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fushitoru · 6 months ago

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chapter 8: the lake a bridgerton au

pairing ⸺ duke!satoru gojo x fem!reader

summary ⸺ dearest gentle reader, a new season is upon us as the ton gets ready for a season filled with drama, heartbreak, and passion. after being crowned diamond of the season, duke gojo⸺only looking to marry just to secure his inheritance⸺has his sights set on you, the easiest (and most obvious) option. later, when you catch his saying unsavory things about you on a terrace when he least suspected it, you swear to never marry gojo. as london's fashionable set goes through yet another wedding season, will there be hope for scandalous gossip, hate, and thinly veiled insults, or will we witness blooming love and passion?

warnings ⸺ nsfw, enemies to lovers, bridgerton au, angst, fluff, SUGGESTIVE, making out, touching bare skin pre-marriage (the scandal), eventual smut, jealousy, misogyny, description of injury, concussion, blood, regency era au, gojo being infuriating, reader also being infuriating, both of them are clueless honestly

chapter summary ⸺ both you and gojo discover contradictory feelings lodged deep in your heart, and a confrontation (with an unexpected ally) leads to a rather....wet conclusion. (4.6k)

a/n additional warning that this chapter is not beta read. this may seem like a short chapter but it has TEAAAA (if you didnt already guess from the summary). i pushed myself to finish this for the peeps who finished finals this week so it may be a bit messy. anywho see u down below <3

prev. the rebound | next. the embers

general masterlist | series masterlist

Dearest gentle reader,

This Author finds herself most intrigued by the unfolding events of the Inos' recent ball. It appears that Her Majesty has not yet abandoned her faith in the diamond she so carefully selected. Will her confidence prove to be misplaced? Only time shall reveal the truth. Yet one cannot deny that fortune seems to shine—dare this Author say, sparkle—upon Miss Itadori of late.

Last evening, she graced the ballroom with a strikingly altered appearance, one that left tongues wagging and gazes lingering. Most notable, however, was the company she kept. Duke Nanami himself was seen at her side, engaged in conversation that appeared both earnest and uncommonly animated. A rare sight indeed, for His Grace has shown little interest in the charms of other young ladies this season. Could this be the beginning of something extraordinary? This Author will watch closely.

And who could forget the Gojo house party, where the drama rivaled even the most lurid novels of the circulating library? Whispers abound of a certain Lord Naoya Zen’in, who, it seems, departed the event looking rather... bruised, both in pride and in visage. What transpired to cause such a spectacle? Alas, my sources have yet to provide all the particulars, but one can only assume that tempers flared—and perhaps fists followed.

⸻ LADY WHISTLEDOWN’S SOCIETY PAPERS

Satoru wipes his knuckles on a spare handkerchief, marring it with streaks of crimson. After the blood coating his hand is cleaned off, it reveals light bruises.

He always abhorred such physical entanglements. Let other men soil their reputations in drunken brawls or duels over imagined slights; Satoru prided himself on wit and charm, a tongue sharp enough to parry any insult.

However, for the first time, it seemed that the blasé duke-to-be Lord Satoru Gojo, ever so apathetic to others and their struggles, was not so blasé anymore. What affected him was contradictory; after all, he had made a big decision to avoid being affected by the woman herself. So why was he so…inconsistent? Perhaps it is this unpredictability, capriciousness the reason he has to distance himself from any others who may be in harm’s way—the way forged by Satoru himself. There is no space for inconstancy, irresponsibility, whimsicality, or contradiction in his life, especially not with his duties and the weight held over his shoulders.

But he allows himself this, one last time. Your expression lingered in his mind—the way your lips parted in shock, the stiff set of your shoulders as you brushed past Naoya’s lecherous words without deigning to respond. He had seen the moment your composure faltered, a crack in the armor you wore so effortlessly. The crack only he was supposed to cause.

It was intolerable.

As soon as pale pink ribbons trail out of the room, he moves toward Naoya, completely ignoring the lady who was talking to him and her trailing protests. When he’s right in front of the other man, he gives him a curt nod. “Naoya.”

The other man’s eyes—which were before no doubt prowling on other unsuspecting ladies—flit to him in surprise. “Lord Gojo, what a pleasant surprise. I daresay—”

“Meet me in the courtyard,” Satoru interrupted, his tone leaving no room for argument.

Naoya’s brows shot up, but he recovered quickly, a sly grin curling his lips. “A private word? How intriguing. Lead the way, my lord.”

Satoru didn’t wait to see if he followed. His stride was steady, his purpose unwavering.

The cool air of the courtyard carried the faint strains of music from the ballroom, the chatter of guests dimmed by the stone walls. Satoru turned to face Naoya, his stance deceptively relaxed, one hand resting on the pommel of his cane.

“Now, my lord,” Naoya drawled, his smirk widening. “To what do I owe this rather dramatic summons?”

The reply came not in words but in the swift arc of Satoru’s fist, connecting solidly with Naoya’s jaw. The sharp crack of the blow shattered the stillness, and Naoya stumbled, clutching his face as shock registered in his eyes.

“What in blazes—”

“Hold your tongue,” Satoru bit out, seizing Naoya by the lapels of his coat and slamming him back against the cold, unyielding wall. His tone was calm, his voice low, but it carried a menace that silenced all protests. “You will not speak of her in that way again. Do you understand me?”

Naoya grimaced, his defiant eyes narrowing despite the pain. “Ah,” he sneered, a breathless rasp laced with derision, “this is about Miss Itadori, isn’t it? Playing the chivalrous hero, are we, Lord Gojo? Or is it your own wounded ego driving this display?”

The next punch silenced him mid-taunt, burying deep in his abdomen. Naoya doubled over with a strangled gasp, his knees threatening to buckle, but Satoru held him upright, his grip vice-like.

“Speak her name again,” Satoru hissed, leaning close, his voice cold enough to chill even the night air, “and I swear you’ll find yourself in far worse condition.”

The tension between them crackled like a storm. For a fleeting moment, Naoya’s lips twitched into the ghost of a sneer, but his words died unspoken, arrogance muted by the sheer force of Satoru’s fury. Satisfied, Satoru released him with a sharp shove, watching dispassionately as Naoya crumpled against the wall, gasping for breath.

“You are mad,” Naoya spat, wiping at the blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. “You’ll ruin yourself over this.”

“Perhaps,” Satoru replied evenly, smoothing the cuffs of his sleeves as though nothing had happened. “But I’ve never much cared for your opinion, Naoya.”

He turned on his heel, his steps measured, his expression impassive.

The sting in his knuckles was a small price to pay. Unfortunately it seemed that for you, it was a price he would pay again and again.

He had told himself the decision was rational. Logical. Your match had to cease because it had begun to unravel him. You were a distraction, one he could not afford. His life was designed for control, every action measured, every move calculated. A match with you, he had realized, would be unlike any other. It would mean more. It would demand more.

And yet, how could he feel this jealousy? This fierce protectiveness? It was contradictory, maddening even. His resolve to avoid entanglements of the heart warred against the memory of your laughter echoing through his mind. It was absurd, but he could not dismiss the sharp ache in his chest whenever you looked at another man, especially one so undeserving as Naoya Zen’in.

He had known from the start that you were different. No coy smiles or simpering obedience. No easy conquest to stroke his ego. Your instant rejection of him during your first meeting had been a blow to his pride and a revelation he had been too stubborn to acknowledge then.

Satoru was not a man who chased after women. He had no need to. And yet…

But even as he walked away, Satoru couldn’t help but feel the cracks in his own carefully constructed armor widening. What, indeed, was he doing?

You startle in your sleep, sitting up abruptly on your bed in the dark.

The season has taken a turn for the good, so far. With Whistledown singing your praises and the Queen not yet deciding to behead you, you were on the path of securing great prospects, whether it be with Duke Nanami or someone else.

“But you’re missing something, aren’t you?”

The voice is a low murmur, brushing the shell of your ear like the ghost of a touch. Your heart leaps to your throat as you twist toward the sound, your eyes darting across the dimly illuminated room. The corners of the chamber remain steeped in shadow, the moonlight doing little to ease your apprehension.

“Who’s there?” you whisper, clutching the sheets tighter, your knuckles whitening around the fabric.

The silence stretches, thick and oppressive, before a figure emerges from the shadow near the mantle. He moves with a predator’s grace, his steps silent against the floorboards. Even before he fully steps into the moonlight, you know who it is.

Gojo.

“You look startled, my lady,” he says, his voice carrying an infuriatingly casual lilt, though his gaze fixes on you with unnerving precision.

“This is a dream,” you murmur, your voice trembling despite your effort to remain calm. “You are not real.”

“And yet,” he replies. “here I am. Curious, isn’t it?”

You swallow hard, the lump in your throat refusing to budge. He’s closer now, standing at the foot of your bed, his pale hair catching the silvery light like a halo—an angel or a devil, you can’t decide. “What do you want, Lord Gojo?” you demand, your voice sharper than you feel.

His eyes sweep over you, lingering for a moment too long before meeting your gaze again. “To commend you, of course,” he says. “You’ve been doing well—dancing with dukes, charming the Queen. The season’s darling.”

His words cut, though you can’t say why. “Why does that matter to you?” you snap, sitting straighter, as though defiance could shield you from the heat simmering in his gaze.

“It doesn’t,” he replies smoothly, though the corner of his mouth quirks into a smirk that betrays him.

“Then why are you here?”

His answer doesn’t come in words. Instead, he steps closer, his boots brushing the edge of your rug. Slowly, deliberately, he reaches out, his gloved hand catching a strand of hair that’s fallen loose. He rolls it between his fingers, as though testing its silkiness, before letting it slip away. “Because I can’t seem to stay away,” he murmurs. His voice is low, meant only for you, and it sends a shiver through your body.

You scoff, though the sound catches in your throat. “You’re insufferable.”

His chuckle is soft, a deep rumble that seems to linger in the air. “And yet, you don’t look away.”

Your fists clench around the sheets, anger flaring in your chest—anger at him, at yourself, at the fact that he’s right. Before you can stop yourself, you throw the covers aside and rise to your feet.

He doesn’t step back. Instead, he stands still, a study in casual defiance, though his gaze flickers with something you can’t name as you move closer. His eyes lazily drag up and down your frame, which you notice is only covered in a flimsy, almost translucent nightgown.

“If this is a dream,” you say, your voice trembling with fury and something unspoken, “then it doesn’t matter what I do, does it?”

His smirk falters, replaced by a glimmer of uncertainty that only fans the reckless fire inside you. “Perhaps not,” he murmurs, though the tension in his voice betrays him.

Your hands shake as you reach out, your fingers curling into the lapels of his coat. His eyes follow the movement, then stare back at you, into your eyes. For a brief moment, his breath hitches, and his hands twitch at his sides, as though warring with the instinct to touch you. But the flicker of surprise in his eyes tells you he didn’t expect this.

With a sharp tug, you pull him closer, your lips meeting his in a collision of unspoken longing, yearning, and pining. The kiss is unsteady at first, as if both of you are testing the waters, but it quickly deepens, becoming a clash of fire and desperation. His hands find your waist, his grip firm but not demanding, as if he’s holding on to something precious.

You press closer, letting the reckless freedom the dream gave you sweep you away. His lips part against yours, and the kiss turns slower, more deliberate, like he’s savoring the moment, savoring you, devouring you. But then, his hands shift, moving from your waist with a slow, tantalizing seductiveness. They skim over your hips, his touch deliberate, before trailing down to the curve of your thighs. His fingers brush over the soft fabric of your nightgown, the heat of his touch searing through the barrier like it isn’t there.

Your breath hitches as he lingers, his thumb tracing a path along the sensitive skin just above your knee. The sensation is electric, and yet it feels like forbidden ground—an intimacy you’ve never dared to imagine, even in your most audacious thoughts.

It’s then that the dream begins to unravel.

His form flickers, as though caught in the haze of a mirage, the sharp lines of his figure softening. The room darkens, the corners of your vision blurring as though the world is folding in on itself.

“No,” you whisper, the word barely audible over the sound of your own pounding heart.

He looks at you one last time, his eyes filled with an intensity that feels as real as your racing pulse. And then he’s gone, the dream dissolving into nothingness, leaving you gasping and clutching the sheets. When you wake, the echo of his touch lingers, the heat of his hands on your thighs an ache you can’t explain. You press trembling fingers to your lips, your breath catching as though the kiss was still happening.

But no matter how much you try, you can’t shake the memory of his hands, of the way he’d touched you like he belonged there. Like he had always belonged there.

You choose to blame the irregular slumber you have gotten this past fortnight as the reason why you are being so discourteous. For Duke Nanami’s words drift your mind, never truly being registered, as you both had strolled, promenading hand in hand.

It is not merely His Grace who suffers from your inattentiveness. Any suitor who dares to approach is met with the same distracted gaze, your thoughts elsewhere. Whether it is the lingering remnants of that unbidden dream—one you’ve tried and failed to forget—or the fleeting moments where you think you spot Lord Gojo across the green only to realize it is a figment of your imagination, your mind is a battlefield.

A few awkward conversations—where you are not truly present—pass and go, until you sit by the lakeside of Surrey Park, deciding to take a break from the conversations that awaited you if you were to stroll towards your family’s pavilion.

But not now, for here, nature offers solace. The gentle ripple of water, the soft rustling of leaves, the occasional bird song—all soothe the cacophony in your head.

You settle onto a bench, your gown fanning around you, and allow yourself to breathe. But even as you close your eyes and tilt your head toward the sun, the peace does not come. Your thoughts betray you, circling back to him—his infuriating smirk, his piercing gaze, the way his voice seemed to linger in the air long after he was gone. The dream was completely unbidden, unexpected. You had only started to move on and start this season anew. It seemed as your consciousness was working against you in an effort to bring fictional desires to life.

You knew clearly that Gojo was infuriating, and had colored your name. So why must your mind actively go against what was clearly a certitude?

Before you could ponder on your thoughts for much longer, you heard her.

“You do seem terribly at ease for someone of your…reputation.”

The voice startles you, cutting through your reverie like a blade. Your eyes snap open, and there stands Lady Mei Mei, her expression a mask of genteel venom. You sigh inwardly, and bring on your best smile, albeit artificial. “Lady Mei Mei,” you greet, striving for composure. “To what do I owe this very unexpected…interruption?”

“Interruption?” she echoes, feigning offense. “How quaint. I merely wished to congratulate you on your newfound popularity. Though, I must say, the…boldness of your wardrobe choices does make one wonder.” Her gaze drags over your form, disdain dripping from every word. “Are you seeking a husband, my dear, or something far less respectable?”

Your fingers curl into the fabric of your skirt, but you maintain your poise. “Boldness, Lady Mei Mei, is often mistaken for confidence by those unfamiliar with either.”

Her lips twitch, but the venom remains. “Confidence, or desperation? It is difficult to tell with one so eager to flaunt herself before the ton. Tell me, do you find it tiring? Whoring yourself out for attention?”

The word lands like a slap, sharp and stinging, and you feel the surge of heat rise to your cheeks. Slowly, deliberately, you rise to your feet, smoothing the folds of your gown as you stand. Your chin tilts upward, a shield of composure against the venom Mei Mei has hurled your way. You desperately fight the urge to slap her into nonsense, but there are eyes, no matter how hidden from public view you may think yourself to be.

“I find it far less tiring than wielding envy as one’s primary weapon,” you reply, your voice cool yet cutting, every syllable sharpened to a blade. “But then, I would not expect you to understand.”

Mei Mei’s lips twist into something that might have been a smile, had it not been dripping with malice. Her eyes narrow, the sunlight catching the cold glint of her stare. She shifts closer, the deliberate grace of her steps at odds with the tension crackling in the air. For a moment, you think she might lash out—a slap, a shove, something physical to match her words.

But before the storm can break, a voice, smooth and deceptively warm, cuts through the charged silence.

“Lady Mei Mei.”

Your breath hitches, and you whip your head around to see him. Lord Gojo strides toward you both, his movements as fluid and effortless as a ripple across the lake’s surface.

For a moment, your mind stutters, unable to reconcile the sight before you. He’s here. Not lingering at the edges of the crowd, not offering a polite nod of acknowledgment before disappearing into the fringes of Surrey Park. No, he’s walking toward you with purpose, the light catching in his silver hair, his focus unerringly fixed on the scene unfolding before him.

The man who had, for days, seemed to find every excuse to avoid you (and you him), whose gaze had flicked past you as though you were nothing more than a fixture of the lawn—he was now approaching with a startling intensity, his presence impossible to ignore.

His expression is inscrutable, but the faint furrow of his brow betrays something darker beneath the veneer of his charm. The tension in his jaw, the faint set of his shoulders—it all speaks of an intent that sends a shiver down your spine.

“Lord Gojo,” you whisper under your breath, your voice barely audible over the blood rushing in your ears. What is he doing here? And why, when he looks at you, does it feel as though the air has shifted?

Lady Mei Mei recovers first, her voice cutting through your disarray like a blade. “Lord Gojo,” she purrs, her saccharine tone a stark contrast to the venom she had wielded moments earlier. “What a surprise to see you here.”

But you can’t take your eyes off him. You’re too stunned, too disoriented by his sudden appearance and the sheer force of his presence. Why must he appear now?

His gaze flicks briefly to Mei Mei, his lips curving into a polite smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, before his attention returns to you. And when it does, it’s as though the world narrows to the space between you.

“Not half as surprising as overhearing this delightful conversation,” he says, his tone light, almost lazy, but there’s an edge to it—a sharpness that wasn’t there before. His eyes meet yours again, and this time, the intensity in them is impossible to ignore. Your breath holds itself in, your confusion and shock colliding with something you can’t quite name. There’s no teasing quip, no playful smirk to soften his words. Just the weight of his gaze, pressing down on you as though he’s searching for something you don’t understand. Then, he returns it to Mei Mei. “I was unaware you had taken to dispensing moral judgments, my lady. Though I suppose one must occupy their time somehow.”

The barb lands, and Mei Mei’s smile falters. Her spine stiffens, her fingers twitching at her side, but Gojo doesn’t stop. He steps closer, his boots crunching against the gravel, and the shift in his demeanor is subtle but unmistakable.

“I would suggest, for the sake of civility,” he says, his voice softening to something far more dangerous, “that you refrain from such remarks in the future.”

The crowd, drawn by the commotion, murmurs from a distance. You feel their gazes prickle against your skin, their curiosity thickening the already-tense air. Mei Mei’s cheeks flush a pale pink, and her hands clench at her sides, the effort to maintain her composure palpable.

“You dare—” she begins, but Gojo cuts her off, his voice a degree colder now.

“I dare a great many things, my lady. Do not test the limits of my patience.”

The words hang heavy in the air, silencing the murmurs of the crowd. Mei Mei’s breath quickens, and though her lips curl into a sneer, the fire in her eyes dims. After a moment, she dips her head again, but this time it’s no longer polite. It’s forced, a concession.

“Very well, my lord,” she says, her voice tight. “I can see when my presence is no longer welcome.”

Lady Mei Mei walked past you to exit the scene, clearly disgraced after Lord Gojo had surprisingly butted in to your defense. Her turn was sharp, and her skirts flared. Then, she did something you hadn’t expected. After all, you were nonplussed from Gojo’s appearance in of itself that you did not have much awareness of your physical environment. Foremost of all, you were furious. How dare he waltz into the scene, aiming at playing hero and gentleman after all he has done to you this season? The anger consumed you, leaving you ignorant to Lady Mei Mei's schemes.

The movement came quickly—a flick of her hand, subtle yet purposeful, as though she intended to brush away an inconvenience. Only, her target was not the hem of her gown or an errant lock of hair. It was you. That is, that was the intention of the action. However, fortuitously enough for you, Lord Gojo had noticed it.

With a sharp tug, his hand closed around your wrist, pulling you aside just as Lady Mei Mei's push landed—on him.

The splash was enormous.

For a moment, the world stood still, the lake swallowing the ripples as though it too were stunned by what had just transpired. Around you, gasps echoed, punctuated by the soft clink of champagne glasses dropped in surprise. All eyes turned toward the water, toward the spot where Gojo had disappeared.

Your pulse pounded erratically, caught between the shock of it all and the mortifying realization that everyone was watching. Watching and waiting.

And then, like something out of a scandalous painting that no young lady of good breeding ought to admit having seen, Gojo emerged.

The water clung to him as though reluctant to let go, his white shirt turned sheer and pasted to his torso, revealing every lean muscle and curve beneath. Droplets trailed from the tips of his silver hair, tracing maddening paths down the sharp edges of his jaw before disappearing beneath the soaked fabric. His black necktie clung damply to his throat, accentuating the hollows there, and when his eyes met yours—gleaming with mischief and something darker—your breath hitched.

It was obscene.

The crowd seemed to agree, though their response was far less scandalized than you might have expected. The ladies weren’t laughing; no, their gazes were riveted, their fans fluttering in a feeble attempt to hide their obvious fascination. Their admiration was palpable, their whispers laden with awe.

Flustered, you took a few steps back to give him space and to not drench yourself (a/n lmaooo you’re drenched already bestie), but you mentally noted to yourself to make his pectorals bigger in your dreams (not that you would continue to have such salacious dreams, of course. It was the mind creating desires you never had, obviously.) It was apparent that you were still very distracted, for you did not notice the two pairs of footsteps rushing towards your direction, towards Gojo.

“What happened?” Duke Nanami looked at Gojo’s very…wet state, concerned and alarmed. “What did you get yourself into this time, Satoru?”

Gojo, who was still wiping water from his hair and grinning like a fool, gave him an exaggerated look of innocence. He ran a hand through his damp, platinum hair, the gesture almost too casual for someone in his drenched state. As he did so, the hem of his shirt inched upward, revealing a tantalizing sliver of bare skin, a sliver that led downward to a trail of white hair disappearing beneath his waistband—

“Kento,” Gojo laughed heartily, as if there were nothing amiss. “You worry too much! A little water never hurt anyone.”

Lord Geto, on the other hand, had been trailing behind Nanami. At the sight of Gojo, he started laughing, snickering mischievously at the sight. He had a knowing look on his face, as if he were fully aware of the scene he was witnessing—Gojo’s accidental plunge into the lake being just another moment of unintentional chaos.

“Oh, Satoru, you're impossible.” Geto stepped closer, shaking his head in mock disbelief, but his smile was far too amused to be truly accusatory or reproachful. "Did you get knocked into the lake by your own... charm?" His voice dripped with sarcasm as he glanced at the crowd of ladies now eyeing Gojo as though he were some mythical creature freshly emerged from the depths.

Nanami sighed, his brow furrowing as he crossed his arms in that ever-earnest manner that seemed to constantly play contrast to Gojo’s reckless energy. “This is exactly why you need a keeper at all times, Satoru.”

Gojo, still basking in the odd mix of amusement and the lingering attention of the nearby ladies, merely shrugged. “I’m fine, Kento. Just a little... refreshment is all.”

“By the looks of it,” Geto continued with a raised brow, “I’m more concerned about you than you are of yourself.” He gestured with a lazy wave, motioning toward the way the water had soaked through Gojo’s shirt, revealing a lot more than was likely intended. “And, I mean, look at that—those ladies aren’t gazing at you for your intellect.” (a/n LMAO ate him up)

Before Gojo could lob a retort, Nanami interjected with his trademark no-nonsense tone. “Enough of this,” he said, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You’re soaked to the bone. Let’s get you inside before you catch a chill—or create an even bigger scene.”

Gojo lingered for a moment, casting a leisurely glance around the gathering. The ladies, previously locked in their own conversations, now shamelessly ogled him, their fans fluttering uselessly against the rising heat in their cheeks. Their gazes trailed after him as he started to walk away, and you swore you caught more than one wistful sigh among the crowd.

And yet, even as he moved farther from the lake and closer to the house, his steps deliberate and unhurried, he suddenly stopped. Slowly, his head turned, and his piercing blue gaze found yours with unnerving accuracy, as if he’d felt your bewildered stare all along.

His smile appeared—lazy, confident, and maddeningly seductive. The corner of his mouth tilted up just enough to make your stomach flip, and his eyes... Oh, his eyes. They gleamed like a predator’s, sharp and teasing, and yet impossibly inviting.

The world seemed to tilt, the air around you thickening. Your chest tightened with the realization: that smile wasn’t for the crowd, nor for the fawning ladies he left in his wake.

It was for you.

Your cheeks burned, your thoughts a chaotic mess as he turned back and sauntered away, water still dripping from his hair and shirt. The ladies continued to gawk openly, but you remained rooted to the spot, your heart pounding erratically.

Oh, that bastard.

prev. the rebound | next. the embers

general masterlist | series masterlist

a/n so....erm this was definitely a CHAPTER.....BUT AH POOKIES ITS HERE i got so excited bc i got the idea to write his lake fall so i finished this chapter. it's a bit messy, like i said, but i hope you liked it <333

I WANT TO SUCK GOJOS DICK BADLYYY i think this chapter was posted so fast after the last bc im on my period and im horny so hence the lake scene was born like i rawdogged this shit in five hours

ANYWYAS THERES PUSH AND PULL YEARNING PINING...so much contradiction hmmmmmm

miss itadori malfunctioning when gojo got out of the water (like a complete SLUT)

anyways i hope some of you WHORESS that simped for bridgerton!geto will be coming anew to simp for our main MAN. this debauchery i approve of. i fear all anons, especially zaynesbathrobe anon and anon in my walls, will be having a field day with this one

thank you for readinggg! please comment and reblog to let me know ur thots :3 (esp reblog, a lot of people have been binging bridgerton!gojo recently and spam liking. tumblr daddy might lock me up and shadowban me/mark my account, so reblogs would be appreciated <3)

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@byhuenii @geniejunn @a-girl-with-thoughts @dazedin2d @chuuqxs

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hamsterbellbelle · 2 months ago

Text

Hong Kong Style Front Doors Set

Includes:

5 doors (for lowest wall)

4 decorative objects - spirit tablet/shrine, doorstop, doorbell, gate (decor)

🐹BASEGAME

⚠️Some swatches of the doors and gates contain Cantonese swear words.

⬇️Details and Download below cut⬇️

⚠️Options to download all @ end of post

⬆️this is how the doors open and close

⬆️sims may clip through the door

⬆️light source: the gate and door are grouped separately, and will follow the light color of different rooms.

⬆️the dirtied version have doddles on the gate, one of them has written "DLLM", which is an abbreviation of a Cantonese swear word. Details of its pronunciation and meaning can be found from this video by Jimmy O Yang. ( •̀ ω •́ )✧

⬆️A: Door and Gate open || B: Door opens only || C: Gate opens only || D: no doors || E: no gates ||

⬆️sim will walk around the opened door instead of through it. i.e. it may block path.

⬆️meaning of the phrases written on the red papers:

one horizontal paper - 出入平安: wishing for safe entry and exit three papers - (left) 大吉大利: wishing for general good luck (right) 和氣生財: harmony brings wealth one diamond-shaped paper - 福: "blessings"

❇️Hong Kong Style Front Door

- polycount: A-C: 672 (high)/ 230 (low) || D: 554 (high)/ 254 (low) || E: 174 (high)/ 92 (low) - 36 swatches (4 door colors x 4 designs x clean/dirty) - basegame

⬇️DOWNLOAD SFS: A || B || C || D || E || MERGED || or Patreon (Free)

🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹

❇️Hong Kong Style Front Door Gate Décor

⚠️This is just a wall decoration, will not cutout walls.

