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virginreprise · 3 months ago

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C A T C H ' A N D ' R E L E A S E ✧ . ┊ ⁭ ⁭ ⁭ ⁭

✧ ˚ 　· 　　 . 𝐢 𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐡 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐢𝐭 𝐜𝐫𝐮𝐜𝐢𝐟𝐢𝐞𝐝 𝐦𝐞 ✧. ┊ ⁭

┊ ┊ ┊. ➶ ˚ jackson!joel miller x reader

✧ . ddlg dynamics, toxic!joel, smut, angst, arguing, mean!joel, he's a little more dark in this one, unspecified age gap, manipulation, daddy kink, breeding kink is heavy in this one, established relationship, pussy spanking, joel slaps you twice, light bondage, sarah and ellie are dead because i don't give joel a break ever, joel is a whole ass oxymoron in this thing, joel also cums fast, and then there is also cum play because i am disgusting, this is probably the craziest thing I've ever written

words: 15.5k

┊┊. AO3 LINK

It started with an eye roll. A simple action, buried in petulance and arrogance that he had taught vehemently was wrong. That he had conditioned you to believe would have dire consequences.

"Don't talk back," he'd said sternly one day when you'd become too whiny, refusing to help him clean the dishes with the simple excuse that you didn't feel like it. And to your credit, you were quick to learn, quick to decipher his warning glances and become the perfect little girl he had taught you to be.

Rules had been implemented and subsequently followed. Praises had been uttered and kept you good. Little rituals that you followed with the sole reason of making him happy.

So when you woke up pouting, groaning as he leaned in for a good morning kiss and complaining about having to stay in the house all day and wait for him to get home, he knew something must have been wrong.

He'd mulled it over on a particularly boring patrol, knowing that if he was lucky he'd be back to you by before four o'clock. He'd wondered what on earth could've caused you to act in such a way towards him, focusing on the last thing he'd seen you do before he'd walked out the door.

You'd rolled your eyes at him.

He'd told you as softly as he could despite his growing irritation, to have a good day, to enjoy yourself and that he'd be back as soon as possible.

And you had rolled your damn eyes.

At the time, he'd been too astonished to reprimand you, too late already on account of your abhorrent mood to do anything but stare in bewilderment and walk out the door whilst shaking his head.

This was not the good girl he'd trained, this was not the girl who did everything so willingly—gave yourself to him as easily and as naturally as it felt to slip a gun in Joel's palm and shoot. It had been eating at him the entire time he was riding alongside Jesse who hadn't dared speak up and ask him what was wrong; fearful of the perpetual scowl on his patrol partner's face that remained the entire time they were working.

As Joel walked around the corner, his house and its glowing windows falling into his vision, he wondered if the boy thought he'd gone mad. Perhaps he'd apologise to him at another time, although he probably wouldn't. He'd never exactly been one to apologise: prideful and stubborn even when he knew he was in the wrong.

But, goddamn, you had left him mad. You had left him furious and he had no choice but to think profusely about why you'd switched so suddenly. You had been perfect for him the night before, sitting between his legs patiently whilst he'd finished the chapter of his book, scurrying upstairs when he'd informed you it was bathtime and getting straight into bed when he'd asked you to. Hell, you'd even had his cock in your mouth and smiled about it like it was a privilege you didn't get to experience so often.

You hadn't woken up on the wrong side of the bed. He would know because he woke up on his preferred right side and you (unusually) far away from him on the left. It had been the first warning sign, the first indicator that he was in for an awful day of work and an even worse night when he stepped into the house and tried to gauge whether your mood had improved any or not.

When he finally made it home, hoping to be greeted by your soft kisses and pretty smiles, he realised that the house was not bustling with your hurried steps, arms flung wide open to greet him. It was instead, eerily quiet. The fire that he'd lain that morning was reduced to glowing coals, the wood piled in the basket beside it barely touched and the blanket on the couch tousled and creased—like you'd peeled it off in a hurry once you'd built up the courage to do what he'd suspected you'd done.

"Baby," he called into the nothing, irritation seeping into the floorboards as he slipped off his coat and shoes—the gun that he insisted he keep in the house despite Maria's passionate objections, placed against the wall where it would temporarily stay until the both of you went to bed and Joel would keep it just within reach. "Baby!" he repeated, louder this time in case you were listening to his CDs again.

Still, he did not hear a thing. Not a creak of the floorboards, or the light rain song of the shower. Not even a sigh. Deadly silent. And when his eyes flicked to the array of shoes parked near the door, he noticed the space the size of your feet—wood where your shoes should rest. Shoes you rarely ever use nowadays since he'd got you being his pretty little housewife.

He was back outside before he could bother to check if his suspicions were accurate, laces loose and coat unbuttoned, not feeling the biting cold that lingered amongst the setting sun. His sights were set on the house a short walk away, decorated in yarrow and anemone. The house that sheltered the reason he had met you at all.

"Tommy!" he banged on the red wood, chest heaving, rage overtaking him. How on earth could you just run like that? Why would you even think of leaving the house without him, never mind leaving without at least telling him beforehand? This behaviour was so unusual, so unlike you that it scared him. If he were to lose you…God, he didn't even want to think about it. The warmth of you, the sweetness that cut straight through the bitter nature that he had succumbed to ever since the world had become trapped in a cataclysmic nuclear winter. He could not let it go. Would never let you go, no matter how much you begged.

The question was falling from his lips as soon as the red was replaced with the face he would recognise even on the foggiest of nights.

"Where is she?"

Joel could've smacked his brother's oblivious look off his face and was seriously considering acting on his thoughts when he opened his mouth.

"Where's who?"

"Goddamnit, Tommy," he groaned, his face the picture of madness—his carefully concealed insanity shining brightly in the face of his loss, your name harsh on his lips when he clarified for his dumb hunk of a brother who exactly he was talking about. As if he would ever be talking about anyone else.

"Hell, brother, I don't know," Tommy exclaimed, perturbed by his brother's attitude, eyes narrowing at the sickness that clouded the man in front of him. "Wherever she is, she ain't gone far. She'll be safe, Joel," he tried to appease but Joel offered nothing in reply except a grumbled disapproval, complaining that his brother just didn't understand, and was off the porch and heading towards the centre of town before Tommy could get another word in.

Joel was steaming. Joel was so desperately, so disgustingly mad at you that he could hardly see any other colour except red. Just a complex, jumbled mess of feelings that he couldn't even begin to decipher as he stomped in the snow and thought of what he would do when he found you—if he would find you at all. God, you were probably dead. Probably buried in a ditch courtesy of whoever in Jackson he did not trust which had, for the past five years, remained pretty much no one. People had tried, with a smile or a home-baked good but it never ameliorated the lingering distrust that Joel had for everyone except those he was closest to. God, he was convinced half the men in Jackson were out to take you away from him and you weren't safe unless you were in the house, in his bed, and waiting for him to rock you to sleep.

If you had ventured any further than the front porch…if you were anywhere near anyone.

He felt fucking insane: raging around town with his boots laced loose and his shirt flying untucked, looking for the object of his affection—the girl he would fall to his feet for. He had devoted so much time to making you perfect. This obedient little thing who did everything he asked and made him feel an amalgamation of jolting, sickening guilt and simultaneous euphoric bliss at the prospect of what could be. He was going to marry you one day. Damn, he was going to give you a kid while he was at it. Just to keep you close.

Joel knew, he knew completely how awful his tendencies were—how they would break you until you were afraid of him. In times like these, he thought of Tommy and how terrified he had been of what Joel would do to you. Nighttime conversations between two tipsy brothers, the drink making the younger sibling sentimental and the older too defensive to talk straight with. Joel had promised him under the low glow of a dying oil lamp, that he would do nothing to you. That, yes, you were young, but he would not treat you any differently because of it.

Both Tommy and Joel had known it was a bunch of bullshit. He'd lost too many people, and seen too many things that he could hardly comprehend. It started with blood-stained blonde and then blood all over the surgery floor when he couldn't get her out of that damn hospital on time. When Joel had come riding back to Jackson with her limp body—gunshot from where a stupid fucking firefly had accidentally hit—and a strong feeling that he had failed. Again.

By God, he would not do it again.

So, marching into the Tipsy Bison with a furious look in his eyes, he could hardly care about the stares; what he knew everyone was thinking when he zeroed in on you talking to Gus—a kind old man who ran the library a street down from the bar and posed no real threat—with bright eyes and a wide smile.

A smile that teetered off the edge when the wind picked up against your face and fell away again—door slamming closed to see him huffing in the lamplight. There was a split second where they all looked, head snapping in the direction of your damnation and then, turned away—afraid of what Joel would do if they looked too close. They parted like the red sea when he advanced, guided by his small "'Scuse me," and his twitching hands as he reached for you.

