wraps his arms around her waist and pulls her in as close as possible. “Now you have me,” he leans in and kisses her lips, her nose and then her forehead. “All of me.”

“Show me,” she whispers, “give it all to me.”

He lays her back down against the bed and starts to kiss down her neck to her chest, he nibbles at her skin, sucking gently so he doesn’t leave any marks but he really wants to. He wants everyone to see it and know she’s taken. He keeps kissing lower and lower until he’s at her stomach. He finally takes a moment to look at her lingerie and smirk. “This is very pretty, by the way.”

“I got it for you,” she admits.

“I don't want you spending money for me,” he says, disappointed.

“It was more for me. I want to look nice and I didn’t feel pretty in anything I already owned. Sue me,” she retorts.

He just shakes his head, she was too mouthy for her own good. Kneeling between her legs he reaches for the clips on her garter belt and releases her stockings. He tosses her heels to the floor and then slowly, he lifts her leg and starts to slide the nylon sock all the way off. Replacing where it once lay with more kisses, down to her knee and then he lets her leg fall back to the mattress to repeat his actions with the other.

She loves watching him like this, he treats her body like it’s the most delicate thing in the world. He worships her. Kneeling between her legs like she’s the alter and he’s trying to find faith, she is his new religion but his touch is heaven.

He pulls her panties all the way off, her garter says around her waist and he reaches behind her back to undo her bra. He peels it off of her and flings all 4 items to the floor then returns to her, he hovers there for a moment and then leans in to lick at her nipple, making her gasp. He sucks it into his mouth, palming the other with his huge hand, she thought she had pretty decently sized boobs until she saw how big his hands still looked on them. She moans when he sucks on the nipple and then lets it go, he gently blows over it, making her shiver to her core.

“Do you want me to go down on you again or just get right to it?”

“Fuck, don’t make me choose?” She looks at him like he’s crazy. “I mean, if I really got a choice I’d be going down on you to make up for this morning.”

He laughs, “You want my cock that bad?”

She nods, “dreamed about it, actually.” Remembering how he asked to know more about these dreams of hers, she decides to tell him. “I want to spend an afternoon under your desk with your cock down my throat. I want you to answer the phone and try and keep your composure, I want Anderson to come in and ask if you’ve seen me and watch you try and tell him no when I’m right in front of you, about to make you cum again. Maybe even rub my dumb little cunt on your shoe, polish the leather with my damp panties, and if I’m lucky, have a few orgasms myself while I cockwarm you.”

He can’t believe all that just came out of her mouth. He simply wraps his arms around her and rolls them over so she’s now on top, “do whatever you want to me.”

She kisses him deeply, feeling down his chest to his boxers, she grips his cock through the fabric and starts to stroke him gently. She kisses his neck and down his chest, paying a loving amount of attention to his scars on her way down. She takes a deep breath before she pulls his boxers down and frees him finally, watching how his erection stands tall and smacks against his stomach, he’s so much bigger than she imagined.

She kisses both of his hip bones and the tip of his cock before licking it from base to tip. Staring him in his glossy eyes the whole time. “This is my specialty,” she teases before taking his cock down her throat in one go and making him reach out and grip her hair a bit too tight, but it felt good.

She hollowed out her cheeks as she sucked back up to the tip, leaving her lips together and gliding them down to the base and licking back up to start it all over again. Swirling her tongue at random times and flicking his slit to really drive him crazy.

“Sweet fucking Christ,” Aaron groans, trying his hardest to stay moderately quiet, but almost failing miserably when the tip hit the back of her throat.

She gags only a little, her eyes water and she tries her best to breathe through her nose. Whatever doesn’t fit in her mouth, she jerks off to the best of her ability but he’s so thick even her hand doesn’t quite wrap around him completely.

“Baby, baby,” he rushes out, getting her to pull off. “I’m too close.”

With her lips swollen and spit dripping down her chin she looks at him, confused, “Do you not want me to swallow?”

“No, no, I mean, yeah, sometime in the future, but I’m not a spring chicken, I’m not going to be able to fuck you if I finish now,” he explains.

She pouts but she understands, “You wanna fuck me that bad?”

He manages to laugh, “Yeah, I do.” He sits up, resting on his one forearm, he reaches out and cups her cheek, “Like you, I’ve been thinking about this for a while.”

She hums, straddles his hips and pulls him up to a sitting position. Chest to chest again, she runs her fingers through his hair and lightly kisses him once, twice, and a third time. “I want you to show me.”

“Lay back against the pillow,” he orders and she’s quick to listen. She lays on the bed the correct way, resting her head on the soft feather pillow. She watches him push his boxers all the way off and then spreads her legs wide enough for him to once again kneel between them. He rubs his thumb over her clit, noticing how wet she is from a bit of kissing and sucking his dick. “Let me just—“ he says as he leans down and has a little taste.