- polycount: 526 - 32 swatches (8 colors x 1 clean swatch x 3 dirty swatches) - basegame

⬇️DOWNLOAD SFS or Patreon (Free)

🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹

❇️Chinese Doorway Spirit Tablet

These are Spirit Tablets. Details of what are these and the meaning of the phrases written on them can be found on Wikipedia.

Here is a short version of the meaning of each tablet:

A - 門口土地財神: dedicated to Tudigong, an Earth Deity, wishing luck and fortune B - 地主神位: dedicated to the Landlord god C - 門官福神: dedicated to the Door Gods D - 定福灶君: dedicated to Zao Jun, the kitchen god E - 天官賜福: dedicated to the Jade Emperor, wishing blessings from the Gods F - 前后地主財神，五方五土龍神: similar to B

- polycount: 320 - 12 swatches - basegame

⬇️DOWNLOAD SFS or Patreon (Free)

🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹

❇️Old-Timey Doorbell

- polycount: 378 - 12 swatches - basegame

⬇️DOWNLOAD SFS or Patreon (Free)

🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹

❇️Very Simple Plastic Doorstop

- polycount: 36 - 12 swatches - basegame

⬇️DOWNLOAD SFS or Patreon (Free)

🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹 🐹

⬇️DOWNLOAD ALL⬇️

ZIP with Merged Doors (SFS) || ZIP with Separate Doors (SFS) ||

Patreon (FREE)

#sims4 #ts4 #sims 4 cc #ts4cc #sets #buildmode #door #deco #cyberpunk #mycc #cc

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suigenerisisadiva · 17 days ago

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"Who in the house would you not let your child date?" - Feat Batsis!Reader <3

Pairing: Batfam/Batboys x Batsis!reader Content: Swearing, use of Y/N, my first crackfic lolol, I believe 'ukhti' means sister!

For my pookie <3 : @inejinn (Sorry If I didn't fulfil your idea the way you imagined </3)

Rapid shuffling of feet ... Camera aggressively pointed in Dick's face

Steph: Dick, who in the family would you not let your child date.

Dick, immediately: [Y/N] cuz she's the reason New Jersey banned nunchucks, of all things

Steph: Jason who in the family would you not let your child date?

Jason, without missing a beat: [Y/n] because she called going to an unexplored island a "light field exercise"

Steph: Timberly, who in the fam would you not let your child date?

Tim: after some thought: Oh 100% [Y/N]

Steph: Why?

Tim, with an offended expression: Because she called me "middle class" as an insult, I AM RICH THO-

Steph: Duke who in the family would you not let your child date?

Duke: [Y/N] because she uses throwing knives as bookmarks, they were diamond-encrusted too. She and Damian have a lot more in common than you think...

Steph: Dames, who in our family would you not let your child date?

Damian, not looking up from his book: Ukthi because she's unhinged.

Steph: Elaborate?

Damian: I saw her sword fighting a mirror as she felt disrespected. My child deserves the utmost love and not nightly visits to Arkham Asylum.

Steph: Cass Cass! Who in the gang would you not let your child date?

Cass: [Y/N], dangerous, seductive, wore Prada to bust drug cartel.

Steph, entering Bruce's study: Yo Brucifer, who in the manor would you not let your child date?

Bruce: [Y/N], she may be my daughter but I don't want another lawsuit.

Steph: LMFAO WHAT WAS THAT ABOUT AGAIN

Bruce, rubbing temples: She took my jet to Milan because the boutiques were "calling her name"

Bruce: Also, out of all of my children, my baby girl is Selina's favourite, which is very telling, don't, under any circumstances, don't leave them together in a room.

Steph: [Y/N], out of everyone in our family, who in the house would you not let your child date?

Y/N: None of those motherfuckers, they're all genetically predisposed to fumbling some of the baddest bitches alive.

Y/N: What'd the rest of 'em say?

Steph: Oh you don't wanna know

Y/N: I mean, for Dad it's kinda warranted, I told him "GYAT" meant "Get Your Act Together" and he yelled it at the Titans plus Jon and they all doubled over laughing and he grounded me :\, but did they actually say me?

Y/N: I genuinely bet those hoes dragged my ass, they picked ME didn't they? YOU KNOW WHAT-

Hope you all enjoyed this! Likes, comments, reblogs and requests are highly appreciated! Requests are open!

Sources !-

Blue lines - @cursed-carmine Bat dividers - @sister-lucifer Batfam Header - Pinterest (Robin #6)

Property of suigenerisisadiva, do not repost my work pls & ty

855 notes · View notes

foxtrology · 3 months ago

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sweet dark haired man (6)

harry castillo x reader

series

word count: 13.8k

warnings: no y/n, 28 year age gap, female reader, angst, fluff, smut.

The Cape Cod light was brutal in its honesty—too bright, too clean, the kind of afternoon sun that made everything look sharper than it should. The ocean beyond the windows of the renovated beach house sparkled like glass, waves crashing against the shore in rhythmic indifference.

Lucy hated it.

She hated how picturesque it was. How calm. How settled. How every breath felt like a performance of peace.

John had gone into town to pick up oysters and a bottle of wine he couldn’t pronounce. He kissed her cheek before he left. He always did that. Like routine made up for the silence between them.

She was curled on the white couch in her favorite silk robe—cream, embroidered, delicate—as if softness could protect her. Her hair was tied up with a scrunchie she didn’t remember choosing. The mug of green tea beside her had long gone cold. She hadn’t touched it.

Her laptop was open on her knees. And the email was staring at her.

Subject: FYI — goes live tomorrow, late afternoon. Thought you’d want to see it first.

From: Carrie Roth

No greeting. No punctuation. Just a single link beneath the sentence. No context.

But Lucy didn’t need context.

She clicked. And the screen unfurled into a headline she already knew would hurt.

"The Billionaire and the Nobody: How Harry Castillo Fell for a Woman Without a Name."

Her breath hitched.

Below the headline, the byline—Carrie Roth. Of course. And below that?

The photo. That photo. The one Harry had supposedly made Carrie delete.

Lucy blinked hard.

There they were—in Harry’s lobby. She remembered the building. The hallway. The marble floors. The stupid orchid arrangement by the elevator that never died.

But that wasn’t what made her pause.

It was the way Harry was looking at the girl. She was in his clothes. Hair wet like she just took a bath. At his place. But Harry? Harry was looking at her like she was the only thing that mattered.

It was instinctive. Natural. The kind of look you didn’t even realize you gave unless someone froze the moment.

Lucy stared at the image. Her hands went cold. Her ring—thin gold, small diamond, a gift from John—pressed into her skin as she clenched her fingers.

She scrolled. The article wasn’t cruel. Not exactly.

It was careful. Surgical. The kind of carefully worded gossip Carrie was famous for—less fire, more poison. Phrases like “rare public moment,” and “sources say she doesn’t have a last name that anyone can find,” and “Castillo’s first serious appearance with someone new since his highly publicized breakup with his ex Lucy.”

Lucy flinched at the mention of her name. It was in bold.

Of course it was.

Carrie had buried the quote deeper in the piece, almost like a treat for the diligent reader.

“She doesn’t know what he’s like yet,” Lucy had said, when asked if she knew about the woman. “How intense. How obsessive. How cold he can be when he wants to.”

She hadn’t meant it to sound bitter. Or maybe she had.

Maybe some part of her had wanted Harry to read that line and feel something sharp in his chest. But now, looking at the photo—the girl in his clothes, the way his body was angled toward her, protective, intimate—Lucy felt something sharp in hers.

Because she recognized that version of him.

The quiet Harry. The gentle one. The one who made tea without asking and never needed to be told what you were thinking because he already knew.

She had killed that version of him. And someone had brought him back to life.

Lucy’s phone buzzed once. A message from John.

John: Need anything else from the store?

She didn’t answer right away. She just stared out the window. The sea was bluer than usual. A boat skimmed across the horizon like punctuation.

She clicked the link again. Scrolled back to the photo. Studied the girl’s face—partially turned, but visible. Eyes cast down. Mouth soft. She didn’t look like a socialite. Or an actress. Or a woman who’d ever once tried to control a room.

She looked like someone who’d wandered into Harry’s life by accident. And stayed.

Lucy’s finger hovered over the keyboard. Her eyes flicked back to the headline. Then to the quote.

She’s not built for it.

She closed the laptop. Stood. The silence in the house was so loud it made her ears ring. And suddenly, Lucy wasn’t sure if she’d moved on at all.

Back in Italy, the sun was just beginning to dip behind the hills, casting everything in gold.

The villa glowed like a painting—stone walls kissed by twilight, lanterns strung along the balcony flickering to life one by one. The air was warm, threaded with rosemary, lemon, and the faintest trace of woodsmoke from somewhere nearby.

She stood in front of the mirror, still pinning one last piece of her hair into place.

Her dress was a soft rust color, silk again, but different from last night. This one moved like water when she walked, low in the back, delicate at the shoulders. Her earrings were borrowed from Francesca. Her lipstick was a shade she got from Maya.

Harry watched her from the edge of the bed.

Shirt crisp. Pants pressed. One hand tucked in his pocket, the other holding a small glass of something he hadn’t sipped yet. He’d shaved, but left a trace of scruff. His chain caught the last bit of sunlight, gleaming like a secret.

“You keep staring,” she said, not looking at him.

“I can’t help it.”

She smiled at her reflection. “Is it the hair?”

“It’s the everything.”

He walked over slowly. Stood behind her. Met her eyes in the mirror.

“I thought I was in love with you before,” he said quietly, brushing a strand of hair off her shoulder. “But then you did that thing with the peach at lunch.”

She laughed, head tilting back slightly. “That wasn’t me. That was the wine.”

“You were licking your thumb.”

“I was cleaning my hand.”

“It was obscene.”

She turned. Faced him.

And for a moment, they just stood there. Quiet. Grounded.

“Well,” she said softly, “good thing I brought extra peaches.”

Harry groaned like a man in pain. “You’re trying to kill me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Liar.”

She kissed him once, quick and mischievous. Then grabbed her bag.

Chiara had texted the address hours ago. Danny was still sulking around the villa, probably pretending not to exist.

The car was waiting. The roads were winding. The evening had started.

And neither of them had any idea what tomorrow night's headline would bring.

But for now—

They were still in Florence. Still in the golden hour. Still theirs.

The driver didn’t speak much.

Harry gave the address once and the rest of the ride passed in a hush, the hum of the engine soft beneath the cobblestone rhythm. The roads curled like ribbon through the hills, olive trees flashing past the windows in soft blurs, golden light smearing the windshield.

In the backseat, she let her head rest against the window for a while, watching the landscape spill by like something dreamt.

Harry sat beside her, shirt deep navy, sleeves rolled up neatly. His trousers were black, fitted. He looked like he belonged on the cover of a magazine—controlled, watchful, impossibly composed.

But his fingers found hers anyway. Laced them together. Rested their joined hands on the seat between them like a promise.

She smiled without turning her head. They didn’t speak the whole ride. They didn’t need to.

When the car finally turned off the main road and slowed onto a gravel path lined with wildflowers and pale stone, she sat up straighter. Adjusted her silk dress. Smoothed her hands down the front.

Harry reached over without a word and tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. His thumb grazed her jaw.

“You ready?” he asked softly.

“Nope.”

“Too late.”

The car stopped. And there it was.

Chiara’s family home was nothing like the villa. It wasn’t grand. It wasn’t curated. It was warm. Chaotic. Built like a hug.

A long, low house with chipped shutters, ivy spilling down the side, and music floating faintly from the open windows. Children’s laughter rang out somewhere around back. The scent of tomato and garlic clung to the air like an old coat.

Lights were strung overhead—crooked, twinkling fairy lights bouncing between olive trees and the wooden beams of a pergola that shaded the long dinner table already half-filled with people.

They stepped out of the car. The gravel crunched under her sandals. Harry opened the door for her, of course. Offered his hand. She took it.

It was now 8:30. And the sun had just melted fully behind the hills, leaving everything bathed in the kind of purple-gold glow that only happened in Italy and movies.

Chiara spotted them first. She was barefoot again, curls pinned half-up, wearing a thin white dress with a red sweater tied around her waist like a ribbon. She bounded toward them with a glass of wine in one hand and a sprig of rosemary in the other.

“You came!” she beamed, flinging her arms around her in a hug. Then looked at Harry and added, “You too. Terrifying boyfriend.”

Harry’s brow ticked. “Thanks.”

Chiara only grinned. “Come meet everyone.”

She grabbed her hand, tugged her forward without giving her time to panic. Harry followed behind, towering, silent, one hand in his pocket, already receiving double-takes from some of the guests as they approached.

The table was long. Wood worn soft by weather and wine stains. Set with mismatched plates and linen napkins. There were pitchers of red wine and baskets of bread at each end. Someone had set out bowls of figs and mozzarella, tomatoes still warm from the vine, plates of roasted eggplant and olives soaked in garlic oil.

Chiara pointed as she rambled on. “That’s my mother—Rosalinda and that’s my father—Leo. Don’t let him pour your wine or you’ll never stop drinking. My brothers—Matteo and Gianni."

There were a bunch of other guests that she didn't introduce but still they still waved.

Everyone waved.

Rosalinda gave a warm smile. “Benvenuti. Welcome.”

Chiara tugged her to two empty chairs at the far end of the table, tucked beneath a blooming wisteria vine. “These are yours. I saved them.”

Harry held the chair out for her. She sat. He took the one beside her.

And just like that, they were in it. The wine was poured before either of them could decline. The bread basket was passed like gospel.

Someone slid over a small dish of anchovies and roasted peppers with a murmur, “Try this. It’ll change your life.”

She was dizzy already—in the best way. Everything smelled like salt and basil and firewood. The table was loud, people speaking over each other in fast Italian, gesturing wildly, laughter bubbling up in waves.

And Harry? Harry didn’t say a word. He didn’t smile. Didn’t reach for the wine. He just sat there—hands folded, watching everything like he was gathering intel.

No one said anything for a while. Until Gianni, Chiara’s younger brother—maybe twenty, maybe high—leaned over the table, squinting.

“So,” he said, accent thick but voice teasing, “you are the scary man, yes?”

Harry looked up. Raised a brow.

Gianni grinned. “Chiara said you looked like you kill people for fun.”

“She wasn’t wrong,” Harry replied, deadpan.

The table froze. Chiara choked on her wine. Then—Rosalinda burst into laughter. Loud. Unapologetic.

Everyone followed. Even Harry smiled, just barely. The kind of smile that curled at the corner of his mouth like a secret. And from that moment, the ice cracked. A little.

Rosalinda passed him the wine again. This time, he took it.

A cousin leaned forward and asked if he was a Gemini.

He said, “Worse.”

The table howled. Dinner unfolded in waves.

The food kept coming—handmade pasta with sage butter and lemon zest, grilled zucchini, risotto flecked with saffron. Someone brought out slices of porchetta carved from a roast, still warm, the scent making her stomach ache with joy.

She reached for a piece of bread and Harry slid the butter toward her without being asked.

Their knees touched under the table. At one point, she turned to him and whispered, “You okay?”

He nodded. “You?”

She smiled. “I’m good.”

He reached for her hand beneath the table. Held it loosely, fingers stroking hers as the night softened.

The stars came out slowly. Someone put on a record player—crackling, old jazz spinning from a speaker tucked beneath the table.

Rosalinda began reading tarot cards near the rosemary bush.

Chiara danced barefoot with her grandmother under the vines.

Leo refilled Harry’s glass without asking. He didn’t argue.

He was still quiet. Still him. But softer now. Warmer.

He leaned in close once, mouth brushing her temple, and murmured, “This is the best night I’ve had in years.”

She looked at him. Eyes lit.

“Me too.”

They didn’t talk about Lucy. They didn’t know that across the ocean, Lucy had just stared down the proof of their intimacy frozen in pixels. They didn’t know the article was going live tomorrow.

They didn’t know that Danny was trying—desperately, recklessly—to contain the fallout.

For now, they just drank the wine. Ate the figs. Held hands under a string of crooked lights.

And when Chiara brought out a lemon cake her aunt had baked that morning, they split a slice and fed each other bites like fools. Harry didn’t even flinch when someone took a photo.

“You’re different here,” she whispered, later, when the table had quieted and only the older guests remained, nursing espresso and arguing softly about soccer.

Harry looked at her.

“You’re softer,” she said.

“I think you make me that way.”

She rested her head on his shoulder. His fingers threaded through hers. The record spun to a close. And for now, the night held. Long and safe and theirs.

But even the gentlest nights had to end.

She was mid-laugh, swirling the last sip of wine in her glass as Chiara told some absurd story about falling into a canal in Venice when she was a child—elbows flying, hands gesturing, cheeks pink with wine and warmth—when it happened.

Harry saw it. The yawn.

Small. Half-hidden. She tried to stifle it behind her knuckles, the motion lazy and unbothered. But he caught it. Of course he did.

It wasn’t the kind of yawn that meant boredom. It was the kind that meant her bones were heavy and her body had officially stopped running on adrenaline and sugar and wine. The kind that meant she wouldn’t be able to keep her eyes open much longer.

He leaned down slightly, his voice brushing her ear like something private.

“You’re fading. Tired?”

She turned, blinking up at him with bleary affection. “No, I’m not.”

“You just yawned mid-sentence.”

“Did not.”

“You did.”

“That was a—dramatic breath,” she mumbled. “For storytelling.”

He smiled. Barely.

Then stood.

It was subtle—how quickly the table noticed. A hush, almost reverent, like the weather had shifted. Conversations paused. Heads tilted.

Harry Castillo had stood. And that meant something.

Chiara looked up. “Leaving?”

Harry gave a slight nod, hand resting at the back of her chair. “We should.”

She opened her mouth to protest. To insist she was fine. But another yawn betrayed her.

Harry quirked a brow.

She gave up. “Okay, fine.”

Chiara leaned over and hugged her, cheek warm against her own. “Thank you for coming. Truly.”

“She’s the one that made us come,” Harry muttered as he shook Leo’s hand.

“You’re a good boyfriend,” Chiara said. Then added, teasing, “Terrifying. But good.”

Harry didn’t answer.

He just placed a hand on the small of her back—warm, grounding—and guided her through the garden path, away from the laughter, the flickering lights, the music still curling into the air like a lullaby.

They walked slowly.

She leaned into him more with each step, her sandals forgotten in one hand, her body sagging with contented exhaustion. The rust silk of her dress shifted with each step, catching moonlight and memory like it was something alive.

The gravel crunched beneath them. The breeze had cooled now, brushing through the trees like whispered secrets. Somewhere in the distance, an owl called once. The sound echoed.

When they reached the car, Harry opened the door for her, of course. Helped her in without speaking. Tucked her sandals at her feet. Then slid into the seat beside her and gave the driver a short nod.

They didn’t speak much on the way back.

She leaned her head on his shoulder somewhere between the vineyard and the old church they’d passed earlier that afternoon. Her fingers drifted to his thigh out of habit. He let her stay like that, barely moving, afraid to shift and break the spell.

By the time the car pulled into the villa’s gravel courtyard, she was half-asleep.

The windows glowed with low golden light. The stone shimmered faintly in the moonlight. Everything felt soft. Suspended. Like they were the last people left in the world.

Until Harry saw movement. Someone was pacing near the stone fountain at the edge of the courtyard. Fast. Sharp. A phone pressed to his ear. Gesturing wildly.

Danny. He looked...frantic.

Harry’s brows furrowed.

She stirred, mumbling sleepily, “Are we back?”

He kissed her temple. “Yeah. Just a second.”

Before she could fully register it, Harry had stepped out of the car, door shutting softly behind him. She blinked herself upright, trying to process the sudden absence of his warmth.

Outside, Harry walked toward Danny with a slow, deliberate pace.

“Who the fuck are you talking to?” he asked, voice low and even.

Danny jumped. Spun.

“Oh—shit—Harry. It’s nothing.”

Harry stopped a few feet away. Arms crossed. Face unreadable. “Doesn’t sound like nothing.”

Danny covered the receiver with one hand. “It’s personal.”

Harry’s eyes narrowed. “From your tone, it sounds like work.”

“It’s not,” Danny said quickly. Too quickly. “It’s one of my exes. She’s losing it. You know how it goes. Screaming about closure or whatever. I’m just trying to shut it down before she flies here with a bat.”

Harry didn’t blink. “You’re lying.”

Danny’s jaw clenched. “I’m not.”

Harry took one step closer.

And for a second—just one, tight, fragile second—Danny’s face cracked.

Not fully. Not visibly. But enough for Harry to see it. To catalog it. To file it under I’ll ask again later.

He looked over Danny once more, then pulled back.

“Figure it out,” Harry muttered, already walking away. “I don’t like being lied to.”

Danny exhaled. Said nothing.

Harry returned to the car without another glance. She was waiting, sandals back on, dress wrinkled from the ride.

“You okay?” she asked, groggy.

“Yeah,” he lied.

He offered his hand. She took it.

Their room was exactly how they’d left it. Soft lighting. The bed turned down. A carafe of water on the nightstand, fresh flowers in the bowl by the window.

She let out a sigh the moment she stepped inside. Toed off her sandals. Swayed slightly in place. Harry locked the door behind them.

She was already halfway to the bed when he said, “Shower first.”

She groaned like a child. “Noooo.”

“Yes.”

“I’m too tired.”

“You’ll feel better.”

“I’ll feel better horizontal.”

Harry arched a brow. “That can be arranged. After you shower.”

“Harry,” she whined, dragging out the syllables like syrup. “I have no bones.”

He moved toward her.

She backed away dramatically, flopping onto the bed like a fainting Victorian ghost. “I’m already dying. Leave me.”

He reached down, grabbed her ankle, and gently tugged her toward the edge of the mattress. She shrieked—quietly, theatrically—but didn’t resist.

“Come on,” he said, voice softer now. “Arms up.”

She blinked.

Then slowly raised her arms. Like surrender.

He knelt down, unzipped the back of her dress. The rust silk peeled away like petals. It fell in a pool at her feet.

She stood in her underwear, hair messy, cheeks flushed from wine and heat and fatigue. She looked like a painting. A little bruised by the night. A little radiant because of it.

Harry touched her waist.

“Shower,” he repeated.

She whined. “You go with me?”

He nodded.

“Fine,” she huffed. “But you better carry me after.”

“Done.”

The shower was warm. Quick.

She leaned into him the entire time, face pressed against his chest, arms around his neck while he washed her hair with the patience of a saint. She mumbled something incoherent about peaches and tarot cards. He just listened.

He dried her gently afterward, wrapping her in a towel, then carrying her back to the bed like she’d demanded.

She giggled when he nearly dropped her onto the mattress. “You’re such a gentleman.”

“I’m reconsidering it.”

She didn’t respond.

She was already half-asleep.

He dressed her slowly—one of his t-shirts again, soft and oversized then a pair of his boxers. Kissed the crown of her head. Pulled the blanket up to her shoulders.

Her lashes fluttered. Then stilled.

And Harry…

Harry sat at the edge of the bed for a while. Just watched her. She looked safe now. Soft. Here. He wanted to believe the worst of it had passed.

But something in Danny’s face—something in that lie—coiled like wire under his ribs.

He reached over. Turned off the lamp. Slipped under the covers beside her.

She stirred only once—just enough to press her cheek to his shoulder, murmuring something like “mine.”

Harry closed his eyes. Wrapped an arm around her waist. And held on. Tighter than usual.

Just in case. But just in case wasn't enough. Not anymore.

Harry opened his eyes before the light did.

It was instinct—some built-in warning system that had always protected him from the worst of it. From too many hours asleep. From the risk of rest. Rest meant exposure. Rest meant you might miss something.

And something was off. He knew it the moment he registered how calm everything was. Too calm.

The room was still. The kind of stillness that only came before something terrible.

She was curled into him like always—head pressed into his chest, one leg tangled over his hip, lips slightly parted as she dreamed something soft.

He looked at her. Really looked.

Hair a little damp from the night before. Cheeks flushed with sleep. The collar of his shirt slipping off one shoulder, exposing the delicate slope of skin he’d kissed a dozen times the night before. Her arm was draped over his chest like she was afraid he’d vanish if she let go.

And he knew—

He would burn the whole fucking world down to keep this. To keep her.

To keep mornings like this where her skin smelled like lavender and sweat and him, where her body knew his even in sleep, where everything had finally felt like it was settling into something close to peace.

Which is why the dread crawling up his spine was unbearable.

He carefully, silently, shifted her arm. She murmured something incoherent. He stilled. Waited.

Then slowly slid out from beneath her. She didn’t wake. Just rolled over, curling into the spot he left behind, still warm.

He grabbed a hoodie off the chair. Pulled it on. Then left.

The hallway outside was dim, washed in soft amber light from the wall sconces. The villa was still asleep—except for Harry. Always Harry. Awake before anyone could disappoint him.

He didn’t make noise. Didn’t need to. He knew exactly where Danny’s room was. Didn’t bother knocking. Just twisted the handle. It wasn’t locked. Because Danny, for all his skills, never thought he needed to hide things from Harry for long.

The room was a mess. Clothes tossed over the back of a chair. Two empty water bottles on the desk. One of those tiny espresso cups half-filled and forgotten on the nightstand.

Danny was asleep on the couch. Fully dressed. Mouth slightly open. One arm flung across his chest like he’d passed out mid-heart attack.

But Harry wasn’t looking at Danny.

His eyes were on the laptop. Sitting open. Still glowing faintly on the coffee table.

He walked over slowly. Silent. Careful. Grabbed the laptop and sat down on a nearby chair.

Danny didn’t stir.

The laptop screen was still unlocked. And there it was. The tab. His name. Her anonymity. His stomach dropped. He clicked it.

There was a draft open—scheduled for publishing at 5PM EST. 11PM Florence. A timestamp in the corner. Carrie Roth.

He felt something cold settle in his ribs.

The headline was more appalling than he expected.

"The Billionaire and the Nobody: How Harry Castillo Fell for a Woman Without a Name."

But it didn’t matter.

Because right below it—

The photo.

The one he’d tried to bury. The one she never even saw. The one Carrie took from the lobby of his penthouse—the day of the delivery, when she was in his clothes, her hair still wet from the bath they took together, no warning.

And him?

He looked like he belonged to her. It wasn’t scandalous. But it was real. Too real.

It was a portrait of something not yet built. Something fragile.

And Carrie had caught it. Was going to publish it. Was going to make it permanent.

He read the first few lines of the article, his jaw tightening with every word...

"She doesn’t look like someone accustomed to being photographed. She doesn’t carry herself like a model, actress, heiress, or anyone remotely used to proximity to power. She looks like she just stepped out of his shower, borrowed his laundry, and followed him out without knowing where they were going next. There’s no stylist, no heels, no curated façade. There’s not even a purse in sight."

"Which, of course, begs the question...Who is she?"

His fingers clenched around the edge of the laptop.

Of course Carrie knew about them in Italy. Livia definitely was the one that informed her.

Of fucking course.

The article was bait. Softly written, yes. But full of implication.

A mystery woman? No digital footprint? They made her sound like a ghost. Like a scandal. Like something waiting to be exposed.

And Harry knew what would come next.

