PEARL NECKLACE ⋆˚࿔
after a creep makes a gross comment to you outside your apartment, pope is forced to explain what a pearl necklace really means. spoiler: it's not jewelry
PAIRING pope cody x bunny!reader
WARNINGS 18+ MDNI suggestive material (not explicit smut), age gap, innocence kink, corruption kink, protective pope cody, obsessive pope cody, stalker-like tendencies, unhealthy attachment, sexual innuendos, explicit sexual language and visuals, sheltered reader, naive/ditzy reader, creepy male attention, objectification, harassment / catcalling, predatory behavior (not from pope), threats of violence, implied violence (no graphic scenes)
WC 3.3k
Pope is here because Smurf told him the property needs checking on. At least that’s the story he’s feeding himself.
And it makes sense. There’s water damage in one of the downstairs units and some dipshit’s been stripping cooper out of the laundry room again. If it’s not one thing going wrong, it’s another.
This building’s always two steps away from falling apart. Someone has to stop it from going to hell completely.
Plenty of good, rational reasons to be here.
None of which do a thing to explain why he does not move from being propped on the hood of his truck just yet.
He stays at the curb as he watches the building’s familiar pulse of seedy activity.
It’s not even the worst spot owned by the Codys, not by far, but that doesn’t make it good. It’s definitely not good enough for you, not by a long shot. Run-down. Full of people who loiter outside longer than they should and pay too much attention to things that aren’t theirs.
A woman argues fervently on the stoop, body tense enough he can see the harsh jut of her collarbone from here. Two boys pretend to clean their bikes by the courtyard, their hands moving in repetitive, meaningless circles, rags never actually removing any grime.
And then there’s the smoker, with a long beard and crooked nose, leaning near the stairs, smoke rising around him.
Pope watches his sleepy gaze harden suddenly, tracking something straight ahead.
Pope’s neck cranes as his vision tunnels into pinpoint clarity, finding what the man found first: you.
Walking up the sidewalk with two grocery bags hooked over your wrists, pink flats picking their way carefully over the buckled concrete, skirt the same shade catching around your knees every time the breeze shifts. White cardigan buttoned all the way up over your chest despite the heat.
You don’t hurry. That bothers him.
You move through the courtyard with no care in the world. Unaware of the eyes that linger on your body, the curiosity you unwittingly ignite.
God he hates this place most when you’re in it. Without you, it’s just brick and mortar. But with you here, everything is suddenly hostile. A million scenarios blooming in his head. Someone following you from your car, someone hiding just around the corner waiting for you to pass by, a neighbor deciding your door lock doesn’t look so hard to force open.
He has tried to get you to stay at Smurf’s countless times now, using different tactics each time. Gentle coaxing, stubborn demands, pushing you into the kind of corner where the only real choice was already decided for you.
And those all work most nights.
Still, every now and then, for reasons unbeknownst to him, you insist on sleeping here.
So every now and then, he comes and sits off to the side, his truck parked discreetly out of view. Always staying within striking distance should anyone dare to try anything stupid.
Thankfully he hasn’t had to act yet, people know better, whispers exchanged in doorways and hallways: that pretty little thing tucked away in apartment 2B is Cody territory. Off limits.
It takes him four long strides to reach you.
He comes up behind you without saying anything, partly because he doesn’t want to startle you and partly because he wants to see how long it takes before you notice a man his size coming up behind you. Too long, apparently.
You don’t notice him when his shadow cuts across the pavement beside yours, not when his boots hit the concrete close enough you should hear him, not even when he’s right behind you, inhaling the faint sweet drift of your perfume over the dirty air of the courtyard.
You just keep walking, grocery bags bumping into your legs every second step, head angled down as you watch your feet over the cracked walkway.
Then you stop so suddenly he nearly runs into you, boots scuffing against the ground in the process.
Nearly turns into definitely when you move again, bending at the waist to grab a little carton that had tumbled out of your bag and rolled near your shoe.
He can’t dodge you fast enough before he’s crashing against you, the ample of your backside pressed flush against him, your skirt skimming his denim-clad thighs.
He grits his teeth, swallowing down the groan lodged somewhere in his throat, and his hands shoot out to grip at your waist. Half to steady you, half to hold himself back.
You jump, a sharp little gasp tearing out of you as you twist in his hold, eyes wide, lips parted.
But the fear vanishes when you realize it’s him. Dissolves so quickly into relief, then blossoming into that lovely smile of yours Pope spends half his days obsessing over. Lip gloss glistens like honey under the afternoon sun, squinting at him through the harsh glare.
“Pope,” you breathe, like he’s something good that happened to you rather than the man who decided to follow you through a parking lot to prove a point.