Your name was harsh on his lips, Gus' words trailing as he looked at the man practically steaming with anger.

You looked terrified in the most delightful way. There was still a hint of defiance lingering in your stare—a brattiness in the pout as he reached for your forearm.

"C'mon we're goin' home," he announced, already dragging you away from the confused young man you had been accompanying.

"But I'm talking to Gus."

The disobedience was instant and he couldn't decide whether your attitude was on purpose, whether you just wanted to be a brat deliberately, or if there was something deeper. Some other issue you'd discovered in the middle of the night when you should've been sleeping. Joel remembered brief images of you slipping from his hold to go to the bathroom but he had been too exhausted to decide whether it had been a dream or not. Maybe it was then. Maybe it had been the hours of the sun's rest when you decided you didn't want him anymore.

"I said, we're goin' home, you've had your fun." His voice was low—warning. He didn't want to make a scene. He didn't want anyone to be looking at you at all, especially when you were in a mood that he couldn't fix by putting you over his knee. If he wanted to show you off at all, he'd want to show how much of a good girl you could be. How well mannered, how sweet and considerate. Not this unrecognisable personality you'd acquired whilst he'd been gone.

"I wanna stay." You were whining. He fucking hated it when you whined.

"We're goin'."

"I'm not—"

Your name came soft from Gus' lips then, a sweet hand on the small of your back that had Joel's fist clenching. "It's okay, Darlin'. You don't have to stay for me, I'll be just fine by myself."

The way you looked at him then, the softness in your eyes as you mouthed a small sorry—throat too dry to produce a sound, was infuriating. If he wasn't angry before, he sure as hell was now, his grip on your arm tightening as he began pulling you out of the bar.

"Joel," you called with a whimper as he guided you through the crowd. "Joel, it hurts." Your fingers were pulling at his, trying as hard as you could to pry him off you, but he refused to let go. He'd keep you tied to the bed if it meant you wouldn't pull a stunt like this again.

Your pleas fell on deaf ears, to Joel and those around you who didn't care enough to involve themselves in your proclivities and the cold was hitting your warm cheeks before you could apologise for bumping into John standing by the door.

"Joel," you said, firmer this time and it seemed to bring his attention back to you—away from the wild rage clouding his head.

He was too angry to speak but his eyes portrayed every word. They pierced you, right through the heart and froze your bones as you stood with the snow falling and the sun setting.

"We're goin' home," was all he managed to spit out and he had no idea what possessed you, where you found the goddamn nerve, but your mouth was opening before he could give you another warning glance—a promise that it wasn't going to end well if you kept up the bullshit.

"It's not my home." There was venom in your voice, a genuine, deep distaste that left him feeling shot in the heart. "I'm not going back there."

"Who do you think you're talkin' to?" He scolded, and he mirrored your scowl with a fire—a heat that blazed and coiled in his stomach. "Huh?" he questioned your lack of answer, disappointment mingled with fury in his eyes.

The snow dampened the silence as you heaved, chest rising and falling in succession with the quick, fateful breaths that passed your lips and danced in the air before falling softly to your feet. There was no reply amalgamated with that dance and he shook his head with a clenched jaw.

"We are goin' home, and we are gonna talk about…" he gestured between the two of you, looking frantically for the words to describe his predicament. "...whatever this is. I ain't dealin' with this out in the snow when all of them are in there-"

"They don't even know me!" you suddenly exclaimed, lip quivering no matter how many times you bit the shake away. "I feel like all of Jackson has tripled the months that I've been with you, I'm sorry that I wanted to familiarise myself." There was a crack in your voice at the end of your sentence, biting back a sob as all the emotions came falling on your head all out at once, dropping bricks from the sky and smothering you under the debris.

Joel had no sympathy. He refused to be deterred by your tears that melted the snow as they touched the ground, nor the delicate pout on your lips that was pushing him to a point of madness unknown.

"You complain' now, huh?" he asked exasperatedly, chin held high, jaw taut with the exertion of his anger. "What more do you want from me? You sayin' I don't spoil you enough? That I don't go out there every week just to keep you and your precious little prissiness safe?"

The door swung open then, hinges creaking as Walt—eyes glazed from the alcohol—looked between the two of you once, afraid of Joel's stare that pierced holes through his head, and scurried away—casting one sympathetic glance to your glistening tears. A pause. The man had interrupted the flow of the argument, emotions now contemplated and swallowed away.

Before Joel knew it, you were running—fast little feet on the move, hurtling through the thoroughfare.

He was chasing you before he could think twice. In truth, he could not think of anything except your pretty little skirt swishing in the wind as you sprinted past Tommy's house and turned right. The opposite way to home.

Joel called your name in the wind, old bones desperate for some relief as his long strides turned into a light jog, then a full sprint as your legs whipped around the corner and into a little alleyway. He knew you had no idea where you were going. He knew that you had barely been in Jackson three months before he'd picked you up and trapped you. Made you play house with his little fantasies that disgusted him in the depths of twilight when he gripped his rifle as tight as possible.

Joel also knew that in a few seconds, you would be faced with a dead end, and as he rounded the corner and cast his eyes on your shuddering frame, the apologies came swiftly from your lips.

"Daddy, I'm sorry."

God, it was so sweet. It itched every scratch, warmed his stomach like a kiss of sunlight and eased the ache in his jaw from his perpetual clenching.

"I-I'm sorry, I don't…" you paused to sniffle, blubbering little thing that you were and he could hardly keep up the bad guy act as he took careful steps through the alley's sludge and planted himself a few feet away from you. "I don't like it when you're mean, I just- just-"

He held his hand up to shush you, shaking his head.

"I don't wanna hear excuses." He truthfully didn't want to hear you blubbering your way through reasons why. He didn't want to hear you blaming it on anyone else except yourself. He did want an answer as to why you'd acted out so deliberately but what he did not want was lies. He knew how to calm you down, he just needed to get you so afraid of him that you'd let him leash you and drag you back home—no matter who saw the depravity.

"I know," you whimpered. "I know daddy, I'm sorry-"

"Stop." He said a measured tone that mirrored the imperceptible look on his face. "I don't need to hear you apologise, not when you don't mean it."

"I do mean it!" you protested. "Please!"

You were silenced by his stare, the creases by his eyes as he squinted and jerked his head behind him—looking briefly, then turning his attention back to you. His next words were simple, almost soft as they fell from his lips, but laced with poison invisible through your silver tears.

"You ain't sorry until I make you sorry." There was a growl in his throat, a twitch of his fingers and then the fire in his eyes dampened to a simmer of coal as he spoke again. "Baby, you know how this goes. You know I can't let something like this go just because you say a few words you don't mean yet."

You had nothing to say in reply then, nothing to indicate you were sorry at all with the way your breaths came heavy and your eyes spilt over with salt that stung the open wounds on your chest. There was a tension, meandering between the two of you, pacing up and down the length of your bodies and colliding in the middle of your union—a heat searing its skin until it crumpled and fell in a heap as you sank to your knees.

He watched you go: down and down and down. Your pretty eyes gazed up at him in wonder, conveying so much with a single simper as you shuffled your way towards him and hesitantly placed your hands on his thighs.

All he did was watch.

He said nothing, reacted to nothing, knowing that all you wanted as you wrapped your arms around his right leg and nuzzled, was his affection.

"I'll be good, Daddy," you whispered into his leg. "I promise."

His head fell back at your words, eyes squeezing shut as he tried not to succumb to your angelic nature—all soft and willing and obedient. He took pride in knowing that he had made you that way; that he was the reason you were willing to ruin your pretty little tights and hurt your delicate knees.

Hands fell to your head in surrender, brushing through your hair as he stared down at you, enamoured by the way you submitted to him.

"I know you will, honey," he reassured. "I know. You're my good girl, yeah? My perfect angel. Sometimes you just make mistakes, don't ya?"

You nodded into his thigh, muffled words he couldn't decipher and he pulled you back by the hair so he could hear you properly.

"Speak up."

Your reply was immediate.

"Yeah, just a mistake, daddy."

He smiled a little at that, a scoff pulled from his throat as he let your hair go and held out his hand. Your fingers were so cold when you placed them in his palm, your whole body shivering as he pulled you up from your position and dragged you tight to his chest.

"Now," he sighed. "We're gonna go home, ain't we? And I'm gonna be honest, babydoll, you ain't gonna like what I do when we get home but it needs to happen, yeah?"

"But-"

"Sh sh sh." He held your hands to his chest, not one to deny you the tiniest bit of comfort when he was being perhaps a little too harsh on you. Either way, you had worried him sick and he wasn't about to let his relief at your subservience show just yet. He needed to make sure that you were entirely with him, that this was just a one-off and that you wouldn't be running away again next month when you got scared. "It needs to happen. Don't it?"