The blogs. The forums. The Reddit threads. The obsessed Twitter girls. The old money pages on TikTok that would start stitching clips of her walking into restaurants and speculating about her outfit, her past, her worth.

They’d find photos. Someone would dig up something. And if there wasn’t anything to find? They’d make it up.

He sat there, breath slowing, vision narrowing. Not out of panic. But calculation.

She didn’t deserve this. She wasn’t ready. This wasn’t what she signed up for. And he should’ve protected her. Should’ve seen this coming. Should’ve buried it the moment Carrie Roth stepped into that lobby. Should’ve crushed it before it had the chance to exist.

But he hadn’t. And now? Now there was a countdown.

Nineteen hours. Until her face was everywhere. Until the silence around her wasn’t a sanctuary—it was an invitation for speculation.

He closed the laptop. Carefully. Stood. Walked over to Danny. And kicked the bottom of the couch. Hard.

Danny jolted awake with a sound that could’ve passed for a war cry. “Jesus fu—Harry?!”

Harry stared down at him. “You lied to me.”

Danny blinked. Rubbed his face. “What?”

“You lied. Last night. In the courtyard. You said it was one of your exes.”

Danny sat up slowly. “Look, I was trying to—”

“You think I give a fuck about your intentions?”

Danny sighed, scrubbing a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t ready yet. The article. Carrie’s still fighting with her editor about the angle. Allegra said—”

“You should’ve told me.”

“Allegra made me swear not to.”

Harry’s voice dropped. “And you listened to her?”

Danny’s jaw twitched.

“I asked you one thing,” Harry said. “One fucking thing. Be honest with me.”

“Carrie was going to publish it no matter what,” Danny snapped. “You think she needed my permission? I was trying to delay it. Manage it. Spin it if I could.”

“You let me walk into that dinner. Laugh and drink and kiss her like everything was fine—”

“Because I knew if I told you, you’d ruin it before it hit the press. You’d blow up at Carrie, maybe even call her yourself, and then she’d publish it just to spite you. I was trying to protect her too.”

That stopped Harry.

A beat passed. He looked down. Then back at Danny.

And his voice was cold now. “You don’t get to say that.”

Danny stood. “Harry—”

“You don’t get to say you were protecting her. Because you don’t know her.”

“I know what she means to you.”

Harry turned. Started for the door.

Danny’s voice followed him. “What are you going to do?”

Harry didn’t answer. He just walked out. Back through the hallway.

Back into the room.

She was still asleep. Barely.

One arm stretched across his pillow now. Her mouth slightly open. Her face soft.

She looked peaceful.

And Harry knew—

He had about sixteen hours to keep it that way. To protect the only thing in his life that didn’t feel manufactured.

To preserve whatever fragile, fierce, ridiculous thing they’d built between cups of espresso and whispered fights and silk dresses and rain-soaked kisses.

And he would. He didn’t know how yet. But he would.

He slipped back into bed beside her. Careful not to wake her. Careful with everything now. More careful than he’d ever been.

He wrapped his arm around her again. Pulled her in.

Held her tighter than he did the night before. Just in case. Because the day was coming.

And with it?

Hell.

Harry didn’t go back to sleep. He couldn’t.

Instead, he laid there with her pressed to his chest and stared at the ceiling like it might give him an answer. Something, anything, to make nineteen hours feel less like a death sentence.

Because that’s what it was. A countdown.

Not just to the article—but to the before and after.

Before, quiet mornings and peach juice on her wrist, wine-stained linen and soft kisses behind alleyway walls, her foot in his lap at lunch, the sound of her laughing with Francesca, the way she tucked into his coat like it was always hers.

After, the world.

He already knew how it would go. He’d seen it a thousand times.

The internet would eat her alive.

They’d comb through every blurry photo, every scrap of background noise, and when they didn’t find anything, they’d start making things up.

“She’s too young for him.”

“She’s using him.”

“She’s boring.”

“She’s not boring enough.”

“She’s not even pretty.”

“She’s too pretty—it’s obvious she’s had work done.”

“She’s only with him for the money.”

“She’s not interesting.”

“She’s trying too hard to be interesting.”

“She’s just like Lucy.”

That one would be the worst.

The comparisons. The analysis. The recycled history he’d spent years burying.

And the photo—that fucking photo—would be the centerpiece. Used in every post, every headline, every whisper campaign. Frozen in time.

A moment that had belonged only to them.

Now handed over to the wolves.

He looked at her again. Still asleep. Still soft and safe and everything the world didn’t deserve.

And he made a decision. He would tell her.

Not all of it. Not yet. He couldn’t put that kind of fear in her eyes. But she needed to know what was coming. Before she saw her own face at a newsstand or on a feed. Before someone DM’d her a link.

She’d never forgive him if he let her find out like that.

So when she woke, he’d tell her. Gently. Slowly. He’d cushion it with espresso and pastries and the kind of touch that said, I’m here, I’m not going anywhere, you’re safe, you’re safe, you’re safe.

The light started to shift around 7:30. The room warmed. Birds stirred outside the balcony. A linen curtain fluttered against the open door.

She woke with a faint groan, face buried in his chest.

“Time is it?” she mumbled, her voice raspy.

“Too early,” Harry murmured. “Go back to sleep.”

But she stretched instead, her body arching against him like a cat.

“No, I’m up. Kind of. Sort of. Halfway.”

He kissed her hair. “Let me get you coffee.”

“No,” she groaned, grabbing his shirt. “You’re too warm. Stay here for five more minutes.”

He did. Of course he did.

She could’ve asked him for anything.

When she finally sat up, the shirt slipped off her shoulder again. She blinked slowly, hair wild, cheeks creased from the pillow. She looked like a dream.

Harry sat up behind her, running his hand down her spine.

“Breakfast?”

“Yeah.”

He helped her out of the shirt—slowly, carefully, like it was ritual. She kissed his jaw before heading into the bathroom, and he stood for a moment in the doorway just watching her.

He wasn’t ready to let her out of his sight.

Not today.

He got dressed while she did her skincare—charcoal slacks, black button-up, sleeves rolled once at the elbow. No tie. No blazer. Just sharp enough to look deliberate.

“Okay, I feel human again,” she declared, voice soft and bright. “Are we staying here for breakfast or leaving?”

He swallowed. “Staying.”

She smiled. “Perfect. I want something carby and sweet and bad for me.”

He watched her cross the room, picking through her things—eventually settling on a soft, tank top and a white cotton skirt. No makeup. Gold hoops. She didn’t even bother with shoes.

“You look…” he stopped, unable to find the right word. “You look beautiful. Truly.”

She blinked.

Then laughed, flushed. “Thank you.”

“You really are.”

They headed down the corridor together, slow and unhurried.

Every staff member they passed tried to look away discreetly. Some nodded. One stuttered out a buongiorno before tripping over his own cart.

She leaned into Harry’s side and whispered, “You know you’re terrifying, right?”

He didn’t respond. Just smirked faintly.

They reached the courtyard where breakfast was being served—small, shaded tables nestled beneath white umbrellas. The smell of espresso, fresh fruit, and butter drifted in the warm air.

She let out a soft sound of delight.

Harry pulled out her chair before she could. She blinked at him, amused.

“Well, thank you, Mr. Castillo.”

He sat beside her, not across. Always beside.

“Of course.”

They ordered coffee—hers with sugar, his black—and two plates of pastries. Then eggs. Then more fruit. He kept glancing at her like she might disappear if he blinked.

She noticed.

“What?” she asked, smiling around her spoon.

“Nothing.”

“Liar.”

“Just thinking.”

“Dangerous,” she teased, nudging his thigh with her knee.

He chuckled softly. Then looked up.

Danny. Crossing the garden with his phone in hand, looking half-dead.

She spotted him too.

“Danny!” she called out, waving.

Harry tried not to flinch.

Danny turned. Paused.

Smiled—but it didn’t reach his eyes.

She tilted her head, voice playful. “You’ve been ghosting me.”

Danny approached slowly. “Me?”

“Yeah, you. Where have you been? I haven’t seen you since dinner, and I was beginning to think you hated me.”

Danny gave her a sheepish shrug. “Just busy. Logistics. Emails. All that boring shit.”

“You should eat. Come sit.”

Danny looked between them. Then shook his head. “Nah. You two should have your moment. You lovebirds deserve it.”

She frowned slightly. “You sure?”

Harry stared at him. Flat. Cold.

Danny nodded. “Yeah. I’ve got to take a call anyway.”

Harry didn’t speak. Didn’t blink. Just watched him turn and leave like a man on fire.

She turned back to Harry. “He’s acting weird.”

“He’s always weird,” Harry muttered, sipping his espresso.

She leaned her chin into her hand and looked at him. “You okay?”

He nodded once. But she didn’t buy it.

“Tell me,” she said softly.

He set down his cup. Met her eyes. And suddenly, the timing felt like glass.

She was so calm. So soft. Wrapped in sunlight and kindness. And he was about to put a crack in that.

But she deserved to know.

So he took her hand. Held it across the table. And started to speak. Because the world was coming. And he wanted her to hear it from him.

Harry shifted his chair beside her, closer than before.

The courtyard buzzed around them in that golden, slow way—espresso cups clinking, forks scraping, someone laughing faintly in the distance—but at their table, time stopped.

She looked radiant in the morning light, unaware that the world was already bending its gaze toward her. That somewhere, in sleek offices and messy group chats, her name was being typed. That headlines were drafted. That judgment had been scheduled.

And Harry—Harry looked like a man about to ruin something precious.

He didn’t start with the photo. He started with her hand. He took it—quietly, deliberately, fingers wrapping around hers like he was grounding himself first.

Then he turned to her, jaw tense, voice low.

“There’s something I need to tell you.”

She stilled. Didn’t speak. Didn’t blink.

The air between them shifted, dipped.

“I found out early this morning,” he continued, “and it's something you should know.”

He glanced away for a moment—toward the far end of the garden where the waiter had just placed another cappuccino down. Then back to her.

“There’s going to be an article. New York Times. It goes live tonight at 11. 5PM back home.”

She didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. But inside? Her heart cracked.

Just once. A fracture.

He kept going.

“It’s about us.”

That hit. Us.

She heard the weight in it—the implication, the inevitability. About us. Not about him. Not just a line in passing about a man seen with a woman. No, this was different. This was targeted. This was real.

Her stomach dropped. Her throat tightened.

“They’re using the photo,” he added. “The one from the lobby. The woman—Carrie—she didn’t delete it like I told her to.”

There it was.

She blinked once. Twice.

Then nodded.

But she didn’t speak.

And that terrified him more than anything.

“I’m sorry,” he said, almost under his breath. “I should’ve seen it coming. Should’ve gotten ahead of it. Should’ve—” he stopped himself, jaw tightening. “It’s my fault.”

She shook her head.

“No,” she said finally, her voice quiet but sharp. “It’s not your fault.”

But she didn’t look at him.

Just stared at the tablecloth.

A pale smear of fig jam stained the edge of her plate. A bird chirped somewhere above. It felt wrong that the world was still moving.

She had known—of course she had. Knew the risk the second she let herself be seen with him in public. Knew the reality the first time he brought her over to his place like she'd belonged to him.

But knowing something and facing it were not the same.

Now it was here. Now she had less than fifteen hours before the world knew her face.

Hopefully maybe more.

Her mind spiraled before she could stop it.

What if they dig?

What if they find the pieces I buried?

What if Harry finds them too?

She tried to breathe normally.

Tried to pretend she wasn’t unraveling inch by inch.

Harry’s voice was gentle now. Careful.

“We can stay here. We don’t have to go anywhere today. I’ll talk to the villa staff—have everything brought in. We’ll just… ride it out.”

She nodded again, but it was slow. Mechanical.

He wasn’t getting it. Not really.

He was trying to protect her, and that only made the shame worse. The guilt. The fear.

Because she hadn’t told him. Not all of it.

Not the history that lived behind her ribs, locked up in a box she’d buried at twenty-one and never opened again. Not the part of her life that wasn’t elegant or poetic or beautifully broken—but messy and raw and stained in ways that didn’t wash out.

He didn’t know.

And once the article hit—once her name spread—once someone, anyone, decided to pull a thread—

He would.

And then what?

Would he look at her differently?

Would the way he kissed her change?

Would she become another complication he had to manage?

She couldn’t bear that.

Not from him.

So she stayed quiet.

Let him think it was just nerves.

Let him reach for her coffee cup and slide it closer, let him kiss her knuckles like it meant something more than a sweet morning gesture.

He thought she was afraid of the article.

But she wasn’t.

She was afraid of the fallout. Of what he’d find in the ashes.

He could feel her slipping into herself, pulling back in that silent, practiced way she did when she was scared.

He moved closer. Touched her jaw, guiding her to look at him.

“You don’t have to say anything,” he said. “Not yet. I just need you to know—none of this changes anything. Not for me. They can write what they want. Post what they want. You’re still mine.”

That broke her a little more.

She forced a smile—soft and small and almost real.

But inside? Panic.

He didn’t know.

And I can’t be the one to tell him.

Not today.

Maybe not ever.

So she leaned into his touch.

Let him kiss her cheek. Let him finish her coffee. Let him believe she was okay.

But part of her heart had already braced for impact. And the worst part?

She wasn’t afraid of the world finding out who she used to be.

She was afraid of Harry finding out.

Because if he looked at her differently—if he pulled away—if the softness in his voice ever twisted into something cold—

It wouldn’t just break her. It would wreck her.

So she smiled.

Held his hand tighter.

And whispered, “Okay.”

Even though it wasn’t. Even though it was anything but.

They finished their breakfast quietly. She picked at a pastry, peeled apart a fig. Harry didn’t push. Didn’t ask. Just let her move at her own pace, his hand never far from hers, his eyes lingering like he was memorizing her all over again.

And when they stood to leave, he didn’t let go of her hand.

Didn’t say a word.

He just walked her back through the sun-washed corridors of the villa, their footsteps soft against the cool stone floors, her cotton skirt swaying gently with each step.

The second the door closed behind them, it changed.

The quiet was heavier now. Not cold. But dense.

Loaded with things neither of them had fully said.

She crossed the room slowly, fingers brushing over the top of the dresser like she didn’t know what to do with her hands. The breeze from the open balcony door moved through the curtains like breath. Her hair fluttered across her shoulder.

Harry watched her for a long moment. Then moved.

He came up behind her—slow, deliberate—his presence folding over her like gravity. His hands slid around her waist. Firm. Certain.

She let out a breath. Leaned into him.

He pressed a kiss to her neck. Then another. Then one just behind her ear, hot and slow, and she shivered.

“You are quiet,” he said softly.

“I’m okay.”

He exhaled against her skin. “You don’t have to be.”

She turned slightly, eyes catching his. “I just need you.”

That did it. Something shifted behind his gaze. His jaw tightened. His grip on her waist flexed.

And before she could blink, she was being spun—back pressed against the dresser, his hands caging her in on either side, his eyes dark and hungry and full of everything he’d been trying to hold back since dawn.

“Say that again,” he said, voice low.

“I need you.”

He kissed her. Hard. Full-mouth, no space in between them, kissed her.

His hands gripped her face, holding her in place as he devoured her mouth—like he was angry at the air between them. She moaned, arms winding around his neck, pulling him closer like she couldn’t get enough.

His hands moved fast—down her sides, over her hips, sliding beneath the soft hem of her tank top. When he touched bare skin, he growled into her mouth.

“No bra?”

She shook her head, breathless.

He smirked—feral, gorgeous.

“Good.”

The shirt was gone in seconds—tugged up and over her head, tossed somewhere across the room without ceremony.

Then his mouth was on her chest.

Kissing. Biting.

Sucking marks into the tops of her breasts like he needed to brand her. His hands palmed her, thumbs rolling over her nipples until her knees buckled.

“Harry—”

He lifted her. Effortless.

Turned and walked her back toward the bed, kissing her the whole time like he couldn’t stop. He dropped her onto the mattress like he was done being soft. Like something inside him had snapped.

The cotton skirt was next—pushed up her thighs, bunched around her waist.

“Keep wearing this fucking skirt,” he murmured, voice rasping like gravel. “It's like you want me to lose my mind.”

“I do.”

He froze. Looked at her.

Then tugged her panties down in one rough motion, dragging them down her legs and off with a single pull.

He didn’t even kiss her again.

Just sank to his knees at the edge of the bed and dragged her hips toward him.

She gasped.

“Harry—”

“Shh.”

He hooked her knees over his shoulders and dove in. His mouth on her was feral. Starved.

He licked her like he was trying to silence every thought in her head—slow, messy drags of his tongue that made her cry out, one hand clutching the sheets, the other buried in his hair.

He held her open, fingers digging into her thighs like he wanted to leave bruises. Every time she tried to squirm, he growled and pulled her tighter against his face.

“You taste like a fucking dream,” he muttered against her, voice hoarse. “This pussy’s mine.”

“Yes,” she gasped. “Yes, yours—Harry, please—”

He moaned into her, sending a jolt straight through her spine. When he added two fingers—thrusting them deep and curling just right—she nearly came right then. Her legs shook. Her head dropped back.

“Good girl,” he murmured. “So wet for me already.”

He worked her like he knew her body better than she did. Licked her until she was whimpering, fucked her with his fingers until her thighs trembled, until her hips bucked uncontrollably.

Then, without warning, he stopped. She whimpered in protest.

He stood.

And looked down at her—chest rising, cheeks flushed, mouth open.

“Turn over.”

She blinked. “What?”

“On your knees.”

The tone left no room for negotiation.

She obeyed—heart pounding, breath ragged.

He dragged her skirt up again. Gripped her ass. Slid two fingers back inside her, slow and deep, making her arch.

“Still so fucking wet,” he growled. “You were dripping at breakfast. Did you like knowing I could take you apart the second we got back here?”

She moaned, pushing back against his hand.

“Answer me.”

“Yes,” she gasped.

“Good girl.”

She heard the rustle of his clothes—his belt, his zipper, the soft hiss of fabric as he freed himself. Then the blunt heat of him at her entrance.

He didn’t ease in.

He slammed into her in one deep, punishing thrust.

She cried out, hands fisting the sheets.

“Fuck, Harry—”

“Shhh, baby,” he growled, leaning over her, one hand on her hip, the other wrapping around her throat. “You can take it. You always do.”

He pulled out slowly—almost all the way—then slammed back in, harder. Deeper. Again. Again. Relentless. Unyielding. Each thrust drove her forward on the mattress, her body a plaything in his hands.

And the sounds—

The slap of skin, her soft gasps, his low grunts—all of it filled the room like heat.

“Look at you,” he rasped, tightening his grip on her throat just slightly. “Letting me fuck you like this. Taking every inch like you were made for it.”

“I was,” she whimpered. “I am—Harry, please—”

He growled.

Dragged her up by the throat, back flush to his chest, his cock still deep inside her.

“Say it.”

She turned her face, breath catching. “Yours.”

He kissed her—deep and brutal—while fucking her harder from behind, one hand between her legs now, rubbing tight circles over her clit until her body started to break apart.

“I’m gonna—Harry—please—”

“I’ve got you,” he whispered into her mouth. “Let go.”

She shattered.

Her orgasm hit like a wave—loud and long, her whole body convulsing as she moaned his name, clenching hard around him. He held her through it, fucked her through it, chasing his own release.

And when he came, he growled something filthy into her neck—buried so deep, so rough, it knocked the breath from both of them.

They collapsed together.

A tangle of limbs and sweat and silk. He stayed inside her. Just held her. Breathing heavy.

His hand moved to her chest—flat over her heart like he was anchoring her. Or himself.

For a long time, neither of them said anything.

Then—

“You’re mine,” he whispered again. Fierce. Quiet.

She nodded. Still trembling.

“I don’t care what they say,” he added. “You’re mine.”

And even though her heart was still racing, even though her mind was already spiraling toward what was coming—

She believed him.

She was his.

And he was hers.

They didn’t move for a while.

The sunlight crept across the bed, warming their bare skin, catching in the folds of the white sheets, highlighting the flushed pink across her chest where he’d kissed too hard, bitten too softly. Her leg was still slung over his hip. Her fingers rested on his stomach, rising and falling with each breath like they were syncing again, recalibrating after the heat of what they’d just done.

Harry couldn’t stop touching her.

His thumb traced idle patterns along the slope of her hip. Her skin was damp, glowing. She was too beautiful like this—undone and half-asleep, skin smelling like lavender, sex, and sweat, hair stuck to her temple.

She blinked up at him. He was already watching her.

“You’re staring again,” she murmured, voice hoarse from pleasure.

“I always stare.”

She smiled. Barely. Then tucked her face against his chest, breathing him in like she didn’t want to forget this. Like she was memorizing the shape of his body beneath her.

Harry looked up at the ceiling, his palm gliding up and down her spine.

Neither of them spoke for a long while. They didn’t need to.

Eventually, she sighed, voice sleepy. “Do we have to leave the room? Or talk to people?”

“No,” Harry said instantly. “We’re not leaving this room today.”

She lifted her head a little. “Really?”

He nodded. “I’m not in the mood to be charming. Or diplomatic. Or hear Lorenzo’s snarky little comments.”

She laughed against his chest. “God, he’s exhausting.”

“Everything out of his mouth is a TED Talk laced with disdain.”

“And Livia’s probably halfway through writing her own op-ed about us already.”

“Exactly,” Harry muttered. “Let them all speculate.”

She sat up slightly, still naked, still flushed, still glowing.

“You sure?” she asked, more serious now. “There’s probably some contract thing or meeting or…I don’t know…state secrets you’re supposed to be handling.”

Harry leaned up on one elbow. Brushed a strand of hair off her cheek.

“I want today to be just ours,” he said softly. “Before everything changes.”

That hit.

She looked at him—really looked at him. The shadows under his eyes. The way his voice dropped when he said “ours.” The crack in his armor that only she ever got to see.

She nodded.

“Okay,” she whispered. “Let’s keep the world out. Just for today.”

He kissed her forehead.

Then wrapped her in the sheet, pulling her back down to his chest, tangling them together like he needed to anchor her to the bed.

They spent the next few hours like that. Not moving much.

Just limbs tangled, bodies lazy with heat and afterglow.

Harry ordered breakfast again—more fruit, more coffee, more bread—then had it delivered straight to the room. When the knock came, he pulled on his slacks and shirt but left the top buttons undone, his chest bare as he cracked the door open and took the tray.

She watched from the bed, head propped on her hand.

“Jesus,” she muttered. “You’re like a hot dad in a cologne ad.”

He smirked. “Tell me more.”

They ate in bed. She sat cross-legged in his t-shirt, drinking espresso from a delicate porcelain cup while he peeled figs and passed them to her, one by one. She stole a bite of his toast. He wiped butter off her lip with his thumb. They didn’t turn on the TV. Didn’t check their phones. The world felt far away.

At one point, she curled into his side again, her cheek pressed to his chest. His hand moved slowly through her hair, over and over, soothing. She drifted off like that—worn out and warm and full of carbs and comfort.

And Harry?

Harry laid there, watching her sleep. For hours.

Until he realized it was past three already. His mind never stopped.

He wanted her to rest. Wanted her to stay soft and safe in their little bubble of stolen hours.

But there was the countdown.

And the closer the clock crept to eleven, the tighter his chest felt.

He waited until her breathing evened out, until her fingers went slack against his stomach. Then, slowly, he slid out from beneath her. Careful. Quiet. Placing a kiss at the crown of her head before easing out of bed.

He dressed quickly—charcoal trousers, navy sweater, no shoes. Ran a hand through his hair. Didn’t bother looking in the mirror.

Then he left the room. For the second time today.

Danny was in the corner of the villa he ran off to, holed up in what used to be a study but had become his makeshift office—a tangle of laptops, chargers, espresso cups, and half-buried Italian snack wrappers.

He barely looked up when Harry walked in.

“Close the door,” Danny muttered.

Harry did.

Then crossed the room in a few long strides.

Danny spoke before he could.

“I’ve been talking to Sadie back at the office all morning. She’s trying to get ahead of it. Our options are limited, but—”

“We’re doing a statement,” Harry said flatly.

Danny blinked. “What?”

“When the article goes live. We control the narrative.”

Danny leaned back in the chair, arms crossed. “You’re sure?”

Harry nodded. “She’s not going to become someone’s TikTok theory. I’m not letting people build a myth out of her silence. They’ll do it anyway—but I’m not giving them fuel.”

Danny ran a hand through his hair. “You realize this means press calls. Confirmations. You’ll have to say something. Actually say it.”

“I don’t care.”

Danny looked at him for a beat.

Then nodded.

“Okay. Then we do it your way.”

Harry exhaled.

The silence that followed was short-lived.

Because then Danny added, almost too casually, “There’s something else.”

Harry’s shoulders tensed. “What?”

Danny hesitated.

“Spit it out.”

Danny didn’t meet his eyes. Just opened his laptop again. Clicked once. Then turned the screen toward him.

It was the article. Still in preview form. But this time—there was a new paragraph at the bottom.

And Harry’s name wasn’t the only one in bold.

Lucy’s was.

He read the quote.

“She doesn’t know what he’s like yet. How intense. How obsessive. How cold he can be when he wants to.”

Harry stilled. Everything in his body went quiet.

Then—

He laughed. Once. Sharp. A sound with no humor in it.

Then he leaned back, ran a hand down his face, and muttered, “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Danny didn’t answer.

Harry stood. Started pacing.

“She gave a quote,” he said flatly. “To Carrie Roth.”

Danny nodded.

Harry barked out another bitter laugh. “The same woman who fed a wedding invite to my team like it was an olive branch now wants to narrate my personal life for the New York fucking Times?”

“Harry—”

“She left,” he snapped. “She left me. She walked away. She broke something in me that no one has touched since, and now—what? She wants to throw rocks at the glass house she abandoned?”

“I don’t think she expected you to—”

“To move on?” Harry turned, eyes dark. “Yeah. That sounds like her.”

Danny watched him carefully.

Harry’s voice dropped, razor-sharp.

“She’s not protecting anyone. She’s not warning anyone. She just wants to stay relevant in my story.”

A long pause. Harry walked to the window. Stared out at the hills.

Then said, quietly—

“She can’t stand that I’m happy.”

Danny didn’t answer. He didn’t need to.

Harry turned back, calmer now. But there was something in his eyes. Something cold. Resolved.

“I want it noted in the statement,” he said. “No comment about Lucy. No clapback. Just silence. Her quote will scream louder against it.”

“You sure?”

“I want her words to hang in the air with nothing to land on.”

Danny nodded. “Okay.”

“And when the article drops—have the staff pull the villa Wi-Fi.”

Danny tilted his head. “You really think that’s necessary?”

Harry didn’t blink. “I want her to sleep through it.”

Danny exhaled. “Understood.”

Harry looked down. Then out the window again.

The sun was slipping low now. Dipping into late afternoon. Only a few hours left.

And somewhere upstairs, she was still asleep in his bed—barely covered, skin warm, lips parted, dreaming of nothing.

Still untouched by what was coming.

He clenched his jaw.

“I’m going back,” he said. “I want her to have as much of today as she can.”

Danny didn’t say another word.

Harry turned. Opened the door. And left.

The light was different when he returned. Softer. Golden. Filtering in through the gauzy curtains like a whispered promise.

She was still curled up in bed, just where he left her—one arm flung over his pillow, the other tucked beneath her cheek. Her hair was a mess. Her leg was kicked out from under the sheets. Her mouth twitched once, like she was smiling in her sleep.