His fingers flex once before he makes them let go.
“You don’t pay attention,” he tells you plainly.
You smile pinches at the edges a little, like you’re trying to decide whether he’s teasing you or scolding you. You seem to assume the later. A good assumption.
“I do pay attention,” you insist, the words coming out with the stubborn certainty of someone who has already decided they're right. Then you glance down at the sidewalk as though it might testify on your behalf. One of the grocery bags slips lower on your wrist, plastic stretching, and you hitch it back up with a small huff of effort. “I was paying attention to the ground. Because last week I almost twisted my ankle right there.”
Pope follows the line of your finger.
Without a word, he reaches for the bags. His hand closes around the handles and lifts them clean off your arm before you can object. You make a small noise of surprise, letting him take them.
“What if it wasn’t me coming up behind you?”
Your brows pull together. “But it was you.”
“Yeah, but what if it wasn’t?”
You hesitate visibly, your fingers weaving together, rocking onto the tips of your shoes. You look almost apologetic when you speak. “I dunno.”
Exactly, he thinks.
He breathes out very slowly through his nose to keep the worst of his frustration from showing. It still sits heavy on his face, he’s sure. In the hard line of his mouth, in the way his hands tighten around the plastic bags until the handles stretch thin.
“You gotta be more aware,” he says, dipping his face towards yours, almost pleading. His gaze flickers anxiously over your face, desperate for more reassurance. “Can you do that for me? Check around when you get out of the car, look before you walk up the stairs, take a second before you open your door.”
You open your mouth to speak, something potentially defensive at the tip of your tongue, before you reconsider, shoulders sinking just a fraction.
“For me,” Pope urges again. No room for misunderstanding.
And because you are you, you give a gentle, almost reluctant nod in surrender. You have a hard time fighting him on anything.
He returns the gesture with his own stiff nod. He knows you don’t fully understand the fuss, not completely, but you’re trying, and that has to be enough for now. He’ll shoulder the rest.
He moves towards the staircase, leaving you to catch up. You hurry to follow behind him.
“Why’re you here anyway?” you voice after him. “Did I miss rent or something?”
Pope doesn’t turn around; doesn’t trust himself to look at you without giving too much away.
“No,” he replies, casual, like it’s not something he thinks about every single month.
You would never be late. You are a meticulously precise creature. Keeping track of everything, neat little numbers, due dates, confirmations, all of it lined up exactly the way you like, and then you get that pleased look on your face when you send the payment, like you’ve done something worth being proud of.
Which you have. He lets you have that. But he can’t stand taking your money.
So every month he waits until that little deposit appears, waits another day or two to avoid suspicion, then finds a way to get it back to you.
Sometimes it’s hidden in elaborate Cody business expenses; other times Craig’s buddy does some invisible computer shit to push numbers back into your account, nothing ever traced to pope.
And occasionally, he just leaves cash in places he knows you’ll find it. In your purse, between pages of a book you’ve left out, tucked behind a coffee mug.
He loves hearing you puzzle over it. You always chalk it up to luck, or fate, or some karmic gift from the universe. Never once suspecting Pope’s fingerprints on every cent.
It all sounds more complicated than it actually is.
Really, it’s just logical. You need the money. Pope has the money. Problem solved.
At the steps, Pope pauses, gently nudging you ahead of him.
It’s a selfish move. He’s got a bad feeling you don’t have shorts under that skirt, and he’s not in the mood to have that confirmed by anyone standing behind you. Better him at your back than anyone else. Better him blocking the view.
As if to confirm his fears, someone over his shoulder lets out a short laugh. “Man, a girl that pretty oughta let me buy her dinner. Hell, maybe I’d even send her home wearing a pearl necklace.”
Pope looks back and finds the bearded cigarette smoker slouched against the vending machine, filter hanging loose between two fingers, eyes still fixed on you with that same open, filthy interest. He’s got a buddy with him now, some wiry little shit standing half a step to the side, not looking too sure of himself now that Pope’s facing him.
Pope thinks about how easy it would be. Pin the guy up against the machine, forearm to windpipe, watching the smartass shine drain out of his eyes. Pictures crushing the cigarette into the soft part of his cheek. But he can’t do that without scaring you off.
So he crouches just enough to place the bags on the stairs without jostling them, eggs and bread and whatever else cushioned upright where it won’t tip.
When he rises, he goes back the way he came, jerking his head in your direction. “You talkin’ about her?”
“Just complimenting her.”
“No,” Pope says. “You weren’t.”
The wiry friend shifts back half a step. Smart.