Your eyes were hesitant, wide, angel-eyes—wings clipped as he held you as close as he could get you without displaying too much desire. Then, a nod.

"Yes, daddy."

Relief washed over him, bathed him in holy water and guided the spirit from heaven to its space above his head. He was revered by your spirit, enamoured by your waiting hands as he let them fall to your sides, eyes cold and not displaying his true feelings at your exhibition of devotion, and turned on his heel to walk back to the house.

"C'mon then," he called after you like you were a dog, snapping his fingers as his long strides and heavy footfalls made a guiding path in the snow.

At your confusion, the furrow of your brows as you looked longingly at his hands, he barked a short "Hey! Keep up," and fought every urge to keep you as close as possible on the roads. Every single time he took you past the threshold of the front porch—which wasn't an awful lot in truth—he would grasp your hand in his, guide you around every corner and past every wandering eye. He would never let go.

Joel could tell the separation had broken something inside you, snapping the strings of your heart and breaking open your chest as you trudged on behind him—slowly shuffling through the snow that seeped into your shoes.

There was little encouragement as the sunset bled across the sky, no words of praise passing his lips as you walked behind him like a sad little puppy, head down and playing with your fingers. You were anxious, he could tell. Anxious and curious and desperate all at once.

You always did look pretty with a pout.

Once he'd rounded the corner to the house, he paused at the steps, looking back at you with an expression indiscernible. No smiles or scowls, just a set stare that kept you on your knees. You paused with him and he couldn't help the thrum of approval that coursed through him at your fear. He shouldn't like it. He knew full well that he shouldn't, but being scared was better than being comfortable. He had learned, too many times, that getting comfortable amounted to pain. You needed to be different. The possessiveness was just a response to a need to protect; every possibility whispered to him through the wind.

It was all part of his need to defend and protect.

"C'mon, honey, up the steps," he encouraged, watching you waiting for his next instruction—his approval.

Obediently, you stepped past him, Joel briefly glancing at the wet dirt at your knees, the notion that it symbolised and huffed a breath of harsh, winter air as he grabbed your wrist before you could reach the incline. He leant in close, lips ghosting the side of your face, a tightness in his chest at the way you stared straight ahead: unmoving.

"I'm gon' give you a headstart," he muttered. "'Cause your old man needs a drink on account of all the runnin' around you been makin' me do."

"I'm-"

"Don't start." He gripped your wrist tighter, shaking his head softly as your eyes met his. "When I get upstairs, you better be waitin' for me how I like you, yeah?"

You narrowed your eyes slightly, a hint of defiance in your eyes that he shut down with a simple tilt of his head—just a flavour of his disapproval of your attitude. He didn't mind you being a brat, not when it was innocent fun in the comfort of your home, spurred on only by his teasing promise of a little harsh treatment that night. But this…he couldn't deal with the disobedience when it ran this deep.

"Yeah, okay, Daddy," you murmured, and you escaped his grasp before he could reprimand the attitude—up the steps as quick as your feet could carry you, and through the front door.

Joel watched you through the frame for a small second, seeing you disappear up to the second floor and he tried not to let himself get too carried away with the image of you stripping your clothes off and settling on your knees beside the armchair that nestled in the corner of his room. Patiently waiting.

He took his time getting inside, treating the occasion as normal as he could: shoes kicked off near the door, coat hung up next to yours, venturing into the living room to stoke the fire and try and revive the flame you had killed, and turn into the dining room to pick a whiskey from the alcohol collection he'd been adding to since he found a bottle of unopened, aged red wine near the old farmhouse near Flat Creek.

Scanning the bottles, his eyes landed on the Whiskey you'd got him for his birthday, the days when you were still allowed on patrol and had been searching for something special for him to commemorate the soft beginnings of your blossoming relationship. You'd told him of the glint under the dried leaves, the rotting wood sign that marked a lost general store, and the brown liquid sloshing near the brim when you'd picked it up.

Joel hadn't the heart to tell you on September twenty-sixth why he had not accepted the gift with gratitude, why he had angrily asked you how you'd found out that it was his birthday and why he'd gone storming off to Tommy's with rage in his eyes when you'd said his little brother had mentioned it in passing.

He'd been drunk from that birthday present when he told you about Sarah and Ellie, and he'd never mentioned them again after the fact. You had not pried, and he had not touched the whiskey since. But, today, it seemed commemorative to pour himself a measure, find some courage in his cowardice and he wondered if the curse of the drink would prevail today when he asked you why you were pulling away.

Maybe, it would be he, who pulled away instead. He was hardly one to care as he took a sip and glanced to the stairway, another sip and a gulp as he began advancing.

It was cold when he got to the landing. The heat had not travelled far yet and any heat from the fire he'd started this morning had dissipated. You'd probably be shivering. Poor thing. Out of the corner of his eye, he spied the framed picture of the two of you, the blurry Polaroid you'd forced him to take in late May when you were more friendly with him in the month you'd known him than anyone else in Jackson.

He remembered your soft giggle as you told him to smile, the scent of your hair when you leaned in close and pushed the camera in his face. You'd been disappointed with how it turned out but had given it to him all the same—your initials scratched in marker on the white border and little heart that seemed as hesitant as you always were.

With another sip, he pushed the picture face-down, obscuring your faces from view and turning his back on the memory of your independence with a sigh.

You were cold. You must be and he couldn't wait a minute longer with the image of you shivering. He was cruel but he was not that cruel. All he wanted now was the truth, and if you were to give it to him if you were to submit yourself to him fully, he would pack up everything in the house and move you two far away.

Joel slinked into the bedroom with soft pads against the floor, your shaking body jumping when you heard the creak that gave away his silent position.

God, you were perfect, facing the chair on your knees, frame tensing as he stepped towards you and sat down; legs spread wide. You knew what it meant, knew the implication and you shuffled in between his strong thighs—hands scratching at his jeans to steady yourself.

Silently, he held out his drink to you, gesturing with a soft nod for you to take it.

"Just a little sip," he murmured, desperate to sing some praise, some words of comfort to you, but found that his throat was dry and he could barely speak the words he had just uttered. He coughed before he spoke again. "You're gonna need it."

You looked skeptically. He never let you drink. He'd said that it wasn't good for you and you hadn't known how serious he was about it until two months into the relationship when he'd seen you curled up on his couch with his wine. He'd taught you the best lesson he knew that day and you had not touched the stuff since. You knew you'd never get away with it and he prided himself on the fact that you would never even try.

"Daddy, I—"

"Just take a sip." You flinched at the irritation in his tone and grasped the glass with two hands to hopefully appease him. Just a simple sip, barely anything except a coat of liquid on your lips and you licked it away with a grimace, handing it back to him with wide, hopeful eyes.

He did not offer you what he knew you were asking for, those words of affirmation that always made you light up in the most delightful way. Instead, his voice was flat as he told you to put his drink on the side and he could tell by the quiver of your lip that you didn't like his behaviour one bit.

"Look at me," he instructed and you did as he asked in a heartbeat. His lips twitched as he almost reflexively told you how good you were, how proud he was as you, but he swallowed it down with his simmering anger—his desire for the truth. However, he did allow you a modicum of comfort as his hand came to the side of your face, cupping your cheek with warmth and rubbing your cheekbone with his thumb. You nuzzled into him like a goddamn cat, desperate for his touch. "I need to know the truth," he said measuredly. "I need you to tell what's got that head of yours thinkin' so hard."

You looked away, ashamedly, bottom lip jutting out in a pout and back hunching as you tried to curl in on yourself. His grip tightened at that, thumb and forefinger travelling to your chin to force your eyes to his.

"Baby, I'm givin' you a chance here—"

"Okay!" you exclaimed suddenly, chest heaving like you were about to start hyperventilating—chin wobbling in his hand as you bit back the tears. "You just gotta promise me you won't leave me. All of this, I- I promise I didn't mean it."

Joel shook his head, grip loosening and thumb stroking along your bottom lip in comfort.

"I just wanna know, honey. Whatever it is."

You contemplated for a moment with your eyes on his, blinking away the glisten before averting your gaze to his lap. He allowed it whilst you thought, knowing that his gentle harshness was the oxymoron that ruled your life.

"Yesterday," you began, and he was surprised at the thickness in your voice. There was no whine, no hesitancy: you sounded like you used to. He reached for his drink to expel the fear. "You were gone. You were working."

The curl of your fingers in his jeans was the only sign of the girl he had turned you into. Even on your knees, naked, there was the shadow of who you were before, a looming figure behind you that grew closer the more you spoke.