He stood at the doorway for a long time. Just watched her. The most peaceful thing in his world.

And he knew—

He would burn it all down if they touched her. If they twisted her story. If they dug too deep.

But for now? She was just his.

He toed off his shoes. Pulled his sweater over his head. Slid back into bed beside her, gentle and quiet, wrapping an arm around her waist.

She stirred. Then melted into him like she’d never left.

And Harry?

Harry closed his eyes. Just for a minute.

Because something was coming.

And with it—hell. But not yet. Not now.

The world outside their villa room remained distant. Muffled. The kind of late afternoon lull that made everything feel dipped in honey. The sun was still warm but fading, and the breeze through the balcony door carried the scent of lemon trees and salt and something blooming.

She was still asleep.

Curled into his side again, her small hand wrapped gently around his thumb like she knew, even in dreams, that something was coming. Harry held her close with one arm, the other resting on the blanket. He hadn’t moved in nearly an hour.

But his mind wouldn’t rest.

He stared at the ceiling. Then at the golden curve of her cheek.

Then, slowly, reached for his phone from the nightstand. The screen glared to life—27 missed messages, 14 emails, 6 calendar alerts—and he ignored them all.

Instead, he opened something he hadn’t touched in weeks.

Messages.

He scrolled down until he found her name.

Lucy.

And clicked.

The thread opened like a wound. Not because he missed her.

But because he couldn’t remember how the hell he ever loved her.

He scrolled, slowly at first. Then faster.

Messages from a year ago. Six months ago.

Texts full of jabs that looked like jokes. Compliments edged with contempt. Whole stretches of time when she wouldn’t respond at all—just long silences punctuated by acid replies.

Harry: I moved the 3PM to 5 to make time for your meeting. Want to get dinner after?

Lucy: Not if you’re going to talk about your profits the whole time again.

He kept scrolling.

Harry: Missed you this morning. Hope your flight was okay.

Lucy: Did you leave the AC on again? My plants are dead. Again.

Another set.

Harry: Can we talk about what happened last night?

Lucy: There’s nothing to talk about. You overreacted. As usual.

He stared at that one for a long moment.

Then scrolled up again.

Harry: I’m not trying to fight with you. I just want to understand why you said that.

Lucy: I said it because it’s true. You’re exhausting, Harry. I’m not going to babysit your emotions every time you feel insecure.

He winced. He remembered that night.

Remembered how she’d looked in the restaurant, eyes glittering like a knife. How she’d laughed in front of the waiter when he tried to explain why a news leak had made him sad.

She’d called him fragile.

He kept scrolling. Closer to the end now.

The final texts before it all fell apart.

Harry: Why are you making me feel guilty for wanting to pay the bill?

Lucy: Because you always do it. Because it makes me feel like I owe you something. You don’t know how to exist in a relationship without treating it like a transaction.

Harry: That’s not fair.

Lucy: Life’s not fair. Grow up.

The last message was his.

One he never got a reply to.

Harry: I just want to take care of you. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.

Three days later, she posted a photo onto Instagram in Montauk with John. Smiling. Holding his hand.

The broke ass waiter she used to mock under her breath during charity dinners. The one she told Harry would never understand her. The one she ran to after burning every bridge in his chest.

Harry looked down at his screen. At the last words he ever typed to Lucy.

Then looked at the girl sleeping on his chest. Everything inside him softened.

Because this—what he had now—was not the same storm. It was something else entirely.

She breathed evenly. Her hand twitched once in her sleep, like she was dreaming of running. Or dancing. Or chasing something. Her leg was still tangled with his, bare skin on bare skin beneath the sheets, her body warm and real and here.

And she didn’t ask him to shrink.

She never mocked his care.

She let him hold her.

She leaned into his protection like it meant something. Like he wasn’t some cold, obsessive machine.

She smiled when he opened the door. Laughed when he kissed her shoulder. Praised him with a look alone.

She was everything Lucy never was.

And Harry felt it in his bones—that she wasn’t just a phase or a fix or a fever. She was real. She was joy and grief and survival and softness all tangled into one beautiful, infuriating, irresistible thing.

He wanted to protect her.

He wanted to keep her laughing in bed, lips sticky with figs and espresso, forever. He wanted her to have days where her past didn’t feel like an undertow and nights where she fell asleep safe in his arms, knowing that no one—not Carrie Roth, not Lucy, not the internet—would ever touch her without going through him first.

His phone buzzed. Once. Then again.

He glanced down, expecting another update from Danny. But it was from Luca.

Luca: Francesca got the film developed.

Luca: Thought you’d want these.

Luca: Don’t let her see them yet unless you’re ready to cry like a little bitch.

Harry opened the message.

Three photos. Film. Unedited. Grainy in the way that made things feel truer.

And the moment he saw the first one, his breath left his chest.

They were at lunch. The one with the crooked string lights and those marzipan. The one where they were wine-drunk and sunk into each other like vines.

The first photo was her on his shoulder. Eyes half-lidded. Flushed cheeks. Lips slightly parted. He was saying something into her ear—something private, something that made her laugh in the second photo. That laugh that cracked her whole face open like light through stained glass.

He looked down at her like she was the only thing that existed.

And in the third photo? She was feeding him a bite of cake. Her fingers near his mouth.

And he was smiling.

Not the tight-lipped, polite kind.

But the kind that looked like freedom. Like after.

Harry stared at the screen, heart hammering.

Francesca had been right. They looked like they’d been in love for a hundred years.

He gently tilted the phone away, not wanting to wake her with the brightness.

Instead, he tucked it under the pillow and looked back at her. Still sleeping.

Still unaware that somewhere, deep in the belly of the internet, her face was already loaded into a server, waiting to be released into the wild.

But not yet. He still had time.

And so, with the weight of Lucy’s cruelty still echoing in the back of his mind and the ghost of her last text sitting unanswered in his pocket, Harry wrapped both arms around the woman he hadn’t lost.

And whispered into her hair like a vow.

“I’ve got you.”

Because for the first time in years, he meant it.

And she believed him. Even in sleep. Especially then.

The late Florence light spilled across their bed like honey, warm and gold and cruel in how peaceful it made everything look. She was still tucked into him, limbs loose and trusting, face slack with sleep. Her cheek pressed to his chest, one hand resting over his heart like she needed to feel it beat to believe it was real.

Harry exhaled slowly.

He was still holding the memory of that photo—her laughing, head tilted, eyes closed, like she’d never known anything but love. It rattled something in his chest. A different kind of grief. The kind you only feel when you realize you almost lived your whole life without something that should’ve been this easy.

His hand moved through her hair.

He closed his eyes. And for the first time in days, he allowed himself to drift.

All the way.

Just enough. Just far enough to feel her breath against his ribs.

Six more hours until the world opened its mouth and swallowed them whole.

Across the other wing, Danny sat hunched over his laptop, AirPods shoved into his ears, a half-empty espresso growing cold beside a massive spreadsheet of crisis comms protocols. Allegra had finally—finally—gotten Carrie Roth on the phone, and now Danny was regretting every second of his life that had led him here.

The call connected with a click.

And then—

“Danny,” Carrie said. Her voice was syrupy and sharp, like honey poured over glass. “Didn’t expect to hear from you.”

“You know why I’m calling,” he said flatly.

She laughed. Not kindly.

“I’m flattered. You sound so serious. Are you practicing for a deposition already?”

“Cut the shit, Carrie,” Danny snapped, already red in the face. “We know what you’re planning. You’re sitting on an invasion of privacy and running it under the guise of journalism.”

“I’m reporting a public figure’s romantic life,” she replied breezily. “Not the Pentagon Papers.”

“She was followed into his home,” Danny snapped. “The lobby was private property—”

“It’s not private if there’s a camera and a doorman.”

“You know exactly what you’re doing. That headline is disgusting. You’re using an image that was never meant for public consumption.”

There was a pause on the line.

Then Carrie’s voice dropped, slow and smug.

“She’s in his clothes, Danny. Her hair’s wet. She looks like she just blew him in his penthouse shower. I’m reporting the moment.”

Danny’s jaw clenched.

“Harry’s going to sue you.”

Another pause.

And then Carrie laughed.

“Let him,” she said. “Honestly, it might boost traffic.”

“You’re playing with people’s lives—”

“Oh please,” she snapped. “Don’t act like he hasn’t played with other people’s lives before. This is how it works. You want to keep her private? Keep her off Fifth Avenue. Don’t parade her around Italy, you know Livia is a good conversationalist.”

Danny stood up from the desk.

Paced.

“You publish that article and I swear to God—”

“It’s done.”

Danny froze.

“What?”

Carrie’s voice was calm. Deliberate. Cold as marble.

“I got tired of the back-and-forth. My editor was stalling and frankly, I don’t care. The world should know. Everyone’s waiting. Might as well give them the headline, fuck those six hours.”

“Carrie—”

“Refresh your browser, Danny.”

He did.

Fingers shaking.

And there it was.

The New York Times

Culture & Style

The Billionaire and the Nobody: How Harry Castillo Fell for a Woman Without a Name

By Carrie Roth | Published 11:14 AM EST, March 5th, 2025

Danny’s stomach dropped.

He opened the article—only the top, only the first few lines before the paywall.

But the photo was there. The photo.

Her. Wet hair. In his sweats. His shirt draped over her frame. Standing beside Harry in his penthouse lobby, his hand hovering near her back like it belonged there.

And Harry—

Harry looked in love.

Frozen in a moment he thought no one would ever see. And now? Now the whole world could.

Danny sank back into his chair, chest tight.

Allegra’s voice buzzed through his phone screen as she called again.

Too late. It was already too late. He was fucking too late. The six hours were gone in an instant.

In the west wing of the villa, the silence still held.

She stirred in Harry’s arms, half-asleep, half-dreaming, lips parted against his skin. Her lashes fluttered. One leg kicked softly under the covers. She murmured something unintelligible—something safe, something soft.

Harry was still asleep.

His chest rose and fell evenly. His face relaxed. His hand loosely tangled in her hair like he couldn’t let go even while unconscious.

They were still untouched. Still dreaming in gold. Still pretending they had six more hours.

And outside their door—

The wolves were already circling.

Meanwhile, across the ocean, Cape Cod was overcast.

The clouds had rolled in sometime after breakfast, dragging a dull gray light over everything—the sand, the water, the white clapboard house Lucy still couldn’t believe she lived in. It was a borrowed kind of life, the kind where the floors creaked like someone else’s memories still lived in the walls.

The kind where she still sometimes reached for a card key instead of a brass doorknob.

John was out back. Raking the garden. They’d promised her parents they’d try growing tomatoes this year. He looked ridiculous in the sweater she shrank in the wash, sleeves too short, collar stretched. He had one earbud in and was humming something off-key.

Lucy watched him from the kitchen window.

There was a teabag steeping in a mug on the counter. She hadn’t touched it.

The clock on the oven read 11:26 AM.

She had tried to write that morning. Opened her laptop. Closed it again. Her Substack hadn’t been updated in two weeks. She had a folder of half-finished drafts, all of them brittle and tired. None of them sounded like her.

She couldn’t figure out what she was trying to say anymore.

The house smelled like Windex and laundry detergent.

She hadn't worn makeup in three days. Her robe was slipping off her shoulder again. The dog—a small mutt they adopted from a local shelter last week—was asleep at her feet.

She didn’t hear her phone at first.

It buzzed once on the counter, face-down. Then again. Then a third time, longer.

She flipped it over with two fingers.

CARRIE ROTH

Lucy stared at the name. The screen. The blinking green light.

Then she answered.

“Carrie,” she said, voice flat. “It’s not a great time.”

“It dropped.”

Lucy’s breath caught. Carrie didn’t elaborate. She didn’t need to. There was only one thing it could mean.

Lucy turned away from the window. Walked slowly to the table. Sat down.

Her voice was quieter now. “Already?”

“About ten minutes ago.”

Lucy swallowed. Her mouth was suddenly dry.

“I thought—”

“Danny threatened to sue me,” Carrie said. “It annoyed me. So I pulled the trigger.”

Lucy didn’t respond.

“People are reading it already,” Carrie continued. “It’s trending.”

Lucy closed her eyes.

“And you used my quote?” she asked. Her voice didn’t shake. But it was cold now. A razor sheathed in velvet.

“You know I did.”

Another long silence.

Carrie didn’t fill it. Just waited.

Finally, Lucy asked, “Does she know yet?”

She could hear the smile in Carrie’s voice.

"She will soon."

Lucy’s stomach turned. She hung up without saying goodbye.

The phone stayed pressed to her palm, screen black, fingers tightening around it like it had betrayed her.

Outside, John waved at her through the glass.

She didn’t wave back. She sat there for a long time.

Long enough for the tea to go cold. Long enough for the dog to shift, whine softly, and curl closer to her feet like it could sense something wrong.

She didn’t cry. She wasn’t the crying type. But something inside her splintered. A small, sharp ache behind the ribs.

She told herself it wasn’t jealousy. She told herself it wasn’t regret. She had made a choice. She left New York. She left him.

And not just the high-rise penthouse and the assistant with the dry wit and the perfectly tailored suits. She left the man.

Harry Castillo. The one who loved quietly.

Who boiled her tea before bed even when they weren’t speaking. Who carried her keys in his coat pocket without asking. Who hated poetry but listened when she read it out loud like he was trying to understand anyway.

But also—

The man who never told her how he felt unless she dragged it out of him. Who made her feel like she was constantly trying to earn softness. Who made the walls of their penthouse feel colder every time he shut down instead of shouting.

They were never right for each other. But they had been something.

And now? He was in love again. And someone had captured it on film.

Lucy had already seen the photo. She didn’t want to have to see it again. She would feel it this time.

The way Carrie had broke it to her. That wasn’t journalism. That was a knife. That was salt in a wound no one was supposed to know she still had.

She looked down at her robe. At the ring on her finger. Thinner than the one Harry had once picked out and never got the chance to give her. The diamond smaller. The love less complicated.

She looked at the phone again. It didn’t buzz. Didn’t ring.

No one was calling to tell her how it felt to be quoted like that. No one was telling her how Harry had reacted.

She wouldn’t know unless she asked. And she wasn’t going to ask.

Because even if she still thought about him when the wind off the ocean sounded like Manhattan in the winter—

Even if she still had his number saved under Harry <3.

Even if she sometimes imagined what he’d say about the neighbors, or the farmer’s market, or the chipped tile in the bathroom—

She had left. And he had moved on.

So she sat there. In the silence. And for the first time since the article dropped—

She wondered if he’d finally fallen in love for real.

And if that woman—whoever she was—wasn’t a nobody after all. But someone who had given him something Lucy never could.

Peace. And the permission to be soft.

She got up slowly. Turned off her phone.And didn’t open the article. Not yet.

─────

The New York Times

Culture & Style

The Billionaire and the Nobody: How Harry Castillo Fell for a Woman Without a Name

By Carrie Roth | Published 11:14 AM EST, March 5th, 2025

When Harry Castillo, the notoriously private hedge fund billionaire and reluctant society darling, walked away from the limelight in late 2024 after a very public and very painful breakup with longtime partner Lucy, no one expected to see him surface again in any intimate context.

Yet here we are.

Castillo, 54, was photographed in the lobby of his Fifth Avenue penthouse earlier this month with a woman whose name, background, and entire existence appear to have baffled both the social elite and the media machine equally. In a world where a last name can function as currency, this woman has none—or at least, not one that anyone seems able to find.

The photo—captured by Carrie Roth and verified by multiple sources—features Castillo in a pair of dark joggers and a custom Valentino long sleeve, his expression unreadable. The woman beside him is dressed in what appear to be his clothes, oversized sweatpants, a faded navy shirt likely pulled from his top drawer, and socks patterned in chaotic, juvenile colors that make one wonder if she dressed herself in the dark or simply enjoys looking like a college freshman home for spring break.

Her hair is wet. So is his. Her face is bare. Her body language, reserved.

It would be forgettable if it weren’t so telling.

She doesn’t look like someone accustomed to being photographed. She doesn’t carry herself like a model, actress, heiress, or anyone remotely used to proximity to power. She looks like she just stepped out of his shower, borrowed his laundry, and followed him out without knowing where they were going next. There’s no stylist, no heels, no curated façade. There’s not even a purse in sight.

Which, of course, begs the question...Who is she?

At the time of publication, no verified identity has been confirmed. What we do know, she’s American. Likely in her twenties or early thirties. No public social media. No recognizable affiliations. No traceable digital footprint. A true anomaly in a city—and a culture—obsessed with documentation.

Some will say it’s romantic. That Castillo, long labeled cold and career-obsessed, has finally fallen for someone outside the machine. That love found him in a quiet corner of life and pulled him back into the light.

Others are less convinced.

The most damning quote comes from Lucy herself, the woman who knew him best—and left.

“She doesn’t know what he’s like yet. How intense. How obsessive. How cold he can be when he wants to. She’s not built for it. She’ll realize eventually. It’s a facade. All of it. He doesn’t do warm. Not really.”

Harsh words from a woman once fiercely loyal to the man she now paints as emotionally inaccessible. But they do echo a question many of Castillo's partners are quietly asking...What happens when the charm wears off?

Castillo’s pattern is well-documented. He disappears for months, reemerges without explanation, and surrounds himself with handlers more loyal than blood. He doesn’t date. He selects. Curates. And if this woman—this “nobody”—has truly captured his attention, she may have unknowingly stepped into a role with no script, no exit, and no idea of the performance required.

The optics are troubling.

The power imbalance is obvious.

He’s 54. She, allegedly is in her late twenties, early thirties. He is a billionaire. She, by all accounts, works in a field so mundane no one’s been able to confirm what it is. (Waitress? Gallerist? Nanny? The rumors span the alphabet.) She does not appear to be in fashion, finance, tech, or any industry tangential to his world.

She is not, in the traditional sense, someone.

And maybe that’s what he wants.

Someone who doesn’t challenge him. Someone who looks up to him. Someone who—like the rest of us—didn’t see it coming.

But let’s be clear, this isn’t a fairy tale. It’s a headline.

And for now, that headline reads like the beginning of a story that’s more about power than love. More about fantasy than future. More about the image of intimacy than the truth of it.

Whether or not the woman in the photo understands what she’s walked into remains to be seen.

But the internet has already decided.

She’s already a meme.

Already a conspiracy thread.

Already a canvas for everyone’s projections.

And Harry Castillo, once the ghost of Manhattan's most elite rooms, has reemerged—only to set the world ablaze with a single photo of a girl who, until now, had the gift of being unseen.

Now?

Now she belongs to the feed.

And the feed never forgets.

Comments (238):

louisa83 Isn’t she that girl from Charlotte? Her brother…you know. The one who killed himself after their dad went to prison?

sampaige OMG. YES. my cousin went to school with her at hillside academy. her family basically imploded. her dad was some finance guy who scammed half the town. people lost their homes. then the son took his own life and the mom vanished overseas. it was a whole thing. wild to see her resurface like this.

deannareads Yup. This was a huge story here in North Carolina. Her dad ran a fake investment firm and got busted in 2019. Ponzi-style. Churches lost money. Local businesses folded. I had a friend whose grandmother lost her retirement in that mess. The daughter (the one in the article) disappeared right after the brother’s funeral. Like poof. Gone.

moneymessNC THEY LIVED IN THAT BIG BRICK HOUSE ON CEDAR RIDGE LANE! Her mom used to throw those weird garden parties and acted like she was royalty. Then the FBI raided their house and it all went to hell. I heard the mom dipped to Europe with a new identity. And now the daughter’s dating a billionaire? Make it make sense.

brookee02 “she doesn’t have a digital footprint” ....or maybe she just scrubbed the hell out of it after the biggest scandal in north carolina since john edwards. this girl isn’t a mystery. she’s a cover up and fake!!!!

southernbella She used to go by a different last name, I swear. She changed it after the trial. Her dad was literally sentenced to life. People were protesting outside their house for weeks. The fact that she ended up with Castillo? Feels strategic. Sorry not sorry.

annahayes Not her climbing her way back up to billionaire status like nothing happened...I remember the story. That family imploded. We’re talking lawsuits, fraud, rehab, funerals, extradition rumors. The whole Netflix package.

jadedjuliet sooo let me get this straight. her dad ruins hundreds of lives, her brother dies, her mom runs away, and she gets to rebrand as mysterious and date a billionaire? cool. must be nice to fail upward.

stellamae Nothing like a tragic backstory to distract from the gold digging. Daddy’s in prison, mommy’s in hiding, brother’s six feet under and she’s wearing $900 sweats in a billionaire’s penthouse like it’s a redemption arc. Give me a break.

─────

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artifacts-and-arthropods · 2 years ago

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Emerald Spectacles from India, c. 1620-1660 CE: the lenses of these spectacles were cut from a single emerald, and the original, uncut stone weighed more than 300 carats

These eyeglasses are also known by the name Astaneh-e ferdaws, meaning "Gate of Paradise," based on the symbolic associations between the color green and the concept of spiritual salvation or "paradise." Those associations, which are rooted in Islamic tradition, were especially common in Mughal India.

The lenses were crafted from two thin slices of the same emerald. Together, the lenses have a combined weight of about 27 carats, but given the precision, size, and shape of each lens, experts believe that the original emerald likely weighed in excess of 300 carats (more than sixty grams) before it was cleaved down in order to produce the lenses.

The emerald was found at a mine in Muzo, Colombia, and it was then transported across the Atlantic by Spanish or Portuguese merchants.

Each lens is encircled by rose-cut diamonds, which run along an ornate frame made of gold and silver. This diamond-studded frame was installed during the late 1800s, when modern stylistic elements were incorporated into the original pince-nez design.

The "Gate of Paradise" spectacles are often accompanied by a second pair of eyeglasses that were created during the same period, and they were almost certainly commissioned by the same person; these other spectacles are known by the name Halqeh-e nur, meaning "Halo of Light," and they feature lenses that were cleaved from a single diamond.

It's estimated that the original, uncut diamond weighed about 200-300 carats, which would make it one of the largest uncut diamonds ever discovered.

The lenses are so clear and so flat that they sometimes seem almost invisible.

Both sets of spectacles date back to the mid-1600s, and it's believed that they were commissioned by a Mughal emperor or prince. The identity of that person is still a bit of a mystery, but it has been widely speculated that the patron was Shah Jahan -- the Mughal ruler who famously commissioned the Taj Mahal after the death of his wife, Mumtaz Mahal. Shah Jahan ruled as the Mughal emperor from about 1628 to 1658.

The emerald and diamond lenses may have served some symbolic, sentimental, or cultural purpose, or they may have been chosen simply because they're pretty and extravagant. Their original purpose and significance remains unclear, but there is evidence to suggest that the spectacles were actually designed to be worn by someone.

Mystical properties have long been attributed to these spectacles; it's believed that they can promote healing, ward off evil, impart wisdom, and/or bring the wearer closer to enlightenment. Those beliefs mostly stem from Indic and Islamic traditions that associate each of the gemstones with specific spiritual qualities. Emeralds are associated with spiritual salvation, healing, cleansing, and eternal life, while diamonds are associated with enlightenment, wisdom, celestial light, and mysticism.

The "Gate of Paradise" and the "Halo of Light" spectacles were both kept in the collections of a wealthy Indian family until 1980, when they were sold to private collectors, and they were then put up for auction once again in 2021. They were most recently valued at about $2 million to $3.4 million per pair.

Sources & More Info:

Sotheby's: Mughal Spectacles

Architectural Digest of India: At Sotheby's auction, Mughal-era eyeglasses made of diamond and emerald create a stir

Only Natural Diamonds: Auspicious Sight & the Halqeh-e Nur Spectacles

The Royal Society Publishing: Cleaving the Halqeh-Ye Nur Diamonds

Gemological Institution of America: Two Antique Mughal Spectacles with Gemstone Lenses

Manuscript: From Satan's Crown to the Holy Grail: emeralds in myth, magic, and history

CNN: The $3.5 million Spectacles Said to Ward off Evil

BBC: Rare Mughal Era Spectacles to be Auctioned by Sotheby's

#history #archaeology #artifact #mughal #india #17th century #art #emerald #diamond #glasses #indian lore #islam #religion #mysticism #indian history #anthropology #spirituality #fashion

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kxsagi · 4 months ago

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"𝐛𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐤 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐞𝐭"

it had been three years that you and isagi yoichi have been dating for. so you couldn’t help but be suspicious why he was leading your hand to the beach known as the “sea of stars” in maldives, also the same place that you told him you dreamt of being proposed to at.

“your eyes are still closed, right?”

“uh huh,” you nod, heart beating in your chest furiously. was tonight the night?

it could have been. this whole trip was very spontaneous after all. your boyfriend had even wanted to book the whole thing and pay for all your expenses himself, even pre-trip stuff like a fresh mani/pedi and new clothes and bags. it was a nice surprise, but he was extra insistent about everything.

the two of you had just finished eating dinner at a fancy restaurant. your lips still taste sweet from the dessert, too. but after getting lost in conversation for an hour, yoichi all of a sudden said he wanted to “take you somewhere,” but “you have to close your eyes.”

the familiar warmth and texture of the grainy sand hits your bare toes as he takes off your heels. you hear him shuffling to take off his shoes, too, then his large hand grabs yours, gently leading you ashore. the relaxing sounds of ocean waves crashing grow louder and louder with each step.

“you’re not gonna push me in the water, right?”

his chuckle fills the air. “wouldn’t dream of it. plus, i wouldn’t wanna ruin that beautiful black off-the-shoulder dress.”

“... you’re acting weird.”

“am i?”

it seemed as if you wouldn’t shut up, trying to mask the nervousness bubbling in your gut. but before you could begin yapping about your favorite part of the dessert you shared an hour ago, you hear, “open your eyes.”

the sight in front of you is breathtaking. stars scattered above in the sky and in the ocean, dark blue neon dots glowing brighter with every movement of a calm wave. you’ve dreamed of seeing bioluminescent phytoplankton like this before, kneeling down gently to lift your dress and place your feet in the water, watching blue glow around your skin.

“wow, it’s so pretty!” you exclaim.

yoichi nods, watching you from a few feet behind as you play around in the water. he’s not one to get his long pants wet, but he’s all for seeing you happy.

after you’re done, you walk back up to him. “there’s like almost no one here!”

“i might’ve paid them to leave us alone for ten minutes,” yoichi shrugs, earning a playful slap to his chest. with a laugh, he points to your left. “look over there.”

you turn to your left, cocking your head as to what he was possibly pointing at. there’s nothing, no boats, no people. just the water and more ethereal bioluminescence. you turn back around, confused.

“i don’t see –”

you’re cut off with yoichi on one knee in front of you, a hand covering half of his face as the other holds a velvet box with a large oval-cut diamond ring on a simple gold band.

“i don’t even know where to start,” he laughs nervously, removing the hand from his face. it’s a bit dark, the only source of light being from the ocean, but you can tell he’s red. “i’ve been rehearsing since 3 AM in the hotel bathroom and i couldn’t sleep.”

you already feel hot tears brimming at your eyelids. yoichi notices, but for you, for this moment, he tries his best to keep himself composed.