The bearded man tries to recover, but it’s too late, Pope can already see the little glint of fear sputtering in his eyes, igniting as he sizes him up.
He lifts the cigarette to his mouth. “Ain’t that serious, man.”
Pope reaches out and plucks the cigarette from his fingers before it gets there. Drops it to the concrete. Crushes it under his boot.
“Look at her again, talk about her again, I’ll make sure the next thing I crush under my boot is your throat.”
The bearded man opens his mouth.
“Don’t. I’m tryin’ real hard not to scare her,” Pope growls. “Don’t make that difficult for me.”
The man’s eyes flick once past Pope, towards the stairs, toward you, then snap back fast like even that was a mistake.
“Alright,” he mutters finally, hands lifting a little. “Didn’t mean nothin’ by it.”
A lie. A terrible one, at that. But Pope doesn’t spare the man another look. Just turns, grabs the grocery bags, and comes back up the steps to where you’re perched on the landing, watching him with that dazed little expression of yours.
“I don’t even like pearls,” you whisper to him the second he gets close enough. “They’re kinda old-ladyish.”
Pope shuts his eyes for half a beat.
“Yeah,” he finally sputters, tips of his ears burning a little. He ushers you towards 2B. “C’mon. Inside.”
The inside of your apartment is cute. Small as it looks from the outside and from what he can see through your window at night, but it’s cute, all pinks and whites and soft little girlish details scattered across every surface.
There’s a coffee table crowded with tiny trinkets he can’t make heads or tails of, glossy little objects with no obvious purpose except that you liked them enough to bring them home.
And it’s clean. He likes that it’s clean. Clean means he won’t spend the time here distracted by dust in the corners and fingerprints on glass, trying not to imagine bleaching every inch of it.
He carries the bags into the kitchen and sets them on the counter one by one. Behind him, you wobble a little taking off your shoes and catch yourself on his shoulder.
It leaves a searing brand behind when you pull away.
“What was that out there?” you ask.
Pope shrugs. “Nothin’. Guy’s just a dick.”
He winces inwardly as soon as he says it. Dick feels too crude aimed anywhere near you, and he has to resist the urge to take it back and replace it with something nicer.
“It’s not like he said anything really bad or anything,” you say, shrugging in a way that suggests you’re used to it.
Used to being stared at, cat called, talked about. And maybe it shouldn’t surprise him, given who you are.
He’s seen it before, at Smurf’s parties, men practically stumbling over themselves to offer you a drink, eyes tracking every movement you make. Drivers nearly wrapping their cars around telephone poles because their heads turn too fast when you walk down the street.
You’re beautiful. Beautiful enough that people can’t help staring at you. But Pope’s never been forced to hear it firsthand, never had to stand there while some pervert talked about putting a pearl necklace across your throat and chest. And you don’t even understand what he was saying.
He could handle it. He could handle it right now. If the guy’s still lingering around when Pope leaves, he might just have to. The asshole will be out of this building tomorrow regardless, he’ll will make damn sure of it.
Your hand touching his arm snaps him out of it. He looks down and sees your painted fingers resting there, cautious like you’re not sure what’s going on in his head.
“Pope?”
The heat cools just enough for him to breathe. He rubs a hand over his jaw. “He said somethin’ bad enough.”
You cock your head to one side. “Taking me to dinner isn’t exactly the worst offer I’ve ever had. And like I said, pearls aren’t really my thing, but it’s a nice sentiment, I guess?”
Pope shoves his hand through his hair, forced to take a step back because standing this close to your face is messing with him.
“Look a pearl necklace isn’t… it’s not jewelry, okay? It’s not fuckin’ nice. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
You fold your arms over your chest, your hair slipping forward and partly covering your face. Pope’s fingers twitch at his sides, fighting the impulse to reach out and brush it back into place.
“Not really… I— well,” you pause, fingers drumming along your left arm. “What else could a pearl necklace be, if it’s not jewelry?”
His blood pressure ticks up exponentially. Why must you make everything so difficult?
“I’m not gonna explain it. Just trust me, it’s not somethin’ appropriate for anyone to say to you.”
“What happened to ‘I’m an adult’ and ‘it’s my call if I wanna know stuff’?”
Shit. He did say that, didn’t he?
Pope takes a deep, irritated breath, wishing he could turn back time and rip his own vocal chords out. This must be his own purgatory. Cursed to answer all your sex related questions for all of eternity and unable to do anything about it.
You trust him. That much is obvious. He doesn’t want to abuse that trust. A Sisyphean task. Endless. Futile.
“Alright, look. It’s slang for a guy… finishin’ on you. On your throat, your chest, wherever.” His voice is strained, worried he might break something delicate in you just by saying it. “It’s disrespectful. Sleazy.”