"I was doing my chores, just…minding my own business like you always tell me to and you'd barely been gone an hour before someone knocked at the door and I know I'm not supposed to answer the door to anyone, I know." You were rambling. You grounded yourself again by taking a breath, glancing up at him and wondering if he was going to say something, but found that his mouth was sealed—his jaw solid and tense. There was a sigh before you spoke the words that had his simmering rage burning in blue flames to the surface.

"But it was only Maria, and I didn't think you'd mind…"

Your voice trailed off, his ears ringing as it all settled into place and it was undeniable that in that moment, he was taken by clarity—swept from the ground by a shuddering realisation. He was not angry with Maria. He was not angry with you. That fog had cleared, had disappeared right before his eyes and he was already formulating future conversations in his head. Plans that had been so hazy before when he rode past the lone structure that housed images that, at the time, seemed profoundly unreachable.

They seemed close now and he was shushing you with a hand in your hair before you could begin relaying what his sister-in-law had said. He already knew and he was almost grateful. Joel knew now that things would be good when he got you out of here.

"You don't gotta say nothin' else, baby," he said, softer than he had said anything today.

Your voice trailed off, staring at him with confusion—questioning with a furrow of your brow.

"You're not mad at me?" you asked. "You're not mad at Maria?"

Truthfully, Joel found it endearing how willing you were to defend his sister-in-law, how desperate you were to be his good girl again. The act of defiance…you could never keep it up for long. He'd moulded you so perfectly that you could hardly live without his praise and affection. Sometimes, it scared him. If he were to die next week, if he were to die tomorrow, what would you do with yourself? He'd spent hours pondering the likely situation, the number of close calls he'd been having out on patrol nowadays too frequent for him to believe he'd be living long enough to see you mature out of him. Right through his skin like a parasite, ripping through the flesh and leaving him bleeding with a broken knee.

He'd tried writing letters, feeling stupid when he put pen to paper and flinging them back into his drawer with the lock on it and promising that he'd try again tomorrow—just so you had a piece of him when he eventually left you. He'd try again tonight when he got you to sleep, although he knew that it would amount to nothing.

All he could give you was what he had right now and his grip on your face grew soft as he realised he could waste no time being mean to you. Not when you liked the pain so much.

"I'm not mad at you," he sighed, shaking his head and leaning back in the chair. "It's okay, baby." The rest of what he said became absent-minded mutters, not really meant for you to hear but you were on your knees and you looked so pretty. Just a little angel in his when he brought your head down to his thigh, feeling you nuzzle into the denim. "I'm gonna take you away from this soon. Gonna give you everything you want. Just you and me."

You were gazing up at him with wide, glazed eyes, remnants of bitten-back tears washing down the side of your face, traversing to your nose where they dropped off onto his thigh—nestling into the fibres of the fabric and drowning against his skin.

"C'mon," he murmured then because he could not bear to see the watercolour, the wetness that stung his soul as much as it stung your pretty eyes. The colour of the iris burned into the backs of his eyelids, the wideness of the pupils when you looked at him expanding in his dreams until all he saw was black and the call of your sweet voice lulling him deeper into his derangement. "Up you come, honey," he encouraged as you clambered into his arms and bracketed his thighs—arms circling his neck as he nestled you against him.

It was the clam before the storm—the sun before the snow.

Joel comforted you for as long as he would allow his brain to feel the clarity; the blissfulness of what the next stage for the two of you was going to be. He would talk to Maria tomorrow, tell her that you were on board and put the plans into place with a soft smirk as he stared at the black hole of delusion that had been sucking him in ever since there was blood in the blonde and auburn.

You were heavy against him, his hands gently stroking along your spine, beginning to bounce his knee a little just to keep you awake, and letting the scent of roses and thyme envelope the space. You were his baby. All his and he held you a little tighter when his hips caught the heat of you and your breath blew sharp from your throat.

It was slow, the way you started to rock and cry into his neck. He could feel the wetness, the deepness of your essence bleeding into him when you settled yourself over his thigh and pressed yourself to him so tight he could hardly breathe with the perfume of you suffocating him.

"That's it," he choked out when you sobbed. Heat against heat, friction burning between your thighs as you gripped his hair and tried regulating your breathing.

You did not call his name as you usually did, you just cried and rocked against him, spurred by his guiding hands and delicate kisses. Joel could barely stand the silence, and could hardly take the muffled crying as you rubbed yourself against his leg. Joel didn't like the way it was transpiring—not with the crystal ball in your court and his fate in your hands.

The hand in your hair tightened, dragging you from his neck and forcing your face to his. He licked away your tears with fervour, roughly pulling you to him, letting him drink from the salt of you and then forcing you back so your eyes bore into his.

"Don't make me hurt you, angel," he said through a scowl, and it sounded so dark coming from his lips that all he could see was the red of your eyes and the red of her blood. There was black on his soul, filth and rotting flesh, infested with maggots that buried themselves right to his core. Sometimes, he was convinced that your soul was made from daisies and angel feathers. Amalgamated, he sullied the freshness. Separated, there remained a hole ripped from the middle of both entities—only healed when he was here with you. Keeping you in place. "You want me to hurt you?"

When you nodded he almost greeted death like a friend. Take the hand of that phantom cloaked in black and drag him from his bloodied existence. But you were muttering, still rocking and muttering and he couldn't leave you as you were. So broken and desperate.

"Want you to hurt me, Daddy." The tears were streaming and they called to his tongue, dehydrated from the salt but greedy for the taste. His greed overcame his rationality in the end. After rationale was no longer needed and he could be safely trapped inside the gates—let out only when the full moon rose and the sun died.

He lapped up the wetness on your cheeks, pressing kisses to the skin, digging himself into you as he felt you seep into his tongue. The sweetness warmed his belly and made him drunk with the feeling—drunk and violent.

"That right?" he questioned with a barely-constrained growl. "Want daddy to hurt you?"

You nodded your head enthusiastically, sob wracking through your body as you clung to him, hips still rolling and rocking; wanting to take everything from him. He found it fascinating that you didn't know you already had. That you'd taken him, mind and soul, dipped them in formaldehyde and displayed them on your shelf—smiling at the collection of body parts until all that remained was his head, spurting blood from the harsh hacking of your heart.

"Goddman, baby." The name was muffled into your shoulder, biting down on your skin to restrain himself. Then, you called, begging him with pretty little whimpers not to be gentle with you. Words spill from your tongue like vomit, spraying him head to toe with your entrails and reminding him of his position. Your protector. Your daddy. Yours.

He would do whatever you wanted him to. He would move mountains, drain the sea and place the moon in your willing hands if it made you happy. He had realised long ago just how willing he was, how pathetic and liberated it made him feel to know that he would never let you go. Contradictory, in its base: he would do anything for you except let you go.

"You sure?" he murmured as he placed kisses along your neck, hands wrapped around your waist and guiding you back and forth over his thigh. "Don't want you runnin' off on me again when I get a little too mean."

"No," you choked out desperately, groaning softly as a sharp tick ran through you. "Never, Daddy."

Joel just kissed you through it all, unable to think of some clever remark or bite back with a teasing question. He just let you rock and wind your fingers into his hair, gripping so tight you were liable to break away with chunks of his skull. He would be nice for this moment, the short, lingering moment where he would let you go brainless with want, pretend that he was going to give you what you so desperately craved, and then strip it from you like Jesus refusing bread for the five thousand.

You were stuttering, hips losing their momentum, cute little whimpers falling from your lips in quick succession, toes curling—all indications. It would've done you better to restrain your noises, to keep rubbing your cute pussy over his leg in careful consideration. Maybe then you could've slipped through the cracks—deceived him into letting you cum.

However, you had not, and he was gripping your hips and ceasing the friction—speaking before you could start whining.

"If I hear one sound outta you, I'll tie you to that bed and leave you there." It was an idle threat considering how much he knew you'd enjoy such an activity. Unfortunately, you had never been bratty enough to warrant such a punishment and now, the sun was setting, the sky was getting dark and, if he was being honest with himself, he didn't have the patience to embark on something so arduous. It did not mean, however, that he wasn't going to hurt you, that he wasn't going to bruise that cute little ass of yours and brand your cheek with his handprint. You'd never want to leave the house again if you were all marked like that—the humiliation was just too much for your sweet soul.

But, you were pouting at his scolding, tingling from the rejected orgasm and he couldn't find it in him to be sympathetic.

He was dragging you to the bed before you could so much as beg him for reprieve. He'd pushed you off his lap with disdain, towering above you as he grabbed your upper arm and led you to the bed. The sheets were fresh, he realised, and it helped your cause just a little: the fact that even though you'd been bad, you'd still found it in you to keep up with your chores.