He sucks on her clit and lets it go with a pop, then he kisses back up her body, slowly pressing himself against her. He grinds against her, wraps his arms around her and cradles her there. He buries his face in her neck, kissing her as his cock rubs against her pussy this time. She reaches between them, helping him angle his cock at her opening and then he slips in slowly. She lets out a shocked gasp, in disbelief at how intense the stretch is.

“You’re taking me so well,” he praises. “Fuck, you’re tight.”

She swoons, hearing his deep voice, feeling him everywhere… it’s everything she’s ever dreamed of. With one hand still stuck between her and the mattress, he frees the other and grabs ahold of her thigh, pushing her leg up, he looks between them and moans. Watching himself as he pulls out gently and pushes back in ever so slightly, wanting her to get used to the stretch. The last thing he wants to do is hurt her. But he wants to go faster, he needs it. He craves it and it’s written all over his face.

“Fuck me,” she whispers, “please, please sir, I need it.”

He drops his head back down to the crook of her neck with a groan, thrusting into her a bit harder, he starts to snap his hips against hers at a quicker pace. Being in a hotel room, on a floor with only 4 rooms total, she doesn’t feel bad as she lets out a loud moan. She tosses her head back against the pillow even further, her nails grip his back and scratch him slightly. He’s still holding one of her thighs up, his hand cupped in her knee pit, pushing it up as far as it can go as he pile-drives into her.

She grips his hair at the nape of his neck and pulls him out of hiding, “kiss me,” she begs. He slams his mouth against hers, the two of them immediately clashing tongues and breathing heavily into the other's mouth. It’s so heated, so intense, she feels him so deep inside her, hot skin on top of her, wet tongue in her mouth. It’s so much. It’s everything.

He pulls his hand out from underneath her and slows his thrusts momentarily. He reaches for another pillow and stuffs it under her, arching her back so he slams past her G-spot with each thrust. He lets go of her other leg and she immediately wraps them around him, he picks up his thrusts again, now using one hand to hold himself up and the other snakes down her stomach to rub her clit with his thumb.

She moans again, pulling him back in for a kiss because if she doesn’t do something with her mouth she’s going to go insane. He’s much deeper now that she’s at a different angle, his quick thrusts cause him to pour against her cervix over and over again making her let out little breathy moans.

Suddenly, as if all at once, she’s right on the edge, “Aaron, Aaron,” she chants his name. “oh my god, right there, right there,” is all she can say as her orgasm bursts through her, causing her legs to quake and her grip to tighten. Her nails dig into his skin, he hisses and pulls away from kissing her, stops rubbing her clit and fucks her even faster as he chases his own orgasm.

With her legs still locked around him, he has the idea she wants him to finish inside and so he does. With a deep moan, he thrusts one last time, cumming deep inside her, breathing heavily against her neck, he drops down against her body. Hot and sweaty, exhausted and euphoric, he manages to laugh, “Holy fuck?”

“Yeah,” is all she can say. Also still out of breath from it all.

She gently runs her fingers over his back, he keeps kissing her neck, the two of them sweetly recovering together as if that wasn’t the dirtiest sex either of them has had in a while.

“Thank you,” she whispers, running her fingers through his hair at the nape of his neck. “That was amazing.”

He snuggles into her more, wrapping his arms back around her, “Yeah, it was…”

“Are you going to fall asleep on me?” She asks, not even caring that he’s still inside of her too.

He nods, “I want to, but I’ve gotta get you cleaned up.” He sighs and starts to sit up. He hovers over her one last time, brushes her hair behind her ear and he smiles. “You’re beautiful.”

She steals a kiss instead of thanking him, letting him feel how grateful she is that way. He pulls away with an audible smooch and slowly but surely pulls out of her, watching himself the whole time. He uses his boxers to gently wipe her down, saving the sheets from a stain. Once he gets off the bed he reaches out for her, he picks her up bridal style and carries her over to the massive bathroom.

“Holy shit?” She says as she looks around. There is a two-person shower with a waterfall feature, a bathtub big enough to swim in and his and her sinks. This room must be so expensive just for one night.

“Did you want to take a bath?” He asks as he sets her down on her feet.

She shakes her head, “Not this time… maybe we can come back?”

He nods, “On a weekend maybe?”

“I’m normally free whenever you are,” she reminds him with a smile. “But, um, can you go? I have to pee.”

He laughs, “Really? After everything we did, you’re afraid for me to hear you pee?”

“Yeah, I am,” she laughs a little, realizing how crazy that is. “Go, you can use it next.” She pushes him gently.

“Fine, I’m going!” He says, closing the door behind himself and then she’s alone.