“honestly, i’ve been in love with you since the moment i laid eyes on you. and every single day since then, i’ve fallen harder, deeper, and more helplessly into this love. you have completely ruined me, in the best way possible. i can’t function without thinking about you. i wake up thinking about you. i go to sleep thinking about you. every little thing you do, every smile, every laugh, every time you look at me… i swear, it feels like my heart is about to explode."

he lets out a small laugh, shaking his head in disbelief at just how gone he is.

“you are my entire world. you are my best friend, my greatest joy, my deepest love, and, honestly, my only personality trait at this point. i would do anything for you. anything. If you told me to swim across this entire ocean right now, i’d ask you if you wanted me to backstroke or freestyle. if you asked me to count every single star in the sky just so you’d know how much i love you, i’d be out here all night, every night, for the rest of my life."

his voice is thick with emotion, looking up at you with complete devotion.

“i have never, not for a second, doubted that you are the one for me. you are my forever, my always, my everything. so, here i am, in front of the most beautiful person in the world, under the most beautiful sky, by the most beautiful ocean, asking the most important question i will ever ask… will you let me spend forever proving that i was meant to be your husband?"

the waves crash softly, the stars above shining brighter, as if the universe itself is waiting for the only answer that could possibly exist.

“yes.”

it was an easy answer, one that needed no hesitation from you. with the happiest smile and a weight lifted off his chest, yoichi slides the ring onto your left ring finger, standing up, picking you up, and twirling you around with joy.

on this night, the stars bore witness to the two of you beginning forever.

𐙚

it’s safe to say that the internet BLEW up after you posted pictures of you with your diamond engagement ring with the caption: “in my fiance eraaa”

everyone knew of your engagement, shippers going crazy and every social media algorithm showing users your beautiful diamond ring that probably cost $1 million easily.

your comments flooded with fans expressing heartfelt congratulations and jealous haters who could only dream of having a love like yours. your family and friends were also very happy for you and so were yoichi’s family and teammates.

a/n: i am aware that everyone has different skin tones, i just used this pic to show off what the ring looks like!

it would be a lie to say you didn’t spend the next day on pinterest looking at wedding inspo instead of enjoying your vacation.

𝐁𝐎𝐍𝐔𝐒:

the wedding ceremony was held a year later.

you made sure to keep it private, only inviting close friends and family from both sides, but there were still a lot of people.

though you might need to be studied, because how did you break the internet again?

shortly after releasing your wedding pictures, they went just as viral as your engagement announcement.

it wasn’t just the off-shoulder lace mermaid dress, or the way yoichi basically began crying the moment he saw you, or the fact you opted to walk down the aisle alone to show how no one but you was going to give yourself away to the love of your life, or how bachira had a dance-off moment with a soccer ball on the middle of the stage, or the fact that rin actually gave a speech.

no, it was your long trailing veil scattered across the ground with two words delicately embroidered at the end: “MRS. ISAGI.”

a/n: yes i am gonna keep writing about my man

#blue lock #blue lock x reader #isagi yoichi #isagi x reader #yoichi isagi #bllk #bllk x reader #isagi yoichi x reader #yoichi isagi x reader #manifesting a love like this for everyone who reads this #break the internet

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otkuhotgirl · 8 months ago

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─── 𝐀𝐔𝐃𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄 .

# with flame emperor sabo.

sabo fell for the fiancé of a wealthy heir. luckily enough, he held no respect for the world government dogs whatsoever — and he was about to let them know that.

⎰ & KINKTOBER. smut (mdni!). public. dry!humping. finger!sucking. pyromania if you squint. afab!reader. no y/n used.

WC: 1.8k

sabo the revolutionary had quite a select number of bad qualities — and twice as many positive ones, if he said so himself — although his sadism concerning those in a position of wealth was of particular prominence. his first intention had not been to get involved in the webs of your life. it was but a simple mission; brief in essence. to infiltrate into the household of a wealthy family, aligned to the world government, to steal the specific letters of the discussed alliance — and some expensive jewelry, while he was at it, and to leave, unscathed. yet, sabo was hot-headed, and his disgust regarding the higher-ups all but served to flare that temper; to feed the beast itching for a fight. you — vexed, fretful, the engagement golden band on your finger, seeming to weigh but a thousand tons — proved to be his perfect excuse for a bit of a thrill.

seducing the sharp-witted fiancé of an arrogant heir, fucking one in the backroom of a ball, at that, was oddly satisfying. sabo presumed it’d be a singular encounter, neither predicting nor planning on repetitions. yet, he caught himself returning to your bedsheets — again and again — somewhat gaining a double-agent who offered him confidential information for the merest sake of getting into the nerves of those who had arranged that marriage. sabo risked the rage of his mentor and comrades, far too obsessed to refrain from returning to your haze of pleasure. and oh, how satisfying it was to claim you right under the royalty’s nose. to have you squirming and begging for his touch, claiming you on the same bed meant to symbolize your chastity.

yet, that had been his most ambiguous act so far. your wedding reception: a boisterous celebration, meant to leave a clear message for the entire world to see. sabo made his way through shadow and crowd, eyes tethered to the gorgeous, statue-worthy, sight of you — a monument in silk and pearls. mutual observation; your glance tethered to his figure, hidden amidst the countless, fancy chandeliers. your smile, brightest than the reflected light on your collar and earrings. it would be impossible for you to excuse yourself from the untrustworthy guests, but no limit was unattainable to him whenever you were concerned. a small, unprecedented commotion outside had the gathering on edge, parroted fools following the source of the sudden explosions — fireworks, reserved for the ceremony, a spectacle he didn’t hesitate to ruin.

a single grin sent his way had him aflame, you but a blur of white striving towards the natural maze in the garden, losing yourself amidst the bushes and thorns, presenting the challenge of being found. countless of others dared venture inside the maze, yet sabo’s senses were attuned to your spirit, the sudden outburst of flames smearing the night sky all but covered by the exploding fireworks. a pool of fire settled under the sole of his boots at his approach, grass giving in to the sudden heat as his hands claimed your hips, pressing your back flush against his chest.

“pearls,” he scoffed, voice laced with irony as his teeth bit on your earlobe. “couldn’t afford diamonds?

an amused sigh mingled with the ever-growing wild tempo of your breathing, your fingers intertwining with his own. “the treasure safe was stolen a few hours ago, such a morbid coincidence.”

“what a tragedy,” sabo mocked, lower intonation expliciting the gradual increase of his lust.

his fingers curled around your necklace, and a brute tug had the elastic snapping, a cascade of pearls meeting the grass, glinting white mirroring the moonlight. he shoved a hand inside the pocket of his trousers, fishing a stolen, diamond necklace, and clasping it around your neck. it shone — pale and ethereal — twice as much as those stupid pearls, the golden band serving as a perfect contrast to the expensive stones.

“would you look at that,” you pointed out in faux shock, and sabo grinned, tongue meeting the bare flesh of your neck.

the warmth around the pair of you increased — a consequence of the wildfire he had created. it was but a matter of time until the alarmed guests followed the trail of smoke; found your figure pressed against his own. sabo wrapped a hand around your throat, his cock hardening at the singular, delighted moan you produced. the sight of you in white; a wedding dress meant for another; had him seething. his teeth claimed your shoulder as he brushed a thumb against your lower lip, his back but a shield that kept you safe from the bruising flames.

sabo had your ass pressed against his clothed erection, a particular thrust causing him to groan, a shuddering breath following-in-suit. you whimpered at each lascivious, harsh roll of his hips, as though he aimed to have his cock inside your cunt regardless of the fabric that separated the pair of you. the commotion was but a mute, irrelevant thing, for sabo was far too dazed; lost amidst the metaphorical haze of lust and the quite literal cloud of smoke, the scent of the burnt bushes filling the air.

your own hips began to move, meeting his thrust halfway, his breath growing ragged at the pressure, his tip smearing the fabric of his underwear, girth aching within the coffins of his trousers. sabo kept a bruising grip on your waist, growing mad at the merest thought of the context of that encounter — your marriage to a scornful, disgusting heir with no respect for human life whatsoever. he snapped his hips, brute and possessive, teeth buried on your shoulders as he forced you to meet his thrusts.

his arm was the one to keep you balanced; tethering you to the earth. you had your head on his shoulder, neck craned to offer further access to the abusing bruises left on your flesh by his famished mouth. you moaned, back arching as he tried to have a brief taste of the folds of your ass, through his clothed girth.

the fire closed in, yet sabo took-in the opportunity offered by the cacophony of your whimpers to shove three of his fingers inside of your mouth, the sudden invasion provoking your gag reflex. dragon-claw technique was made for violence; battling. yet it had not been the first time he used the crafted strength of his fingers on you — oftentimes shoving them so deep into your pussy, you were left unable to feel your legs for a couple of succeeding hours. your mouth, however, was quite a new territory — and one he was eager to venture through, especially with the incoming crowd.

“suck on it,” he rasped out, and your moan sent a tide of vibrations through his skin, your tongue following-in-suit; swirling, warm and wet, having him grunt at the reminder of how it felt to have your mouth wrapped around his cock.

drool dripped past your parted lips, trailing down your chin. he did not dare shove his fingers knuckle deep, well-aware that the limitations of your mouth were far less extensive than those of your cunt, yet the strength of the thrusting into your mouth remained, filling the ambience with the sound of your struggle; your constant gagging. your cheeks were hollowed as you all but failed to match his tempo, tongue giving-in under the pressure of his digits. it was erratic, vicious and lewd, saliva coated fingers and a brutal, ever-constant thrust of his girth against your ass. yet, sabo had never been more hard; neglected cock leaking. tears rolled down your cheeks, mingled with liquid streaks of black as your fluids ruined the makeup you wore. he wondered how long those people had wasted, dolling you up, turning you into an ethereal and desirable object, coated in richness and assuming an image so far from the you he knew. sabo chuckled — darkly, malicious — for he meant to demolish the foundation of their plans, stealing their most precious jewel.

flames engulfed the surroundings, daring to lick the hem of your dress, silk crumbling from the heat. for a second, sabo allowed the wildfire to destroy it; to claim the fabric and the one who wore it. the long, chic dress shrunk, offering him a clear sight of your thigh. you gagged, whether it had been from his fingers or the smoke, he could not guess, but the sound had been engulfed by the gasps from the outsiders, and sabo, at last, laughed. he picked up the pace of his humping, dragging his tongue up your neck, teeth teasing your earlobe.

he heard flabbergasted shouting and gasping, the guests failing to approach the two of you, figures engulfed by a curtain of flames and smoke. sabo grew more excited at their reaction, grunting as he shoved his fingers, knuckle deep, a final time. you gagged, clinging to his wrist, pleading stance edging him further. he was close to cumming in his pants as though a ridiculous, untouched virgin, yet he did not care whatsoever, retreating his fingers to grip at your chin, forcing you to face the alarmed guests, observing the scene without the means to retrieve you.

the groom barked out orders, yet the fire began to spread with renewed fury, a tide of devastating heat challenging him to face it. sabo’s breath tickled the side of your cheek as he smirked, forcing your hips to remain pressed against his cock.

“you’re going to sing for them,” sabo rasped out, lips moving to bite on your earlobe. “let them know where your loyalty lies.”

he groped one of your breasts, your saliva soaking the thin silken fabric, making it easier for him to tease your hardening nipple, pinching it ever-so-slightly. sabo forced you to feel every inch of his erection, wet mouth sucking bruises on your neck as he coaxed a loud, broken moan out of you. that hardly would be enough to have either of you cumming, but he could fix that soon enough. as of then, sabo enjoyed the sight of your ruined dress; tear-stricken face; abused throat. the fact that he melted you into nothing but a reminder of the role you were forced to play earlier. he grunted, twitching your nipple with non-forethought strength, causing you to mewl, a victim of his unrelenting touch.

sirens flared; the distinctive shout for the marines. sabo clicked his tongue, wrapping an arm around your figure, ceasing to tease you. he let out an amused laugh at the sight of your displeasure, barely clinging to consciousness due to the smoke, yet willing to ignore said barrier for the sake of having his fingers shoved into your awaiting mouth. sabo used his devil-fruit to propel the pair of you up, flames engulfing the lower part of his body as he flew far from the commotion, towards the docks. moonlight reflected on the diamonds adorning your neck, and a certain hint of possession settled itself in the pit of his stomach, heat sent straight into his still leaking, neglected cock.

“where to?” you inquired, secured into his arms, comfortable despite the height.

“freedom,” he answered, not adding that freedom’s gates were but an improvised bed on a small ship, promising a proper fuck — with those diamonds resting on your breasts.

— 🐈‍⬛ : google will PAY for the stress it’s been giving me this past week i swear!! kinktober almost ending, though. ☹️

#kinktober 2024 #one piece #op x reader #op #one piece x reader #one piece x you #op x you #one piece smut #op x y/n #sabo x you #flame emperor sabo #sabo x reader #revolutionary sabo #one piece sabo #sabo #op sabo #sabo smut #sabo x y/n

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deunmiu-dessie · 1 year ago

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ⅲ▬ ⁽ 𝒹𝑒𝓂𝑜𝓃 ⁾²

part one

𝓌𝑜𝓇𝒹 𝒸𝑜𝓊𝓃𝓉 ♡︎ : ₇˖₅ₖ ˚₊·—̳͟͞͞♡

𝓌𝒶𝓇𝓃𝒾𝓃𝑔𝓈 ♡︎ : mdni----- unedited, NSFW, explicit content, teratophilia, demon/human, rough sex, unprotected sex, creampie, cunnilingus (both receiving), overstimulation. ₍⑅ᐢ..ᐢ₎

𝓈𝓊𝓂𝓂𝒶𝓇𝓎 ♡︎: with your escape from your kidnapping, you find yourself now stranded in a world unfamiliar to you, how will you get home?

꒰m!demon ₊⊹ afab!reader꒱

𝒴 ou find yourself lost in thought, pondering how long you've been sitting outside. Your trusty (albeit broken) silver watch stubbornly displays midnight, but time seems irrelevant in this alternate world where minutes stretch into eternity. The rhythmic patter of raindrops keeps you company on the balcony, drawing you in with its soothing melody. Despite the allure of a cozy bed mere steps away, you remain entranced by the stormy night. Rain has always been your sanctuary, a source of comfort in turbulent times. And much like the rain, you find beauty in the fog that accompanies it, shrouding the world in a veil of mystery and distorting the passage of time.

In this enchanting world, you find yourself drawn to its allure. The raindrops fall delicately, resembling glittering diamonds, while the thick and mesmerizing fog gracefully enveloped everything in sight. Despite its seemingly monotonous nature, the sound of rain became a melody that resonated with your soul, especially during the serene nights when your neighborhood fell into a peaceful slumber. However, you were no longer in the comfort of your own home. Instead, there was a certain allure in venturing outside in this strange world during your unconventional waking hours, embracing the rain as it transformed the radiant light of the two moons into a muted glow amidst the stormy clouds. The lantern lights shimmered briefly, casting a magical glow before fading away. This was the embodiment of tranquility.

Your eyes trail to where the last lantern light on the garden flickers out, and your body turns rigid as something, tall, lanky, and dark comes slinking your way, well not necessarily your way, but down the path in your direction. The rain intensifies, drumming against the balcony railing and soaking your legs and feet. Perhaps your mind is playing tricks on you? You were stressed and scared. A crashing sound of thunder startles you, a trail of goosebumps crawling up your arms. The sensation of them developing sends a quiver down your spine, one that leaves your bones rattling and achy.

As the rain continues to pour down heavily, the path ahead becomes a blur, even with the faint light of the moons flickering through the clouds. You can almost feel the wetness of the soil beneath your feet, the sensation of it squishing between your toes. The raindrops relentlessly peck at your face, while the gentle rustling of the trees creates a comforting hum. It's as if Mother Nature herself is embracing you. Suddenly, a sharp pang of unease shoots through your chest, causing your eyes to flutter open.

You raise your head from its tilted position and peer down the path below the balcony. It's not a long stretch, the length of a car and then some. Your breath catches in your throat as you spot something peculiar. The figure that had been walking along the trail earlier, which you had dismissed as a figment of your fear, now stands at the end of your balcony. It is drenched and covered in a mysterious black substance. Although still tall, it no longer possesses its unnaturally thin appearance.

A terrifying grin stretches across its mouth, revealing a multitude of razor-sharp teeth, causing an uncontrollable scream to burst from your lips. In a frantic scramble, you seek refuge within the confines of your room, desperately hoping to evade the horrifying sight. The name you scream had meant to scream was Elmira, but out came, "U-Ulysses!" Your body turns into a puddle of goo, hot, sappy goo when a large hand settles over your eyes to obscure your vision. "Well aren't you a troublemaker?" he remarks, his eyebrows minutely creasing at the warmth emanating from your forehead and skin. As your hand rests upon his, he takes note of the clamminess of your palm.

"Do you like the rain?"

Amidst the relentless downpour, his voice cuts through the noise, smooth and velvety. It's reminiscent of savoring a fine whiskey, leaving a warm trail down your throat. You can't help but wonder if he tastes just as divine or otherwordly, and that thought alone makes your eyebrows furrow softly. You can feel his eyes on you, curious and searching. Knowing. Your words come out almost incoherent, but he doesn't seem to mind. His hearing is ten times sharper than yours, after all. Your voice, like a serene lake, barely makes a ripple. As your lips part, his eyes follow every movement with unwavering attention.

“I do.”

The rain has been falling relentlessly for hours, the constant pitter-patter on the ground and roof soothing you into a cozy and passionate state. Your affection for the rain is unwavering, it's a love that will never fade. Observing it brings back memories of your dreams, those beautiful dreams where you're standing in a vast field, letting the rain drench your clothes and moisten your skin. It's just you and the raindrops. The rain brings you solace. That's why you have no qualms about watching it endlessly.

“Do you like the rain?”

Your question catches him off guard, yet he craves the feeling of vulnerability you display by trusting and relying on him, despite your previous lack of trust.

“No.”

As your sight remains obscured, you're swiftly hoisted off the ground, the creature beneath you fading from your mind and your heart gradually returning to its normal rhythm. You hesitate to inquire further, realizing you're essentially a prisoner in this situation, with him as your captor.

“Why.”

As you both walk in silence, there is a sense of comfort that envelops you. It's a silence that doesn't make you feel awkward or embarrassed about the lack of response from him. Suddenly, a thought crosses your mind - where exactly are you heading? Although the bed assigned to you wasn't too distant, it feels like you've been strolling together for quite some time.

"Where are you taking me?"

As soon as your question leaves your lips, the unmistakable sound of a door slamming shut echoes through the room. Suddenly, you find yourself being gently placed onto a much larger bed than the one you were initially provided. "You'll be staying in my quarters until I can resolve the issue with the infestation,"

As your vision returns, you sit upright on the bed and fix your gaze upon him, your eyebrows furrowing in confusion. "Are you talking about mice? Or rats?" A blush spreads across your cheeks when he glances at you sideways, emitting a small chuckle devoid of humor. "Sure," he replies.

Sliding off the bed, you cross your arms protectively over your chest. "I won't be staying in a room with you. Find me another one." His eyebrow quirks and his eyes narrow, causing you to take a step back instinctively. "I have no intention of laying a finger on your body, especially considering you're human," he retorts. Offended, your mouth hangs open in disbelief and you take a step towards him.

"I wouldn't let you touch me, even if you begged!" Your words are sharp as he approaches. "Calm yourself, ao bewl ¹, I'll be in the next room over." ( my love )¹ A sudden wave of heat washes over you, causing your vision to blur and your breath to quicken. Ulysses remains unfazed as he steps closer, grabbing your wrist and pulling you towards him, his other hand lifting to touch your chin and check your forehead. "Silly woman, how long have you been out in the rain?"

Ulysses notices your lack of response and tenderly lifts you up from your slouched position against him, carefully placing you back in bed. "The rain in Lomaliue is unlike anything you've experienced in the Upper Realm," he whispers under his breath, his cool hands gently brushing against your forehead and then your neck. You peer at him through blurry eyes, your heart pounding in your chest. "Is this the end for me? Am I dying? I'm dying, right? " Fear grips you as tears stream down your face, and the room starts to spin around you.

The Demon can't contain his amusement and lets out a deep, rich chuckle. "Come now, little human, no need for theatrics. You're not dying. It's simply the unfamiliar weather and atmosphere of the Under Realm that's causing you discomfort. You'll be alright." Sweat clings to your body like a second skin, drenching your hair and clothing, leaving little to the imagination. A wave of intense pain surges through your abdomen, causing you to wince and squeeze your eyes shut. "It hurts, it hurts."

Ulysses sighs and softly caresses your complexion from top to bottom, hovering just slightly over your face. Your eyes slide shut and sleep takes over. He doesn't even startle or rise when Elmira enters the room, eyes worried. "She'll be fine, bring my papers from the office here, cancel the board meeting, and rearrange it a sennight from now." Elmira nods obediently and laces her hands behind her back. "Of course Master." Before she can turn to leave, he he adds, "The Guard, have them hunt down the Helkuma that made its way in. I'll be conducting a border check to identify any lapses in security."

"Yes Master." Elmira leaves the room and shuts the door behind her softly, leaving the two. Ulysses rises from the bed, intending to make his way to the plush velvet couch, but his progress is halted by a gentle tug on his loose tunic. Your small, tender hand clings to him with an intensity that suggests a desperate need for his presence, while the worry lines between your eyebrows deepen. "It seems I've been mated to a clingy human."

For the next coming days, Ulysses spends his time doting on you as you're in and out of sleep, while also doing a lot of the work that had piled up in his absence. Surprisingly, in your drowsy state, you show no fear towards him; in fact, you become quite affectionate and touchy. On the seventh day, your fever finally breaks, and your pretty eyes no longer hold that bleary look of exhaustion and pain; it soothes Ulysses more than he cares to admit. Elmira hands him another stack of reports, her smile tinged with guilt as she notices his exasperated glare. "Just a few more to go, and we'll be done, except for the east wing reconstruction," she says, but stops when he raises one of his hands (from his third arm, the others are busy with paperwork) "Don't remind me."

Ba-Bump. Ba-Bump

The feline demon's ears twitch as your heart rate quickens. "Master, My Lady has awakened," he hums in acknowledgment, placing the two out of the three pens down and rising from the desk he had relocated to the room. "Ask the Chef to prepare a light meal and gather medicine and a sweet treat." Carrying a few crucial documents, he settles onto the plush velvet couch, flipping through them. Elmira nods in understanding and swiftly exits the room, gently closing the door behind her.

"I am aware that you are awake, my dear 'captive'."

He finds your bewildered grunt incredibly amusing, much more than he had anticipated. With a slight chuckle, he resumes his task of signing, paying no attention as you ungracefully slide out of bed and stumble toward the couch farthest from his position. Wrapped in the sheets, you look absolutely adorable, with it trailing behind you as you settle into the comfortable couch. "What time is it? What day?"

"It's been a sennight since you've come down with fever, that makes it Woedenes dæg, and it's noon." He steals a quick glance at his watch, indicating that he's running out of time and you have a feeling that he's about to go. "Which also means I have my meeting soon." And your intuition was spot on.

Ulysses stands up and carelessly tosses the pages onto the table. "Elmira will bring you something to eat. Take a brief stroll in the gardens and enjoy the fresh air. Just remember, not more than 10 minutes. Your body needs time to adjust to this environment."

You give a slight nod, feeling a bit disoriented and not up for a debate, the situation still feeling surreal. A sudden feeling of bashfulness overtakes you, making your cheeks burn. "Have you been here the entire time?" "Yes, the employees here are not accustomed to dealing with humans. You're also mine. My responsibility and I allowed you to become ill, and for that, I am sorry."

Your heart skips a beat and your stomach does a flip, but it comes crashing down when he finishes. "I also didn't want to put them through the pain of your snoring and clinginess." Ulysses finds amusement in the glare you send his way, observing as you settle back into the couch, appearing at ease in his presence. "Aren't you supposed to be somewhere else? Hurry and get out." His eyes soften and a smile quirks his lips, "I'll come to visit you after." You huff and wave him off with a middle finger. "Don't bother!" Your voice trails off weakly as he walks out, shutting the door with a solid thud.

Just as you are lost in your own thoughts, Elmira enters the room carrying a tray of steaming soup. Her face lights up with a warm smile, and her steps exude a contagious energy. "My Lady, I'm overjoyed to see you recovering. Your illness had the entire castle in a frenzy, and the servants have been sending their good wishes." It's puzzling, isn't it? You were just an ordinary person who stumbled upon this grand castle one day. Your interactions were minimal, and you couldn't even recall the names of those you encountered. So why all the fuss?

Elmira seems to read your mind and responds with a gentle smile. "In the sennights you've been here, your presence has brightened this place. The Gardeners feel like they have a purpose, the Chef gets to cook more often and the other maids love to dote on you." The Garden. The mere thought of dining in the garden brings a smile to your face as you sit up from your previously huddled position. "Elmira, I would like to eat in the garden."

The walk to the Gardens (a place you had never been to) was quick and pleasant, with the suns shining brightly at noon. The knights on patrol greeted you warmly and in a slightly cute and chaotic manner. Stepping outside, you slipped off your new flats, lifted your dress, and ran into the grassy plains with a soft smile and squinted eyes, the sun's rays shining in your eyes and warming your skin. A gentle sigh of contentment escaped your lips as you wiggled your bare feet in the grass of the garden. With a slight breeze in the air, Elmira draped a shawl over your shoulders before heading back to the table to prepare your breakfast.

"Elmira, why is it that I've never been here before?" you inquire, your voice gentle as you lower yourself, your gown spreading over the earth and your hand encircling your knees. The scent of the air is pure and invigorating, a stark contrast to the environment you're used to at home. Your fingers trace the outline of a dandelion-like flower, smoothing over its bright yellow stem before picking it. Raising it to your face, you inspect the pink fluff that surrounds it. The clinking of dishes is the only sound until she interrupts.

"This is the Master's private garden, in order to come here you would need approval. While you were recovering, I told him that you enjoyed being outside and in Nature, and he gave you access to this Garden." Elmira answers, occupied with the dolly that holds the tea and soup that had been prepared prior. As you listen to her words, a soft smile graces your lips, and your heart flutters with excitement. You take in a deep breath and let out a puff, air releasing from your lungs and onto the flower. The pappus soars through the wind, taking flight and drifting further and further away from you. The garden mesmerizes you with its meticulous upkeep, vibrant hues, and the intoxicating fragrance of the dew-kissed plants. Every plant thrives, leaving you thoroughly delighted.

You now longed for a book to read, so you could lose yourself within the garden and experience something you had yet to want until now. But, after realizing that perhaps all the books were in the language of this new world, you would have to ask Elmira or Ulysses to get you something. Ah, you said it so easily, as if staying here was a forever thing, but perhaps it was. Ulysses had hit the nail on the head about your old life - no caring family, a job ready to let you go, and no one waiting for you back home. You weren't living, just surviving miserably. With a soft groan, you rose from your crouched position, hands moving up from your knees as you straightened. Your eyes roamed and landed on a beautiful glass table that Elmira was setting the dishes onto. It was clear, almost see-through. White placeholders were facing the chairs that came with the table. "It's so beautiful here." Your voice barely above a whisper, your fingers glide along the smooth glass surface, the set looking as if water had stilled. It could've been mistaken for ice if the warmth from the present sun didn't beam onto everything in its path. You hesitate, stealing glances at the elegant table, unsure if you should dare to sit. The opulence of the furniture makes you question if you might tarnish it. "Elmira, is it alright for me to sit here? It looks expensive." The cat demon nods absentmindedly, focused on arranging the items. "Certainly, the furniture is meticulously cleaned every day." "Oh," you respond, your brows furrowing. Your gaze swiftly shifts to your hand, a delighted smile spreading across your face as you notice something unexpected. "What is this?" you whisper softly, bringing your hand closer to examine it.