"Sit," he commanded sharply and you crawled onto the bed with a whimper, pressing your thighs together and curling your fists to stop yourself from touching any inch of you.

Obediently, you nestled on your knees in the middle of the bed, eyes wide and glistening, fingers fumbling as you tried to cease your anxiousness. You looked so breakable it made him sick. For some reason, today of all days he couldn't stop thinking about who you used to be: fierce, completely independent. God, he remembered the time when he tried to adjust your stance when you were sniping some stray runners and you'd scowled at him and told him with vigour that you could do it yourself. If you dared do something like that now…hell, if you even tried picking up a goddamn gun, you knew he'd have your neck.

He understood, completely, what he had done to you. How he had broken every little bone in your body until you were just a mass of flesh.

"Arms out, honey," he muttered suddenly, right hand pulling at his belt buckle and slipping the leather from its loops. He was desperate to get his jeans off, desperate to tie you up and keep you down as you held out your hands, palms up and shuddered as he folded his belt in half and watched it come hurtling down against your skin.

Almost immediately, a harsh red line blossomed along your hands, a tear slipping down your cheek as he shushed your whimpers and began wrapping the leather around your wrists. He tugged tight, pulling on the item to make sure it was secure and letting your hands fall to your lap.

He smiled when you looked up at him with bleary eyes, stepping back to go and sit back down on his chair.

Your tears filled with more tears at the disconnect, and he palmed his bulge with a soft grunt when you began whining.

"Daddy, what—"

"What did I say?" he interrupted harshly. "Huh?"

Your voice was quiet and cracked like a dropped porcelain doll when you answered.

"No more whining."

He sighed in gratitude at your response, settling down and letting his old bones relax after an awfully long day of worrying about your stupid fucking head.

"That's right," he muttered, gazing at you with soft eyes that glinted with licentiousness. He wanted to touch you. You knew it, God knew it, but he would not allow himself. Not for now. "I want you to touch yourself, baby?"

Your eyebrows shot up, back straightening and he hushed you when you began asking how.

"You'll figure it out, you're a big girl, ain't you? Now, I want you to touch yourself, and if you dare cum, I'll throw you outside in the snow just as you are."

You pouted and he twitched. It disappeared in an instant when you realised fully how willing he was to smack the expression off your face. With hesitant, bound hands, you began searching between your legs, restricted by the loss of movement in your wrists and fingers fumbling as you tried to gain all the friction you could.

Your eyes bore into his, watching him watch you, stuttering softly when you managed to brush against your clit and fall back onto your elbows—spreading your legs to reach the sweet space between your thighs.

"There you go," he murmured, reaching for his whiskey. "You're so pretty when you listen."

You glared frustratedly, Joel knowing full well that you could barely get any kind of momentum with your hands bound in such a way.

"Don't look at me like that, you got all your fingers don't ya?" He shook his head as he took a sip of whiskey, the sweetness of honey dancing along his tongue as he honed in on your glistening pussy—unashamedly adjusting himself in his pants when you helplessly tried to find an angel that could give you the most pleasure.

After a few minutes of fumbling, a sob broke through your chest. Whining.

"I can't do it, Daddy!" you exclaimed. "It doesn't feel good, you're just being mean."

"Would you rather not get touched at all?" he asked with a bite, gnawing into your psyche, breaking you down until you could hardly think.

"No," you drawled out. "Just want to cum, daddy."

"Then keep goddam goin', little girl. One more word outta you and I'm leavin' and sleepin' on the couch." The look you gave him then was the cutest thing ever, laced with a need so deep. A need not just for the sex, but for the love—for the kiss of his skin against yours when you fell asleep with soft snores. For the vitality that permeated the connection, you shared when he held you close and told you of times long past, aired his grievances and then apologized when he realised a little girl like you shouldn't be burdened by his impediments.

You craved him and he could hardly contain his pride at the notion.

He mumbled a short, "That's what I thought," when you started trying to touch yourself again, hiding his smirk behind his glass and letting the warmth of the alcohol settle in his stomach.

Watching you struggle, watching you so desperate had always been his favourite thing—something that kept him sane during the dark winter nights when even the moon seemed to lose its light. The image of you, bound and wet glistened in the slight lamplight that expelled from the cracks in the walls.

And here you were. His naughty little girl with your wrists tied together and your tears streaming as you tried to get yourself off.

Disgruntled moans fell from your lips, eyes wide as you stared at him with meaning slathering your gaze. He gauged your silent words and he downed the rest of his drink before his instructions came.

"Come over here," he commanded, legs widening as he settled, no intentions of coddling you, rubbing away the sores on your wrists and telling you that you were his good girl again. You had not atoned yet, you had not fully experienced the judgement day that befell as soon as the thunderclouds had rolled in and clapped with an almighty roar above your head. He wanted to be revered, wanted you to look at him how you used to—like he was God himself.

You pathetically scrambled off the bed, your body trembling as your sweat began to dry in the cold chill of the winter air. You could shiver all you want. It was your fault it was cold in the first place.

When he witnessed you standing on two feet, ready to take a step, he shook his head.

"Hands and knees, honey, come on you gotta crawl."

"But, daddy, my hands—"

"I don't give a damn if you gotta army crawl, just get your ass over here."

He revelled in the way your lip quivered, the way you slowly genuflected at the altar of his cruel kindness and shuffled slowly to the crown of thorns he held between two calloused hands. When you nestled between him, he dug the thorns into the skin of your forehead and immortalised you with a bloody cross on your chest, giving so freely when he brushed his fingers through your hair to soothe the wounds.

You began apologising again, nuzzling into the feel of his hands against you, knees scraping against the floor as you pressed your face down against his thigh.

"Wanna make you feel good, Daddy," you whimpered. "Please, I'm sorry. Wanna let you hurt me."

Joel scoffed, smiling down at you as you leaned against him.

"You think you deserve Daddy's cock, huh?" he muttered. "Sometimes, I think the best way to make you listen is to make you go without. It ain't exactly a punishment when you like it so much, is it?"

You whined then, shaking your head and pressing your face fully against his crotch, no shame in the way you pawed at him, not heat to your cheeks when he went to grasp the sides of your face and pull your gaze to his.

"How do we ask?" he questioned with a tilt of his eyebrow, playing with the pout on your lips.

Your eyes went down at his tone, bottom lip jutting out even further as he brushed his thumb over it and words mumbled as you uttered the third rule on the ever-growing list stuck to the fridge.

"Can't hear you," he said, only catching the odd few words that you managed to enunciate properly.

"Ask like a polite young lady or I don't get what I want."

He sighed happily, nodding his head and tilting your head from side to side, admiring you from every angle before letting you go and muttering, "That's right." You basked in the minute praise, the implications of his words and his actions as he spread his legs a little wider with a silent command, and flicked his eyes to his crotch. "Ain't got all night," he uttered. "Already took the belt off for ya. Is a button too hard for ya?"

You shook your head vehemently, fingers clasped around the metal fly and tugged downward once you'd pushed the denim through the button. Reaching in with ardour, he settled into his chair, ready to watch you fumble with the size of him, your warm mouth encasing him whilst he gave no assistance or encouragement. The casualness of the licentiousness was always his favourite. Those moments on the couch when you were on his lap and he'd rub at your clit in soft circles—not intending to make you cum. If anything, it always made you sleepy, your body going heavy and slack against his as your eyes flickered.

It was the same now, with his face straight, reaching for the book that he'd left on the side table and opening up on the last page. In truth, he wasn't focused on the words. All he could think about was trying not to elicit a groan when your hand wrapped around him, a little too tight as if you were trying to get one back at him, and pressed a tentative kiss to the tip.

The feat became even more of a difficulty when you thanked him, all sweet and soft before taking him whole in your mouth—right down to the base, breathing heavily through your nose, eyes wet with tears that dripped into his grey pubes, and suppressing the inevitable gag that had you choking and spluttering as you surfaced for air.

"C'mon," he said suddenly, flicking the page like he'd even absorbed any of the information on the last one, and grabbed your hair to push you back down on his cock. "You don't stop unless you can't breathe, you understand me?" he asked authoritatively. Then, a little softer with his tone, just that touch lighter with a downturn of his eyes to reiterate something you already knew. "If you wanna stop altogether, you know what you gotta say don't you?"

You nodded with his cock down your throat, humming around him and basking in the small victory of a choked groan, then the desperation for composure when he shook his head and trained his eyes on the top of the page.

Diligently, you began to work, up and down, tongue running along the underside, catching the veins you had mapped—now muscle memory that lingered in the backrooms of your mind. Your dominant hand was forever caressing his balls, a comfortable weight in your hand—almost calming—as you took the entirety of him. The soft tip reached the back of your throat with every movement, reflexes smothered as you tried as best you could to not focus on the feeling of your jaw locking.