She does her thing, checks her makeup and her hair and sighs. She’s lucky she keeps some makeup in her purse and she has a change of clothes at work because she’s not going home tonight.

She still has her stupid garter around her waist, other than that she’s completely naked and nervous to walk back out there. She wants a shirt. Maybe he has one… she opens the door just a crack and calls for him. “Hey, Aaron?”

“Yeah?” He calls back and then appears in front of the door, changing into a new pair of boxers and a grey t-shirt. “What’s up?”

“Do you have a shirt that would fit me, that I can borrow? And can you bring me my underwear?”

“Yeah, of course,” he doesn’t mind at all. It takes him a second but then he returns, he has a blank white t-shirt and her underwear. “Are you okay?”

She nods, “Yeah, thank you.”

“I’m a little hungry, did you want food?”

“Um… yeah, I’ll eat whatever you want to order.”

“I can get you anything, what do you want?” He restates his question. He’d really do anything for her.

“Um… a Greek salad? And if they could put some grilled chicken in it, I’d love that… and drink, Pepsi or coke, whatever they have— I don’t mind.”

“You got it, beautiful.”

That makes her blush on the inside, she feels butterflies and her face heats up. She’s falling in love with him slowly but surely. Of course, she was. He’s Aaron Freaking Hotchner… who wouldn’t fall in love with him? She quickly changes and heads back out into the main room.

It's almost 10pm, it’s dark outside, and the room is dimly lit and cozy as hell with the fake fireplace on but no heat coming out of it. The rooms are set to a perfect temperature, she can hear Aaron on the phone with room service still, so she takes a chance to look around their suite. It’s huge. There's an office, a living room with nice chairs and a piano and of course, their king-sized bed.

She takes a seat on the mattress and reaches for the bottle of Champagne, reading it over while she waits for Aaron to come back. She feels like she’s in a movie… pretty woman or something like that. Amazing sex with a rich man, older man, in penthouse suite she didn’t have to pay for. It’s almost a bit too much.

Aaron plops himself down on the bed beside her, smiling, “You want some?”

“Did it come with the room?”

He nods, “I told them it was our anniversary… free things are always fun.”

“Well, Mr. Lewis, I think we have to open it, then, don’t we?”

“I think you’re right, Mrs. Lewis,” he teases, taking the bottle from her. He peels off the wrapping, untwists the wire and carefully pops the cork without making a huge mess.

She hops off the bed and runs over to the little bar, she takes two champagne flutes off the shelf and returns to him with a smile. “I’ve never had expensive champagne before.”

“It all still tastes a little like paint thinner,” he says, completely serious.

She laughs, “When have you tasted paint thinner?”

He smirks, “I haven’t, I just mean the taste is almost as strong as paint thinner smells- if that makes any sense?”

“We should’ve gotten some strawberries, apparently it makes it taste better,” she shares, remembering it from Pretty Woman, yet again.

“I know, I’ve seen the movie—

“You’ve seen pretty woman?”

He nods, “My ex-wife took me to see it when it first opened back in the ’90s.”

She feels a bit awkward then, gritting her teeth, “Sorry.”

“It’s fine, it’s been long enough, it doesn’t hurt as bad anymore,” he assures her. “I’m doing better than I ever imagined I could, I have a kid who’s happy and loves me and my work life is… okay? I mean, no one wants me dead that I know of, at least. And I have you.”

“Oh, Aaron,” she swoons, she finds a place to put her drink and she quickly cups his face. “You are the sweetest man in the world?”

“Everyones always surprised—

“It’s because of your ever-present frown at work,” she teases. “But I get it, if I had to see what you’ve seen every day for the last 20 years, I’d frown a lot too.”

He puts his glass down too, wraps his arms around her middle and he pulls her in for a kiss. He backs her up towards the bed once more, cradling her head and back as he lays her down once more. This was going to be a long night.

—

She wakes up alone the next morning. He’s left her a note on the hotel stationary saying he had to get home to be there when his son woke up. He takes him to school every morning he can. She understands that, she actually finds it very charming that he’s such a good father and he cares so much that she’s not too upset about waking up alone.

She never brought a bag with her last night, so she gets redressed in yesterday's outfit. She has a go-bag at work for when home cases keep her in the office more than 24 hours, she’ll just change into one of those outfits if she can.

She’s in the elevator on her way down to the lobby when a text comes in, there’s been another attack in California, he’s hit U of C Davis this time and killed again. Looks like the team will be headed there this afternoon.

When she arrives at the office, she’s in the middle of a phone call with one of the detectives in LA, she doesn’t have time to change, she just heads right to the fax machine. She gathers all the new information, files it and sends the copies to the main team's tablets and prints off a paper file for Doctor Reid. She lays them all down in the briefing room and then heads to Aaron's office. She knocks once on his open door and gets his attention, Derek and Dave are in there with him.