Perched on the back of your hand is a mesmerizing bug, its vibrant blue hue adorned with delicate white spots. At first glance, you might mistake it for a ladybug, if not for its peculiar shading and the menacing stinger at the end of its abdomen. Elmira's expression changes as you inquire about the bug, her face turning pale. With a sense of urgency, she urges you. "My Lady, quickly blow it off your hand!" You look up and away from the bug and glance toward her, panicking slightly at her tone. "What? Why? What's wrong–." Before you can comprehend her warning, a scorching sensation surges through your veins, engulfing your body in unbearable pain. As you glance back at your hand, you discover that the bug's stinger is now embedded in your skin, while the insect itself has vanished amidst your frantic state.

In an instant, you're sprawled on the ground, and Elmira rushes over, tenderly cupping your face in her palms. It's hard not to ponder why a mundane day is an elusive dream in this peculiar world, where nothing ever seems to be ordinary.

"—The Hundyai Region has become overrun with–."

The atmosphere in the meeting room instantly turns heavy as a sudden knock reverberates through the door. All eyes turn towards the interruption, their curiosity piqued. It is a rare occurrence to interrupt a meeting with the fearsome Demon Lord Ulysses, it had never been done before, or well, successfully done. Before he can even speak, Elmira enters the room with a sense of urgency, her steps quick and purposeful. Bending down to whisper into his ear, she imparts crucial information to their Lord, causing a ripple of tension to spread across the room. The council members watch intently as Ulysses' eyes narrow and his jaw tightens in response. With a stiff nod, he acknowledges Elmira's message, prompting her to exit the room gracefully. Bidding a respectful farewell to the men at the table, she disappears as silently as she had arrived.

Standing up from his spot at the head of the table, Ulysses straightens his cuff links. "Let's postpone the meeting for now. Feel free to wait in the lounge with some refreshments." There are no protests, no irritation, just unwavering loyalty. "Understood, my Lord." She can't seem to stay out of trouble.

"How long ago was it?"

Elmira anxiously clasps her hands together as she hurries alongside Ulysses, makes his way to his bed in a few long strides."It couldn't have been more than five minutes. I rushed to your side as soon as I could. Ghallahan brought her back here," she explains. Ulysses tenderly cups your chin in his large hand, observing as your eyes glaze over and your lips part to take a deep breath upon his touch. Your skin feels warm and moist with a thin layer of perspiration, causing him to curse himself for his lack of attentiveness. "Bring me something to alleviate the pain and swelling within 10 minutes. Clear out the staff near my room and instead attend to our guests. If I need anything, I'll call for you." Elmira, though reluctant, nods and shuffles out of the room. "What's happening to me?" Ulysses, captivated by the alluring and breathy tone of your voice, shifts his attention back to you. He nonchalantly rolls up his sleeves and unbuttons his shirt ever so slightly. "While in the Garden you were stung by a Fern. Their venom can intensify one's libido to a dangerous extent if not treated correctly. It can also lead to swelling in the limbs and even the brain, depending on the specific type of Fern."

In the midst of your poisoned state, your eyes widen with a mixture of fear and disbelief. Your thighs involuntarily clench together as your heart beats erratically in your chest. The overwhelming realization that death may be imminent engulfs you, and you find yourself uttering desperate words, "Oh God, I'm going to die, I don't want to die." However, amidst the chaos, a strange sensation begins to stir within you. Your nipples harden beneath the fabric of your dress, the sensation bordering on painful. Ulysses gently brushes his hand against your, puffy lips sending a jolt of electricity through your body. His touch trails down the side of your neck, leaving a trail of anticipation in its wake. "For it to stop, I need to pleasure you." Your body tenses at the information and your cheeks flush. "I'll just do it myself. Why can't I do it myself?"

"It doesn't work that way, little dove."

The thought of him touching you so intimately sends tingles of white-hot pleasure down your tummy. Another wave of heat hits and beneath your dress your wet, sticky thighs rub together, desperate for a touch of any kind. You can feel your clit swell and ache as your blood rushes to it. Your panties are damp with your arousal. As you lock eyes with him, his passive yet sharp features, and his deep, alluring red eyes, you sense a hunger that sets him apart from the rest. The sinewy muscles of his arms ripple, captivating your attention, and you boldly cup your breast within your small hands, embracing your own provocative nature. It becomes clear that the mere thought of his touch has the power to bring you to the brink of climax.

You can't help but feel a little shy, but there's no denying the effect he has on you. The way his voice rumbles sends shivers down your spine. His deep, sultry tone stirs something deep inside you. "Dove, talk to me." His voice is almost pleading, and you comply with a quick nod, gasping as his lips press against yours, dominating and all-consuming. His tongue dances over your lower lip, relishing the addictive taste of your mouth. His teeth sink in, causing a pleasurable moan to escape into his mouth, your fingers desperately clinging to him; as his fingers trail calmly down your waistline and tickle your belly button. Slowly, they make their way back up to the neckline of your dress, effortlessly tearing it off, and exposing your breasts to the cold air, causing goosebumps to rise. Though his warm mouth chases them away.

Your thighs tighten around his waist, feeling the hot, pulsating bulge in his pants pressing against your stomach. The most sultry, erotic moan he's ever heard pierces his ears and the deep, primal groan that he lets out makes you whimper. He lifts his head to gaze into your eyes, seeing the raw desire and intense need reflected at him.

His fingers delve into your hips, reassuring and light as he pulls you closer to him, his mouth continuing a slow, tantalizing assault on your nipples. Each time his teeth nip you, you mewl wantonly and arch into him, hips grinding against him. Tears trickle down your cheeks at the discomfort between your thighs, a fire that slowly starts to eat you alive.

Ulysses' hand caresses your breast, thumb teasing your wet nipple. And you let out the most sinful, obscene moan he's ever heard; and you attempt to stifle it with your hand. " It's only me and you here, dove " He states, kissing down the valley of your breast, eyes flitting upwards to gaze at your tortured face. His breath leaves his lungs in a shocked rush, and a surge of emotions engulfs him when his eyes find yours, they're wet with tears and you down at him through thick lashes, eyes so trusting and yet so scared.

"In this life and the next, you possess the power to consume me entirely." His voice, a mere whisper, and his hands cupping the soft weight of your breast. He bends his head, his teeth scraping over your left nipple. His other arms work on taking off the top half of his clothing, carelessly ripping them away. You sob out, the sound unlike anything he's heard, it makes his cock strain against his pants. Once again, he claims your breast, his mouth unyielding. Suckling vigorously, his tongue dancing across your nipple, while his fingers tease and caress the other. Your cries echo, as you entangle your fingers in his tousled locks.

As he lifts his head from devouring you, his gaze fixates on the vibrant hues that adorn your bosom, and you gasp at the color of his eyes. He knows you see the dark red of his eyes, a lust-filled predator, and yet you don't seem to care one bit. Instead, you yearn for him, your arms entwining around his neck to meet him in a kiss. Ulysses revels in the sensation of your body melding seamlessly with his, surrendering to his dominance as he ravishes your mouth with a fervent hunger, relishing the taste of your fervor. Your mouth, an addictive nectar, surpasses any pleasure he has ever savored in his two millennia of existence.

As your perky nipples graze against the chiseled contours of his muscular chest, a shiver of pleasure courses through your body, leaving you breathless and emitting a delicate whimper. He hungrily devours your sounds, his lips relentlessly claiming yours, until your once tender lips become swollen, evidence of his insatiable desire.

“More," You plead softly. "I need more." You can't help but squirm against him, hips bucking. Hungry. Needy. Demanding. The poison inside you ignites a fiery hunger, and only he can quench it. All you desire is him. His touch, his kiss, rough and demanding. You yearn for the numbness that envelops you when he tilts your head back, dominating your mouth repeatedly. Your cries are filled with urgency, and you don't care if you have to beg him to get what you want. What you needed.

"I can feel the heat of your cunt through my pants, dove," He whispers softly, and to you? He murmurs gently to you. He exudes pure, sinful allure. Temptation. Forbidden and devilish. The brush of his teeth on your neck causes your eyes to close and your lips to part. "I bet your panties are drenched, aren't they?" The question has another wave of slick dripping from your pussy.

He doesn't bother waiting for your response; instead, he plants a series of kisses from your lips to your neck, and then down to your breasts. Every gentle bite or caress sends a surge of heat directly to your pussy. The heat is intense, scorching, pulsating between your thighs, and you can't help but squirm. Your pussy twitches, clenches, and weeps with hunger.

"I want to see for myself," He states, nipping under your breast and then down along your ribs. "I need the taste of you on my tongue, my mate." His sensual words make you flush red, but sends your stomach clenching in anticipation, it goes straight to your core. You weren't certain you could survive. Certainly if he didn't speed up his teasing you wouldn't, you truly didn't want your brain to swell and explode.

His stalling mouth doesn't stay very long but continues to journey down your belly, his tongue dipping into your navel. Gracefully, he slides off the bed and kneels in front of you, urging you to the edge and pushing your thighs apart. "Rest your feet on my shoulders," he commands, his voice thick and velvety. Filled with dark promise. A shiver runs down your spine at the sound and another pulse of hunger shudders through you. There's no thought in your mind that think to defy the edge in his tone. Without hesitation, you comply, soft feet settling over his broad shoulders.

You would do anything for him at this moment. You had never in your 20+ years of living ever felt so desperate or needy. The feeling was so strange but, so intense, your body shook with it. Your heart raced, blood pounding in your ears and flushing your cheeks. Ulysses' face bore a dark, erotic lewdness. Intense. Savage even. Feral and untamed, it stirred something deep within you, something you didn't even realize was there. You hungered for him so much that you could feel the warm wetness of your arousal smearing your thighs and gathering between your folds in anticipation.

A soft whimper escaped your lips as you gripped his locs of hair, your breathing ragged. You were completely bare to him and you should have been embarrassed to have a demon you just met buried between your thighs, but instead, you were all the more desperate for him to do something—anything.

"So wet. So sweet." His gaze fixates on the luscious, soft curls on your mound, damp with heat, his eyes hooded and hungry. With a low, primal growl, he exhales a cool breath directly onto your feverish folds, and you sob, oversensitive and gripping his horns to steady yourself. "You belong to me," he declares. You don't even have time to process his words because he lowers his head to the feast between your shaking thighs. Your cry is hoarse. Broken. Mewling. He doesn't just give a tentative lick. Ulysses takes what he wants like a starved beast. He consumes your mind, body, and soul with a ravenous appetite.

He consumes you. His tongue delving deep to extract the musky, sweet taste of you. He nibbles, sucks. He dominates you with just his mouth and nothing more. Powerless to do anything but hold on, you grasp his horns, his firm hold on your thighs, keeping your legs spread wide for his plundering mouth. It was beautiful. So good. Better than anything you could have imagined. Your mind refuses to function, focusing on the sheer pleasure escalating like a tsunami. The sensations are indecent, and arousing, the intensity escalating the insatiable desire within her higher and higher.

He releases a fierce hunger within you, his tongue flicking, diving deep repeatedly, caressing and teasing. His deep snarls only added to the sensations battering through you. The flames roar back with a vengeance, tantalizing your nerves and scorching through your veins, a blaze of passion across your stomach and down your legs, along your spine, and deep inside your sopping pussy. You were so close, the tension coiling so tightly you cry out with need as his mouth envelops your hypersensitive bundle of nerves, he licks just enough to overwhelm you with sensations, but not enough to release you. "Ulysses," You whimper his name in a desperate plea. Begging. Longing. Knowing he would fulfill your desires in his own time. Your body was his. He had claimed it and he was making sure you were aware of that. "Please," You whisper, fingers now clutching his black tresses.

He looks up at you and you feel the added intensity of his twinkling eyes. Your hips involuntarily thrust against him, craving the tantalizing sensations that tease you just beyond your grasp. His mouth covers your sensitive clit once again, his tongue flicking, licking, pressing with broad, flat strokes and caresses, driving you higher than you thought possible, until you scream your release. The rapid, relentless rhythm pushes you beyond your limits, causing you to surrender to the overwhelming release that consumes you. Overwhelmed by ecstasy, you bury his face deeper into your pulsating core, grinding against his tongue as your thighs tremble with desire. "Ulysses." You sob his name like a prayer. He tenderly traces the inside of your thigh, soothing your senses with his gentle touch. Slowly, your eyes flutter shut, your racing heartbeat gradually returning to its steady rhythm. Exhaustion washes over you, and the sweet embrace of sleep claims you.

With a soft knock on the door, the demon eases you back into bed, pulling the duvet over your body. Elmira glides into the room, placing the requested items on the table. "Escort the guest back to the meeting room, we'll resume the conference."

As you wake up from your poisoning-induced slumber, the darkness of night surrounds you, the castle eerily quiet except for the gentle sound of raindrops. Sitting up in bed, you slowly rub the sleep from your eyes, allowing the events of the day to slowly return to your mind. "Oh God." The events from earlier today rush back to you in vivid detail. You cover your mouth with your hand, shaking your head in disbelief. It must have been a dream, an incredibly lifelike, tantalizing dream. But the dampness between your thighs and your labia tells a different story. "I must have been dreaming."

"Of what?" The deep voice that you were starting to get used to startles you. Ulysses closes the door behind him, striding over to his desk. "I came to check on you after what happened earlier," His muscles tense and a surge of desire flickers in his eyes. Oh, and you were naked beneath the sheets. "So, I wasn't dreaming?" Ulysses chuckles humorlessly. "With the taste of your pussy still on my tongue, I don't think so." You try and ignore his lewd words, cheeks heating, instead you question him. "Earlier, when, yeah— you called me your mate, are we talking like, Australian mate? Pirate mate? Ahoy. What did you mean by it?"

"As in soulmate, predestined. You belong to me as I belong to you." His voice is gravelly and tinged with weariness, and you almost invite him into bed with you. "How? And how do you find me? Why me?" "Soulmates for Demons are rare, not many have them and they usually outlive them. Stumbling upon you was a fluke, but one I wouldn't change." Ulysses studies your reaction with a bated breath, searching and wondering. "I discovered you through your heartbeat. Your emotions. I could sense them all. Your fear, your relief, your longing."

"As simple as that, I got attached. Part of me wanted to leave you there, to never lay eyes on you again. However, your emotions anchored me. The solace you found in the echo of my voice and the sense of security you experienced, impelled me to protect you." Ulysses saunters closer, pausing to rest against the bed frame. "Your clumsiness, magnet to trouble, love of nature, and politeness to the staff, only made you more irresistible."

Your heart pounds relentlessly in your chest, a rhythmic thump that resonates with the intensity of a confession. "Whether you desire to depart from this place is inconsequential, for I have no intentions of releasing you," Is it sinful that you find yourself utterly aroused? The way his smoldering eyes possessively roam over your figure sends a tantalizing shiver down your spine. His eyebrow quirks in a provocative gesture, and his eyes sparkle with a magnetic allure.

You felt your cheeks flush and your heart pound. He knew exactly how to turn you on. It was wrong, but it was also thrilling. The way he gazed at you made your pussy drool. Your clit throbbed with excitement. A part of you blamed it on the poison still gliding through your veins. "I don't see a reason to go anywhere," you murmur, relaxing your grip on the sheet. Ulysses' jaw tightens as he advances, his lips crashing onto yours forcefully, swallowing your moan before breaking away.

"I'll put your mouth to use little human."

The thought of his throbbing cock sliding deep into your throat sends delightful shivers down your spine and the way his gaze darkens lets you know that he can also feel what you think as well. With a hint of shyness, you cautiously approach him, allowing the sheet to gracefully slip from your body, settling on your knees right before him. Craning your neck to look up at him, captivated by his towering presence. At his staggering height, you had no problem being face-to-face with his bulge. Your lips form a sultry pout as he gently cradles your face in his hands, while his other two hands firmly grip your hair, a hold that is both biting and intoxicating, leaving your pussy dripping.

A primal hunger consumes you. He was an irresistible temptation, and you had already indulged in a sinful taste of him, otherworldly and enigmatic. You yearned for more. "Put your hands on my thighs," He says softly, his gaze burning into yours. You inhale deeply, your head shaking in disbelief, your eyes sparkling with desire. "I've never done this before."

"I know." Those two words swirl inside you. Makes you shiver. With his remaining hand, he deftly undoes his pants, revealing his cock.

As you inhale deeply, your throat tightens and your eyes feast upon him. His jet-black hair is elegantly swept away from his captivating face. With broad shoulders and narrow hips, he possesses a striking V-shaped silhouette. His thighs are thick, lean and firm, but your gaze is centered on his pulsing, jerking cock. He's bigger than you imagined a man would be— well a demon. He's long and thick, perfectly matching his purple-grey skin tone, but there is an otherworldly quality to it that leaves you craving more. Intricate ridges and pulsating veins adorn its length.

"Keep looking at me, dove. I need to see you, to make certain you want this."

Your gaze swiftly ascended, locked in a passionate connection, for in that very moment, you were ready to surrender the world to him. He envelops his fingers around the base of his cock, guiding it towards your awaiting mouth, an act so tantalizingly arousing, it surpasses any previous encounters. (Not that you've had many, but…) Ulysses presses the velvety head against your lips, and the sensation of his precum moistening them ignites a pulsating surge of pleasure within your core. Driven by instinct, you part your lips and sensually lick the glistening droplets, taking the offering and savoring his taste.

His groan is deep as the flat of your tongue dances over his sensitive tip. He retreats momentarily, causing you to whimper in protest, which is quickly silenced as he abruptly sinks into your mouth, giving you what you want. He moves unhurriedly, each stroke taking him deeper until he's nearly at the back of your throat, careful of you. But you can feel the way his body responds as you suckle hard. It's orgasmic, the violent way his muscles contract from the burning pleasure. His gaze, dark and intense, follows every movement of his cock as it slides in and out of your mouth; tip and shaft sloppy now, dripping with saliva.

You revel in the sensation of his intense gaze watching your pillowy lips enveloping his cock, and this feeling alone from you has his cock swollen and engorged, so much so that your jaw aches. You sensually trace circles around the tip before lavishly slurping the underside of his shaft. Your eyes lock with his as he spasmodically twitches within your mouth.

"Enough." An order, his voice rough. He can't help himself. He had to have you. The plea in your eyes, the pure fire burning there, swallowing him whole, is too difficult to oppose. With one final thrust, he plunges deep into your throat, holding you there until your eyes well up with tears, before sliding his cock from your mouth.

Ulysses follows you down onto the bed, your arms circling his neck. Your thighs part, thighs glistening and pussy glittering in the soft, dull glow of the moons. And oh, he seizes the opportunity, lodging the wide head of his cock into that fiery haven. A growl rumbles low in his chest as your pussy clenches, squeezing around the tip of his cock.

Your cunt felt like molten lava engulfing him, so intense that he feels he might explode. Ulysses slowly applies pressure, short bursts that push through your resistance. It's scorching. So perfect. Too tight. Strangling him in a vice grip. The sensation is sheer bliss, your body stretching and igniting, reluctantly surrendering to his invasion.

Ulysses halts as he knocks dully on your thin, virgin wall and holds himself still, jaw ticking and hands gripping the bed frame, causing it to splinter. To give your body the time it needed to adjust to his incursion. He wasn't nearly in deep enough. The effort to remain still is almost unbearable. "Dove, look at me." he pleads. He had to see your eyes. Your lashes flutter and then lift. His stomach muscles contract malevolently. His body shudders and his cock thickens, and throbs, desperate for more.

You looked absolutely breathtaking.

"I need more," You whisper. "Please, hurry. Please. I'm burning up. I need . . ."

"I know what you need." Three of his arms embraces your hips, lifting you effortlessly. In an instant, your legs coil around him, ankles clasping at his waist, and fingers entwining at the back of his neck, eyes pleading. Ulysses takes a deep breath, for the sight of you is overwhelming.

He thrusts forward, with unrelenting intensity. Breaking through your innocence and forcefully entering your tightness, the scalding fire seizing him, and your tight pussy has no choice but to accept all of him.

You cry out at the bite of pain, but he feels you surround his cock tightly, tugging him deeper until he's lodged all the way, kissing your cervix. Your tight muscles contract around him, gripping and pulsating. Your hips buck. A small whimper of need slips from your throat. The need to fuck hard and deep into you repeatedly nearly sends him over the edge. "Are you ready? Breathe for me, dove." Your eyes meet his. Wild. So untamed, his breath catches in his throat. He holds you still while you try your hardest to grind against him, desperate to move.

"Please, fuck me." Your voice sends him over the edge. He moves then, drawing back and then plunging deep into your drooling cunt. Your tightness, like scorching silk, grip his cock. He feels the last of his control snap and he begins to drill into you. It's rough, too rough for your innocence, but he can't help himself. The pleasure consumes him, almost bordering on pain in its intensity.

He can feel you rising toward your orgasm. Surging toward it. He grasps your hips firmly, holding you, for a moment, savoring your tight, dripping cunt, and then he surges into you over and over with hard, deep strokes. Ulysses feels his balls tighten at the sudden, overwhelming convulsion of your pussy. The intense fluttering around him. Your moans fill his ears—his very being. Pleasure overwhelms him.

Each hard jerk of his thick, creamy cum spilling into you is a wave of pleasure. He raises his head and looks down at you, at the helpless, cute, bewildered pleasure on your face. Your lashes flutter and before you can open your eyes all the way, Ulysses slants his mouth across yours. Gently. Completely at odds with his roughness earlier. And you respond softly. Tiredly.

"Sleep, we have all of eternity."

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dreamsteddie · 4 months ago

Text

Can't Take My Eyes Off You

Written for the @stmarchmm day one prompt “courting rituals” | Tags: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Courting Rituals, Alpha Eddie Munson, Omega Steve Harrington - Also on Ao3

Bat divider -@popmilky | Diamond divider - @inklore

Eddie knows he doesn’t have much going for him in terms of mating material.

Despite presenting as an Alpha early at age twelve, something that should have given him some kind of status in a town like Hawkins, there’s always been something about him that makes people turn their noses up at him, close doors in his face. He’s kind of wishy-washy when it comes to the things he’s not passionate about, he smells like wet pavement and cigarette smoke, and can’t for the life of him seem to graduate high school.

He also can’t grow a beard, can’t remember to separate the darks from the lights, can’t tie his shoes without using the bunny ears method, can’t hop in place and rub his tummy, can’t-

Well the point is, there are a lot of “can’t”s in his life and never a whole lot of “can”s

The one thing Eddie can do without a shadow of a doubt is pursue delusions of grandeur with a single-minded determination. No matter how hard this shit-hole town and all its designation-obsessed inhabitants have tried to beat him into the dirt over the years, he’s never let go of his dreams. Some day, he’s going to play songs for the entire goddamn planet, making millions of dollars off lyrics inspired by all the games and books that have gotten his head shoved in the Hawkin’s High toilets over the years, and Mayor Kline will have to give him a key to the city while Eddie Munson, town freak, gives him the middle finger.

And, if all the stars align and the Big Guy upstairs he doesn’t believe in does him several solids, he’ll be doing it with Steve Harrington standing by his side.

The guys think he’s crazy—Eddie thinks he’s crazy—but Eddie is determined to give his all into courting Steve Harrington before their shared senior year ends. He’s, by and large, the most eligible Omega in all of Hawkins, even with his recent breakup with Nancy Wheeler under his belt. No amount of ditching the popular crowd, adopting a bunch of children, and becoming best friends with band geek Robin Buckley has been enough to deter the Alphas of Hawkins High, even if some of them won’t admit it.

Eddie takes great pleasure in watching every failed courting offer. Steve has always been picky about who he lets take him out, but he hasn’t taken up a single Alpha’s offer since Nancy and the rejections are getting more brutal by the day. Eddie suspects it’s Robin’s influence and if that is the case he needs to thank her profusely because Eddie goes a little weak in the knees every time he sees Steve literally turn up his perfect nose at an offer.

So, the odds aren’t looking good. Steve is picky and Eddie is famously a poor, nobody freak, not the kind of guy with the resources to properly woo a guy like Steve, but what Eddie does have is a lot of passion and a strong desire to prove himself.

So Eddie has a capital P Plan.

“Hey Buckley,” Eddie says sliding up to the girl where she’s packing up at the bleachers after practice. She gives him a scrutinizing look and clearly finds him lacking, squinting her eyes at him like he’s a little bug landed on her shoulder. Irritating and suspicious. Which, rude. “I was wondering if a fine lady like yourself would happen to know what one Steve Harrington might be hoping for in a courting” Robin clearly wasn’t expecting him to come right out and ask, her blue eyes going wide.

“What the fuck, Munson!” She crows, clearly embarrassed by his lack of tact.

“What!?” He fires back, not understanding what the big deal is. He wants to court Steve and Robin is the best source of information on how to go about it.

“You can’t just ask that, you doofus,” she hisses, lavender scent going smokey like brush fire.

“Why not? I want to court him, like, publicly. Everyone’s gonna know in a couple weeks anyway. Shouldn’t you be glad you’re the first to know?” He huffs. He knows it’s not exactly the done thing to go around telling people you’re going to court someone. You’re supposed to be delicate. Hint at it and build up little courting gifts and don’t look anyone in the eye. It’s dumb as hell and Eddie wants no part of it. Besides, so far as Eddie has seen, that method hasn’t worked on Steve anyway. Eddie may as well go about this in his own way, which includes getting insider information.

Still clearly not impressed, Robin says “You? You want to court Steve? Resident anti-conformist, jock-hating, Eddie Munson wants to court Steve Harrington. Why?” Her tone is clearly disbelieving, which, again, rude.

“Uh, I mean, have you seen him with those kids? He’s wicked hot with that whole mom thing he’s got going on.” At that, Robin gags. “And, I mean, I know he’s a jock but he’s also an Omega and he pretty much said fuck it to Hawkin’s High when he presented and refused to give up his position as captain. That was super fucking metal,” he says all earnest.

“And I like the way he smells, like a fresh cinnamon roll. And we shared an English class once and he asked me about the doodle of a Beholder I worked on instead of taking notes. And I know I’m not exactly a prime Alpha but I don’t think that really matters. At least not to me. I want to kiss him and make sweet love to him and have babies with him and -” Robin cuts him off with a hand over his mouth.

“Ok, I get it. You like him.” She says that, but she’s still looking at him like she can’t figure him out. “Alright…I don’t know if I like you Eddie but I’ll throw you a bone. Just one, got it? And if you fuck it up, I’m not helping you again.” She says, waiting for him to nod before removing her hand from his mouth.

Eddie takes a deep, overdramatic breath in like he’s just breached water. “Got it.”

Robin takes a deep breath of her own. “Steve’s been propositioned for courting 19 times since he presented and he’s only said yes to one. One-off dates not included.” She hasn’t stopped looking him straight in the eye, making sure he pays attention. “Nancy gave him a set of handwritten notes for history because she noticed he was struggling. All the other Alphas got him fancy jewelry, useless house stuff, and generic valentine's day crap.” With that, she gives him one last, long look before grabbing her trumpet and leaving, the sound of metal clanging under her feet following in her wake.