The tears were damp on his skin, the suction around his cock a malicious force that threatened to reveal his position and your pretty little eyes looking up at him with desperation for his attention. He could feel your gaze in his periphery and from the observant nature he knew still lay somewhere within you, you'd probably gauged that the book was nothing more than a disguise considering he had not turned the page in the past ten minutes. You knew the speed at which he read considering he read to you almost every night and with an extreme lack of restraint, his eyes honed in on you over the top of the cover.

"What're you lookin' at?" he asked with a strain, succumbing completely when his eyes flickered shut—giving himself a second to breathe. A moment of composure and his eyes were back on you. Yours had not left him. "Hm? What're you crying for, babygirl?"

His thumbs came to wipe at the corners of your eyes, holding underneath your chin to pull you off him gently. The string of spit that attached you to him had his position completely displaced—the stalemate broken as he raised the white flag in surrender and let the book fall gently against his lap. A forgotten entity as you leaned in with haste to lick the precum off his leaking tip. Just cause you liked the taste.

He still didn't know if you were lying about that or if you really were a little goddamn cumslut but he would take the wins as considerately as he took the losses.

Your eyes mystified him, the windows to your soul glistening like the heavenly gates of eudaimonia and you hypnotised him into acquiescing. Not forgiving. No, you were in no position to be forgiven just yet, not before he pressed your body into the bed and fucked his cum into you. The harshness just seemed to fall away.

"Goddamn, I can't stay mad at you," he said with exasperation, both hands cupping your cheeks and feeling his back crack as he leant down to kiss you.

Your tears wet his thumbs as his tongue slipped into your mouth, all spit and desire as you sobbed against his mouth. He pulled away to caress your hair, watching you blubber with carefully concealed guilt that he would bury down into the pits of the bruise on his chest by the day's end.

"I hate it when you're mad at me," you cried and it was so sincere he could hardly stand it.

"I know, baby, I know," he murmured. "But I don't like it when you're not good. And I gotta do what I gotta do. I don't want you runnin' off again, honey."

"I won't," you said, shaking your head. "I promise I won't."

In truth, Joel knew you wouldn't. Now, he knew that this temporary setback was nothing more than just that. You'd just got a little tetchy. It was understandable considering how much freedom he had taken from you. Your life had slowly transformed into a small slice of what it once was, the patrols dwindling to stable duty, then to greenhouse duty, and then helping keep the grocery store shelves stocked every other day, and then right down to Joel's house where nothing could get to you except the beast of a man who passed the threshold every day.

There was a short silence between your words and his next, licking his lips in contemplation before signalling over to the bed with his head.

"Go lay down."

Almost immediately, you did as he asked, bound hands placed on the ground, ready to crawl then stopping when you heard his no.

You looked in confusion, wondering what you had done wrong now. All he said was, "It's okay, you don't have to crawl just-" he sighed, looking at your hands and deciding he liked the scratches on his back far too much to restrict your movement for much longer. "Come here," he asked, and you obediently settled back into your previous position. He carefully removed the belt bind, rubbing at the marks on your wrist when the leather fell to the floor with a thud.

Then, the moment of softness was gone and he pushed you away with another nod to the bed before reaching for the hem of his shirt and pulling it over his head. He smiled when you glanced back on your journey to look at him undressing, a suppressed smirk on your face when you nestled down on your side of the bed and pressed your face into your pillow.

You didn't sneak another glance when he started shucking his jeans down his legs, kicking them off alongside his socks until all the clothes lay on a pile next to his chair, and then stood with a crack in his knees to settle down next to you.

The bed dipped when he sat, reaching for you with a gentle hand across your waist, turning you to face him.

You melted into him, shuffling closer so you could touch him in any capacity, eyes raking over his old frame as if he were anything special. In times like these, when you shamelessly soaked in the pudge of his belly, the wrinkles in his forehead and the grey in his hair, he felt wanted. You made him feel wanted, loved, desired—something he hadn't in years. Even before all this goddamn shit, when he was focused solely on giving his daughter the best life possible, when he didn't have time to sink into some cliche romance with a woman of respectable age and a similar situation. Even Tess, goddamn Tess who lingered in his periphery when he was beating a runner to death—flashes of all the people he'd killed and tortured with her by his side. He did not even feel wanted then. Just a disposable commodity. He had known that he was not the only man she messed around with in that QZ. Everyone was looking for comfort, everyone desperate for the touch of another to soothe them to sleep when the bombs dropped and there was nothing to keep them from crying.

Even when he had walked into Jackson with his head held high and the pretty woman who led patrol group C asked him if he'd ever want to go out for drinks sometime, he had not felt wanted. He had sat in the secluded corner of the Tipsy Bison with her hand on his thigh and whispered promises between sips of whiskey and decided that it didn't feel right—that there was something in her eyes that told him she wouldn't devote herself to him as you had done.

God and he felt so guilty every time he thought about how he turned Jessica down with a frown, holding her hands between his and telling her that he had enjoyed every second, that it wasn't anything to do with her or her character but all down to the fact that Joel didn't want to lose someone he grew close to again. He couldn't make room for any more pain in his chest.

Sometimes, he felt like it with you, felt like he should let you run away just to prevent the feeling when you eventually left anyway.

But, you stared at him with so much love, naked and wide-eyed and he couldn't even fathom the thought of letting you go. In this moment, when you rested your head on the pillow and nuzzled into his waiting palm when he cupped your cheek, he couldn't bear the images that danced and fell of you running away. Of you turning your back on him like he hadn't given you everything.

"Daddy," you murmured, eyes worried at his intense thinking, the silence stretching just a little too long.

He was pulled from his reverie with a shake of his head, eyes catching yours, fixated on the deepness of your intent and absent-mindedly tracing his hand down your arm, tickling along the soft hair and reaching for your palm with a squeeze.

"You ain't ever gonna leave, are ya?" he asked suddenly, intent on hearing you say it without blubbering, without the girl he'd turned you into saying it for you. He wanted to see the girl in the Polaroid, the girl who had once been crucified by the horrors of the plains. He wanted to feel the nails in your palms and feet, the sacrifice of yourself streaming into your eyes where the thorns had cut too deep.

You got quiet, your hand wriggling against his until you could fully intertwine your fingers. You squeezed once, shuffling up the bed to sit up slightly, and brought the back of his hand to your mouth. You kissed, as delicately as he had ever seen you kiss, and fucked his soul with the softness of your affections.

Then, you shook your head, all guts no glory.

"No. I won't go anywhere else for as long as I live."

He let the words settle, let them linger for just a little while—struggling to swallow them down, his teeth ripped from his gums and blood spilling on his tongue as he attempted to chew. They didn't quite reach his stomach, just nestled somewhere in his throat, a space where he couldn't quite cough them back up but also couldn't quite force them down. So instead, he kissed you before you could say another word, tongue down your throat, a hand wrapped around where the muscle dug, and pressed you into the mattress with the weight of his mania.

In truth, he knew he had been crazed since the beginning of it all—completely insane by the end of it, too.

He gave it all to you, and it was too perfect that you took it so willingly. All of his derangement was given to you in a china bowl, a side of rotting flesh and a cup of piss to wash it all down. He masked you with the poison and made you just as deluded as he was until you both lived in your very own madhouse.

"You know just what to say to make Daddy happy," he breathed between kisses. "Know just what to do to make me forgive you, huh? Even when you've been bad."

You moaned in response, his lips latching onto your jugular, hands everywhere he could reach, working you into a sweat before he clasped your clit between two twitching fingers.

He shushed you when you cried out, using his other hand to press over your mouth.

"Sh, sh, sh, I know, baby, I know. It hurts so good, huh?"

You nodded desperately, jerking when he pinched harder, then let out a muffled cry when he swiftly pulled his hand away and then brought it right back down flat against your bare pussy. He revelled in the tears, the look of desperation on your face for more—for him to hurt you until you felt like you were his good girl again.

So, he hit again, landing square in the middle of your wet cunt, pulling back his hand to see the glisten—the lingering essence of you slicking the skin. You did not notice him staring through the blur of your tears, just tugging on the ends of his hair which was getting too long, to pull him down to your mouth. He went willingly, soothing over your clit with softer fingers and basking in the feeling of you against him.

It had been a long day. A long time alone, even with the company of Jesse. He had been worried about you and the relief that he had you where he wanted was insurmountable. An indescribable reprieve from the stress of his day and the panic of losing you like he had lost everyone else.

So, he slipped his fingers inside you with the grace of an arcing arrow, and reached for the transcendence of your moans, searched for the mystery of the sea in your eyes and the reverence of the Lord Jesus Christ in your devotion.