You blink, eyes huge as you look up at him, clearly stunned by what you just heard. You shake your head slightly, trying to puzzle it out. “So it’s… disrespectful if someone does that to you?”
Pope cracks his neck, wincing slightly, as if the right words are somewhere trapped there and refusing to come out easy.
“Christ — yes,” he grumbles. Then quickly, backtracking, “I mean no — no, it ain’t disrespectful if it’s something you, uh, wanted someone to do, but it’s disrespectful for someone to say shit like that to you unprompted.”
“Oh, well, yeah, that was gross,” you agree, wrinkling your nose.
Then you turn away from him, starting to put away the groceries with a distracted, absent-minded care. He thinks he’s in the clear, that you’re satisfied with his sparks note version of the definition.
He’s eyeing the door, when you pause again, bottom lip caught between your teeth, a bag of carrots dangling in your hand.
“Why would someone even want to do that to someone? The guy, I mean? Not him specifically, just, like, any guy? Is that something… you think about? Like a lot?”
He coughs, almost choking, and a hot flush creeps up the back of his neck.
There’s an instant headache pulsing behind he eyes as he tries desperately not to picture exactly what you just asked him.
Is it something he thinks about? Not until this moment. Not until he imagines those same wide and trusting eyes looking up at him as he spills milky white ropes of cum across your bare chest.
Christ. He’s no better than that asshole downstairs, thinking shit like that about you.
He presses two fingers to his temple. “No, it’s not like I sit around thinking about stuff like that.”
It feels like a fib now.
“So why would someone wanna do that at all?”
Because it would feel good, he thinks. Immediately. The act itself, yes, but the claim in the aftermath. The evidence left behind.
The way people are always trying to leave marks on things they like. Names carved into desks. Initials scratched into trees. Dogs pissing on fire hydrants.
You stare at him expectantly, waiting for an answer.
He looks at the wall behind you, at the cheap paint and the little crooked shelf you’ve decorated with candles and a tiny ceramic flower.
Anything but your face. Anything but the curve of your throat. Anything but the where your shirt dips when you shift closer.
“It’s…” He cuts himself off, jaw ticking. “It’s visual.” The word sounds dragged out of him. “That’s part of it. Men are wired like that. And part of it’s ego. They wanna see you messy like that. Wanna see that you let ‘em do it.” His mouth flattens. “It’s not always romantic. A lotta the time it’s just selfish.”
“But maybe it depends on who it is? Like doing it to you?” You continue to worry your bottom lip between your teeth. “Like… if it was someone safe. Someone you trusted a lot.” A tiny crease forms between your brows. “And if it was something you wanted too, couldn’t it be kind of romantic?”
Pope goes still. All his blood seeming to rush downwards as the question lands between you like something lit, something rolling close to dry brush.
He can feel the conversation slipping somewhere it shouldn’t. He needs to reign it back in, regain control.
Instead he says, “Could be. If you trusted ‘em. If it was somethin’ you were askin’ for, or… into. Not somethin’ that’s being pushed on you.”
You go quiet, turning that over.
Then, in that soft, absentminded way of yours, like you don’t realize you’re lighting a match in a room full of gas, you say, “I guess that makes sense. A lot of things probably feel different with a person you trust.”
You’re looking at him so intensely he has to take another step back. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
He doesn’t say anything for a minute. Can’t. Your gaze moves back down into the grocery bag with a shrug, sweet and unaware that you’ve just handed his imagination enough to ruin the rest of his night.
He’s corrupt for wanting to be that person for you. The one you trust enough to paint your body. To teach you all this dumb shit, but with his hands, with his mouth, with his cock.
He clears his throat hard, grabs the last bag off the counter even though it’s already empty, then sets it right back down like he forgot what he was doing in the first place.
“Yeah,” he says finally, voice flat in that way it only gets when he’s holding too much under it. “Maybe.”
He leaves not long after that. Before you ask anything else. Before he can give into his urges and contaminate you with his darkness.
By the next afternoon, the guy downstairs is gone.
Smurf’s property manager tells the tenants it was a lease violation. Some issue with unauthorized guests, late rent, maybe smoking too close to the building. Nobody asks too many questions. Nobody wants to.
And a few days later, you mention in passing that the creepy man by the vending machine must’ve gotten into some kind of accident.
“His face looked weird when he was packing up all his stuff,” you say, frowning a little. “Like he burned himself or something.”
Pope just hums, eyes on the road.
He doesn’t tell you cigarette burns heal terribly.
YOU CAN FIND MY POPE CODY MASTERLIST HERE ⭑.ᐟ