“Thanks, Buckey!” He calls out, waving his hand wildly at her retreating back. She ignores him.

Well, no matter. He’s got a courting to plan.

The thing about courting when you have $3.45 to your name after rent and gas is that you have to get creative. Which isn’t a problem, Eddie breathes creativity. If he wasn't already “The Freak” he’s sure he would be Eddie “The Creative” Munson. Really, it has a nice ring to it.

The problem comes with making something with $3.45 that is also a worthy courting gift for Steve Harrington. Which, given Robin’s tip, might not be as big a concern as he would have thought. But even if Steve would be happy with a heartfelt love letter and those peanut butter brownies Eddie knows he likes, there’s a part of him that wants to blow every other Alpha and Beta that came before him completely out of the water. Maybe especially Nancy Wheeler.

Sue him, he wants to be the best.

Which leaves him with the option of a gesture. Eddie loves a gesture, but this one is going to require some help. Luckily, Eddie knows where every gang of geeks in Hawkin’s makes their dens, even if they’re not his gang of geeks. It comes with being Head Freak. It’s his responsibility, really.

Which is how he finds himself in the Hawkins Middle AV club room being stared down by a bunch of beady-eyed thirteen year olds on the verge of presenting. Jesus, these kids are intense.

“So yeah, that’s what I’m planning,” he finishes explaining. Would it kill them to look a little impressed? He’s pretty proud of it himself. Instead of sharing looks of awe, the six of them share looks of judgement between them, obviously having a silent conversation between them like some kind of hive mind. Eddie will never admit it makes him sweat a little bit.

“You want to ask to court Steve. Steve Harrington?” the tall, skinny one asks like he can’t believe it. Eddie doesn’t know if the disgust is for him or for the Omega. Either way, ouch.

“Yes,” he replies, sweating a little more. They all share more looks, the redhead in particular is looking at him like he’s gum stuck on the bottom of her shoes.

“Why?” The curly one asks, firm and more seriously than any kid that dorky looking should have any right to speak. Seriously, he looks like a poodle in a Star Wars shirt and a trucker hat. But, Eddie knows enough about Steve to know that these are his kids, his pups, and despite how much it chafes him to have people continually asking why he wants to court Steve, like it isn’t obvious, he knows these pups are just looking out for their pack Omega.

With a deep sigh, Eddie explains for the second time in less than a week, everything he loves about Steve Harrington. At the end of his speech, the pups stare at him for a long moment before simultaneously turning their back on him to form an honest to God huddle. Seriously, the hive mind thing is looking more and more likely. Maybe he should use this for a campaign. Very Children of the Corn.

While Eddie is lost in his musing, they seem to come to some kind of conclusion, breaking up and returning to one solid, unbreakable line. It’s the other girl, hair short and at that awkward growing out length that Eddie knows all too well that steps forward. All these kids are intense, but there’s something especially severe about her, something Eddie only half recognizes.

“We will help you,” she says, quiet and solemn.

This is going to fucking fantastic, Eddie thinks, wild grin splitting across his face.

It’s embarrassingly easy to sneak a band of six middle schoolers and one elementary schooler into the school after hours. The kids met him outside the building just at exactly 4:00 PM the Friday after their meeting in the AV room just as they planned. The addition of the feisty ten year old was unexpected, but she proved herself invaluable in charming the one teacher that stopped them on their way to the radio room, spinning some tale about being so excited for higher learning that they wanted to explore the high school. Eddie thinks Erica Sinclair should run the world.

The kids are a well oiled, if slightly annoying, machine. As soon as Eddie pops the door open they’re getting to work figuring out how the PA system works and how long the range is. Dustin and Lucas insist that they move the entire unit closer to the field, and Max and Will are quick to source a cart for the whole thing. In record time they’re all piling into the coaches office, the one with a clear view of the basketball court where the team is running their Friday drills. Honestly, it feels a little like they’re highjacking Eddie’s plan, but the smiles on their face and their puppy sweet excitement softens the blow a little.

“You ready?” The curly haired one, Dustin, asks while offering him the mic.

“I was born for this, Dusty,” he says, snatching the mic out of his hand and taking his place outside the main gym doors.

Despite what he said, Eddie is nervous. He shakes his hands and bounces in place, trying to shake it off. Before he’s ready, he hears the slightly crackly jazzy intro pouring through the speakers. He counts his beats, waiting for his que. He spent hours planning this, recording the background music with the band, turning the lyrics over and over in his head, even practicing his grand entrance. He’s as ready as he can be.

God, he hopes this works.

And there’s his que, that little pause in the music just enough time for him to push open the doors to the main gym with all his strength, relishing in the dramatic banging sound.

All eyes are on him. Steve’s eyes are on him.

You're just too good to be true,

Can't take my eyes off of you,

He sings as he walks. All the activity in the gym has come to a halt, everyone too confused and curious to stop it. He’s looking right at Steve, who turns his head like he’s expecting to see someone else behind him. He’s so cute, Eddie wants to eat him alive.

At long last love has arrived,

And I thank God I'm alive,

You're just too good to be true

Eddie knows he doesn’t have a lot of time, any moment now principle Higgins and his one security lackey are going to bust through the doors to find out who stole the announcement equipment. This is the moment, the one that needs to count. Eddie saunters right up to Steve like his heart isn’t trying to beat out of his chest and kneels down like a knight to their king. He takes his hand, and Steve lets him as he sings the next line looking right up into those beautiful hazel eyes.

Can't take my eyes off of you.

He turns the hand in his own over to expose the Omega’s wrist just as the music pauses and presses a soft, lingering kiss to the gland there. A courting kiss.

Almost like he planned it, the doors burst open a second time revealing the fuming face of Principle Higgins and his goon. He turns a manic grin Steve’s way just as the music picks back up, cutting straight to the chorus. He presses one last kiss to Steve’s wrist and takes in the way his pretty, pink lips are parted in disbelief, eyes wide and then he’s running.

I love you baby,

And if it's quite alright,

I need you baby,

To warm the lonely nights

Let it never be said that Eddie Munson, for all the ways he fails to be the ideal Alpha, doesn’t have a hell of a lot of stamina. He’s been a proud runner all his life, and he’s using it to his advantage today to put on a show. He’s singing and he’s running as Higgins and Officer Jerry chase his tail like they have any hope of catching him when he doesn’t want to be caught, when he can see the most beautiful boy in the world laughing at him in disbelief as he ducks and dodges around the court.

But even Eddie has his limits and, like he said, he planned this to a T. He can feel himself running out of breath but he refuses to call it before the climax. He’s stomping his way up the bleachers, making a show of going between the rows dancing like he’s in an old hollywood musical. Higgin’s is closing in, but there’s now way he’s getting caught. Not today. He puts in a burst of speed, leaving them in the dust and putting himself right at the top of the wooden stands, singing directly to Steve who is absolutely glowing on the court.

And let me love you,

Baby let me love you…

The music gives one last swell, the Corroded Coffin of two days ago pouring their heart out for the Eddie of today. The music comes to an abrupt halt, the gym very quickly filling with laughter and applause. The kids are screaming their heads off in the office, loud enough to draw Steve’s attention to where they can be seen through the large window. The joy and disbelief on Steve’s face makes all of this worth it, no matter what happens next.

Eddie wishes he could relish in it longer, but the goon squad is gaining ground fast and he has one last message to give before he hauls ass into the next phase of his plan. He starts inching his way toward the exit, not taking his eyes off Steve as he goes. He needs him to hear this.

“Steve Harrington, it would be the honor of my life to court you with the intention of mating. Meet me at the lake at seven if you’ll hear me out.” And with that, he’s gone. He wishes he could stay to see his reaction, but he’s out of time.

He pushes through the emergency exit to the sound of hollering and clapping, all he can do now is commence with phase two.

Phase two mainly consists of picking everything up from the trailer, changing into his nice clothes, and heading toward Lover’s Lake to set everything up.

Eddie thinks this is the most nerve wracking part of the whole plan. In many ways, the whole big performance was the easy part. Eddie loves to perform, eats up the attention like a cat laps up milk. This, the full bearing of his heart to the Omega he wants to spend his life with, is far scarier than anything else. Here in the back of his van, the paper hearts and pillar candles, hand-picked daisies and hand-made peanut butter brownies, leave him completely exposed.

He wonders if Steve will show up.

He wishes he didn’t set up so god damn early. The waiting is excruciating.

The Alpha paces around, adjusts the blankets on the bottom of the van and then decides they were better before, and checks his watch every half minute like it will make time move faster. He sits and watches the hands turn from 6:59 to 7:00. Maybe Steve won’t come. Maybe this was all for nothing and he’ll have to go back to school on Monday and pretend like he isn’t heartbroken.

His watch continues to tick. 7:03, 7:07, 7:10. He’s getting ready to pick it all back up when he hears the muffled sound of tires on soft dirt. Suddenly, his heart is in his throat as he watches the distinct headlights of his favorite Beamer turn into the clearing.

Eddie scrambles to his feet, he has a plan to carry out.

He watches, heart in his throat as Steve parks. Watches as the door opens and Steve emerges, a sweet, sheepish smile on his face.

“Sorry I’m late.” Steve looks like a dream. He clearly went home and had a shower and a change of clothes. He’s wearing light wash jeans that hug his thighs and a soft looking, deep red sweater, the collar of a white dress shirt peeking out from underneath. He’s dressed up for Eddie.

There’s a long pause where Eddie forgets how to speak and Steve just stands there, clearly waiting for Eddie to make a move. Eddie comes back to himself all at one, shaking his head hard like a dog, making Steve let out a startled laugh. “What the hell?” He asks, not mean, but bemused.

“My deepest apologies my liege, I was simply stunned by your beauty,” he says with a half bow, extending his arm for Steve to take. “It is my pleasure to welcome you to Cafe Munson, the finest pop up restaurant this side of Indiana.” It’s goofy and a little ridiculous but Steve takes the offered arm with a little smile, sending a pleasant jolt through his body.

Eddie leads Steve toward the open back of the van, watching him intently as he takes it in. He gets to see as the Omega’s eyes go wide, mouth parting in a little gasp. When he turns to look at Eddie, he’s already looking back. “You did this for me?” He asks, wonder coloring his voice. All of a sudden Eddie feels a little shy, a little sheepish.

“I know it’s not much, I’m not exactly liquid at the moment, but I wanted to do something nice for you,” he says, unoccupied arm reaching up to tug a piece of hair over his mouth. Steve looks at him for a long moment before turning back to the van. There are blankets everywhere, pretty much every one from the house plus a couple he nicked from Gareth’s house after practice. The emergency pillar lights from the pantry give the space a soft glow, paper hearts hang from string from the metal roof, and a repurposed laundry basket full of tupperwares and miller lites sits in the center.

“It’s perfect” Steve says, and Eddie can’t help but believe him. Not when his scent is blooming, cinnamon roll sweet, right under Eddie’s nose.

Eddie leads him to the van, gives him his hand to help him into the back. He takes a moment to take it all in, Steve Harrington settling into a date with Eddie Munson. It’s his biggest dream come true.

He climbs in after the other boy and starts pulling out tupperwares. Steve has settled in to lean on the wall of pillows Eddie constructed for just this reason, pulling a blanket over the both of them when Eddie settles in next to him. Steve laughs with every overly dramatic introduction he makes for the food, and Eddie doesn’t think he’s ever been this warm. Neither of them brings up why they’re here, the underlying meaning behind it all. They dance around it, laughing about the kids, Steve’s sports and Eddie’s games, the look on Principle Higgin’s face when he burst into the gym earlier that day. The whole place smells like cinnamon and smoke, Eddie doesn’t think there’s a better smell in the whole world.

They don’t say a thing about courting or mating or scents until they polish off their cold pasta, courtesy of Wayne, and Eddie pulls out the last tupperware from the bottom of the laundry basket. “And for dessert, may I have a drumroll please….” Steve rolls his eyes but smiles as he complies, drumming a little beat with fingers on the side of the van. Eddie pulls out the container with a flourish, “The finest peanut butter brownies $3.15 worth of ingredients from Melvald’s can get you.” He expects laughter, maybe some light teasing as Steve has been shown to enjoy throughout the night, but all he gets is silence.

He worries, for a moment, that he got it wrong. Maybe Steve doesn’t like peanut butter brownies. Jesus H Christ, maybe he’s allergic to peanuts and Eddie has just massively fucked this up. He’s getting ready to spiral and try to fix it when Steve speaks, voice soft in a way Eddie can’t place.

“Those are my favorites,” he says. When Eddie is brave enough to look at his face again, he’s met with wet, adoring eyes. Eddie doesn't know if anyone has ever looked at him like that before. Like he was something magical. Something special just for them.

Eddie clears his throat when Steve doesn’t say anything else. Just keeps staring at him like he’s waiting for something big. “Yeah, yeah I know,” he says, bracing himself for what comes next. “I uh, I saw you buy some at the club fair last year. You bought three of them and then came back for one more before they closed the booth.” It shouldn’t be such a big admission, but it feels like he’s just handed Steve his heart on a silver platter.

“Eddie?” Steve asks, turning toward him fully.

“Yeah?” Eddie asks, sitting up so they’re eye to eye.

“What you said, on the basketball court, will you ask me again?” He’s looking at him with so much hope in his eyes, Eddie almost feels like he could choke on it. Instead, he focuses in on the perfect scent of the man next to him, breathes steadily in and out.

“It would be the honor of my life to court you with the intention of mating, Steve Harrington.” As he says it, he reaches into his pocket for his last offering, his hail mary pass, his death saving throw. It’s a silly thing, cost his last 30 cents at the stationary store, but he was listening to Robin on those bleachers that day. Knows that the gesture and the picnic are all well and good, but what Steve has been missing with all those other Alphas is someone who notices the small details and holds them close. Someone who cares about his C+ in History, someone who knows his favorite brownies are swirled with peanut butter.

Someone who notices that he lost his eraser last week and has been meaning to pick up a new one.

Eddie holds out his heart one last time, it’s shaped like a 30 cent eraser. White and covered with a paper band. The best one on the market.

Steve stares at the little eraser like it contains the answers to the universe, and then he’s plucking it, oh so gently, out of his hands and cradling it in his own. Eddie waits, the ball is completely in Steve’s court now, Eddie has played all his cards.

Suddenly, Steve scent starts to bloom, even more than it did when he first saw the van. The smell of sugar, cinnamon, and yeast so strong it makes Eddie feel light headed. Eddie gets a glimpse of the most beautiful smile in the world just before Steve is throwing his arm around his neck, nudging his way into his lap to notch his head right at Eddie’s scent gland. Eddie’s arms instinctually wrap around his back, keeping him close.

“Yes,” Steve says, the sound of it muffled by the soft skin of Eddie’s neck. Eddie squeezes him tight, knows he needs to ask, just to make sure but worried he’s hallucinating. Scared to believe he’s getting everything he’s ever wanted.

“Yes?” He asks, lips trembling where they’ve found their own place at Steve’s neck, wanting to be as close as possible, just in case.

“Yes.” And Steve is pulling back, which Eddie hates, and cupping his face in is hands. “It would be the honor of my life to accept your courting offer, Eddie Munson,” he says, sure and steady and full to the brim of hope.

“Holy shit.” Eddie can’t believe this is happening. Despite all the planing and the performing and the putting his heart on the line he never actually let himself think that this would happen. Never let himself think about how it would end.

Without much though Eddie barrels forward to bury his head back into the Omega’s neck, his Omega’s neck, peppering him with fervent little kisses until Steve is giggling so hard he tips them over into the pile of pillows behind him. Eddie is full to the brim with joy, happier than he’s ever been and all of a sudden he needs to move. Needs to let the whole world know what he’s got in the palm of his hands.

He jolts up with one last kiss to Steve’s cheek, managing a quick “be right back!” before he launching himself out of the van. He hears Steve calling out in confusion, but it quickly turns into more joyous laughter as Eddie steps out of the van and starts jumping in place, punching the air and whooping into the night sky.

“Fuck you Hawkins! I’m courting Steve Harrington! I’m on top of the God Damn world!” He gets in one last double bird in the general direction of Main Street before Steve is calling him back in.

“Ok, you’ve had your moment. Now get your ass back in here and kiss me for real, you dumb Alpha,” he says, laughter still caught in his throat. And really? Who is Eddie do deny a request like that?

So excited for MMM, guys! I won't be doing every day, but I will be doing at lest a couple of full one shots and some of my normal ramblings. (Also, this is the longest thing I've ever written that wasn't an academic paper and I am low key very proud of myself)

#March Mating Madness #steddie #omegaverse #stranger things #eddie munson #steve harrington #alpha eddie munson #omega steve harrington #dreamer speaks #fanfiction #robin buckley

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jinjeriffic · 1 year ago

Text

DCxDP Prophecy Universe Part 2

Part 1

Damian glared at the envelope. He and Father were in the process of analysing the letter for any signs of toxins, explosives or other traps. Obviously he wasn’t fool enough to open a missive from a questionable source without taking precautions. So far, all their scans had come up empty. Literally. The letter was defying all their attempts at chemical or spectroscopic testing, x-ray and magnetic resonance scans were inconclusive, it defied all properties of ordinary matter. It was frustrating. It was vexing. He was blaming magic.

For all intents and purposes, the letter looked like ordinary paper, with an ordinary wax seal, bearing the initials CW. The looping handwriting addressing it to Damian was precise and neat. Swiping the surface of the letter for chemical traces yielded no results. When Damian had tried to cut off a corner of the paper for analysis it had resisted all attempts, including a laser and a diamond headed cutting tool. Damian’s only satisfaction was that when Father had grunted and taken over the task from Damian, he had no more success than his son. As if Damian didn’t know how to perform the standard array of tests!

It certainly didn’t help that his siblings wouldn’t stop their incessant chattering!

“I’m just saying, ghosts wouldn’t be the weirdest thing we’ve encountered, Red. I’m not sure it would even make my personal Top 5.”

It seemed gossip among heroes travelled faster than the speed of light.

“Really, Nightwing? Ghosts? It’s far more likely to be a meta with something to hide. Or a few screws loose.” Damian could practically hear the eyeroll in Drake’s voice “And since when do ghosts act as glorified mailmen?”

“I don’t know Red, since when do aliens pretend to be Kansas farmboys? C’mon, we deal with magic users all the time!”

“And lets not forget people coming back from the dead” Red Hood interjected over the open comm line.

“Magic is just science we don’t understand yet. Any sufficiently analysed magic becomes indistinguishable from science!”

“B, a little help here?”

“Hn” Father straightened up from his position at the lab table “Oracle, any progress on clearing up the footage from Robin’s mask?”

Grayson threw up his hands with a frustrated huff while Drake smirked.

“The program is almost finished rendering. Whatever scrambler they used did a real number on the video quality. I’m surprised the audio is as clear as it is.” Oracle replied.

“Hn. And the isotope tracer on the money?”

“Sorry B, no hits on the local sensors. Wherever the guy went it’s either outside Gotham or shielded somehow.” she said, mildly frustrated.

“Maybe it’s ghost magiiiiic” Drake sing-songed. Grayson lightly cuffed the back of his head, to which the former Robin responded with a firm shove. Their interaction quickly devolved into a childish tussle.

Damian gave an annoyed huff. “Don’t you two imbeciles have anything better to do?”

“Aww, we’re just here to look out for our baby brother!” Nightwing teased.

“Yeah, we gotta make sure your ghost encounter didn’t leave any lasting psychological damage!” Red Robin added.

Before Damian could retaliate for their needling, Oracle chimed in. “Uh, guys? You’re going to want to see this. Most of the footage was corrupted beyond repair, but I was able to pull some partial stills and, well…” she threw a handful of pictures up on the screen. There was artifacting marring them, but parts of the stranger were visible in each of them. Oracle magnified one that had a pretty good view of his face.

“Holy shit” Drake whispered.

Damian frowned. “What?”

“Dami, he looks like you. Just… older.” Grayson said softly.

“What are you talking about?” Damian snapped.

“Disregard the pale colouring for a second. The nose, the chin… he looks like you if you had a growth spurt,” Drake wrinkled his nose “and went through puberty.”

The commlines erupted into chaos.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Spoiler exclaimed “are you telling me there’s an older version of Robin running around Gotham?!”

“Copy?” Batgirl inquired.

“Don’t tell me Talia cooked up Demon Brat 2.0!”

“Given that he looks older it’s more likely version 0.1 if anything,” Drake snarked, “though there’s the possibility of artificially accelerated growth rates…”

Damian had had enough. “Tt. You are ignoring the obvious - if this is some kind of supernatural entity it likely copied aspects of my appearance in an attempt to engender feelings of familiarity.” he said haughtily, pushing down the uncomfortable churning in his stomach. There was no way Mother would replace him with a cheap copy. She couldn’t! “Besides, the creature has obvious powers and neither of my bloodlines has any trace of the meta gene.”

“That’s ignoring the ghostly elephant in the room.” Grayson chimed in, “Maybe it’s a dead ancestor?”

Drake gave their older brother an annoyed look “Even a time travelling descendant from the future is more likely than that. And delivering a ‘prophecy’ to boot?”

Oracle pulled up an aged up picture of Damian next to the stranger’s, highlighting several reference points. “On closer inspection, there’s a couple of discrepancies. The cheekbones for one - Robin definitely takes after his mother, while our mystery meta looks more like… well… Robin’s grandmother on the paternal side.” she finished hesitantly. “B?”

They turned to look at Batman, who had remained silent during the whole exchange. If they hadn’t known him so well they would have thought him unaffected, but the tightening around his mouth betrayed his agitation.

“There’s no use in pointless speculation until we have more data to work from,” he growled, “Oracle, look for any reports of a meta matching the target. Since our regular methods have failed to yield results, I will contact the JLD about running tests on the letter.” He turned to Drake, “Red Robin, see what you can find on recent League activities. If this is another scheme by Ra’s or Talia we need to know about it.”

“The last thing we need is more demon spawn running around!” Red Hood groaned over the comms.

Damian was furious. This was absurd! To even indulge the possibility that that creature was in any way related to him was making him feel like he had swallowed battery acid. He was the Demon’s Heir! He was not replaceable! There was only one thing to do.

“Robin? Stop!”

He ignored his Father’s shout. He stomped over to the lab table, snatched up the envelope and broke the seal.

Nothing happened.

He unfolded the paper and saw the same handwriting that had been on the outside.

Brother of blood, brother of soul

Never buried but already mourned

In lightning and ice the scorned child returned

To strike down the Demon’s Head

With all that Death earned

Damian’s hand shook. He reread the lines over and over again, refusing to comprehend. He could feel his Father standing behind him, scrutinising the letter as well.

“Son…”

Suddenly, the paper burst into green flames, going up into smoke that dissipated unnaturally quickly.

Silence reigned for a few moments. Then…

“Well that was needlessly melodramatic” Nightwing remarked.

Part 3

#dcxdp #dpxdc #dc x dp #dp x dc #danny phantom #batman #dc domics #batfamily #no beta we die like danny phantom #prophecy universe #the one where clockwork uses prophecies to mess things up (and set things right)#fanfic #congrats bruce it's a boy #clockwork loves melodrama

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cherryheairt · 4 months ago

Note

Hi, could I please request jealous and possessive Chishiya? Thanks

Out of Bounds

fem!reader x Chishiya one-shot

The foul combination of alcohol, vomit, sweat, and chlorine was the trademark of The Beach. There were designated cleaners, the people who had bracelet numbers deciding their spots at the very bottom of the ranks, but no matter how much the floors were mopped or the pool was cleaned, the scent lingered. When you complained about the looseness of the way the residents treated the resort spot like their personal trash cans, Hatter only laughed and patted your shoulder.

"They enjoy their days between games the right way. Why waste time when you know any day could be your last, hm?" His playful voice tinged through your ears, eyes gleaming down past his sunglasses and stretching his arms out as he walked past you. "You should, too. I hate to see you huddled up with number nine so much when you could be out with the rest of us having fun."

"Hard to have fun when all I can think about is my last games." You mumbled, pulling your coverup closer over your shoulders and shivering at the chill that the windows brought into the executive room.

He shrugged. "Your loss. I guess Chishiya would hate to see you have fun with the rest of us."

His words rang through your mind over and over even after he left the room to join the party downstairs.

You often stayed glued to Chishiya, the blonde man you'd met during your second game, a six of diamonds, and decided that he was your main source of companionship after you were the two sole survivors. He didn't mind and, in fact, sought you out, too, before and after your separate games. He never said 'good luck' or an 'I'm happy to see you safe,' but his actions spoke louder. You hung around your room most of the time, lounging around on your queen size hotel bed while he tinkered away at your desk. Something about his room being too monitored by the militants, not that you gave a crap whose room you lingered in.

You drank occasionally, bringing some fruity drinks from the bar up to your room for you and Chishiya to sip on throughout the evenings and nights, but you never included yourself in The Beach's nightlife like the majority had.

Others may consider you boring or perhaps a wallflower, but the company you chose was enough for you. Kuina, Chishiya, occasionally Hatter and Tatta when you explored during the day. No one else caught your eye—certainly not the prospect of running into drunk and trigger-happy militants. Aguni and Niragi intimidated you since the day you first arrived with Chishiya, and Niragi especially made it clear his annoyance for the smart-ass blonde. You didn't want their feud to affect you, so steering clear was the best option. You were probably the safest and most reasonable person who lived in the hotel resort.

And probably the most boring.

After some lonely contemplation stuck in your room just waiting for Kuina or Chishiya to arrive and keep you company, you decided to give into the Beach's atmosphere and crowd. When in Rome, do as Romans do, right?

Wasting no more time, you dressed from your comfortable lounge clothes into a newer black two-piece that Ann had provided you weeks back when you first arrived. Without a reason to wear a more revealing piece, you had usually stuck to jean-shorts and light cover-ups over your simpler bikini tops. Tonight, you styled your hair with the heat tools Kuina had abandoned in your bathroom and headed out to the pool and bar to begin your night.

Downstairs, the crowd was already bursting with life. Music assaulted your senses, and you struggled to climb through the dancing people to get to the bar. Finally finding a good spot to idle, you attracted the attention of Tatta.

"Just ah—whatever is most popular." You decided on, not able to recall the names of most drinks with such a busy atmosphere. A few drinks wouldn't hurt, and who knew if you would even stay here long. At the poolside, most Beachers were already coupled up with their fling of the night and making the most of their limited time. You felt a tinge of envy, unable to empathize with their carefree natures.

When Tatta finally finished and slid your drink over, you gratefully nodded and brought it out of the thickest portion of the crowd to be able to breathe.

Finally able to think straight, you situated yourself on one of the few available pool chairs and nursed your fruity (and surprisingly strong) drink while simply observing the people.

It was almost peaceful until a certain inky-haired man took it upon himself to sit with you. Not next to you on another chair, no, but right at your feet, forcing you to bend your legs at the knee to make room for him. "Niragi." You greeted with a forced enthusiasm. "I thought you were out tonight." Hoped, more like. Everyone avoided Niragi like the plague, but he always seemed to find targets to amuse himself with. If you'd known he wasn't out, you would've holed yourself up in your room again.

"How could I miss little missus lock and key?" He started, leaning in close as you shuffled in your seat. "I'm surprised that Chishiya doesn't have you locked up again."