"There we go," he murmured when you started moaning, the heel of his palm digging into your clit to provide extra stimulation. "That's the one, ain't it, babydoll. My pretty little babydoll- fuck."

If it wasn't for the painful hardness of his cock or the consolation that you were here to stay, he would've been embarrassed by the way he moaned with you. Embarrassed by the way he hissed every time his cock dragged along your thigh. If he was someone else entirely, he would've been embarrassed altogether by the way he had you. By the way you had him.

Joel knew, had known for some time, that he needed you far more than you needed him. It was why, sometimes, he could never bring himself to worry about what you would do when he eventually left for the West—why he struggled so much to sit down and write that goddamn letter he had distressed himself over so much. He had faith that eventually, you would be okay. You would learn to live without him.

Because Joel Miller was nothing special. He was not glorious. He was far from good and a lot of the time, he believed that he deserved to die. That his penance for his misdeeds was God sending you for him to look after, knowing that your presence would make him utterly insane. He wanted to give you far more than he could, he knew that. Yet, he would love you like he loved the memories and believe you when you said that you loved him too.

If it wasn't for that sickening love, Joel would've been embarrassed by the way he asked you for the second time, "You ain't leavin'? You promise me?"

"Fuck," you whimpered and he didn't have it in him to scold you for cursing. "Fuck, yes."

He groaned when you gushed around him, a vice-like grip on his fingers when he brushed a thumb over your nipple and sucked your collarbone.

"Yes, what?" he breathed out almost desperately. "Tell me what."

You expelled a harsh breath, hand wrapping around his working wrist and squeezing tight until a ring of white branded itself into his skin.

"N-never leaving," you half-moaned, unable to control the desperation for his fingers. "Don't want you to leave ever, Daddy."

"Oh, baby," he muttered. "I ain't goin' anywhere, my pretty little thing."

You clung to him, then, arms wrapping around him to pull his chest to yours, to feel the weight of him crushing you into the earth, burying you with a pearl headstone adorning the grave of passion. The depths you fell, you were unsure, the way you tugged him with you into the abyss, Joel could not appease.

The adrenaline began coursing through him when you begged him to put it in, when you told him with a whine that you wanted to feel him deep—that you didn't just want it but you needed it.

"Daddy, please," you cried, eyes full to the brim with desperate tears, the salt sliding down your cheeks, another whine when he slipped his fingers from you to swipe away the tears.

"Goddamn," he muttered to himself, mesmerised by how gorgeous you looked with his wet fingers against your cheek, eyes red raw from the constant crying that symbolised so much more than the pain of knowing him. "You're beautiful, baby. So beautiful, I can't even hurt you."

"You can hurt me," you said so eagerly. "I want you to-"

"I can't," he cut you off firm and soft, shaking his head with a vulnerability he hadn't felt in a long time. "Not right now. Not when I've got you back."

"B-but I haven't been good," you protested. "Daddy, I haven't been good."

Joel shushed you, refusing to listen to whatever else you had to say.

"You're always good. Always my good girl, yeah?"

You shook your head and his hand came whipping down against the side of your cheek—an unconscious decision that he would've felt guilty for if it wasn't for the brightness in your eyes at the action. Still, he could not continue with these bouts of violence; could not position himself as a force of injudicious actions. You did not deserve what he gave you. You never had. But, he couldn't force himself to stop the power, to feel the domineering presence of his words fall over you like a ton of fucking bricks. You loved it, he knew you did. Just like he knew you loved his hate and his insanity. You craved it like he craved your innocence and, although both were completely twisted in their own ways, who was he to deny you what you wanted?

So, he asserted a simple, "Repeat it," one last smack to the side of your face before he gripped his cock in hand and eased the tip inside.

"Ah," you cried, never used to the stretch no matter how many times he peeled you apart.

"Repeat it," he asked again, trying to gain composure as you swallowed him whole.

"I'm- I'm…" The words fell away from you, your mind going blank as he pushed himself inside you. Inching further and further despite the resistance of your tightness.

"C'mon, baby, let daddy hear it," he groaned, breathing heavily to keep himself from moaning. "Repeat it."

"I'm a good girl," you garbled out, all in one mess as he simultaneously bottomed out inside of you, both gasping into each other's mouth at the feel of him nestling.

Joel gripped the sides of your face between his thumb and forefinger, tilting your head from side to side, just to test how limp you were—how fucked out you were already despite him not even moving. He missed the days in late summer when he used to keep you on his cock all day long, too hot to make too much movement in fear you'd both overheat. Just you, lolling against him and spiralling into heaven with the tip of him rubbing against your cervix.

Your legs wrapped around your waist, pulling him in all that deeper and he had no words, no teasing phrases to punish you for breaking the rules. He didn't give a shit about that, not anymore. Not after what had been remedied here in your bed. As he looked at you, eyes closed shut, lips swollen and kiss-bitten, all he thought about was what would happen next. Where he would take the two of you. He had ideas, thoughts once private that he spewed between your lips when he started rolling his hips.

"Gonna marry you," he uttered. "Gonna make you a Mama."

You moaned in retaliation, babbling something he couldn't quite hear, ignoring the "no" that he thought had been strung within your incoherent sentences.

"Yeah, baby," he breathed out. "Gonna take you away from here. Gonna keep you forever."

Your chest was heaving, his was too, and he couldn't find it in himself to be deterred by his own words—the words that he had not thought of as anything more than a disparagement of his own sanctity when the nights got too dark and he couldn't see the future from where he stood.

His hips got quicker, adrenaline fuelling the ache of his bones and your pussy was so tight and wet he could hardly focus on the task at hand. His thrusts were quick and sharp, pistoning into you with the force of all his desires and holding back nothing at all when cupped your face in both hands and begged you for one thing.

"Look at me," he asked through gritted teeth.

You complied as best as you could, eyelashes fluttering and eyes hooded, unable to look at him properly with the incandescent nature of the sensations.

"God, I love you," he breathed out and he could barely keep the contact anymore, the wet squelching coming from your legs keeping him grounded at the moment, Yet, he could feel himself floating with each ringing in his ear, so desperate to cum that he neglected to touch your clit, giving you the much-needed stimulation that would send you floating on high right next to him; bathed in sunlight and the reverence of God Almighty.

Chasing his orgasm only, he thrust as fast as he could, groaning into your ear with each snap of his hips and burying his face into your neck to keep the noises from embarrassing him when he thought back on them later. And suddenly, with one sharp shout, he came, fast and hard and underwhelming—deep inside you as he sagged and shuddered above you.

You both lay there for a moment, his breath hot and heavy against your neck and as the high faltered, his cheeks began to heat.

"Shit," he muttered. "Shit, baby, I'm sorry."

He pulled away to face you, gauging your reaction and finding nothing but a soft smile on your face.

"You came before me," you whispered, unable to control the giggles that spilt from your mouth. "You never cum before me."

His stomach was still clenched, his humiliation unable to overpower the spinning in his head and he was so bewildered that he looked at you with an expression of complete confusion. It took a moment for the giggles to settle in his ears before he began to crack a smile, shaking his head and unsuccessfully trying to get you to stop.

"Alright, alright, it ain't that funny." For some reason, that made you laugh harder and it was so infectious that he began laughing with you: complete easement, not even bothering to feel embarrassed about the way he'd just cum as fast as a virgin and hadn't even bothered to attempt to make you cum as well.

It felt normal, like you weren't both fucked in your own ways, called to the west and blinded by the sun in the east. The two of you were just you and Joel. The nice couple down the street who always kissed each other goodbye: a wife who made blueberry pie for the potluck and a husband who cooked sausages on the barbecue with the neighbours, telling him all about how lucky he is to have you. A little sickly sweet but normal all the same. But how could you be normal when the world did not adhere to the definition? How could anyone pretend that the situation of the globe was usual? Ravaged wasteland. Disparaged morals.

The two of you were not normal and, he decided, that he was fine with that. That neither of you wanted normality, and he was kissing away your laughs with a soft smile, teeth clattering in an unrefined connection. It was slow, almost sleazy the way your tongues began to touch, the humour fading to something more complex—a dependency so profound it maddened him.

"I'm sorry, baby," he murmured into your mouth. "Sorry I didn't make you cum on my cock, I know you like it best like that, don't ya?" Joel smiled at your nod, humming along with you. "Yeah, I know you do."

His kisses trailed down to your neck, down down down to your heaving breasts, nipples just desperate to be kissed and he sucked one into his mouth with ardour. You were so soft, always were and the smoothness of you beneath his tongue was something akin to heaven. He knew he would never reach the kingdom, and knew that eternity with God was impossible, so he would take what he could get while he was here. He would sin: murder, sex, and love with no bounds. He would deny His existence and then beg on judgement day for the feel of you one more time, his lips along your stomach as he kissed his way to your waiting cunt, spilling with his cum.