“Sorry, Sir, the California College Rapist killed again, I have the case ready for briefing at the round table,” she announces.

“We’ll be right in,” he announces, standing from his desk. He’s changed at least. In a nice grey suit with a blue tie, he looks handsome.

“Okay,” she gives him a small smile and heads back down to the bullpen, the others are gathered at Spencer's desk, talking over coffee and donuts that one of them must’ve brought in. She cuts into their conversation when she can, “Sorry, I hate to bother you but we have a case, the others are meeting in the briefing room shortly.”

“Okay, thanks we’ll be right in,” JJ says with a smile.

She doesn't even remember that she’s wearing the same outfit as yesterday until Derek walks into the briefing room with the rest of the gang in tow.

“Is that the same outfit as yesterday?” He asks, trying to tease her.

She looks down and gets flustered, not knowing what to say. “Uh, yeah. It is.”

“And is that a hickey?” He points to her chest, it’s just barely hidden by her dress strap.

She looks down at it and realizes that yes, it is. She looked in the mirror at the hotel, earlier, just to check her makeup and make sure she didn’t look too fucked out and crazy. She washed it off and fixed her hair, she was going to reapply her makeup in the taxi on the way to work but she was on the phone the whole time. She didn’t even think to check for marks or bruises when she was in front of the mirror… now she’s horrified.

“Look at you, gettin’ some on a Thursday night,” Derek teases again, making the rest of the team snicker.

She doesn’t know what to do or say she’s just frozen with embarrassment. She never noticed Aaron standing in the doorway either.

“Hey, enough,” Hotch raises his voice a bit. “She’s here to show us a serious case, she’s clearly been busy this morning, cut her some slack before we’re all forced into another HR seminar because of you, Derek.”

“Right, sorry—

“Don’t apologize to me,” he references Y/N.

“Sorry, Y/N,” Derek says with a look of true sincerity on his face.

“It’s fine,” she brushes past it and picks up her tablet and remote. “Um, I’ve been keeping a close eye on this case in California..”

She heads into her spiel, she’s rehearsed it in her head a number of times for when this moment came and now it’s here. She walks them through each case, all the evidence and the theories that the local cops have so far. Because it’s crossed jurisdictions, the cops didn’t consider them connected until the 4th girl came forward and yet another sketch of the same man was uploaded to VICAP.

“He’s an anger excitation rapist, getting more daring with each case, he’s now killed twice and he thinks that by hitting a different college each time, he can evade the police,” She explains. “I’ve asked the police to keep it to themselves that we know these are all connected and they’ve brought in the 4 alive victims for both protection and so we can interview them when you arrive,” she explains.

“You’ve done a fantastic job,” Hotch compliments her as he pushes his chair back and stands up, he gathers his files and his tablet and looks at the clock. “I had Anderson tell the pilot to ready the Jet before we sat down, wheels up in 15… Y/L/N, follow me.”

“Yes sir,” she follows him out of the room and around the bullpen, towards his office.

“I want you to take JJ’s old office,” he announces. “Facilities management is going to be emptying it within the next few hours and then you can move into it. These cases are delicate and I can’t have you on the floor discussing intimate details of the case, now you’ll have a whole room to yourself.”

She feels a sense of pride rip through her, like she’s finally made it here even though she knows this is probably to do with their affair. “Thank you, sir, I really appreciate it.”

He steps even closer to her and lowers her voice, “This isn’t a reward or a bribe to keep this thing between us quiet. I genuinely appreciate all the work you do for this team and that office has been and always will be for the Media Liaison. You deserve that office, I’m sorry it’s taken so long for you to get it.”

“Aaron,” she smiles up at him. “Thank you.”

He reaches out for her hand and gives it a loving squeeze, wishing he could kiss her goodbye but the blinds are open, anyone could see. And then he’s gone, brushing past her and rushing down the stairs, he meets the others in the bullpen and together they head out the double glass doors.

She sighs. Before it was nice to watch him leave, she could stare at his butt and giggle to herself… now she’s completely enamoured with him and watching him go fills her stomach with fear. All she wants is for him to come home in one piece. To come home to her.

@ssamorganhotchner @hotchsdoormat thank you for your encouragement while writing this fic, its gotten so long I'm breaking it up into two parts just so i don't crash the app like I've done with my other long fics <3 hope you like it

General Taglist

@ncsls0515 @stevesmunsons @reidsbookclub @sweetyyhippyy @manuosorioh @mrs-dr-reid @k-k0129 @squishyturtle @katsukis1wife @babybisexual @marsmunson86

#aaron hotchner #aaron hotch hotchner #aaron hotch x reader #aaron hotch x you #hotch smut #hotch x reader #criminal minds smut #criminal minds imagine

622 notes · View notes