"Chishiya?" You asked, surprised that he even knew you two were friends. "He doesn't keep me locked up?"

He laughed, the scent of alcohol clear on his warm breath. "Hanging out in your room all day and night isn't 'locked up' to you? He practically cages you like a dog."

"He doesn't.' You defended Chishiya, despite knowing that he doesn't give one crap about people's opinion. "I just like the quiet."

"But not tonight, hm?" Niragi asked, eyeing your exposed legs and reaching out to caress an ankle. You winced inwardly, gulping down the rest of your drink and springing up.

"I wanted to have some fun tonight, is all." You said cheerfully. "I'm gonna get another—" You slipped past him, speedily walking into the thick of the crowd.

Hearing his shout, you sat yourself at the bar yet again and placed your glass in front of Tatta yet again. "Could I get another?" You leaned in, slightly hushed. "Mind if I sit here a while?"

He waved you off, nodding while shaking another group's shots and pouring a line of them. "'Course. Don't gotta ask."

The rainbow shot line intrigued you, and after a brief glance over your shoulder, you saw no sign of Niragi. "A round of those, too." You decided.

In only a few minutes, you had downed more shots than you had in the past few months combined. Dancing with random girls you didn't know the names of and didn't care to, The Beach's outside area was blasting with loud music and even louder people. Yourself included, for the first time. You couldn't hear your laughs or cheers over the others', but the alcohol had taken effect quickly and did its job just right. Hatter couldn't say that you were wasting your remaining days on Earth anymore. Suddenly, you understood the temptations that most of the others fell to every day. It was pure, thoughtless bliss.

You didn't even flinch at the hands running up and down your waist and hips, simply swaying to the beat and clutching your drink to your chest to prevent it from spilling. The deep voice as whoever was dancing with you spoke directly into your ear, causing you to shiver. "Having fun yet?" He asked, purring.

You nodded, giggling despite yourself. Sober, you would shrug a random guy off in a heartbeat or simply walk away. Tonight, the attention seemed to feed your dusty ego as you leaned into his touch.

"Why don't we go upstairs then?" He continued.

"I wanna keep dancing!" You spoke over the music, gulping your last sip of the drink down and already eyeing the bar again.

"Come on, it's a bit crowded down here, isn't it?" At this point, you were growing irritated at his insistance. You wanted to get drunk and enjoy your night out, not pretend that you came after a two minute pump-and-go guy thought he was all that and more.

"I'm good." You said, slipping out of his hands and towards the bar.

A hand at your elbow stopped you, and you had a sudden urge to just whip the glass over this dipshit's head. Turning to face him, you felt the blood drain from your face, "Niragi?" You asked, voice smaller.

His smug grin seemed to grow as you finally noticed who he was. Not bothering to be subtle anymore, he kept his grip on your arm and leaned in closer, his hot breath brushing over your face as he spoke. "Why don't we continue this in my room?"

His eyes were already dark as is, but you could clearly see the effects of alcohol or whatever other substance he had taken blow his pupils wide. He looked like a predator, a dangerous hunter cornering his latest prey and wasting no time to pounce.

"I said I'm good," you repeated, taking a cautionary step back and feeling yourself sober up immediately.

He threw his head back, groaning dramatically. "Come on, don't pretend like you weren't enjoying yourself a minute ago."

"I'm gonna go to the ladies' room." You said, brushing him off and squeezing past a particularly grotesque trio of adults in the crowd. No one seemed to pay you and Niragi any mind, but you couldn't decide whether you were glad for the lack of humiliation or worried for your next five minutes of safety.

It's not like there were any locks on your door. Waiting him out downstairs in the safety of a crowd was your best chance. You hummed to yourself as you leaned against the bar, observing the crowd of dancers once more as a bystander rather than a participant. He would find another girl to take back up to his room in no time.

Tatta seemed to be glad to see you again, but his perky smile quickly turned to pursed lips and a paled face as he glanced over your shoulder. Turning his head away to the next waiting 'customer', you didn't have to be Einstein to know that Niragi followed you to the bar, obviously catching on to your lie or even intending to follow you there as if you invited him.

His hands found your hips again like velcro on shoes. "You never finished that dance with me." Your name from his mouth sounded like gritting sandpaper to your ears as you shifted on your feet and glanced around nervously.

Laughing, you placed your hands on his chest to create distance between you both. "I'm not feeling too good." Maybe if he thought you might puke your guts out, he'd be too grossed out.

"So you go to the bar instead of the bathroom?" He asked with a snicker.

As he opened his mouth to speak again, a deep voice cut him off. "This is depressing to watch." It was Chishiya, leaning against the wall of the bar area where the counter lifted up and down for the bartender to come and go. "You that desperate for some action, Niragi? Is everyone else sick of you, too?"

Relief spead through your body, and you instinctively tried to pry Niragi's hands from your skin to join Chishiya's side instead. He tightened his grip, if anything, and swinging his arm over your shoulder like he was your boyfriend and Chishiya was the one harassing his girl.

The blonde merely raised a brow, glancing to you below the strobes and looking you up and down. You swayed slightly, the previously feigned nausea coming back to bite you in the ass as completely real effects.

"Stay out of it, Chishiya." Niragi growled. "She's not yours."

"She's not." Chishiya agreed. "But unless you want vomit down your throat, I would move on to someone else." He seemed amused by Niragi's immediate aggression, playing into it as if the taller guy would hesitate to shoot him then and there. He absolutely would not (if only Aguni would allow that).

Niragi glared daggers at Chishiya, glancing down at you to finally notice your swaying and colorless features. He clicked his pierced tongue, letting you go with a slight push toward Chishiya. "Whatever." He scoffed.

Stumbling, you were surprised to find that Chishiya had the decency to reach out and steady you by your shoulders. He didn't directly ask anything, but you swore you saw concern in his dark eyes as he looked you up and down yet again. "Come on. We're staying in my room tonight "

You didn't fight it, giggling lightly as you took the initiative to pull him into a tight hug. He tensed, arms hovering over your exposed skin like he'd never been embraced so warmly before. "Thank you, Chishiya." You murmured into his neck.

"Mmhm." He huffed. "Don't throw up all over me, either. I'll never speak to you again."

You laughed harder, pulling away from him but interlocking your arms to let him guide you up the many stairs that led to his room. "Liar. You'd take care of me still."

He rolled his eyes but didn't bother to argue. You were always right, after all.

Not responsible for any inconsistencies, I wrote this in two sittings of like 20 minutes in the middle of the night 🫡

#chishiya #chishiya x fem!reader #chishiya shuntaro x reader #chishiya alice in borderland #alice in borderland x reader #fanfiction #xreader #chishiya x reader

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naffeclipse · 9 months ago

Text

Charm Brought It Back

Reader x Witches!Sun, Moon, & Eclipse

Commission Info

I am so excited to present this Hocus Pocus inspired AU requested by the lovely @jackofallrabbits! The boys star as the witchy brothers who return once a fated reader lights the starry candle. They simply must show their gratitude! And what better day to post such a spooky and fun fic than on Friday the 13th?!

Content Warning: Suggestive themes, heavy kissing, and heavy touching.

———

You turn the key and cut the engine of your car. With a flick, you turn off the headlights. The beginning of a sunset swoops down onto your ill-adjusted vision. The horizon is drenched in purples and oranges as shadows begin to crawl off of trees and their yellowed leaves. It will take a minute or two for your sight to adapt, but you have tilted and revolved the structure waiting just at the edge of the forest within your mind’s eyes for days now. It’s beyond the dirt road you’ve pulled onto the shoulder of.

Blinking slowly, you find the house’s dark silhouette through the boughs of clustered trees, and you sigh at the beauty of its preserved history.

The building is an artifact dating back roughly to the 1630s. A post-medieval English-style home, it contains two stories with an overhanging jetty and stunning clapboard siding that has survived a little under four centuries of existence. Your eyes catch on the windows and your heart sings at the sight. Diamond-paned casement. And there, decorative pendants of celestial bodies, including iron-casted suns, moons, and overlapping symbols of the two. The steeply pitched roof is common for the era and is more renowned in its descendant the saltbox form, but this style boosts its spooky aura.

The Puritan colonists were the ones responsible for importing the style to America as they landed here on the eastern coast.

It’s no stretch of the imagination to think of witches and execution trials while gazing over the beautiful home. You’re particularly intrigued by the history of the Salem witch trials, and as a historian, you couldn’t deny yourself the chance to enter the building and feed the gnawing need to stand within a piece of history.

Stepping out of your car, a gust of wind carrying the bitter edge of autumn cuts through your brown sweater. You shiver and shut the door as quietly as you can manage. This is hallowed ground. This will supply your ever inquisitive mind which is always looking to the past with a curiosity most insatiable.

You face the home. A footpath lightly serpentines between the trees. Hooligans with destructive tendencies and teenagers on dares will venture here for a spooky, fun time, but are usually caught by the police because the building sits on private property. You asked for permission from the owner of the hundreds of acres of forest land that includes the so-called “Witch House” if you might enter the premises. Given your credentials, you were certain the owner would trust you with exploring the home.

Much to your relief, the owner agreed.

You look up, arms clutching your knitted sleeves to fight the chill of an October breeze, in awe and reverence.

From your pocket, you slip out a wrought-iron key with the symbol of the moon overlapping the sun to form a black eclipse and marvel again at the intricacy of ancient beauty. Your fingertips grow chilled in the late hour. The sun shifts from orange to dark, bleeding red like blood from a heart spilled across the horizon. You walk towards the home.

Perhaps you should have arrived sooner. You were caught in another historical journal depicting the specific timeframe of when this home would have been occupied by its original inhabitants.

The rumors even now speak of curses and cursed artifacts within the building. Some of it is true—you have confirmed with your own scholarly sources. The original owners were a trio of brothers. They were accused of witchcraft and hanged for the crimes. That much is historically documented and verified.

What is fantasy is the tale of the brothers casting a curse with their dying breaths, declaring they would one day return if a virgin lit a starry candle on the anniversary of their executions.

Superstition. Most likely, the fear of the townspeople transcended to their children, and their children, down and down until it became a tale to spin on Halloween night around these parts.

The door is black as you approach it. A stray branch catches on your sweater, pulling on a thread, and you yank yourself free and silently mourn the roughen fabric before returning your attention to what really matters. You must be careful. This entire place is iconic and in need of preservation.

You slip the key into the lock hole and turn it with a thick, heavy click before the black wood door groans and slides inwards as if inviting you into its sphere. You take a breath. Your boots cross the threshold and you enter the home.

As is typical of some homes built in the early seventeenth century, an open hall greets you. In the far back is the fireplace with a cauldron still sitting upon an ashy bed. An original wood-carve table and chairs are set to one side as a staircase climbs up into the darkness of the second level. What little red light leaks inside is narrowed and cut up into diamonds by the panes. To one wall, shelves contain dusty and forgotten cooking utensils, once glimmery copper pots, and dinner dishes with designs considered much too gawky in the Puritan era but it causes you to softly gasp.

Your hand covers your mouth as you gaze around you, overwhelmed with the beautiful intricacies of metallic chandeliers holding half-burned tallow candles, and to the other wall lies a bookshelf covered in cobwebs as if the spiders refuse to let anyone examine such precious reads. Your fingers already itch to gently pry out one manuscript and gaze at the original script of whoever wrote it.

But the light—it’s far too dark now. The red has given way to blue and pale indigo. You squint. You reach into your other pocket for a lighter and flick it on. The tiny flame spouts a delicate light. Never would you dare admit this out loud to a living soul, but you so desperately wish to see the home in its authentic state, lit only by the technology the brothers had at the time: fire.

There are thick, yellowed candles lying on the table and clustered together on the narrow window sills. You have no hope of reaching the metal chandeliers but you do spy a candelabra positioned near the bookshelf on a small end table. You light it first with a careful touch of your lighter flame. The wick catches, even after all of these years. You smile softly, your heart warm within your chest as you bask in the essence of this beautiful place.

A few more candles should suffice.

You slip to the table to light the thick and tall candles. The flames bloom and warm the space in rich light, casting thick shadows from support beams. You almost set your lighter away when you spy one last candle set upon a golden candle holder. The fashioned metal twists and twines with elaborate engravings of shooting stars and slices of sun rays were placed in the corner of the room almost out of sight. The curiosity within you urges you to take a step, then another, and another. You stand in front of the almost forgotten candle.

The tallow is black as midnight. Strange. How did they color this? Embedded within the darkness are speckles of white, splattering the candle like an array of stars. Your eyes stray in search of constellations before shaking your head.

It’s true. There is a starry candle. Perhaps the brothers did dabble in the occult, playing with cards and fortune telling, and being punished with death for their interest in unholy magic.

The wick is dark and untouched as if it were never lit before. You bring the lighter flame closer. Superstition might worry another, but you concern yourself with logic and reason—explanations of humanity rather than inexplicable forces beyond comprehension.

Something stirs from a nearby corner shelf. Two long ears twitch. You catch a glimpse of a rabbit with creamy white fur just before it leaps off of the shelf and directly onto your arm. You yelp. Nearly dropping the lighter, you scramble back as the rabbit hits the floor, collects itself, and sits on its haunches.

Green eyes glare up at you. The rabbit, small and bunny-like, stays firmly between you and the starry candle.

You stand with your chest heaving and your lungs scraping out air, almost burning your thumb on the lighter flame before turning around yourself. Where did the woodland creature come from? Did it crawl its way inside like a rat and become trapped within the colonial home? The shot of adrenaline still flowing through your veins leaves your hands shaking.

The rabbit is still watching you with uncanny eyes. Prey animals so rarely stare back at bigger, larger threats. Perhaps it’s a pet. A runaway pet that somehow ended up here, of all places.

You slowly offer out your hand, keeping the lighter away in your other, as you take a step towards it.

It thumps a foot once, as if in warning, then bounds away. You watch it disappear into the house, still reeling from the fright it gave you.

If Michael was here, he would have laughed and told you to leave with him, now. He never wanted you to go here, especially alone, but you shake such ominous warnings away. He said curiosity killed the cat. You disagreed. This house is a part of history, not a curse. Witches are mere stories, conjured out of historical unrest and the longing to blame bad luck and tragedies upon an individual or three.

There’s always an explanation for fear superstition or mistrust. It’s far more sad than it is spooky.

You shake your head, smooth out the creases in your sweater, and face the starry candle again. The lighter flame flickers softly as you draw near it.

It is the anniversary of the brothers’ executions. You remember now as the shadows from other candles drape over you like a veil. You are also a virgin.

You laugh to yourself, covering your mouth as you do so. Look at you! You’re getting so worked up because a rabbit jumped at you.

It’s only hocus-pocus.

You tilt the lighter until it engulfs the wick. The flame catches, and you at last snap the lighter shut and return it to your pocket. Your eyes squint slightly at the candle. The wick snaps and bursts into sparks. The flame is not yellow or orange or even blue—it’s pure white like a comet streaking across the sky.

A crack of thunder splits the night sky with a bellow so monstrous, you feel like a child again, fearing a storm. You drop low to the ground, shielding your head as if the very world was going to fall upon you. A spark cracks in the fireplace, conjured out of ash underneath the cauldron before it burns hot and bright. The cauldron immediately begins roiling and bubbling with water. Laughter, great and terrible, and filled with the most jester-like joy sweeps over the room.

The pulse in your ears drowns at any sense but the need to hide. You scramble into the corner, tucking yourself behind the stand of the starry candle and hunker down. Holding your breath, you grab a fistful of your sweater while clutching your chest, and watch the door to the almost 400-year-old house fly open.

Three figures stride inside, looking about the place with wide eyes and disk-like heads framed in jutting adornments not unlike sun rays or shrouded in a heavy, dark blue hood.

“Brothers! We’re home!” The first one, tall and dark with deep red hues to his form, accent in sharp orange sun rays and an eclipse upon his face, turns to face his brother with bright, cat-like yellow eyes. “Isn’t it glorious?”

Another figure steps forward, yellow and off-white. Pale eyes beam. His head is crowned in bright sun rays as well. His spindly fingers twindle together in exuberant energy while he glances about the room eagerly. “Oh, yes, yes! More than anything! It’s as if we weren’t gone for more than a day—though the dust and cobwebs beg to differ.”

He draws a claw—you suck in a sharp breath—along the table’s edge and rubs his taloned fingertips together in disappointment.

“We must get to cleaning at once.”

“No,” the last figure fixes his hood with silvery digits. Golden jewels hang down the back of his unusual skull, the last and most prominent adornment a thick, golden star pendant. His eyes cast around the room, scarlet, and searching. “We must thank the little mouse who lit the candle.”

He flashes sharp teeth within his wide mouth, shaping it into a hungry grin. You gulp.

“Where are our manners?” The red and dark one twists back to the room with a flourish of his arms. His yellow gaze sweeps over the shelves and floors with a blade-like glint. “Of course, we must thank one so lovely.”

A dark cape drapes about his person. Underneath, a white flowing shirt hangs loosely to his lithe and slender figure, causing you to balk upon staring at such an exposed chest. The other two are no different, wearing similar shirts and dark trousers, but the hooded one bears a thick, longer cape while the sunny figure shares a cape similar to the first.

The yellow one lifts his wrists and frowns at the red ribbons tied around them. Golden bells jingle softly in an ominous chord.

“How terrible a reminder of our current impermanence,” he growls low in his throat, all cheerfulness lost and causing you to squeeze your ribs in fear.

“Patience, Sun,” the red one speaks, though he too casts a narrowed glance to the black ribbons and golden bells adorning his wrists. “We will affix ourselves back to this world in due time.”

“Eclipse, what a delicious creature I smell.” The hooded figure steps deeper into the home. Blue claws scratch at equally blue ribbons knotted to his hand bones but his attention is terrifyingly fixed on the candle stand just above your hiding spot.

You shrink further into the corner.

“Yes, Moon? And how lovely?” Eclipse, you assume, asks. His yellow eyes flash.

“As lovely as the stars,” Moon answers.

You watch claws curl around the wooden side of the candle stand, scratching deeply into the wood before a half-moon face emerges from behind, teeth set like a predator’s upon the sight of a wounded animal. Your heart flutters like a bird with a broken wing.

“Hello, little mouse. Won’t you come and play with us?”

You scream as he leaps behind the candle stand, takes you by the arms, and pulls you to your feet. You struggle to free yourself, crying out as he grabs hold of your wrists and fixes you firmly in place.

“My, how sweet,” he purrs in a dangerously low voice that rolls in the back of his throat. “You are the darling virgin who lit the candle, no?”

“Let me go!” You thrash but Moon grins in delight, as if you’re simply too precious.

“You deserve proper thanks,” He lowers one hand, forcing you to submit with slightly bent knees. “Here is my gratitude, little mouse.”

You freeze as he brings your hand towards his mouth, and a hundred, horrifying visions of him biting your fingers off or sinking his teeth in your palm send your blood into a frozen sludge of fear.

The witch, however, presses a kiss to the center of your palm. The softness catches the gears in your mind and jerks them to a halt.

“Thank you for allowing us to return once more,” he rasps. His scarlet eyes find yours between the space of your thumb and forefinger, and a strange stirring takes hold of your middle.

“This isn’t real,” you breathe. Dizziness begins to take hold.

This must be a dream, a thought gone wild, or inhaled bacteria triggering hallucinations.

Moon’s grin widens. He lowers your hand, loosening his hold for one precious moment. You rip your hands free of his grasp. A low growl escapes him but you’ve already slipped away, your eyes upon the door and spilling with the need to rush out into the night, away from the impossibilities standing before you—

Arms snatch your waist and lift your feet from the ground. You gasp.

Held in the air, you squirm before a hot breath dusts the shoulder of your sweater. You fall still, your throat bobbing as a mouth presses into the corner of your neck and lays a kiss on the sensitive spot. Gooseflesh prickles up and down your body.

“I assure you, I’m very real, little mouse,” Moon purrs. His hands squeeze your hips once. “And as nice as this… attire is, I would dress you in blues and silvers. You would look proper and powerful, like my brothers and I.”

A squeak escapes you. You shrink against him, caught in his embrace.

“Brothers?” The word rattles out of your throat.

“This is our home,” Moon whispers. “And you are our most honored guest.”

You manage to pry off his hands from your waist. With a sinister chuckle, the blue and silver hands release you. Without looking back, you run, ignoring the twinge in your stomach that whispers it was too easy to get away.

You hardly get a few steps before the sunny one—Sun—steps into your path. He catches you in his arms and spins you in a waltz at breakneck speed, your feet never touching the ground, before stopping without warning as he dips you low. He looms above you, his smile filled with sharp teeth.

“Let me get an eyeful. Oh, yes, you look good enough to eat,” he simpers. His hand splays along the small of your back and you gawk up at him, still trying to regain your balance after the sickness-inducing whirl. “You have no idea how long I’ve waited for you.”

“I just want to leave,” you whimper. “Please, don’t hurt me.”

“Hurt you? Sunshine,” he laughs, and it echoes with all of his heart—do once-hanged witches have a heart? There is no historical journey to give context to this very moment, you fear.

He lowers his sultry gaze to you. “I wish to only thank you. And I intend to.”

He pulls you back to your feet. You’re still clasped in his embrace like lovers on a ballroom floor. His hand hooks tight to your hip, and his other catches the side of your face. Heat spreads through the marrow of your bones.

On the tabletop beside you, something white moves across the plane of its surface, hunkering behind the thick stack of candles still burning.

His head lowers to your neck. You stiffen as he tilts your head away, opening you to his parting teeth. A tongue, dark and sinuous, flicks out of his maw. A gasp slips from your lips at the wet lick up the column of your throat. Eyelids fluttering, you start to sag as weakness fills your knees. He drags his tongue higher to taste your jawline and finishes at your cheek with a swipe for good measure.

Your hands find him and clutch tightly to his slender arms. He presses his lips to your ear and with a misty warmth, whispers.

“Thank you for—Gah!”

The white rabbit leaps up from the table, squirming directly between you and his chest, breaking you apart. Instinctively, you jump away just as Sun snarls. The heart-wrenching sound shakes your entire frame as he snatches the rabbit by the scruff before it can scramble back from his wretched claws.

“I’ll boil you alive!” he thunders. He steps towards the cauldron, back where Moon leans against the wall, watching the spectacle with an amusing twitch of his grinning maw. Behind you, Eclipse stands at the door like a sentinel, his eyes still hungry and even furious as he follows his brother’s movement to the cauldron.

Sun dangles the rabbit, now struggling and kicking but unable to find purchase against the witch’s hold, above the boiling water of the caldron.

“No!” you cry.

Sun’s eyes widen. He turns back to you just as you close the distance and scoop the rabbit in your arms. His claws, pale-boned and wickedly curved, clench around emptiness. Without thought, you turn and run again though there is little hope as you come to the door. Your boots stamp against the wooden floorboards.

The rabbit in your embrace turns its face up to you and mutters in a woman’s voice, “You have no idea what you’ve just done.”

You gawk, stunned before hands catch you by the shoulders. You’re brought to a dead halt. The rabbit leaps from your arms, drops to the floor, and races away into a shadowy corner of the room with only one glimpse of its fluffy tail before you’re left alone.

You twist and face the eldest witch’s attention. Eclipse. His yellow eyes go up and down your body, and you watch in muted shock as two additional arms emerge from the shadows of his cap. He forces you backward, one step after the other until your back is pinned against a dusty wall.

You stare into his eyes, chest rising and falling rapidly. Your pulse pounds in your eardrums.

“I don’t believe this is happening,” you utter.

The witch tilts his head with a wicked grin.

“We’ll make you a believer yet.” He promises, and his deep cords vibrate through your form. “My dear, we simply must thank you for all that you’ve done for us.”

His claws slip over your collarbones. Your breath quickens, a stirring you cannot name unfolding deep within your middle. His extra set of hands fall to your hips and begin caressing the bones. Daintily, carefully, his warm fingertips slip just underneath the hem of your sweater, touching your bare flesh. A shiver runs down your entire body, leaving you to squirm.

“Be a good little comet,” he says softly, “Let me pour my gratitude all over you.”

“I didn’t—I didn’t know it was true,” you stare into his face, marked with a red crescent over a dark shadow, and his eyes pierce into the very nature of your being. “You’re back.”

“Because of you,” he rumbles softly in his chest. His grin pulls higher at the corners.

His claws slip over the nap of your neck and card gently into the small, sensitive hairs at the bottom of your skull. You breathe in. His eyes brighten in pleasure before he slips his sharp but controlled talons over the shells of your ears and follows the arch of your cheekbone. His gaze drops to your lips. Your heart thumps and thumps against your sternum so powerfully, you fear he may hear it.

His lips pull over his razor-sharp teeth and you stop breathing.

His other set of hands begins working up the sides of your torso. He rubs slowly and gently, but you squirm despite this. He touches you far too intimately when you have never experienced such affections before. A mewl escapes your lips. You wriggle as he refuses to relent.

In answer, his upper hands lower and capture your hands together in one, and pin them above your head to hold you in place. He coos, chastising. A great roil starts in your stomach and expands upwards until your face becomes pink and flushed.

“Hold still, little comet,” he chuckles, and you whimper. “I’m not finished with showering you in all my adoration.”

“Eclipse,” your breath is harsh and hot.

“It is good to hear my name upon such lovely lips,” his voice lowers, husky and scorching. “I knew a virgin would light the candle. I swore it to my brothers as they set us on the gallows and draped nooses around our necks. You are our light, our savior. How could I ever thank you?”

In his words, his burning stare that singes with sincerity, it clicks into place. All at once, you believe what you are seeing with your own two eyes.

It’s true. He’s back. He and his brothers have returned with magic.

“I have questions,” you say hesitantly in your demureness, “I want answers.”

“Of course,” Eclipse agrees easily. “But first…”

A dark claw brushes your hair back from your face. The flutter in your heart can’t seem to hold still. Eclipse’s grin widens and his eyes soften.

“You have freckles like constellations,” he murmurs in the manner of one gazing at the night sky or one studying an ornate painting.

Before you can shape words to reply, to say anything that might free you from his grasp, his mouth is upon yours. A sound softly catches in the back of your throat. You fall still under his caressing hands still moving below your sweater. He traces the row of your ribs. You have just enough mind to wonder if he feels your skin prickle in your sensitivity. His other hand clasps your wrists tighter. You gasp against his teeth.

He pulls gently, hungrily, taking you as if a bite of honeycomb. You become melted honey, easily malleable between his teeth and then molded by his mouth. His tongue invades you. You moan softly at the claim he lays upon you until you become weak in the knees and almost fall. His kiss seals your fate.

He releases you from his maw. You sink slightly, and his arms fall out from under your sweater to properly catch you. He lowers your wrists, returns your hands, and brushes your hair once more from your face.

A chuckle emits from his lips, and you burn.

“You’ll stay with us, won’t you?” he asks, but he waits for no answer as he scoops you into his arms. Feet dangling, you have no choice but to cling to his shoulders and endure his brothers’ attention as he twists around and faces them.

The rabbit’s right. You are in trouble. Michael warned you. He said curiosity killed the cat.

But charm brought it back.

#naff's writing commissions #witches and rabbits and candles oh my #if michael was there he would be so mad at you for lighting the candle smh #hocus pocus au my beloved #witch!eclipse #witch!sun #witch!moon #charm brought it back #naff writing

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