It was utter depravity when he saw the sticky white contrasted against the colour of you, dripping down onto the bed sheets and looking so incredibly appetising. And he was always crazed in his arousal, whispering words of insanity against your pussy in the hopes that one day he would indoctrinate you into believing them too.

"You think it's gonna take one of these days?" he asked, pulling you apart with his fingers, just to watch it fall out of you again. "You think daddy's gonna knock you up, hm?"

You were looking down at him with wide eyes, propped up on your elbows and looking so unsure of yourself in the moonlight. It only occurred to him then that it was now completely dark, the moon hanging bright in the sky, the day far behind you and winter subtly coming to a close. He refused to believe you when you shook your head, flopping back down to the pillows with a sigh when he traced the white all the way up to your aching clit.

"No?" His lips came down to your thighs, kissing the insides of the plush flesh and gracing you with soft bites, careful not to hurt you too much as you buried your flushed cheeks into the feathers. "You sure?"

You shook your head, moaning softly as he pressed his lips to the crease where you met, Joel's breath hot against you as you awaited the kiss of death.

"Please," you muttered. "Just wanna cum."

"Oh, she wants to cum?" There was condescension to his tone, harsh sarcasm that he didn't really mean and your hips bucked into his face in retaliation. He almost groaned at the scent of you, the sight of you so desperate for his tongue. He would make you cum if it was the last thing he did and he was ashamed that it would not be on his cock but he was getting older and the one hard-on was plenty for his body to handle. "It's okay, I'll make you cum, honey."

There, his lips latched onto your clit, moaning into the sensation, tongue lapping up the remnants of his cum with a single swipe and holding it dangerously in his mouth. Pulling away, he tapped his finger against your chin, crawling back up to face you with a mouthful of seed and disgusting thoughts he couldn't reconcile once all was said and done. You opened your mouth with no abandon, eyes wide as he gathered the combination of fluids in his mouth, and spat them directly into yours. Swiftly, he pushed on your chin, closing your mouth with a simple command of "swallow," and watched the bob of your throat as it all slid down to nestle into your stomach.

"Atta girl," he uttered, mesmerised by your obedience, slipping down your body again to begin eating you once more. Between kisses and sucks and licks, he murmured praise between your legs, promising you that you were his good girl—that you always were even when you broke the rules, even when you made him so mad and worried he could hardly think.

Joel's lips stayed clasped around your clit, fingers working into your cum-soaked cunt without abandon and stroking at the spot inside you that expelled every cry and moan from your mouth.

"Daddy," you whimpered. "Daddy, please, I-"

Muffled, he questioned you, asking if already after maybe only a few minutes of working, you were already on the edge—already ready to jump. Sometimes, he thought that maybe you always were. Maybe you were always just waiting for the moment he would push you—needing the extra little bit of assurance to tip you off the side of the cliff. You came so quickly and it was so cute. So special to him. So he sucked harder, fingers moving faster and your hands were in his hair and tugging with the force of the wind smacking against your face as you arched and fell and came into his waiting mouth.

Yet, he did not stop there, did not think you deserved just the one experience of falling, so he pushed that little harder, undeterred by your hands pushing against his head to force him away and placed his forearm over the expanse of your bucking hips to keep you down. He lapped and basked, the feeling of himself and you on his tongue an amalgamation of nature that could rival the wonders of the world. Surely, you were the eighth wonder, at least a figment in the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, at least something greater than conceivable.

Because when you came, there was nothing but you, nothing but the expression on your face and feel of your fervour and he was determined to experience it again, despite your oppositions.

"T-too much, Daddy, it's- gonna." You were babbling, tears streaming into your temples, eyes squeezed shut from the overstimulation and your hands going limp against his head as you gave up the fight. You were leaning into it, he could tell. Rising higher into the darkness of the sky to find peace from the calling glare of the Lighthouse of Alexandria

When you got like this, he knew he'd have to rock you back to safety, find comfort in the uncomfortable when you were lolling in a headspace that cast a spell on your psyche, dug so deep inside you that it took bit by bit from your common sense each day.

"Daddy," you droned out, the moniker repeated over and over until you were gasping and twitching. "Daddy, I love you…love you s-so much." You cut your crying with a moan, revered by his tongue, motivated by the feel of his thick fingers inside you stroking and baiting you into coming again.

It came even quicker this time, the clenching of your stomach, the stopping of your sharp breaths as it built and built, rising tall until it shadowed your trembling figure. Then it all came tumbling down like a ton of bricks, a piece hitting you straight in the head as the heavens opened and the rain came pouring.

A chorus of "daddy" came tumbling from your lips, a hymn reserved for your own personal mass and you sermonised your affections with the snapping of your restraint—your thighs clamping down around his head, fingers digging into the mattress and tugging on the sheets. Seizing from the pleasure and then falling away completely as a long, drawn-out moan graced his ears.

Slowly but surely, his suction loosened, his fingers slipping from your sticky pussy and slathering over the skin of your stomach. Both of you were out of breath, a string of spit connecting you that mirrored the depravity that had taken place in the armchair not so long ago. He licked it away with a smile, crawling over you to press a kiss to your unresponsive lips.

Your thighs came together to remedy the aftershocks, your whimpers muffled by his mouth; an action that you had no energy to reciprocate. Knowingly, he moved away from your panting and practised your special dance, lips against your cheeks, your forehead, your nose and then burying his face in your hair.

"You okay?" he asked softly. "Want me to go get you some water."

You shook your head immediately, wrapping your arms around his neck and your legs around his waist, pulling him down against you.

"Please don't go," you whispered, throat hoarse and eyes drying to a crust.

"Okay, okay," he appeased, softly manoeuvring you onto your side and tucking in beside you—letting you shuffle yourself as close to him as you could get. "There we go…did so good for me, babygirl. So good."

The regular moment of silence befell the both of you, the time after the fall when you were wrapped up in the feeling of each other and gave yourselves a moment to contemplate. Moments where sometimes, he got worried about what you were thinking, if the clarity that he felt after the fact was the same for you, or if you felt just as manic and possessive as he did when the intelligibility gave way to new sensations that trumped the lucidity.

Yet, you always managed to ease his wandering mind, always had something to say, all muffled and sleepy once he'd tucked you both in bed and buried you in the covers—just so you wouldn't complain about the cold and not sleep skin to skin with him.

"I'm never leaving," you said against his chest. All the promises at sundown—this one an addition to the long list of equivocations. "I'm just worried one day you'll leave me."

"Hey now, I ain't ever-"

"Not that," you corrected, eyes appearing from underneath him, chin resting on his chest and looking up at him with watchful, waiting eyes. "I'm worried that one day you'll leave even when you don't want to."

Joel understood the meaning as easily as he understood his own impending doom, wondering briefly if it had been the imminence of his oncoming suicide that had permeated your thoughts as much as it had his. He had to give it to you, you were one observant motherfucker, even if you tried pretending that you weren't. He knew that you felt it too, every time he went out into the snow: the thought that maybe he won't come back.

"You know I try my best to get back to you every day, don't you?" he uttered, fingers trailing up and down your arm, the other raking into your hair and pulling you back down to his chest. He didn't think he could bear to look at you, to see your scepticism when he denied the feeling that it was coming someday soon.

"I know," you murmured. "I just…Joel, I was wrong today."

His movements along your arm stopped, time ceasing altogether at your tone, at your stability. He couldn't quite stop the lump in his throat or the filling of tears in his eyes as you poured your heart into him.

"This is my home," you whispered, voice cracking. "I don't wanna be anywhere else, I don't wanna be with anyone else, you make me feel something I've never felt before and I need you."

A pause. A moment. Then you repeated it, the three words that almost meant more than the expression of your love.

"I need you. I don't think I can live without you." He almost begged you to stop, his hand firmly placed on the back of your head and holding you against his chest so you didn't see the tears that he desperately tried to blink away. "Please don't leave."

Joel wished you hadn't spoken, almost wished the entire day hadn't happened altogether. It was all too real, all too goddamn strange and harsh; he could feel his heart shattering when he cleared his throat and lied right in your fucking face.

"I promise," he falsified. "I ain't leavin' you ever."

a/n: ngl it's one in the morning and half of this has barely been edited because I was proof-reading as I wrote (which has been over the course of a few months tbh) and I just really wanted to get this out and finished and I don't want to ever think about it again but IF you see anything that doesn't make sense then please tell me so I can go back and correct. I hate having bad grammar, so it is of utmost importance to me. There also may be a few bits that don't read as well, especially towards the end, because I had a rough time writing smut for some reason. Either way, this went in so many directions, and I hope you enjoyed it!!!

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